[dharmab]

Even the games that have successful have cross game items- like Blood Dragon Armor in Mass Effect and Dragon Age- had to have entirely separate 3D models for the item. Because the Grey Warden and Commander Shepard have different bodies!

[nomel]

I'm not sure I understand how having different models is a valid criticism, especially since it's an implementation detail. To me, the "neat" idea is that there's some trading system that lives outside of the game company owned database, allowing it to be possible. Some other public database, with a sane transaction record, would work just as well.

For the choice in the implementation detail, plenty of clothing systems (Roblox included, ffs) support morphing, to fit any body shape. I don't think that necessarily always makes sense though. Having different assets, to fit the style of the game, might be a benefit in some cases.

I don't know. I like the idea of being able to give in game stuffs to my friends. I don't care how it's done, NFT or not. What do you suggest?

[piva00]

> I'm not sure I understand how having different models is a valid criticism, especially since it's an implementation detail. To me, the "neat" idea is that there's some trading system that lives outside of the game company owned database, allowing it to be possible. Some other public database, with a sane transaction record, would work just as well.

The implementation detail is everything though. The NFT does not hold the data about the model, the model is in the game, the model needs to be created by someone to match whatever the NFT says it is, the whole thing is completely and ultimately dependent on the implementation in each game the model should be available...

The NFT would just say "player X currently holds the bits with ID N" whatever ID N means is up to each game to say, your item that is a sword in a game could be a dildo in another, matching the same NFT.

It's a complete bonkers idea that requires all games implementing support for it to create 3D models, stats, animations, for every cross-game item. It doesn't solve anything and just adds a lot of complexity to managing assets of a game.

And a game could just drop support for the NFT'd item at some point due to any number of reasons, then what is your NFT actually doing? That item you bought from someone that got it on Counter-Strike to play the game you were interested now does not exist anymore. Or the item you bought for 50 bucks because it was pretty good for your game was nerfed, and your NFT now is worth 10 cents because of it.

It's all around a bad idea with lots of implementation complexities, and bizarre market dynamics since the NFT does not mean anything concrete at the time of purchase, it's completely dependent on the state of all the games supporting that specific NFT.

[nomel]

> It's a complete bonkers idea that requires all games implementing support for it

I'm not sure I understand. In game items are billions of dollars of sales. The idea of an in game item, that you can trade externally, is not bonkers. See the dozens of marketplaces/grey/black markets for doing it. That was my first sentence. My second sentence is something I thought was neat, which is the ability to use this public information for something else, like sharing items between games, which is already a thing. Some sequels and collaborating studios already do this. If you unlock an item in the first game, you can use it in the second. I'm not suggested it will or should be supported by every game forever. Even a single game could use it, like Magic the gathering. Yes, in those cases it's flag. I don't understand what's wrong with that possible implementation.

NFTs are a public transaction record. That's it. Sometimes with a little bit of expensive data. There are other ways to implement a public transaction record. As I said in my comment, NFTs aren't required. I was answering the question of one use case that I saw for NFT in a game, which I regret giving. I don't have or plan on buying NFTs, and lost $100 on bitcoin. I see it as a public transaction record, which, as all the other public transaction records prove, is a concept that can have value.

Related, are there any other decentralized public transaction records, maybe without the name "NFT" or "coin", so peoples buttholes won't clench?

[kemotep]

I’m sure you can understand why game developers are not too keen on allowing third parties to upload arbitrary code into their online games that they can’t easily control?

Allowing people to upload a weapon that does infinite damage or a skin that’s smart contract means any interaction with it steals all other contents of that user’s wallet is probably not a sustainable solution to allowing you to trade things with your friends.

[nomel]

I don't understand your comment, or see how it's applicable. The games that I've seen have the game studio generate the NFTs, and have a collaboration with other games/studios. The asset only exists if it passed through designated wallets. It's simply a receipt for ownership, that you can transfer to another account, so you can trade things in the game, or externally. The games I've seen are simple and use this receipt as a flag to enable some inventory item, just as a regular purchase would, stored in a game studio database, in a regular game. A couple also grab some image files/text.

Maybe you're unfamiliar with game engines, but arbitrary code isn't required to import assets or metadata. But, that's not required, and ins't required in any of the games I've seen. It's just a lookup to an enable flag in the game. You don't mint your own armor and import it.

[kemotep]

Then why use a blockchain at all?

The arbitrary code part is the extensible nature of Solidity smart contracts (in the case of Ethereum). If third party game developers can’t utilize their nfts in your game without an established partnership, then why are we using nfts? You need permission to transfer or upload an NFT doesn’t that defeat the portability argument?

[nomel]

> is the extensible nature of Solidity smart contracts

This is not relevant.

> Then why use a blockchain at all?

No need. Any other public, distributed, transaction records would work. Choose one. Or don't. Some games have implemented this on proprietary systems. If you support the concept locked proprietary systems, then that's ok too! Some people like the idea of things persisting, in some form, beyond the desire for game studio to persist them.

> You need permission to transfer or upload an NFT doesn’t that defeat the portability argument?

I think there's a fundamental misunderstanding of what NFTs actually are here. It's just a number in a wallet, sometimes with a little bit of data. The game studio mints an NFT. It's "part of the game" once it passes through the game studios wallet. The game tracks what has passed through that game studio wallet. The owner of the thing is the last wallet it transferred to. The player of the game adds their wallet address to their game account. This allows the game to know what belongs to the player. There are ways to prove that the player actually own the wallet. The game enables those items if it sees them in the players wallet.

In the context of most of these games, it's, first, a public transaction record used for tracking what belongs to who. It's really really simple. It's public, so anyone can see it. The little bit of data attached can be used to give nicer human/computer meaning to what that number means.

[kemotep]

I truly believe that we are talking past each other.

I understand all of what you are saying and was aware of it before now. I do not see the value add of non-fungible tokens in relation to games beyond a single game. Partnerships, deals, development time, and so on would need to be done to allow for the transaction, transfer, and use of NFTs in between games. Buy a skin from Fortnite from a friend and use it in Halo does not make Microsoft any money unless the smart contract associated with the NFT includes a royalty system to hash out payments between all relevant parties.

It isn’t simple, it isn’t easy, and as you even say, blockchains aren’t even necessary. And if not designed properly can be abused as we have seen with many NFT projects and platforms so far.