Simon Davis is the co-founder and CEO of Mighty Bear Video games, a multiplatform sport developer in Southeast Asia creating accessible multiplayer experiences in Web3.
Davis has spent nearly 20 years working within the gaming business, however he by no means deliberate to truly work on this area.
Earlier than crypto, he was an expert guitarist who made ends meet by taking part in in steel bands and canopy bands and by instructing guitar. However after his cash dried up one summer time, he scored a six-week gig as an expert sport tester — and he’s by no means seemed again.
Throughout his time within the gaming business, Davis has held administration and product lead positions at gaming corporations together with King Digital Leisure, Ubisoft, Bigpoint, AKQA, Empire Interactive, and Laughing Jackal.
In 2017, Davis teamed up with some buddies and fellow business veterans to launch Mighty Bear Video games in Singapore, the place they supposed to deal with creating conventional video games — earlier than pivoting to blockchain in 2022. And in 2023, the agency launched an open beta for Mighty Motion Heroes, its first Web3 gaming title.
Davis, who additionally goes by “Papa Bear,” mentioned each Mighty Bear worker receives a “bear title.” A few of Papa Bear’s workers embrace “Arty Bear,” “Bear-Abel,” “Excel Bear,” and “Bear McNumbers.”
Why the pivot to blockchain gaming?
I used to be fortunate sufficient to type of get into Bitcoin accidentally in 2015, so I’ve been within the area for just a few years. In 2021, I began taking part in with NFTs, and I’m fortunate sufficient to be additionally primarily based in Southeast Asia, so I might see firsthand what was taking place with Axie [Infinity]. I believe, for me, as somebody who lived by the transition to free-to-play, it felt very very like a second, type of like when Farmville got here out on Fb.
I believe that for reside service titles [games like Fortnite, League of Legends and Apex Legends], a dominant enterprise mannequin goes to emerge to revolve round player-owned and operated economies. As a result of I don’t consider you possibly can have digital worlds with out digital property rights, primarily.
And I believe that does allow numerous new issues that we’re actually beginning to scratch the floor on. So, I believe that basically was the pull issue.
What format do you assume serves as one of the simplest ways to draw customers to blockchain gaming?
I believe cellular gaming goes to be the dominant platform due to geography. You see this when you take a look at the charts for the nations which have a fantastic slope of curiosity in crypto or Web3. They are usually nations the place current fee rails aren’t tremendous developed.
Persons are largely unbanked in locations like Indonesia and Brazil. These markets are mobile-first. Like, folks within the Philippines and India aren’t essentially utilizing high-end PCs.
So, you should go the place the customers are. And this can be a little bit of a spicy take, however that is why I’m very bearish on folks making tremendous HD high-end Web3 video games as a result of it’s simply not the place the markets are in the present day. So, you see numerous these groups elevating, like, mega bucks to make console-quality titles, but when nobody can play them, then they aren’t going to do very a lot.
What do you assume the present hurdles are for large-scale blockchain gaming adoption?
Lots of people speak about it when it comes to silver bullets, proper? Like, “Oh, we’d like one good sport,” or like, “We have to clear up the pockets drawback.” I don’t assume it’s any a type of issues. I really assume it’s simply numerous lead bullets, numerous small issues that must occur.
What I’ve skilled in the present day remains to be fairly horrible, and scary, like social restoration. And it’s beginning to change into a factor, however that should change into loads simpler.
Learn additionally
I simply assume, typically, it must be as straightforward and as brainless to make use of as a Web2 expertise. And so I believe there’s an inherent battle in the present day with how folks take into consideration Web3, you recognize. They are saying issues like, “Oh, you should educate the customers,” or, “Practice folks to carry their personal keys.”
However you recognize, my mother doesn’t need to maintain her personal personal keys. She does all her buying and selling on Crypto.com. We have to make it primarily idiot-proof so anybody can do it.
I believe we’re nonetheless fairly a good distance away, however I’m seeing significant enhancements, really. I’m seeing merchandise which can be going to go to market subsequent yr that are going to assist loads.
I don’t understand how outdated you might be, however I’ve simply turned 40 this yr. I keep in mind within the 90s establishing a house web connection on dial-up. It took me two days of calling technical help and somebody telling me like configs. I used to be having to go in and alter manually and stuff. And now, you recognize, we solved that, proper? After which, the web grew to become a mass market, after which folks might simply put a CD of their laptop, and it simply labored. I believe we have to get to that stage.
Do you assume the dangerous rap blockchain/NFT gaming will get is an enormous situation?
It’s humorous as a result of gaming obtained a reasonably dangerous rap within the 90s. You realize, everybody was speaking about how video games have been making kids violent. There was an enormous ethical panic, similar to there was in music just a few years earlier than.
However I believe that while you begin to get this stuff in folks’s arms and expertise them, perceptions change. I do assume numerous the repute that we have now in crypto and Web3 is deserved. There are numerous dangerous actors exploiting the dearth of regulation, however the issues that excite me: I’ve seen some video games, for instance, that enable gamers to earn small quantities of Bitcoin, And this kind of factor’s retention numbers are very robust, just like the preliminary metrics are very promising. And I believe that’s a very nice use case.
Reddit can be a fantastic instance, proper? They put NFTs within the arms of giant numbers of individuals. Lots of people didn’t even understand they have been interacting with NFTs. So then that they had their first style, and yeah — there are some stats which have come up, and never an enormous quantity of them have transacted on-chain.
However I really don’t assume that’s such a foul factor. If persons are not dumping the property on day one, I don’t see that as a unfavourable. So, I believe onboarding by stealth is fairly good.
What sort of adoption metrics are you searching for together with your video games?
So, folks speak about installs and sign-ups — it’s only a vainness metric. For me, I’m all for how many individuals are coming in day-after-day, how usually they’re coming again, and what the expansion curve of that appears like initially.
After which as soon as we do the cellular launch [of Mighty Action Heroes], which will likely be round August/September, how effectively are we doing on attracting non-crypto-native folks into the sport as effectively? That will likely be very attention-grabbing, and to see how they play collectively. It’s a distinct angle, nevertheless it’s one which I’m fairly bullish on.
What are some concepts or tech upgrades that would assist blockchain gaming?
ERC-6551 tokens.
Basically, they provide a sensible contract account or a sensible contract pockets to a 721 [token]. So, you recognize, a conventional NFT can be a JPG with some metadata connected. However primarily, the JPG or the asset, no matter that’s, is then sure to a sensible contract.
And that is fairly cool as a result of it signifies that property can talk straight with one another. So NFT to NFT, with out utilizing MetaMask. And it is also suitable with different good contract wallets.
I believe the actually cool factor is that, primarily, your asset turns into a pockets and may have its personal logic as effectively. So you could possibly have a base character in a sport because the 6551 token, after which all the garments or the objects or all the pieces that that character has, the type of sub-assets, can change inside, every with its personal logic.
As a sport developer, you begin pondering of how your characters might evolve and how one can connect new property with out updating the core.
Then as a dev, I believe it’s actually good for repute administration as effectively. Like, when you did a soulbound model, you could possibly have achievements, proof-of-work, proof-of-play, social id. I believe it’s fairly cool. […] It’s safer as a result of it’s not simply an asset inside a pockets like it’s on good contracts with its personal personal key.
Subscribe
Essentially the most participating reads in blockchain. Delivered as soon as a
week.
