[samatman]

I'm aware that mentioning this tends to get you crucified on HN, but making something like this fun is a good use for blockchain technology.

Blockchains create digital scarcity, and in fact, are the only decentralized way to have digital scarcity. So having the "cards" represent tokens on e.g. Ethereum would be a clever way to do that, I'm sure the processors can provide a secp256k1 signature, and the rest is read-only. I'd suggest not keeping your playing cards on the same wallet as other valuable stuff though.

I think some of the deep antipathy which certain commenters on this site exhibit towards the blockchain, is a hangover from the proof of work days. Sure, Bitcoin still uses it, but Ethereum doesn't. So it's decentralized digital scarcity, which is a useful property, at a reasonable environmental price.

There's plenty left to criticize about some uses of Ethereum, sure, but this wouldn't be one of those uses.

[spywaregorilla]

> decentralized digital scarcity, which is a useful property

Complete loss of control over your game's ecosystem is, in fact, not a useful property.

[samatman]

I don't see how you're deriving that quality from the suggestion. Losing complete control over your game's ecosystem is not an essential property of the technology I'm suggesting.

Perhaps if you explain what you mean, I'll understand the point you're attempting to make.

[spywaregorilla]

See adjacent reply

[inhumantsar]

in what way would that loss of control be complete?

the contract developer would still have knobs and levers for adjusting rarity, issuing new cards, etc.

they wouldn't control the secondary market, but that's no different from Magic The Gathering or Pokemon or good old fashioned baseball cards.

[spywaregorilla]

If you, exclusively, can control the rarity and issue new cards then it's hardly a decentralized market and there's no reason not do just make it a centralized system.

[samatman]

It's still a decentralized market, it's one with a single issuer, as many buyers as want cards, and as many sellers as wish to sell. Much like, for instance, Magic the Gathering. Not a lot of point in selling rare playing cards when they aren't rare, so sure, you could set up a token contract where anyone can issue as many "cards" with whatever properties they'd like. But that wouldn't produce a fun game.

I've personally never been drawn to the rare collectible genre of game, but they're quite popular, one of the services offered is balancing rarity and power. People who like these games enjoy the lottery aspect of buying a sight-unseen pack, opening it, and hoping to score a rare card, they like participating in an aftermarket, and they like putting together decks which other people don't have. All of which can be auditably provided using a blockchain, without having to check for counterfeits, and with players able to confirm that a card is actually scarce just by examining the state of the contract.

There are two reasons not to just make it a centralized system. One I addressed in another comment, the other is that with a decentralized system, it's possible to get the same properties as a physical collectible playing card game.

Namely: the creators control the properties of cards, how many are issued, and enjoy the profits of the first sale. But after that sale, the cards/token belong to whomever purchased them, and that person can sell them to whomever they like.

It's also possible to attach royalties to additional sales, or even retain the right to destroy tokens, but I would advise against this on business grounds, since those decisions would be unpopular ones for customers and players.

Of course, a centralized system would allow the issuers to confiscate the assets at any time, or forbid their transfer, or change the arrangement so that people are lured in with the premise that they can freely resell their cards, and then impose some cut of the resale price ex post facto. Plus if the company goes out of business, and shuts down the database and servers, that's the end of all that, your supposedly scarce bits are now useless.

So if your definition of losing control involves not being able to abuse your customers in that way, I can see why a centralized database might be preferable.

If it doesn't, then a centralized database is clearly inferior in every way that matters, for this application. Of course, someone starting with a thesis that blockchains are useless by definition, is going to begin with the conclusion, and work their way backward looking for reasons that conclusion is true.

[faeranne]

Why is digital scarcity a good thing? Why is scarcity at all a good thing? Is there any reason for this, outside of trying to sell them at an ever higher price? And how does sharing a read-only e-ink card benefit over a regular card, or a card with an NFC tag in it?

I get the feeling people think because things are scarce already, scarcity is good. but... it really isn't. outside of a store-of-value, there is no real benefit to it, is there?

[beefnugs]

The guy who made magic the gathering made a game called Keyforge, every deck sold at retail has a unique selection of cards in it. You do not get to mix and match your own ingredients to play the game.

Very unique idea, very unique feeling, I still dont even know how it is mass produced actually... Kind of mediocre game to me, but thats just personal taste. It is special enough that any board gamer should give it a play at least a couple times to feel it

[bitmasher9]

Trading can be fun, but it’s pointless if you could just download anything onto your card. Pokémon with a GameShark is just a totally different experience.

[itishappy]

Why choose this approach over a traditional centralized database?

[samatman]

Because you have to pay to keep a traditional centralized database running, you have to trust the people running it, and when those people don't want to run it anymore, it's gone.

With a blockchain, you pay to modify it, so moving stuff around costs cybercoins, but even if no one wants to mint blocks anymore, you can still read your copy, which has your cards in it. And in that event, if you want to move stuff around, you still can, because anyone can set up a validator, even if they're the only one interested in keeping it going.

But I think this is reasonably unlikely to happen to any of the top blockchains on a reasonable timeframe. Whereas a game company shutting off its servers is virtually assured.