Both artificial intelligence (AI) and cryptocurrencies have made gamers move from what has always been the norm to welcome evolving technologies. Each plays a different role in many industries, including the gaming world. Cryptocurrencies have changed the way people view digital transactions, while AI is changing the gaming experience itself. Developers and players have received both AI and cryptocurrencies with mixed feelings, depending on the way they affect their creations and gaming, respectively.
This article seeks to explore how AI and crypto are used in gaming, their adoption, and their possible future.
The Rise of AI and Crypto in Gaming
It is without a doubt that both AI and crypto have changed the gaming world, by bringing different technologies aimed at improving gaming. AI is meant to make life easier for humans by completing tasks that are difficult and take a lot of time to tackle. These can include forecasting, game development, and security improvements, among other things. On the other hand, cryptocurrencies give players different ways to fund and engage with games.
How Crypto is Used in Video Gaming
Crypto gaming has opened different opportunities for developers and players to make money that was not available when online gaming involved fiat currency only. Crypto has various uses in gaming, some of which are listed below:
- Crypto can be used to advance a player’s game by buying skins, accessories, currency, weapons, armour, and potions as needed.
- Crypto can be used to pay players for their dedication to finish quests, upgrade characters, or when they take part in-game events.
- Players can exchange their crypto for NFTs (non-fungible tokens), or vice versa, within the game.
How Crypto is Used in Online Casinos
Crypto casinos use cryptocurrencies as a payment method for deposits and withdrawals, while traditional online casinos use fiat currency. Because they use blockchain technology, crypto casino sites have changed online gaming by allowing players to place their bets using cryptocurrency instead of real money. In his article, Sergio Zammit highlights the ground-breaking features that have been introduced by crypto casinos to gaming such as anonymity and favourable withdrawal terms, to mention but a few.
How AI is used in Online Casinos
It is important for online casino operators to maintain their customer base and attract even more players to their casinos. They can use AI to find out the most engaging games from their pool, determined by the number of players interacting with them. AI can collect the required information in a short space of time and casino operators can use it to offer their players the kind of games that they find interesting. To keep them playing and even attract new players, casino operators can offer unique promotions and bonuses.
While AI is monitoring player interactions with gaming platforms, it can detect and prevent fraud by using machine learning algorithms (MLA). After monitoring player activity for a while, AI can pick up certain changes in player behavior which can be an indicator of fraudulent activities. Besides being a fraud detection tool, AI can also use the gathered information to improve a player’s online gambling experience by offering game suggestions such as crypto poker, based on a player’s gaming history.
AI also ensures that players get unlimited customer support through chatbots, which are computer programs that communicate with players in a way that is similar to human interaction. Player queries are addressed in time leaving players satisfied by such prompt services.
Uses of AI in Video Games
A video game uses AI to give non-player characters (NPC) the ability to move from one point to another without bumping into objects. For game developers to create interesting games that retain current players and attract new ones, they need to find out the kind of games that most people like and also look at their competitors’ games and how they are received by players. However, doing this manually can be time-consuming as they will have to engage with competitor games personally so as to see if they are above their competition, identify any areas that are lacking in their own games, and come up with ways to improve their creations.
The use of AI in gaming removes the need to gather the necessary information manually, as AI can quickly identify the required trends by comparing large sets of data. This helps game developers discover the best way in which new games should be created, based on player information and competitor analysis. Having AI do most of the work allows developers to concentrate on improving their creations without worrying about performing any trend analysis.
AI collects information on what makes players stop playing a particular game, and why most players are attracted to a certain game, among other things. Having knowledge of these aspects helps determine how a game should be developed or improved. The motive behind game creation is to come up with realistic experiences that are challenging enough to keep players engaged.
Adoption of AI and Crypto
Crypto and AI have not been received in the same way by gamers. While AI faces less resistance, crypto has faced criticism and regulatory barriers due to its decentralized and complicated nature. However, AI’s quick adoption is because of its potential to improve various aspects of game development.
A Look Into the Future
The future of AI in gaming looks promising and is likely to involve even more advanced AI systems that can adapt to player behavior and provide more personalized and involved experiences like AI-driven storytelling in the future.
On the other hand, although the future of crypto in gaming is still relatively uncertain because of the volatility of crypto, blockchain gaming is expected to see increased adoption and reach a revenue of $73 billion by 2030. There are several potential directions that crypto gaming could take, such as the integration of blockchain technology by players to create their own game content and sell it to other players.
