Mojang made waves yesterday when it said in no uncertain terms that NFTs are not welcome in Minecraft (opens in new tab). Good news for gamers perhaps, but not so much for anyone who has already committed to incorporating blockchain technology into the game, such as NFT Worlds for example.
“NFT Worlds is a fully decentralized, fully customizable, community-driven earning game platform where world owners can create their own unlimited metaverse games or experiences for players or exclusive communities within their worlds,” its website (opens in new tab) say.
Currently using Minecraft and its sprawling open source ecosystem, NFT Worlds is building on the backbone of decades of open source development within the Minecraft community and radically expanding it to include a whole new type of 3D voxel-based, enable decentralized gaming metaverses supported by the Ethereum blockchain.”
Basically, what that means is that it supports custom Minecraft servers where players can buy plots of virtual land and earn (and spend) cryptocurrency — the kind of hybrid system that Mojang’s blockchain policy seems to specifically shut down. And it certainly had an impact: the price of $WRLD (opens in new tab) poorly fueled immediately after the studio’s announcement.
In response to Mojang’s new policy, NFT Worlds issued a statement: (opens in new tab) Mojang and Minecraft denounce as “disrespecting creators, builders and players”, vowing to create its own game to replace it.
“We are creating a new game and platform based on many of Minecraft’s core mechanics, but with modernization and active development, Minecraft has been missing for years,” said NFT Worlds. “This is not a rewrite of an open source Minecraft clone, which would likely violate the EULA or still be at risk of legal action, this is completely from scratch. In addition, this transition will involve a public-facing brand identity change that is more player-friendly.”
The future of NFT worlds 🌎Read our statement below via the attached Twitter thread, or here: https://t.co/w0nf1f2xxnA thread 🧵👇 pic.twitter.com/Oy2T7oXQVgJuly 22, 2022
The new game will have a “playstyle, look and feel” similar to Minecraft, NFT Worlds said, but will feature performance optimizations, graphical improvements and new mechanics that will provide “a more accessible, proprietary and enjoyable playing experience.” It will be free for all players and “completely decoupled from the policy enforcement that Microsoft and Mojang have over Minecraft.” At the same time, it will also be backwards compatible with existing Minecraft server plugins, so when it comes time to switch platforms, content creators can make the switch with minimal fuss.
Making Minecraft better than Minecraft (while maintaining compatibility with Minecraft) is a hell of a job, and one that I think would require immediate and intense scrutiny from Microsoft, but NFT Worlds doesn’t have many options. Mojang has effectively closed the door to its business model, but a large-scale move to a new game would leave existing users, and everything they’ve built so far, out in the cold. The only way to keep the wheels spinning is to come up with something that is functionally Minecraft without actually being Minecraft. That is quite a task.
In the more near future, NFT Worlds said it will make changes to the launcher and playback pages to attract new players who are not interested in the cryptocurrency corner. It also laid some very dramatic, high stakes for the future of NFT Worlds as a battle for both the philosophical and technological soul of the Internet.
“Microsoft has made it clear that they will always act in the best interests of their shareholders and balance sheet, at the expense of innovation, player experience and creators,” said NFT Worlds. “We believe that an open, free, evolved version of what Minecraft has brought to the world will provide a brighter future for creators, developers, and ultimately gamers.
“We are fighting for a future with a player-owned and operated economy where all participants benefit from their contributions to the ecosystem. We recognize that this is a monumental task.”
I have reached out to Microsoft for comment on the NFT Worlds plan and will update if I get a response.
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