When things are connected to the internet, and people began to realize that transactions can happen with the technology, the world of commerce was never happier.
And when blockchain allows ownerships to be documented and transferred in a way that each are unique, people began to aim for even more money.
But for Will Wright, things are a bit different.
The hall of fame game designer is known as the man behind the ever-popular The Sims and SimCity game.
He too is eyeing on a blockchain game he calls VOXverse. But unlike most people's approach, his game can’t just be about blockchain.
From his past works, Will Wright is considered among the biggest names in the gaming industry.
He acknowledges that people can spend an inordinate amount of money on a game or the NFTs that just might be tied to the blockchain. And he too knows that businesses piggybacking the hype can bring in millions of dollars, if not billions, if done correctly.
The thing is, Wright wants to stay true to his games' legacies, and because of that, he wants his blockchain-based game to be fun to play.
Wright likens blockchain to plumbing or some other underlying tech.
"I don’t care how you do it," he said. "I want to have secure transactions for content creators."
He recalled how early The Sims early players whose custom creations he estimates amounted to 30% of the franchise’s value but wasn’t allowed to be significantly monetized.
"The creators who created the content participated in maybe 1 or 2% of the economic returns."
He wants players to have better control on VOXverse.
Wright envisions a game that can attract three groups of people: a small number of rich virtual landowners, paying for plots with cryptocurrencies; a middle group of creative and active players who rents the spaces owned by the landowners to make things (and share any sale proceeds from what they make), and a mass of free-to-play users who will hang out and play in the world.
In other words, Wright wants players to own land, mine, harvest resources from the land, and create "attractions."
Wright also wants it to be a game that incorporates systems of fame and trust, as well as basic character needs such as energy or hunger.
This echoes how The Sims is.
The major difference is that, the world has plots that can be transacted using real money, and things that can be done on those places, also transacted using real money.
Wright also wants users to be able to transform some starter objects, like a car or a coffee cup, for example, and tweak them, or even "patent" them via the blockchain for revenue-generating reuse.
To create this vision, Wright co-founded Gallium Games, a blockchain-focused startup, with Lauren Elliot, the co-creator of Carmen Sandiego, who first shipped a game with Wright in 1984.
While Elliot is doing the more technical works, Wright is more focused on the game's design.
Wright also partners with cryptocurrency gaming boosters Gala Games, which has spent over $25 million funding the effort.
For its part, Gala wants Wright’s game to help popularize its VOX characters, which are digital collectibles, or NFTs.
But despite the game being heavily integrated with NFTs, and seemingly being marketed towards keen "whale" buyers, Wright appears reluctant to take pride in the game’s business model.
"I don't really want to be in the business of selling NFTs," Wright explained.
Wright said that the whales may be the unnecessary evil who can bring money into the game, and by building part of the game’s economic model to NFTs, the game can eventually start "distributing that value downwards" to players who are more interested in "[creating] experiences for the millions of players."
"These people (whales) exist, whether we like it or not," he said.
As for the actual development of the game, according to Gala's blog post, Gallium Games is partnering with Unity Technologies, a video game software development company based in San Francisco.
