Behaviour Interactive Inc. is getting the bad attention of its player base following official announcement of Dead by Daylight’s support of NFTs. This also comes after Valve recently proclaimed its stance against games that make use of cryptocurrency and NFTs on Steam.
Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are such a topic of great interest recently. Essentially an economy on itself, NFTs thrive in the idea of sole ownership, which puts value to anything by virtue of being unique. Through NFT, it grants a seller the authority to generate fresh content in exchange for cryptocurrency. In return, the buyer is promised exclusive ownership of the NFT item in question. Meaning, nobody else gets the same thing, once sold and bought, within the blockchain space.
Digital Wild West
Right now, there’s no specific guideline that regulates pricing for NFTs. Everything is subjective—which means that even a simple image or short video can cost so much or so little. It all depends on the agreement between two parties, the seller and the buyer, like how you’d bargain at a street market. Think of Beeple’s brief video that originally listed for $66,666.60, only for it to ultimately sell for $6.6 million following bids via auction. It’s such a lucrative concept, it could literally put the notion of a “hungry artist” out of anyone’s vocabulary.
Polarizing reception
However, for something so revolutionary, NFT is nevertheless a controversial topic that many opposes. Primarily, for its idea of granting unparallel individual ownership over something, without necessarily offering something as potent and binding as a copyright claim. Take, for instance, the video we spoke of earlier. Despite now being owned, the video still remains accessible for anyone to view. Worse, the media can be replicated by merely choosing to download it as a video.
Behaviour worked with Boss Protocol over several months to adapt in-game models for use as NFTs and approved them prior to the release of Pinhead in DbD. The NFTs have a chance to grant access to the #Hellraiser chapter of DbD. pic.twitter.com/3ZZKq3uPYN
— Dead by Daylight (@DeadbyDaylight) October 18, 2021
Now, putting the same concept on Dead by Daylight and what you get is a community of gamers who didn’t take it fondly. The issue seemingly boiling down to multiple issues. One is how the developers lied at taking a stance against NFT, only to adopt it. Another is how the mining of the cryptocurrency used in NFT plays role in the destruction of the environment through its massive consumption of electricity. Lastly, is the fact that the mechanism could alienate players who may haven’t adopted digital currency, yet. The latter speaking of contents potentially locked behind a cryptocurrency paywall.
Lash back
In retaliation, Dead by Daylight players are rallying in the game’s official tweet expressing their scorn over the move. Some even go to the extreme as openly rooting for the game’s competition, uninstalling, or promising to never play again.
Image used courtesy of Dead by Daylight/YouTube Screenshot