Ubisoft has announced Ubisoft Quartz, which is a way for the company to bring NFTs to its games. It’s starting out with Ghost Recon: Breakpoint, but I’m sure it’ll soon move into all sorts of other games before too long. This early period will be a beta test for the platform, but with big companies like this, I’m sure beta means it’s definitely happening at this point. I hate this idea, and I think it will change our games for the worse. I’ve been thinking about all the things that might happen with NFTs in games, and they’re all terrible.
First, imagine what a game would look like if we all had NFTs in it. Suddenly, everyone is wearing something unique that doesn’t fit with the title. Sure, that tends to happen in most multiplayer games anyway, but in a game like Ghost Recon: Breakpoint, where fans want a realistic if not simulated soldier experience, there’s no place for silly skins that make you stand out. Sure, in Assassin’s Creed you can explain it away as an Animus glitch, but you can’t explain away how a realistic game based on soldiers in the field has bright pink camo based on a unicorn.
I also think that the way in which these NFTs can be sold will hurt games. Each game will have a market within its community for selling the, and it’ll be cutthroat. Everyone will just be out to sell their NFT, and no one will actually want to play the game. The thing about Ghost Recon: Breakpoint is that it’s a genuinely good game that was already ruined by microtransactions and poor decisions. This NFT business is just one more nail in the coffin, except now that coffin will have a zombie inside of it trying to sell you stuff.
I can see no good that can come out of NFTs in a game, other than a greedy company getting more profit. It’s nothing that players want, it only serves to benefit companies and not the player or the world. Developers should be supported, yes, but that shouldn’t come at the cost of our morals or the community in a game as a whole.
