Unfortunate but true: Change comes top down, not bottom up.

Sorry! It's the way of the world. It's why true democracy in DAOs failed miserably. The masses of people do not want the responsibility that comes with democracy; they want security promised and entertainment delivered.

[Gamers == Masses in case you missed my subtle inference]

As such, when Ubisoft boldly proclaims that gamers should "feel comfortable with not owning their games," the most you'll get from the herd is a Charlie Puth rant with tons of yougogirl comments. Ubisoft and every other game publisher knows that when they get ready to implement a change, no amount of kerfuffle from the proletariat should stop them. 

None of these Zoomers or Gen Alfalfas are going to stop playing CoD or miss out on the latest GTA because they can't "own" the game any more. 

What's important to web3 investors is how to use this information (tl;dr, get into web3 gaming infrastructure NOW, most notably consumer-ready chains and DePIN).

...no amount of MoistCritical snark is going to stop [gaming publishers] from earning hundreds of billions more per year.

Why Do Game Publishers Love Web3?

tl;dr — it makes them $$$

Ubisoft and every other gaming publisher is moving away from physical games because digital subscriptions increase profit margins. No more casing to pay for, no more shipping to Gamestop, no more breakage write-offs. Exponentially faster time to market, instant game updates, endless opportunities for microtransactions, etc., etc., etc.

Web3 allows publishers with moats around their audiences to milk them even more. Here's a short list of what simply using a ledger affords a company like Ubi:

• Onboards the black market for game asset trades and monetizes it through trading fees
• Creates an opportunity to sell character upgrades
• Lets a company combine its IPs into a single metaverse to cross collateralize profit centers
• Instant and fully transparent transaction finality, drastically reducing customer service queries and costs
• Instant and fully transparent rewards distribution

This is just the tip of the iceberg. Every bullet means higher profit margins for publishers, and no amount of MoistCritical snark is going to stop them from earning hundreds of billions more per year.

So we have publishers with incentive to implement web3 and a player base basically helpless to stop it. End of story?

Not quite...

Web3 and User Generated Content (UGC)

If the current iteration of gaming throughput were gaming's final form, publishers would have unassailable ownership of the player experience. The airline industry shows us what happens when the producers and distributors gain a necklock on an essential service — they squeeze every penny out of their audience while gradually sucking all the legroom out of the plane. 🤣

Fortunately, the tools and training for game creation are far more accessible than the tools and training to become a pilot. Enter the UGC creator — the rebel indie dev or precocious teenybopper who builds a viral experience over Fortnite, Roblox, Sandbox, Nifty Island, and earns millions because of the laissez faire attitude of gamers towards the who of making a genuinely unique or culturally relevant experience.

The same inertia that allows the big publishers to control masses of gamers acts as a force multiplier when those gamers finally choose the next shiny object over some reheated AAA IP.

Because UGC tools are becoming more accessible to the average lunkhead, it's inevitable that UGC take significant market share from AAA studios over the next 3-5 years. No-code is the buzzword of the day. Many top performing UEFN maps use no coding whatsoever. No code options will only proliferate because bringing in no-coders as Fortnite map creators makes Epic Games tons of money (they get 60% of the profit on every map while having to build none of them). It's in Epic's interest to not only create no-code tools, but to focus on those tools, as there are exponentially more no-code people in the world than coders.

Although Fortnite, Roblox and Minecraft have UGC platforms, web3 native metaverses come custom-made with the profit-mining infrastructure mentioned above. So you can bet the winners of the web3 metaverse race will attract top UGC creators and their corresponding revenue streams — web3 already has the funding to draw in top creatives and the incentives to keep them.

Protip: Potential 100-1000X in $UEFN at below $2M mcap, a play to take full advantage of the UGC narrative during the 2024-2025 bull cycle.]

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Making Money in the New Gaming Paradigm

So the big publishers will be using web3 to shylock every nickel from gamers, and the indie market will be flooded with smaller, localized UGC productions based in web3. 

How do we capitalize?

Fortunately I have a list!

1. Find the Web3 Metaverses that Outperform

2023 ended our first real metaverse cycle. We got to see which projects could withstand a market downturn. The teams that kept their heads down and runway intact put themselves in an incredible position. Good thing, too, because the market is currently being saturated by copycats pumping out derivative projects hoping to snag a piece. 

On the surface, there's nothing wrong with MetaXSeed, $XAI, Cornucopia, $NAKA, $GFAL, etc., etc., (so far), but they're just treading over the same ground that $GALA, Myria and $MAGIC have already covered. Sans scam, all of these projects will pump in the bull. But which will outperform?

Personally, I focus on the metaverses that have already survived a cycle. No worries about rugs, VCs are out already so they can't dump on you, track record is transparent. I wrote an entire piece on how to measure the future success of these old school projects.

[Protip: Stay far away from BAYC and Otherside assets. Instead, focus on second gen metaverses like Nifty Island that have solved the $APE governance and UGC issues. You're early on Nifty; airdrop all but confirmed.] 

[Protip 2: The Ronin metaverse and $RON are the best example of what a successful metaverse looks like, but don't buy into $RON expecting a 100X. You're late. Instead, look for systems that give Ronin vibes like $UEFN.]

2. Focus on Systems, Not Individual Games

I know $SHRAP and $ATLAS have all the hype. I know! But do you really want to put all your eggs in one basket? Crypto's already speculative enough.

This tip is especially important for Western investors who believe a game needs to look like CoD and play like GTA in order to succeed. Web3 gives Asia a bigger say in gaming than it's ever had before. CoD and GTA are not the norm there. Cute, collaborative, casual games earn big money, which is why gaming systems like $GALA, $MAGIC, $MYRIA do very well in web3.

[Protip: Potential 100-1000X play in $GAMEFI. It's a first mover gaming DAO and system on Metis, which has 8 figures of runway. They finally delivered a somewhat playable experience in $TITANS.]

I would much rather put my $1000 in a system that functions as auto-diversification over a consistently growing set of games than put $1000 into one experience like $SHRAP, $ILV, $SIPHER.

Even the Johnny-come-lately second round of gaming systems — $NAKA, $GFAL, $XAI, $3ULL — give you a better chance of success than individual games like $AURY or $ILV.

But only if you can follow tips 3, 4 and 5 without fail...

3. Get in Early

4. Get in Early

5. Get in Early

Did I mention get in early? For instance: Getting in early means buying $XAI nodes at around $300 per node, not FOMOing in right now at around $1500. Even if $XAI fails, you likely ROI on a $300 node. You may not on a $1500 node. Getting in late shifts the risk/reward curve too far towards a coin toss for me, and it's fatal in crypto. Believe someone who's suffered it many times or learn the hard way.

The secret to winning in crypto is simple: Don't bet money on any project's legitimacy. Bet on the probability of getting your capital back. If it's high, do it. If it's not, stay out. I don't care if $XAI flips bitcoin in market cap. I don't care how many shills on Telegram and Youtube try to make me their exit liquidity. I didn't get the node price I wanted, so everything about $XAI is dead to me now. It doesn't exist. This attitude has made me profitable even when investing in shit projects.

Bet on the probability of getting your capital back. If it's high, do it. If it's not, stay out.

6. DePIN

...or put simply, buying nodes.

Investing (early) in gaming node projects is perhaps the best way to fight back against the Churn Cooties, Bottomsell Bacteria and the FOMO Flu. Nodes in good projects provide a steady income, but most importantly, there is no project currently that allows you to sell the node. This will be changing in the near future, but for now, use this to your advantage to force trading discipline.

Node projects you're still early on: Galaxis (personal favorite, referral code embedded in link), MetaXSeed, Cornucopia (prices escalate, get in early), Gunzilla (only available right on on OTC, KYC required, YUCK), but likely to do well because Gunzilla games owns the narrative right now).

The best part: Once your nodes start providing you steady web3 income, you can easily swap to diversify your holdings into other games, even speculative individual plays.

[Best bets for individual games in 2024: $SHRAP, $AURY, $ILV, all 100X potential]

tl;dr

To find the systems that will outperform:

• look for systems with a positive track record of building and UGC features,
• invest first in systems, not individual games,
• get in early,
• stabilize your portfolio with nodes.

Top plays: $UEFN, $MAGIC, Myria nodes, Galaxis nodes, Gunzilla nodes.

Remember: Web3 gaming will soon just be gaming, bros. Until all are one.

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