Forte, together with developer partners, is seeking to integrate new economic designs into both existing and future games. Some of these ideas are designed to enhance popular gameplay mechanics like earning in-game cosmetics and player rewards. Newer ideas are to introduce measures like guild ownership and governance. A further application is with offering in-game services (offered player-to-player), together with community-generated experiences, and forms of income generation. Indeed the global video game industry is estimated to havea global worth of $152 billion, with the main markets centred in the Asia-Pacific region and North America, with just China and the U.S.beging the most lucrative, as reported by the website US Gambling Sites).
Blockchain technology refers to a digital, decentralized, distributed ledger which functions to record the provenance of a digital asset. Most blockchains are in the form of digital ledgers, composed of records termed blocks. The ledger is used to record transactions across many computers. This process ensures that any entry made into a block cannot be altered retroactively, without the alteration of all subsequent blocks and with each stakeholder being notified. The interest in blockchain is in providing solutions to enhance trust, transparency and auditability.
The Forte proposal of developing “community economics” and inserting these into a video gaming platform is intended to enable players to create income potential through the sale of digital goods and in-game services and for supporters and players to have opportunities to participate in a game’s official economy (not black market economies) by creating and selling goods, and making money for their contributions. This application can be incorporated into various e-sports programs.
By fusing community economics and block chain, digital marketplaces can be created that will allow participants to make joint investments in shared spaces without assigning all of the market power to a single platform operator.
The objective is also to provide developers and publishers with more sustainable and ongoing business and financial opportunities through the development of in-game economies. It is also possible that consumers will see lower prices on games provided video game publishers see increased revenue streams.
With the new initiative, Forte has entered into partnership with Will Wright and Lauren Elliot’s Gallium Studios (Wright created the hit franchise The Sims, and Elliot was the co-designer of the Carmen Sandiego game series); Jeff Tunnell’s Monster Ideas (Jeff is co-founder Garage Games and produced many hit titles at Electronic Arts and Activision); plus, Penrose Studios and GC Turbo.
