By Due to the recent success of major game releases on a multitude of platform-agnostic devices including smartphones and tablets, the gaming industry has come to the realization that video game consoles may become a relic of the past.
Yves Guillemot, the Ubisoft CEO, has stated that he believes that there may only be one more generation of game consoles before they are replaced by game streaming services. Yves Guillemot believes that in time we will see less and less gaming hardware and that streaming “will become more accessible to many players and make it not necessary to have big hardware at home”.
Ubisoft and the Blockchain Game Alliance
With this in mind, it is unsurprising that Ubisoft, the AAA game publishing giant, has set its sights on the technology that is thought to one day replace video game consoles, that of blockchain technology. Ubisoft’s Strategic Innovation Lab had reportedly already started to explore blockchain technology and the development of distributed ledger technology (DLT), as well as sponsoring conferences on DLT applications and blockchain hackathons. Furthermore, Ubisoft has reportedly joined the Blockchain Game Alliance as a founding member, with the hope to develop industry standards and best practices for gaming applications reliant on DLT through collaborative innovation.
Ubisoft is joined in the Blockchain Game Alliance by the likes of Fig, EverdreamSoft, Enjin, B2Expand, ConsenSys, Alto, Gimli, Ultra and more. ConsenSys is the blockchain development studio founded by Joseph Lubin, the co-creator Ethereum. EverdreamSoft created the first blockchain game Spells of Genesis, while Fig is the independent game publisher which acquired a blockchain development company and is responsible for the games Wasteland 3 and Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire.
The Blockchain Game Alliance has stated that it is convinced that blockchain technology will have numerous benefits for the gaming industry, “from developers to players, we provide an open forum for all stakeholders to share knowledge and collaborate on research that foster new ways to create and play games”.
Project Stream: a Ubisoft and Google Collaboration
In July this year Google Cloud partnered with Digital Asset in order to create software development kits (SDK) for developers which would provide developers with a means to explore the potential for web-based innovations in blockchain. Google is attempting to advance its blockchain development products in an effort to avoid falling behind its competitors Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure, which have both released blockchain products allowing DLT applications to be employed by developers, negating the need for developers to write the entire code.
The tech giant’s most recent and ambitious collaboration with Ubisoft represents another commitment by the gaming industry to the belief that cloud gaming is the way of the future. In addition to joining the Blockchain Game Alliance, Ubisoft has also partnered up with Google for Project Stream which, although in its trial phase, plans to stream AAA games through the Google Chrome web browser allowing participants to stream games, for free, such as Ubisoft’s latest game in its flagship franchise Assassin’s Creed.
The involvement of Ubisoft and other companies in the development and use of blockchain-related technologies is an indication of the evolution of the gaming industry. Although the gaming console may be on its last generation, blockchain technology is undoubtedly creating new opportunities for innovation and development within the gaming industry.
Do you believe gaming consoles will be a thing of the past? What do you think of Ubisoft’s Project Stream? Give us your thoughts in the comments below.
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