New crypto developer has, uh, ambitious plans

Another day, another new developer convinced that he can solve the impossible problem of making NFT games fun. Midnight is a new blockchain-based developer led by some of the “most commercially successful creators” in the industry, and it has already announced some ridiculously ambitious plans, which always bodes well.

The blockchain “revolution” in gaming continues apace. FIFA recently announced four blockchain games to coincide with the World Cup, and industry figures like Dan Houser have also publicly supported blockchain technology. Now, another new studio has sprung up from the carpentry: Midnight, which, according to a somewhat disconcerting press release, “emerged from stealth” with $7.5 million in funding from crypto investors.

So what is Midnight? Its leaders include Wargame: Age of Fire (yes, that boring mobile game) designer Geoffrey Hunt and unlikely former CCO Bill Roper, and investors include blockchain platform Forte, mod company Overwolf and others. Its mission is to use the blockchain as “a layer that creates real value and utility for gamers”. Hmm.

Many of Midnight’s promises will sound familiar if you’ve followed the world of blockchain and Web3 (which is definitely it’s still going very well, Besides). The studio says it wants to create blockchain games that are fun and profitable first as an added layer, and also that its games will be “fun without the NFT layer.” Midnight also says it wants to attract “the widest range of players”, which we’ll have to see about that.

Perhaps more disturbing (or enticing, depending on your perspective) is that Midnight says it has four games in the works, three of which it provided brief descriptions of. The first is a 4X MMO, Legion, which seems to me an alarmingly ambitious first project even without the others. The second is a 2D pixel brawler called Next Protectorsand the third is a “couch co-op” (they don’t say what kind of game) called At your service.

It remains to be seen exactly what will now happen to Midnight. Maybe these projects will really come to fruition, and they’ll be the first developers to create games that truly bridge the gap between fun games and NFT quibbling, sorry, “economics.” Watch this space for more Midnight news.

Elsewhere in the blockchain gaming world, things are going pretty much exactly as planned, especially if a recent exchange between Jason Schreier and the Web3 Gam3 Awards ceremony is something to pass. Schreier accuses the Gam3 Awards of stealing his Game Awards biography (who, well, are you surprised?), and the ceremony organizers accuse Schreier of an “anti-blockchain gaming agenda.”

Subsequently, Twitter user Dan Sandler pointed out that one of the Best Strategy Game nominees used stolen assets to promote himself, calling it “bad faith all the way”. Ouch. Not that Midnight is related to any of that, of course. Just something to keep in mind when thinking about the Web3 world.