Games on the Block - Origin

It might seem like I appeared out of nowhere, but I have been playing Splinterlands since 2020.

And I wasn’t playing just Splinterlands. It is fair to say - without exaggeration - that I probably played 100 “crypto games” already.

On a personal level, I would really prefer and continue to stay in the shadows, but it had to change.

I truly believe “crypto games” is a major breakthrough, on the same level as AI and nuclear fusion.

Gaming in super underrated. People still think of them as these time sinks to play on their phones, but it can be so much more.

I guess I was lucky and was able to experience really immersive worlds in the late 90s and early 2000s, before the game industry “matured” and is now mainly addictive chores designed for users to open their wallets and get their dopamine fix.

Games have the potential to be these virtual worlds where we can actually experience and try new things. We can try new ways on how we socialize, how we govern ourselves, how we trade, how we overcome challenges. Potentially shaping how we live.

However, to do that properly we would need to have a lot more freedom on how we play. Which is now finally possible thanks to blockchain and other cryptography techniques.

It would be extremely hard to have a great game if we were bound to one specific monetary system, single guild guidelines or having no freedom of speech.

Anyway, surely after playing 100 crypto games for years I’ve found some awesome ones, right? Not even close! I don’t know any truly web3 game yet.

Maybe I am asking too much?

Of course games are not gonna fit my dream scenario perfectly. But I think we can all agree on a couple characteristics. A web3 game should at least be:

Sustainable

Permission-less

I couldn’t find a single game that fulfilled these 2 criteria.

The best game that I found was Splinterlands, and no, Splinterlands is neither sustainable nor permission-less, but they are at least aiming for that, which is far more than what most other games are doing. And while I don’t agree with many of the team’s decisions (some I think are straight up going backwards from web3, like banning bots, having soulbound cards or having company IP) I am glad that there are people out there trying.

It was clear to me that crypto games were not going where I think they should, but who was I to complain? I wasn’t doing anything to help and had nothing to show for to give any weight to my opinions.

That’s why I started Games on the Block. It is how we will help make web3 games happen.

And do so by actually doing it. By building in public, sharing knowledge and playing together with the community.

Right now we have 2 games in alpha which will be sustainable and permission-less.
There is a content creator directory so we can find each other.
There are also multiple other tools - starting with Hive - such as a token distributor, a faucet, and a Splinterlands 1-click-rental.
We are also helping with the sealed tournaments in Splinterlands lead by TeamPh, which has had great feedback so far.

It is a humble beginning and while these might not seem like a lot and is by no means battle tested, I feel comfortable enough writing this post already because I am confident now that we can make it happen.

We have a lot of infrastructure to build, things to learn and teach and, well, games to play.

I invite you to get out of the shadows as well and join us to help improve web3 gaming :)

Thanks to @azircon for inspiring me to write this post.

Site: https://www.gamesontheblock.com/
Discord: https://discord.gg/aD2rTuwAmX