Disclosing its early ambitions for gaming in 2023, it’s been in 2024 that web3 game company Mysten Labs and its L1 blockchain Sui have started to bloom.
Among its more recent initiatives is PC gaming handheld SuiPlay0X1, which is set for delivery in H1 2025. Moreover it’s working with NDCUS towards the launch of anticipated shooter Xociety, and Blowfish’s brawler royale Darktimes, and many more games.
We thought it’s a good time to check in with Mysten Labs head of gaming partnerships Anthony Palma.
BlockchainGamer: How important is gaming for Sui?
Anthony Palma: At Mysten Labs, we believe that a major path to mass adoption for web3 lies in gaming. Apart from being a multi-billion dollar industry that grows every year, gamers are the audience best positioned to reap the benefits of blockchain-based technology. Gamers have been participating in digital economies for over a decade, from buying digital augmentations for their weapons in Call of Duty to customizing their avatar appearances in Fortnite – they are already primed to understand the value and power of digital asset ownership.
By building on Sui, gaming studios of all kinds empower their customers with best-in-class technology thanks to Sui’s lightning-fast speed, composable and nestable NFTs, and the innovative Layer 1’s object-based model.
Do you think you’ve delivered according to expectations?
Our initial goal was to onboard enough developers to be taken seriously. We wanted to launch games that proved our thesis, and we wanted to make sure we had a robust tooling system in place, both of which we have successfully done.
Now, our focus is bringing big games onchain, games that catch and hold users’ attention.
What do you think is Sui’s USP for game developers and gamers?
Blockchains that are capable of supporting gaming have to be able to deliver on a trifecta of qualities.
- The first is performance, which includes scale, speed, and predictably low gas fees. Sui’s gas fees were designed to stay extremely low.
- The second is functionality.
- The third is user experience.
- The fourth is abstraction, which is less about the chain itself and more about the technology being built in the ecosystem.
In order to make a good game, game developers need seamless interaction. Many chains have achieved some combination of the above, but Sui fits all of them.
Why Xociety?
The Xociety team is amazing – they are vetted AAA veterans who have worked with some of the best game developers in the world. We were really impressed and excited by Xociety’s RPG elements, dynamic PvP, and immersive PvE experiences.
[embedded content]
We are especially excited as Xociety‘s architecture, having been built on Unreal Engine 5, means it is compatible with the SuiPlay0X1, and will be one of the first titles available on the handheld device.
Can you say anything about your communications with the big traditional game companies? Are they still interested in blockchain?
This is interesting because it’s really not about “big” vs “small” game companies, in our experience – it’s about East vs West. Eastern gaming markets are much faster to adopt new technologies; they are willing to experiment and play with new ideas, whereas gaming partners in the West are more conservative in their approach.
Both Xociety and our Korean gaming partner, gaming giant NHN are great examples. Western gaming companies are interested, and willing to experiment in smaller ways, but they are waiting for that mass adoption moment.
How long do you think it will be until gaming drives substantial blockchain adoption?
We might be seeing it right now! Off The Grid from Gunzilla launched recently, and we’re excited to see how an Avalanche-based game does. For true mass adoption, i.e. a majority of games employing web3 strategies, we’re probably still a couple of years out.
What do you think will be the impact of AI in blockchain gaming in the long term?
While AI and LLM can make indexing faster and more efficient, and has consumer facing applications, such as an NPC or NFT that you own gets a personality or gets to know you based on decisions you make in-game, it’s still unclear how much impact AI in blockchain gaming will have in the long term.
We’re still extremely early.
Powered by WPeMatico
