Video games have always been an integral part of modern life and and certainly an integral part of the Internet. More and more people are playing games today from casual to hardcore gamers. Games are bleeding into real life with tournaments and brand deals and all kinds of pop culture like NFTs and more.
Points
People love keeping score when they're playing against AI but even more when they're playing against each other. Social games are naturally viral and form strong communities of players and teams.
Points can range from in-game-only points which do nothing anywhere else to points that can be used to purchase in-game items (so they're worth money) and also games where you earn straight rewards that can be redeemed for things or where you earn straight money.
Tournaments
Global competitions are now common around the world across a variety of gaming titles such as Fortnite and PUBG and many others. These franchises are often larger than many sports franchises and live streaming rights are getting more expensive each year.
E-sports and gaming are becoming mainstream everywhere and businesses should know what is popular amongst their customer base.
Avatars
As people play different games across consoles and app-stores, their identity becomes important as a persistent character that develops experience and skills and potentially other material is collected across adventures.
Explicit support for portable avatars with persistent identities is a key part of the future of games.
Economics
A game is a new dimension of reality with time and space with places and things and a community that forms a strong fanbase around the culture of the game universe, the characters, the levels, the quests and challenges, team play and strategy, and also importantly around the economy of in-app and out-of-app items for trade.
In-game purchases are common enough, but new social experiences are allowing gamers themselves to create inventory to sell to each other, or to trade collected items with each other in open markets.
Ultimately, each player on the other side of their avatars is a real human being with needs and desires that go beyond just the game, and smart businesses will capitalize on the opportunity from in-game CRM and in-game eCommerce for both digital (and virtual) goods as well as for physical products and services that get delivered in the real world.
Gamification
This merging of the online and offline universes leads to a single unified multiverse which can be a rich field for data not just for businesses but also for individual content creators and solo entrepreneurs now free to play the game of universal commerce and market domination.
Game developers already use points and contests to create a competitive spirit amongst their communities and smart businesses can leverage the same idea across digital games and across digital media, using various incentives and jackpots to drive up engagement and to increase the value of the brand through deep and authentic association.
Crypto, NFTS, and more
Web3 changes everything on the Internet and games and gamification are also changed because of this new way of life and business. The naturally decentralized nature of games with each player and each team their own economic unity, co-creating value with other players and teams, across the experienceable shared world of the game or metaverse.
Awake Internet Protocols integrate deeply with the Web3 world thus merging the experience of Web2 or regular gaming with the authenticated and sovereign experience of the blockchain multiverse.
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