Return of the Fortnite - The Metacast by Naavik

so having that perfect mix of battle warn plus someone just new a graduate someone's been in the industry for maybe a year or so they'll think about things that you can think of because your brain is a bit locked in a box [Music] hello everyone welcome to the metacast round table by navic uh my is already making me laugh and we haven't even started recording well we kind of have no um yeah so I'm joined by abanu Kumar today co-founder at navic Matt Dian senior product manager at EA and Anil dasuta co-founder and CPO at first night games um Manu said that he's nice Manu today so I don't really know what it

means to not be nice on you what does it mean I I also don't know what it means every day is a nice day so every day is nice menu yes indeed um so we're going to carry on trying out this new format I'm not going to announce topics it's going to be a surprise as we get through it um I was just about to announce a top topic I wasn't going to go very well so Matt what do you have today yes so today I thought we would talk about fortnite coming back to mobile uh through Xbox Cloud streaming so this was announced by Xbox and Tim Sweeney on on Twitter um as you might know fortnite was previously removed from the App Store and Google Play Store because of the whole epic games versus Apple sort of uh disagreement legal argument what have

you um and it hasn't really been available on mobile for a while um which I think has been noteworthy from a mobile shooter perspective it's like a a massive game right and uh the only way to play it on mobile has been through sort of Niche services like uh the um Nvidia I think it was the GeForce now uh streaming maybe through like the Samsung store or something small like that but uh otherwise unavailable to mobile players um so I thought this was really interesting that they found a sort of sweetheart deal with Microsoft perhaps um and I wonder you know what was what is the arrangement who is what kind of a take rate are they getting from Microsoft as compared to the 30% that they would have paid otherwise uh were they still on the app store or the Google Play Store um here's a quote that that I think is interesting as well uh we're starting with fortnite right and we'll

look to bring more free-to-play games people love in the future at Xbox we want to make gaming accessible to the three billion players around the world y y y so um hinting at potential uh additions on the freeto play side as well so I guess two things going on here one is what what do you all think is happening what was the arrangement between um epic and Microsoft you think that others like perhaps Amazon were trying to get in on this deal as well and then the second part which we can discuss in a little bit is like where do you think this goes next what other free to-play games are coming to Xbox uh Cloud streaming let's let's start with the fortnite Microsoft deal first what do you all think do do you guys think Microsoft like took advantage of that position you know lots of Leverage over here but to totally when I when I read this when I read this I imagine two people are in a bar and they discuss oh I got rejected from being an apple I I can't I have to pay the 30% send and then the other

person says Ah me too why why is this the world and then they come together and oh we can bypass it by using Cloud browser technology do do you think it could be more cynical than that I I sometimes think well to to be honest I sort of think there's a bit of being Manchild here in the sense that fair play to Tim Sweeny I just want to say he is a bit of a hero of mine obviously anyone who makes unreal I mean that's a game that I grew up with unbelievable engine top talent incredible person but he really hates closed platforms doesn't he I mean that's his thing and really what this is for me is just like a giant middle finger to say okay Tim Cook you think you can stop me but I'm the smartest guy in the room and I'm going to show you that there's still a way for me to do it because if you look at it from a sort of profitability standpoint there's none There's No Business argument if I went to any of you here like you were my boss and I said hey Maria um I've got a great way to get our game onto iOS is by going

through Microsoft you'd laugh at me youd be like why not just go through the App Store so that everyone can play it rather than this convoluted other way that you can do it but so in some ways it does make me laugh but it I don't know it's just sort of like I just have imagining like like of billionaires throwing money at each other having like money fights and that's sort of what it is really but that maybe that's just the cynical side of me I mean at the same time it is kind of cool that you can do it if people get to play the game good for the play um but yeah I I can't help just think there's another way of doing it but look at the end of the day it's the world's most popular game or one of the most popular games so and a lot of people were unfairly blocked out again because billionaires were throwing money at one another so if you can play your favorite game that's the goost thing but um yeah that's my S on just the fortnite deal anyway I I actually don't know sorry go ahead no I just saying SED In Too Deep there's no there's no way back from this position you know even even even in the

even in the announcement uh in the like the official announcement text um I guess like maybe epic games also wrote it because in their list of devices available you know all the Apple devices were first in the list and then they said and also Windows PC I mean you know talk about like you know just like taking home that middle finger but uh but yeah yeah I I totally agree like um I I think that be because they've made this decision to fight apple and fight Google like that decision is made they've sort of painted themselves into a corner uh so given that that's not an option you know it's either like no revenue from mobile no one's playing on mobile or they do something like this or you know maybe they go with one of the other Cloud streaming platforms or they just you know rely on the smaller services that I mentioned earlier but you know it's I think it's like a sort of a win-win for both parties here right like epic gets some Revenue they get to

give the big middle finger to Apple and Google and Microsoft gets a really big title on their uh Cloud streaming platform so you know it makes a lot of sense but I I also agree with your cynical point of view and you'll like totally agree I mean like it could uh I because I mean epic and Tim Sweeney specifically has also kind of cemented his um you know impression as like this Good Samaritan of the of you know industry developers and such uh it does kind of um um uh what's the word d dullin is if is that a word like like you dull the edge off of something okay uh but it kind of like dulls the edge of Microsoft's leverage because this is um or it could because you know uh whatever deal terms are also getting set up over here uh will probably you know play a pretty big role in future deal terms that Microsoft will want to be setting up with other you know uh or getting

other free to play Big freeo play games onto their streaming platform so um sure like Microsoft was in a strong position but they also kind of need to set like a a tone you know with this move um going forward but well I think Matt your second part on the point I think is the really interesting part and I'm glad that you alluded to it because whilst this might be just the middle finger actually to be fair the back door that it potentially opens is super cool um I have to say that a few weeks ago I think it was on this podcast with Maria we were talking about the game pass and like Sony and you know them making kind of decisions and some of us were saying oh it wouldn't surprise us if 10 years from now the Microsoft Game Pass was available on the PlayStation and if you think about it does this not sort of mean that the game pass is available on iOS kind of sort of maybe if you squint your eyes yeah and then then it's not just free-to-play games but it could be any game that's that's potentially what I could see happen that's maybe a bit

too speculative to say though I I don't think it's too speculative and no matter how much people in business portray us doing it for Good Samaritan reasons you're a business you're doing this with a strategy in mind and you're trying to lay lay the floor the path for the future we're seeing the metaverse everyone's trying to create a platform and all in all from the start in this discussion and you know quote unquote war with apple of trying to not have to pay all the royalties and have other ways to distribute the apps through through the the store it's it's all for business reasons no no one's trying to do this out of the like kindness of their heart to change the world Maria I can tell you're a product manager if you didn't know that already like that entire statement you're 100% corre 100% correct well you can wrap it up in the Good Samaritan Bo yeah presenting it but yeah

um one question I did have was sorry go ahead no no you go you go no I I was just saying that um I was kind of also uh thinking about you know what happened to steria and um I mean if I remember correctly um Apple had like a pretty big backlash to what stadia was doing right like the like creating this like library of games and kind of Distributing it also uh on on Apple um am I right about then I don't recall yeah me neither okay stadio I just remember something like that time you know yeah maybe I'm remembering incorrectly but um but yeah I was just wondering also you know if Xbox is going to be like um getting more and more of these games uh into their catalog and it's now getting distributed through um you know iOS and stuff it's kind of um I mean basically it's a library of games that you have access to through an app which with skirts the you know uh

guideline lines uh of Apple um and I wonder I wonder what'll happen over there yeah I actually just searched the App Store and there's a Google stadia app that you can download and were you the first person to download it after taking it down because that product was so poor that was anyway that's another story for another time but I mean look to be fair to Microsoft I mean the way that they're going how will anyone not have a game pass if you're a game fan and they have great games and you can run it on anything and they've just bought blizzard Activision King atal I mean they are going to be the Netflix of games in my opinion that's perfect way of doing it this is just another way that they can kind of break it down and yeah I right now don't own a Game Pass don't own a Microsoft console at the moment I have had it in the past it was great to be fair like all the online worked it was pretty good value so

basically I guess I'm just contemplating the fact that I can't see myself not having one in the sort of next X amount of time so I think they're from their kind of product strategy on that particular thing of what they're doing it's all really it it just makes a big difference as sort of like the Steve bber era doesn't it with Microsoft whereas now you've got Sati and Adela and it's just all coming together I feel so yeah Fair flate it looks good if I had to pick a game please Destiny 2 come come back come into the the cloud but that's gone to Sony hasn't it so yeah I think they're still going to distribute on Xbox at least according to the announcement we'll we'll see but I like Matt you're becoming a great host you just dropped this little seed and then you saw the the conspiracy theories come about oh yeah I love conspiracy theory talk on the podcast actively encouraging it um anything else on on this topic or

we'll we well I mean if you have any bold predictions on which games are going to come next uh we could we could do that um to which freet to-play games are coming to Xbox Cloud streaming I mean I think it's an interesting like uh intersection of macro Trends right because we're seeing more games are launching on multiple platforms at the same time like there was recently the announcement that Diablo Immortal is going to be a PC and mobile game uh the Star Trek mobile game did it too um I think raid Shadow Legends has done it so like a bunch of games have done it I don't know if there's any big pred predictions from you all on like which title might come next I can go first if you're not ready go then yeah you you're ready I think okay I think Path of Exile I think Path of Exile would be that would be cool yeah I know they've tried to do a mobile game or they've talked about doing a mobile game and this makes total sense like just do it that is a bull prediction can uh can rocket League be a guess or is it I just I don't know

fality there or not but no they've got there is a mobile version that they're working on isn't it but the original full fat version isn't but would that be possible don't know I'm sticking with my destiny prediction because I love Destiny you guys good at Rocket League by the way no like I've just had the hardest time like playing that game it's insanely hard yeah that's why it'sing today it's fun game that actually makes a lot of sense though because it's epic yeah right makes a lot of sense Matt are there any um Halo games that are free to play they're not are they not even the strategy game is free to play is it um I think well I don't know about on cloud streaming but the the newest one I think as long as you have Game Pass it's free to play so I guess not really free but yeah the multiplayer is free the campaign cost money yeah yeah the game I discovered I'm great at

is mobile Legends bang bang or maybe their onboarding is so good that it makes me feel powerful against bots but no I'm sure I'm playing against Real players and I'm amazing right yeah we're going to see Maria in one of those Esports uh you know capsules with the teams just competing pretty soon I could do it no no I can't um an Neil what what did you bring today okay so um this one's may be bit controversial but I find it quite interesting I'll explain why so the topic I brought was China's attempts to control the video games industry in China and specifically they are having some sort of system which is preventing people from tipping streamers and watching streams after 10 p.m. now that topic perhaps by itself is probably a bit too controversial for this this metacast because I don't want to sort of get into a massive conversation about politics or state control and all that kind of stuff so that's not really what

the topic about is about why I wanted to discuss it is that I think for us that kind of work in video games in general there is like sort of elephant in the room that we are deliberately designing addictive experiences and these addictive experiences I would go as far as saying aren't quite fully understood by the public at large and they can have quite detrimental effects on people and so I guess what I'm sort of saying here is even though I obviously think that the way control is put on people is is bad is there maybe actually some Merit to what they're doing by trying to look after people by stopping them playing for so long by stopping them playing for Endless amount of hours so that was my topic they were kind of my thoughts that I wanted to move on so I guess yeah I think everyone can agree that the state government controlling what you can and can't do at certain times is is bad so that's that but the wider topic is more should there be controls or prevent measures that are put in place for

gamers in general particularly younger audiences and is it something that we as game makers should be more consider of well the UK has the age appropriate design code that I personally working in the industry hope will roll out just more globally and generally and comes with all these regulations about how you cannot do personalized promotions to players who are underage they must have notifications turned off automatically and they have to purposely go to the settings to turn them on so you can't try to get them to accept by topping popups terms and conditions privacy policy is all summarized so it's more easy to understand it has all of these data privacy and it limits it limits how much games can Target players who are underage and try to protect them but but conversely Maria I mean you're in product so if you told your boss that you'd worked on the game and you'd manag to make the day three retention

90% you'd probably be promoted because that would be a pretty phenomenal achievement but the thing is is that 90% it depends what company you work for yeah it depends who who you're working for um I personally want to work for a company that has some morals and it's not all about money well so that's what I'm saying so in this imaginary situation because something that's similar is look how sort of adct kids are to Tik Tok similar thing they make a super addictive experience they know that it's addictive and then it kind of takes it that way so you know for example in China other things they did is they forced you to log out of games if you played it for too long because people were playing um you know the the mber over there you know um Rise of Kings for way too long and all the spiritual opium as call it yeah and so the reason why I really want to raise this I guess is because in in my experience I have friends where I've

seen this happen to and the thing is I I can see the argument for doing things like this so Co was obviously impacted everybody and there were definitely people I knew who then just video game for sort of 12 hours a day and then now that covid restrictions have decreased they're kind of still video gaming for 12 hours a day and they didn't beforehand and the thing is is that I feel that because experiences are addictive it's a bit like being an alcoholic you know the first step is realizing you have a problem but do people even recognize that it's a problem like I feel here with this news it's sort of like the CCP sort of is recognizing that it is quite a big problem that they are maybe losing productivity and you know I've seen studies where they've seen that now you know rather than students being you know really motivated to get the top grades which is of course what they really want they'd rather just be really good at mobile Legends bang bang so they can beat Maria um so yeah I don't want to say too much my topic you see I'm quite passionate about it but I'm just curious if if you think of it or am I just like being the old man yelling at a cloud which is also possibly

true I think that is that's sorry go ahead m i I was just going to say they're going to need to play more than 10 12 hours a day to keep up with Maria I mean that's just what it is but uh to you know to to be more serious and maybe this is my you know American bias but like I think it's it's like a personal responsibility like there's two two things we're talking about here right one is just like people um controlling their own gaming habits and the other is children and making decisions on their behalf and like I think my bias is to give parents the ultimate say and like there are all sorts of um sort of uh parental controls that you can put in place on your uh mobile device or you whatever gaming platform you're using these are typically built in so that's that's sort of where I tend to fall back to as a child who played a lot of games but I I understand your perspective uh certain certainly um there is definitely

a role for regulation but I I don't know like I think that maybe the the Chinese approach is a bit heavy-handed well 100% is heavy-handed isn't it but I mean I have to say I was one of those said children you're talking about and um I video gam a lot and I got told off quite a number of times now luckily I've got the fullback maybe like all of you were like oh it turns out those video games did pay off after all but we're probably about the one in a thousand people that can say that but man you what what's your thoughts on this yeah no I was just going to add on to what Matt said like the the two other entities are of course uh you know uh the developers um designing games respon responsibly uh you know um I think at least where like freeto play was 10 years back which was really the wild west of you know game mechanics and addictive mechanics and such we've really come a long way and companies like you know um yeah I mean supercell obviously to mind kind of you know just

setting um kind of yeah setting setting the foundation for okay what is what is still like you know highly retentive uh game design but also responsible game design you know and but mind you are chests that unlock four hours after you claim the reward in keeping with what you've just said because I would say that they're not and that's a mechanic that's known to BR people in and is done by the very company youve suggested so look I I'm not going to be too critical I've used that exact design pattern in many games that I've worked in because I understand how powerful it is but I would say that like and I guess going back to the point with kids is that yeah I agree like it probably it should be on the adults but so many times it's hard to police like you know I I personally was playing Grand Theft dauto I think at the age of I know 11 or something like that like my mom just thought it was another game she didn't know that I was running over Harry krishna's and getting a multiplayer bonus for it you know because you have no idea so isn't that

the same with cable TV yeah I I was young I was a child and watching these Viking movies at 1:00 in the morning that were very violent um it it all comes down to parental parental responsibility in a way and for example Xbox has a lot of parental controls and they're they're building a very in-depth product where as a parent you can control can players add your child um as a friend who can contact them how many hours um can you play what can you play to try to give the tools to parents to control the experience similarly to how um you know tech devices like an an iPhone or an iPad try try to do I do agree that I believe the industry will move on potentially more to a place where products have to have an option where you can turn off purchases uh so that you can uh try try to when you have

that that need to make a purchase you can't because you turn it off in the settings so you you can moderate yourself a little bit more but I don't know yeah individual responsibility like yeah yeah I just feel like uh you know as games just grow as an um as an industry and also just grow their uh significance across uh you know the world's population uh there eventually will be some role that regulation plays but how heavy-handed that ends up being yeah that's the point of question right like I don't I personally don't agree with you know China's way of handling this that's that's really like treating everyone like kids you know that's that's really not the way to do it um but I think there would be like a middle path you know maybe on the lines of what Maria said and you know how the UK has this design code I didn't know about that but that's like really interesting I I know they have like policies around ad advertisements and such uh um but yeah I mean I think as

gaming kind of grows its significance regulation will end up playing some kind of a role and um and yeah it there would be kind of like this Middle Ground And even like to to that example of um yeah like the chess mechanic right for I mean there's also like a population of people who I would argue like enjoy having those mechanics there's like a whole generation that's grown up with free to play play games now you know as kind of like the first games they played and they're kind of used to it I I catch myself also sometimes you know playing uh playing some playing a box product and I'll be like ah man I miss uh I missed the timer over here it's like too free flowing you know there's like there's too much of availability of content instantly you know and it's it's like a weird feeling but uh some sometimes I I miss those mechanics too so it's kind of like do they enjoy those

mechanics or have they been trained to enjoy those mechanics because I quite like junk food but it turns out if all you eat is junk food you end up being quite a beaste and you end up being unhealthy now for what it's worth you know on the sliding scale of evils I would put video games quite low I think there are things that are much worse I would for example think in in Britain online gambling I think is out of control I see people going to football matches that don't even look at the match they're just looking at their phone because got something riding on the game and they don't realize that that's how far gone they are you have I think Tik Tok is actually quite irresponsible in terms of how addictive it is and I think it's coming more and more to light that Facebook know full well that Instagram is horrific to female teenagers mental health but they've done nothing about it so listen on the sliding scale of evils in fact it was funny because during covid they were like be a hero play fortnite for 12 hours today just don't go out right and that was like you know an actual commercial that was being run I think in Germany and things like that but like I

said that's just um something I want to be aware of and it's more of a discussion Point rather than me being militant saying this must be the way um yeah but you know I guess I'm saying like you know because on the one hand we are literally being paid and being Advanced for making things addictive and then on the other hand we're saying oh but people need to to have better control but it's like as we get better at our jobs we're getting better and better at making it more addictive so we're actually destroying the work that they're trying to do them I think it really depends the company that you work for at we have we have people in leadership asking these tough questions of are we should we pull it back a bit are we finding the right balance should we introduce these features to help people control um how much they're spending and so I think yeah it really depends who you're who you're working with and there's this book that's very read in the product Community called hooked and after reading it I felt bad because it

was all teaching about how to design experiences that are meant to addict people to wanting more so I think it also comes down to whoever is developing products and being a designer you also have to be responsible and think about the consequences on others yeah yeah I also feel like uh yeah I wouldn't characterize it as you know um like we're getting paid to build addictive things uh I mean at the end of the day uh every every game designer or um anyone in the games industry um has the option to you know not do that and and that's why all these different types of games also exist there are box products which I mean there multiple companies that someone could join to like create those uh there's free to-play Revenue line there's this the G the definition of gaming is now expanding with you know blockchain games I mean now you're putting a straight up Financial incentive over there like talk about adct uh but I mean at the end of the day

it's really just an expansion of you know uh the definition of a game and the people making the games in each of these in each of these lines the people making the game should definitely be responsible about you know how they wield that power while they're you know in front of their uh whatever 3DX Max or their Excel sheet balancing you know economies and stuff uh but um but yeah I mean developers have a choice to build uh what they want uh players have a choice or at least the ones who are not considered kids have a choice to play what they want um and then yeah eventually yeah like I said I think regulation will end up playing some role in this space but um but yeah I mean yeah what China is doing that's that's just a little bit over the top yeah Manu you you raised um you know blockchain gaming that was what I was going to say is like you we mentioned earlier what if

you had a game that retained 90% well like axi Infinity's retention was pretty pretty high and and that was like because it was a job and people were making money and so you know as far as I'm aware there's no restrictions from there's no age restrictions on participating in play to earn games and so that's maybe like something to think about for the near to medium-term Futures like what does what does that mean for children can they when they can just log on and make money playing video games like yeah by the way I work in blockchain games so the the massive hypocrisy of my entire statement is not lost on me I just want to make that clear no I mean to to be honest like the same the same question that you brought up anel or this perspective of well you guys are getting paid to you know uh of you guys are getting paid to you know build addictive experiences how many bar conversations I've had with people who are not in the games industry who say the exact same thing to me my God and it's uh it's just it's the same you know I'm just like repeating the same thing

but I mean even when like I when I was designing you know games or mechanics back ining this was like a Super Key point for me as as a product manager you know um like how how how can you like not or basically a lot of Zinga PMS I felt were you know just very focused on revenue maximization and then they would do anything to the mechanic to make sure like the daily revenue goals end up getting hit you know uh but that I drew I kind of like drew the line over there I was like okay great we have Revenue goals and such but it is fully my decision as kind of feature owner to figure out you know what is a good balance of you know design over here and um yeah that that does come down to personal choice and and that's why I felt like um yeah I'm not yeah I'm not getting paid to you know design addictive experiences I'm trying to like figure out how to create fun within the constraints of a business model instead you know um

so but yeah are we are we ready to carry on I feel we could talk about this for another half an hour this yeah this is like like a big debate topic really is yeah um I'll I'll very quickly summarize what I brought uh it makes me extremely happy so Eve online they presented their road map they're having the eve Fan Fest I think it's an inperson an inperson event in um in Iceland and so we've been seeing CCP investing in improving the new player Journey um EV online has been here for nearly 20 years they're planning on having it around for another decade and they're doing a lot to uplift the technology The Experience modernize it so that it has a chance to compete with modern um MMORPGs and other um massive worlds are Dynamic that players can engage with nowadays and at Eve Fest

they announced also an integration with Microsoft Excel and I thought that was amazing because Eve online has always been called a spreadsheet MMO and so actually leaning into it and just saying okay we're going to make it easy for you here you go we know you love this we know that you need it because of the complex complexity of the game and making that Journey easy for players as a product manager that just made me so happy because I know that they're eliminating that that pain point for for their players to be successful but the most exciting thing though is that what never kept me playing Eve online is that there's barely a story like the story is made by leaning into the politics and your faction and the wars and just being part of this emerging story that's created with players but EV online is going to start bringing back uh narrative arcs and according to what happens during these

arcs with what players do and the consequences they're then going to continue that story so players my understanding is that players will be able to influence and there will be Universe consequences with their decisions so I don't know if they decide to blow up a planet well the planet is going to blow up and then it won't be there anymore that's that's really cool because that's something that I hear a lot of web 3 games promising and just seeing a game that's been around for 20 years just be like hey we can do this too uh yeah it's great really happy I don't think you'll hear any disagreement from any of us as product people you know I think we all support Microsoft Excel and uh spreadsheet integration into games it's you know fantastic I was excited when I read this news uh I think more games should do this I you know have have an export to CSV function like I love it let's do it what about Google Sheets what about us inferior people that don't have are we being left out what about

Apple Numbers I think you can open i' I've definitely open Excel spreadsheets on Google Sheets it has some kind of magic magic behind it um yeah it's just I I think it's it's so inspiring and refreshing and loving seeing a company continuing to invest in this amazing game that they've been building for 20 years they want to carry on providing this experience for 30 players are essentially creating the history of the game just by being a part of it and and taking their actions I there's not much out there in the world that can compare to the position that EV online has in the gaming industry and I can't wait to be 40 years old and hear them announce another 10 years it also comes to knowing your customer as well doesn't it because what other product manager says hey guys guess what we're going to do this Sprint we're going to do

excellent it's the ultimate quality of life you CCB clearly has PMs and designers and teams thinking about how to make the experience better for their players it's amazing as well that's that's how it should be so yeah as you say 20 years I mean that's a phenomenal achievement that people still play it and keep supporting it and keep adding for it yeah congratulations and what a terrific example for the rest of us in the industry to try and aspire to yeah blast Royale 30 years I actually think a lot of blockchain games will be thinking about this I mean like looking at some of the streamers and whatnot like and how they kind of you know um showcase like their playing experience Excel is also a key portion of their video you know uh just to analyze the game and such but yeah imagine if this is like a you know growing segment of the games industry just like sheets and Excel you know partnership like you know look at a g like this is really silly but like pubg

mobile has partnered with every brand out there like there's got to be an Excel partnership coming soon right like you it's it's I think it's like hilarious but also makes so much sense and then Tim Sweeny refuses to let Pages go into fortnite and he doesn't of course not yeah yeah he's going Excel all the way okay um now that there's a partnership between epic and Microsoft can we please see the word paperclip as a character in fortnite oh oh my God uh they put they put clippy in Halo did he really yeah yeah there's like I don't know what it is exactly it's but there's like a there's an integration of clippy into Halo like as a character you know I'd have to look it up I forget what they did exactly I want to say it was like a cosmetic or something but it's there I saw I saw a headline about it I love it I won't clip you more um moving on moving on um to a

serious topic again after my birst of of Happiness Manu what's a serious topic I don't know I don't know if it's a serious topic but uh I think it's also a good one for a debate um uh so yeah there was this article kind of doing the rounds uh it's called it's called stop blindly comparing web 3 with uh free topl uh from a web 2 Dev in uh in Brackets and um I actually expected it to get a little bit more traction you know like one of those medium articles that have you know 900 200 claps on it but this one just had like two but I I thought it was like a pretty thought-provoking piece it's written by um Joe Lee who is uh the director of product management and uh strategic advisory at triot he's been there for about 5 years um and it's primar like a PM research type role um on League of Legends and um but yeah his key

thesis and um I'm just going to like you know just kind of set the stage and just reading a little bit from the article so his key thesis kind of goes like this um web3 enthusiasts uh need to stop blindly comparing web 3 games to freeo play games without actually understanding why freet topl succeeded while there are similar Trends between freeo play and web 3 it does not mean that web 3 games will follow the same Trend and end up dominating the marketplace the primary comparison points I see cited are um both early free-to-play and web 3 games experienced resistance from the core gamer segment I mean how many times I've I've heard this uh and the second one is both early freed playay and web3 games uh look like crap compared to existing incumbent also a line that I've heard uh quite often um so then and yeah the last paragraph he continues these two comparisons points uh these two comparison points uh are the outputs of the equation and the

wrong things to be focused on freet topl games have strong underlying fundamentals that make it work from a Game Dev and player value perspective so while simil similarities exist between the two they are also inconsequential um so I mean yeah pretty strong start uh to this article and you know um I think for a lot of people reading it um and also you know a lot of people building in the space A lot of people are actually like standing on the shoulders of you know what they've learned in free to play and trying to like apply some of those learnings in in the web 3 space um and and broadly I would say I I do like not agree with some of what he said in the article which we can get to but broadly I do agree with what he is saying uh in general uh and I found it a little bit important also for you know readers of this article to keep in mind like how he starts off the article addressing web 3 enthusiasts because that's where this rhetoric I

feel has also originated from you know because I mean the first people kind of building these games were also like Crypton native folks who are usually like they've not or mostly they've not like built a a game before and you know that's I feel like some of this rhetoric was also like a coping Mech mechanism for them in the space while they're kind of like at the you know bleeding edge of where the industry is uh kind of going so uh but on the flip side I I don't think like many Game Dev game devs say this you know like I I've never heard Anil say something like that and he's building in the space because he knows like which World he's coming from and you know which World he's building for uh now so well no but do you know what man I I I think well I think it's a great article to kind of compare because to be honest with you I think that there's a lot of Merit in this like to me what this really reminds me of is the start of mobile so I personally probably

like a lot of people here I was like a console Dev I actually worked on Console games so now there's a mobile platform we think is going to be big what games are we going to make for it and everyone's like oh I know how to make games so let's just make our console game and put it on mobile and then you think hang on a minute Resident Evil 4 doesn't work on mobile why Resident Evil 4 is an amazing game Oh you mean people don't want to play a 16 hour game on mobile you know and it was this kind of thinking and then you know then we started realizing that actually the games that people wanted to play were bite-size experiences that lasted 5 minutes that gave you a simple endorphine rush and then were addictive and you'd play the game for two hours over the course of a day but in chunks of 3 to five minutes and it required an entirely different set of of comprehending it and then I remember playing for example Clash of Clans and I was like ah this is what a hit freetop playay game looks like this is someone that's taken an idea RTS and made it for mobile and made it amazing and added to something doing it so to be honest with

this article I I think it is really true that right now all we're seeing is people saying let's take game X put it on the blockchain and it should work and you know it might work there might not be anything against that that's certainly like a safe option but I think it is realistic to say that actually the winning formula which will'll probably be seen in three to four years probably will be something that we haven't even comprehended yet like for our team we often think to ourselves okay we're making a fairly standardized game that's kind of safe but but can you think of a game idea that you could only make on the blockchain that would literally not be possible to do in any other ways and like we have some ideas with them we're not too convinced how successful they would be but we can because maybe we're not that good at you know at coming up with something really creative but there's definitely things like that and so that probably is true and I think also furthermore to that and this was also proven with mobile is that you know games industry is not cannibalistic often right you know the market is huge right why could it not be for example that blockchain g can exist in their own massive space but freet toop playay

games can exist alongside them just like console games do just like casual games do just like MMOs do and so perhaps it will be that yeah you just have games with jpegs of monkeys battling other jpegs of monies in some Yuga laabs borap type thing the yug right and that's a huge industry by itself and then you have more traditional games that we have so yeah I I think they're definitely right to say this but for me I think the takeaway more is that I I I definitely have don't think I've seen a game where I look at it and I think wow that game could only be done on the blockchain maybe there's like one or two there's like one right now that's not even a game it's called steepen where it's actually moved to earn so the more exercise you do you can earn crypto and it's like even if that game is a Mario is Mario is earning a little bit from that well that's one of the few times you could say it's a good pumsy scheme because if everyone in the world gets fit and then some people get rich of it is that a bad thing Maybe not maybe that's for me to say I don't want to take too much of it but I I think

mechanics are addictive yeah yeah but it could have yeah it could be bad for my health and this is why I think freeto play will always have a space or non non- crypto games because as soon as there's money involved I'm stressed because there's money I'm not that kind of person who can have money and then if it goes down it's fine I with this whole thing that's happening with Luna Tera and UTC I I would just be in a ball of stress and not being able to really cope with life seeing all of my money going down the drain um so it's not for me and I want to play a game where I'm not my money isn't disappearing I suppose and at risk I just want to have fun without that that feeling that burden that that's like one of the other rhetorics you know where there's just like this polar um polar perspective on like free to play is is going to Prevail and blockchain will be nothing or the other way around like blockchain

is going to eat up free to play and I feel I I honestly feel like in one of those you know uh newu graphs about the market or or another graph that we end up doing with bit craft soon there will be like this blockchain Revenue line you know uh that will just add up to the to the market because I mean like uh back to the first topic uh where we were talking about like the definition of what a game is is expanding that would just like you know incentivize different people to be playing and engaging with different experiences and kind of creating the revenue line I I do agree um or yeah like you know something uh that um that anel also said I was trying to like figure out okay what what is um like he said you know like we should not focus on this the equation outputs um and I was wondering like what what is kind of like the takeaway with with this piece and for me uh I felt like the reason he's kind of like you know um he advises not to focus on the equation

outputs is um because like while you're building in um While You're Building like these web3 games if you over index on some of these um rhetorics then you know you kind of um you kind of end up justifying a development road map that you know potentially doesn't like fully embrace the future uh or the the potential of this technology you know like for example if you if you over index on core Gamers also used to hate early uh free toplay games then I mean that does not mean like it's okay to ignore core Gamers when you're kind of building a web 3 game right you can also like build they're also like uh free to play experiences that have core Gamers uh kind of playing those those games and there will always be like a chunk of core Gamers who will never like any kind of change ever you know um and and yeah I mean yeah like games like fortnite and cl Ro you know wouldn't be there or wouldn't be where they are today without

that realization but but yeah my overall point this kind of tldr is or my takeaway from this was probably the reason he's kind of saying you know not to over index on these uh or not not to focus on these equation outputs is because if we end up over indexing on the rhetoric then it hampers product development road maps in a way where you constrain yourself as a designer to not fully take advantage of the tech the underlying Tech you know um but yeah like was that was that kind of like a similar takeaway for you guys from this piece or yeah oh Matt I I already did my hash on step in so if you want to go no I agree I agree with with what you've all said I think it's um you know it's a spectrum uh of how ingrained the financial aspect of it will be into the game you know there's Pure Play to earn and there's probably some hybrid out there where like you can you know play and own I've heard before where um it's

mainly about the game but you have an opportunity to sort of uh uh grind your way up to ownership of a you know game items or something like that you know to to Maria's Point like how How Deeply intertwined the financial aspect is with the fun aspect um has a massive impact on the type of players that you're going to attract um and so you know I can understand the criticisms uh from this article like a lot of the early blockchain games are they don't really distinguish um a certain type of player you know it's not like you if you think about games today you know there's all sorts of um you know segmentation and market research like we're making a game in this genre with this specific mechanic for this type of player and blockchain games are just like we're making a game with crypto attached to it and like anyone come play and make some money you know it's like it's not really differentiated I guess we'll get there for sure like I know there's all sorts of games being built uh in different

genres in different areas that will um evolve the space but it's just not there yet and so I can understand the backlash and the criticism it's just like it's it's different but there is a place for blockchain gaming and it's not a zero sum outcome it's like it will exist alongside everything else yeah it will eventually go back to play these play and earn play to earn play and own it will it'll go back to play and everything's a play and you have different kinds of play it yeah secret Mar not to tell people about that yeah it will eventually happen it will just create social media was new for a while and then it just became part of normal life and no no one even thinks about it anymore as a new thing uh it's just expected and eventually this will happen as well um hopefully I will never be on steppen because then I'll run every day and that's bad for me and then I have to pay more health insurance yeah it it it will come full circle and

I think that's why I I really enjoy this article it didn't feel like a CR criticism piece it felt uh just take a step back and think because if you focus too much on these uh rules um predispositions in your brain it will limit your Innovation it will stifle your creativity on on the weekend I was trying to ideate some web 3 game Concepts and I realized I had to just start from scratch and think about what can I do that's new type of play using blockchain and that's what like that's like another thing I'm maybe a little bit worried about and even like in our Consulting engagements and such I feel even myself kind of getting caught in the Trap which is just like spending so much time in the free topl space and knowing like best practices and like how to build for it like how how can I force myself to keep all that aside when I'm thinking about the you know and is there basically a new way to kind of think

about do we need to have like the four our chest you know in in this or not you know and uh and yeah like that's yeah basically there's a lot of like so there's definitely a talent migration that started right um I anel is at the Forefront of that um and uh and yeah there will be like significant unlearning I feel also can can I just touch on yes please please you should you're in thees actually you should tell us like how how is it I've just got a good good anecdote on the unlearning thing because something that I was told quite a lot when I was at Capcom was how that what tends to happen with Gamers is they just make when they come up with a game idea their game idea is just another game that already exists but plus 10% because they just love their favorite game so it's like yeah I want to make Street Fighter but it's got like chairs in it or something like that but it's something stupid and they said that their best ideas often came from people who had sort of nothing to do with games and two examples that I'll never forget

which turned out to be big hits for them so one was Monster Hunter and the reason why Monster Hunter came about is because this guy went on a trip to Loch Ness and he went on a special Expedition tour where it's called hunt Nessie and what this whole thing it was like for a week and you got dressed up in this gear and you went around Scotland around the lake and you like trying to find Nessie and of course Nessie doesn't exist spoilers but he said even though he never met Nessie the thrill of like being in a team and you encounter this incredible Beast was like really cool feeling and then obviously one of the game designers like wow that's a lot better than my idea of just making Street Fighter four but putting it in a wrestling and so they made that game instead and then another one was um there was someone had to do jewelry service in Japan and they went to do jewelry service and they saw these two amazing lawyers having this really heated exchange and you can probably guess what game that led to it was Ace Attorney Phoenix right and again because I often because that was actually one of the first games I worked on and it's was like what possessed you guys to make a legal simulator like who on Earth came that idea

the yeah yeah so all I would say I just think unlearning is exactly right and that is the point of the article I think so that's why I feel the anecdote is valid it's not just me sping my old man stories that it's um it's relevant and like that's a good exercise for all of us When approaching like a new technology that that's what I said to you that's what we've tried to do as a team and I think we're quite far away from it but yeah we're thinking in the future like when we've got like The Proven Tech well what could you actually do of it that hasn't been done before because I'm sure there'll be some really Innovative stuff and you know it's important not just to take your already proven well proven paradigms and try to shoe on them in like again look at product design in general I mean just this week you know Apple announced that they retired the iPod Rip but the original iPod do you remember the wheel I mean the wheel was amazing I remember using it for the first time thinking what is this and then after about 6 hours I was like this is the greatest thing I've ever seen in my life like you can onehanded you can go full seconds back 10 seconds and I just thought whoever designed it they were like why

do we just need to copy like the Sony Walkman design when you could do something different and so I'd love to be I'd love to have that ability to be honest with you to be able to think about things in that way I think it takes a certain type of Personality or or skill set um and I think people who can kind of merge that with this new technology will be successful yeah that's how we it's even more important now to hire young people that don't have these these constraints into your team because experience is great however experience blinds you in a way it you keep thinking I've done this before I can do it again it will work and it's you have to do that exercise to try to remove the biases that you have of your experience and so having that perfect mix of battle warn plus someone just new a graduate someone's been in the industry for maybe a year or so they'll think about things that you can think of because your brain is a bit locked in box and you know we see this at the

crypto meetups and earlier crypto cabal there's so many young people there graduates are interested in getting into and thinking about games so I was going to say you took the words out of my mouth I mean if we were on a twitch stream right now I would subscribe to the Maria twitch Channel and I would donate a thousand bits like that statement and I think it's not just true for um blockchain games I think it's true in games in general like I personally noticed that as well coming up is that sometimes as you get older you do just become that cranky old person that knows what works and you keep to it but you know there's an entirely New Generation I mean another one you might see do you ever seen like kids how they try and turn the channel on the TV by going up to the screen and swiping and it's because they think why would you use a remote control that's like really cumbersome when on the phone they're taught that that's how you change it and that's like another good example of like yeah we should be doing things in an entirely different way but we still use this like archaic system for many things so um yeah I think if you're in the 20s right now and you're gaming you're going to probably have a really good time over the

film yeah it's definitely also like one point for you know I mean even like the crypto native teams building in the space get a lot of shade for not having games experience but like two to this whole discussion uh point I mean some of the most successful games right now are you know built by crypto native teams and they are kind of forging the path of innovation in the space setting up you know the first um uh line of best practices which will of course like evolve but yeah they bring absolutely you know fresh thought and even in freet to play one another interesting anecdote about you know um accidental Innovation the longer you know fre to play has existed uh um I was uh I was chatting with um the the CEO of happy Studios at some point you know when they when when I did the argro deconstruct with Eva and uh basically asked him like how how did they like come up with the core mechanic because you know that was that was like

something really really new something we didn't see basically the point of you know when you remove the thumb the the shooting is automatic um that's something that we haven't really seen um and he said yeah it was basically just an accidental Innovation that happened you know it wasn't like a fully engineered kind of a thing all they knew was uh when they had their initial control system and you know there was a button for shoot and a button for move it was too much of a headache and it didn't feel fun enough and somehow the designer just said let's you know kill the kill the shoot button and when you remove the thumb he's shooting automatically and that just took it to a whole new level and you know uh and that that was kind of like the heart of the game also in a way um but yeah I mean coming back to this whole discussion um yeah definitely worth a read this article uh it's quite quite thought-provoking in many ways and that also we yeah we're running out of time but I made like a list of some interesting statements he made uh um you

know where he was talking about like uh how web 3 games could like lean more into wagering and gambling as mechanics and such uh um I yeah maybe gambling is like the negative way to say it but um on those lines uh it does open up the design space to those possibilities you know um and but yeah very interesting article would definitely recommend read and a deep thought about it on a Sunday with a coffee that does sound quite lovely on this gray day I'm in nice menu indeed we're we're seeing the happy menu this is great I love it okay well that was great some some great stories from NE Neil too I appreciated hearing those anecdotes and like now I'm reminiscing about my old iPod I still have it by the way yeah me too me too I bought the YouTu special ition oh did you that was like um oh

shoot I heard an anecdote about this recently it was like the first uh um like I don't know spyware or something where they they they give you the iPod it's pre-loaded with you you can't do anything about did you did you get the eyew watch too Maria wow of course you brought that up I know it's Apple watch okay what a call back Apple watch had to do it Gavin do not Ed it this out I reheard the podcast I was so embarrassed on my own on that there'll be many more episodes you can take a pot shot at me later don't worry with your NPCs Manu we we got them we got them safe um if you want to join the discussion join us on naic's Discord and thanks everyone for joining and we'll see you next week bye everyone oh [Music]