yo what's up guys I'm Sam just
added you if you want to play
some music what says your
listener fresco hit us with the
first haven't seen that one in a
minute the quickest thumbs in the
game the thumbs are hot boy yeah
the dumbs are hot boy yeah what's up you got some beats it was good yeah let's
let's play some beats while we bring up the panel I got another one queued up
boy we're gonna keep it fresh
All right, we're so back with episode number six.
The year is flying so fast.
It's so great to have all these amazing speakers.
I'm going to start just banging out some intros so we can get into the meat of today's show
as all shows should aim to do.
He's a paragon, a profit in the pantheon of pixels and play from the fierce furrows of
He's chiseled champions and cultivated a legion of high caliber creators with 11 and
Now, with Magic Eaton, he's not just managing, he's metamorphosizing the marketplaces in Web
Here, he magnetizes the masses, making Magic Eaton not just a market, but a mecca.
So ready your ears, steady your senses, and prepare for the powerhouse, the pontiff of
polygons, the titan of tactical talk, the esports evangelist is Knok.
Yo, what's up, everybody?
Live from a glass box in the Magic Eaton office, everybody walking past and staring at me like
It's super fucking weird, but excited to jump into the topics today.
What Silicon Valley monster decided to put us all in these like two foot by two foot
boxes that are soundproof and be like, yeah, this is totally this is the normal thing
That is not at all analogous to a zoo whatsoever.
Next, his Odyssey in the interactive and digital media landscape spans over a quarter century,
a journey marked by innovation, imagination, and ingenuity.
While at LucasArts, he didn't just occupy a seat.
He was the luminary on the technology Council at the legendary Skywalker Ranch as the creator
and conductor of the Visual FX Group.
As the president of Happy Giant, he steered the ship through the uncharted waters of
VR and AR, transforming the company into a recognized leader in the space, collaborating
with tech titans like Google, Niantic, Microsoft, and Meta, solidified his reputation as a guru
of gaming and a seer of software.
In his latest quest, he's embraced the burgeoning world of Web3 gaming with Mystic Moose,
creating Planet Mojo, an auto battler in a universe that promises to be as boundless
So let's give a pixel perfect welcome to the VR visionary from Planet Mojo.
Well, I was waiting for that and you do deliver.
So thanks for having me here, honored to be here, a long time listener, first time caller.
And that was pretty much the most clever thing I could think of to say.
So hope I don't say too many dumb things.
And that was all without mentioning the fact that he literally has a Star Wars character
I just want to slide that in there so people can put some respect on Mike's name.
Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, prepare your extinguishers and sound the alarms because
we're about to introduce a guest that's hotter than a four long fire from the blazing infernos
of firefighting to the fierce flames of financial fortitude.
He's the combustible combination of courage and cunning and his firefighting feats and
financial wizardry weren't enough.
Living legend of live events, orchestrating epic experiences that burn brighter than a
Let's not forget his physique sculpted like a Greek God at six five two thirty pounds
Let's meet the fiscal friar brand.
The man with the Midas touch its fresco.
Yeah I don't know why you laughed and you said that because every part of that was true.
The last time that I was sitting in a two foot by two foot box knock, people were throwing
We're not going to relive those days that one missed the intro.
I'll have to do some some adjustments for next week up next with a history as a software
engineer at forethought, a generative company since twenty nineteen.
She's been sharpening the cutting edge.
Her coding isn't just writing its digital poetry, but her brilliance doesn't stop
She's an educator, a speaker and a creator turning complex concepts into accessible insights
recognized by Forbes as a top ten by Forbes as a top ten NFT influencer.
She's not she's not just a name on a list.
She's a leader in a league of her own.
So let's get ready to be odd, educated and inspired by the software sage, the educational
It's hard to follow the last one with the glass box and the dollars to be honest with
Yeah, a few few can follow that one up with any meaningful insights.
We're just going to let that one slide from the dynamite detonations to powder keg pops.
His work with shrapnel isn't just a flash in the pan.
He's booming down barriers blasting into wet through with an explosive entrance with the
experience of managing the financial firepower of a whopping one hundred million dollar budget
He's ignited the industry, ensuring every campaign combusts with captivating clarity
in a realm riddled with ricochets.
He remains the relentless rocket, always ready to rupture the routine.
Ladies and gentlemen, prepare for a percussive presentation as we introduce the man who's
It's the FBS being on the combat connoisseur representing shrapnel.
Can't wait to chat about simplifying web three for the masses.
You love to hear it, Tony.
Ladies and gentlemen, swing into excitement and peel back your perceptions because we're
about to introduce a king of the jungle in the world of intelligent investments in the
dense forest of data and the swinging vines of virtual ventures.
He's the brainy banana in the world of bland fruit, not just monkeying around.
He leaps from branch to branch of blockchain wisdom, sharing insights that share shine brighter
than a banana under the jungle sun with the smarts of a silverback in the strategy of
He's not just another ape in the pack.
He's a gorilla with the golden touch, leading his followers to bunches of success.
So let's beat our chests and admiration and welcome the primate pundit who's as brilliant
in his investments as he is boisterous in his banter is crypto gorilla.
Give me a little chest bump that did I don't know how you do that.
You write these down, or is it just off the dome?
If it was off the dome, I'd be signing a record deal off the dome, baby, off the dome.
Next time I'm gonna just let people believe that that would be incredible.
Great to have you gorilla.
He's the CEO extraordinaire of not one, not two, but a quartet of quantum leaps into
web three pixel vault, punks, comics, meta hero and wolf dot game.
He's not just running companies.
He's orchestrating online odysseys, but because this tycoon isn't done yet, he's also the
builder extraordinaire at reboot gg where building is in a task.
He's the juggernaut juggling juggernauts, the emperor of enterprise, the wizard of web
three with a vision so vast it makes the horizon look like a starting line.
So put your hands together for the commander of crypto creativity.
The emperor of enterprise is g fuck.
Yeah, I got a bottle up that intro for all my, my zoom calls.
We'll run it back at GDC every, every time you walk through a door, I'll just hit you
I'm going to put a clock around my neck.
This is the guy who's got more rhythm in his pinky toe than most have in their whole body
So sharp, they could cut the tension in a thriller movie.
Now he orchestrates deals with the same elegance and energy he wants to use to dominate the
This man doesn't just close deals.
He cha cha's through contracts and pirouettes around partnerships.
This is the guy who could lay down a track so hot it can melt your speakers.
He puts the D and decentralized in the J and jabroni and it's made and lost more money in
web three than I've ever seen in my life.
The Baron of the beat, the turntable Titan.
If only I could put the J and jabroni.
Now my life has really come full circle.
I wasn't ready for that one.
When I wrote that one, I was real proud of myself.
I don't know if it made any sense, but he's a DJ.
It took me a second because when you started with D, I was like, where is this headed?
And then luckily J came next.
It's very, very meta, dude.
You got to be paying attention.
We got a little throwback to Sam and them one time.
Alpha vomit on the space is already gluten free spaghetti.
Despite his gluten intolerance, he's calm and ready to drop bombs on web three gaming.
We got the giver of gaming games, bracing the space.
He made an amazing case and came in as creator of the year.
First place add into his trophy case.
My bro, Sam Stefanina, Alpha vomit on the space is already, was it for me?
That was, that was the one that did it.
I'm trying to keep you safe from the gluten bro.
Even, even on the digital airwaves, they'll make sure that gluten doesn't sneak its way
We also have Jonah joining us from the space.
The man needs no introduction and thank God for that because I didn't know he was going
But as soon as he requests to speak up, you know, kind of bring the man up.
So of course, Jonah Blake, one of the best minds in web three, that one's off the cuff
Breaking business bastards, Jonah Blake.
The lying boys, something, something when you don't get an intro, you just make your own
I'm doing these in real time.
This is that's actual off the cuff.
Brace yourselves for a blast of ballistic brilliance as we spotlight shrapnel.
The Titan of web three gaming.
The official game was simplified.
This first person shooter phenomenon is a high octane Odyssey into the heart of web three
You're not just firing bullets.
You're launching a legacy of lethal skirmishes.
So prepare to parachute into a world where every click is a countdown to chaos.
Our lucky legionnaires today stand a chance to snag not just any gear, but shrapnel's
elite extraction packs, navigate to shrapnel.com and enlist with your call sign and get ready
to grenade your look your way to glory.
Will you answer the call?
And of course we got three dark frontier white lists to give out as well today.
I'm very excited to be able to do that.
So make sure you're dropping some comments, get in the read tweets, give us some likes
and of course chime in on these subjects, man.
We'd love to hear from you guys in the audience.
I'm going to send this one straight to knock.
You know where it's going, but I'm sure Jonah has some thoughts on this to explain the
What records did it break and why is this so successful?
And most importantly, what does this mean for a web three game like pixel mon and other
Pokemon like games and web three knock.
Yo, there is just so much to unpack here, so I'll kind of keep it short with this first
I think the important thing is to know right off rip.
It is now officially the single record holder for most concurrent players for a paid game
It is not a track to you.
PUBG is the only one in front of it.
I don't I don't think so.
I think PUBG I think they're number two.
I don't think they're I think today they just passed their sixth game in total for over
the course of steam history to ever reach that million concurrent player mark.
This is a game that is beyond big.
It is one of the largest releases in the last three to five years period.
This is a really interesting thing because it shows it's a game that's built off of everything
that we're supposed to hate.
It's copyright infringement borderline.
It's a game mechanic and the overall game itself isn't really polished, but what it is is a
It's something that touches on the nostalgia for a lot of people who grew up playing Pokemon
where it's close enough, but not quite.
It adds an over the top element with gunplay and borderline like creature slavery.
They're working in like the fucking mines and shit like the game is so absurd, but
I think that that's part of what the power behind palo world has become.
It is a game that is built for virality.
It touches on the heartstrings.
It plays into the nostalgia.
It's something that we all want to get our hands on for a couple of reasons.
The first is it's just so ridiculous.
There's no way that you just don't want to give it a shot.
You need to see what this game is all about.
The second piece is it is more than just a gimmick.
I think that that's where a lot of people had reservations coming into the release of
People felt like this was going to be a game that was designed for shock value and
to some degree it is, but when you hop in and you start world building and you have
raids on the base that you've created and you need to maintain and care for all the
creatures that you capture, you realize that this game actually has a pretty significant
element of depth to it and I think that that's been the secret sauce.
It is a really viral game.
It was designed for virality.
I want to make that very clear, but once you get your hands on it, once you actually
start to play the game, you realize that there's a lot of depth and there's a lot
of things that you can do with the game that you just haven't seen before.
Couple that with the fact that you're blending a couple of genres together and I think it's
a really unique, really fresh experience on gameplay that we've been waiting for for
quite some time, honestly, for major releases like this and it just goes to show that all
of the noise that people talk about, the things that we don't like to see, the things
that you're never going to be successful if you launch a game with these things, none
of that actually matters if you just deliver a really fucking fun game.
Power World is so, so exciting.
I don't want to hog the mic.
I want to dive into it, but at a high level, I think that those are some of the things
Yeah, and if anybody doesn't know if they've missed the boat on Power World, it's basically
Pokemon with guns and like satisfactory elements.
You can like craft and build and make them your slaves and they do additional stuff.
It's like four genres mixed into one.
Jonah, what are your thoughts on this and how it relates to the games that are trying
to do something similar in Web3?
Yeah, I think, man, I think a lot of the games in Web3 that are going to try and do this
So I've played about seven hours of this game, so I feel like I've played with enough of
the systems to tell you that this is not like some meme game.
This is a highly complex, like multi-year development based on the mechanics that I've
And there are some buggy moments, but I already know what's going to come is like they're
going to say, oh, this is like alluvium and I just like, there's nothing wrong with alluvium.
But if you do that, you're killing alluvium, like alluvium is a dead game.
If people compare it to Power World, I'm just telling you right now, like no shot
that they have any powder to compete with this game, having played both.
I can break down why I think the marketing worked, but you asked me a very particular
question and that's my answer.
I would love to hear from Tony or Mike behind Planet Mojo and what they think from the development
perspective on this as well.
Mike, do you have any thoughts on Power?
Have you had time to look at it yet?
So I have not played the game.
I'll say that up front, but I did do some studying today and it turns out one of our
lead engineers spent his entire weekend playing it.
So I talked with him for quite a while about it and dove into a little bit of the history.
And yeah, I mean, I think like the headline is sort of sexy Pokemon and guns, but like
I think it's important to remember this game was announced two years ago and it's probably
been in development for double that time.
And its wishlist on Steam, you know, was likely huge.
So they had a great launching off point and it seemed like they delivered something that
like, first of all, like it's Pokemon on the PC with Unreal five.
You know, it's like, I think it's something that like people wanted Nintendo to deliver
something like this for a long time and they have it.
So I think it like fills a void, right place, right time.
I'm curious to hear what Jonah says about the marketing, but you know, and it's important
This game's in early access.
Everyone forgets that because that's becoming the norm.
Their last game is still in early access that they shipped years ago and may never
go to full release, right?
They have updated it to their credit, but like it just sort of shows you the state
of things of how big you can be.
The numbers you were citing knock this game isn't even fully released.
The multiplayer, it seems like it has a way to go and there's a lot they can add
to that and how that's going to work.
But like, you know, my program or engineer uses like, Hey, if a bunch of my friends
wanted to start playing, I just start over, you know, cause I guess the multiplayer
stuff doesn't like the stuff you build doesn't cross over to other servers.
So that was one thing that was a little, he thinks they'll work out over time.
But yeah, it seems like really original and hit the right place at the right time.
Well, I'm sad to hear that about the, uh, the, the lack of cross-server
functionality because your boy, uh, bought it last night and had absolutely
no time to play and all my friends were having a great time knock.
I'm going to let you finish this subject up and then we're going to go ahead
and move on cause this is a web three gaming space, baby.
Yeah, I actually think that there's a lesson in this for a lot of the teams
that are building the web three space over, over the last couple of years.
We've, we've been obsessed with this idea of AAA quality graphics and high
fidelity assets and super polished systems and things that are all net new and
created specifically for the game that we're building and while all of that
is like really fun and it's, it's sexy if you're an NFT speculator and you're
going to buy assets based off of all of these promises that a developer is
delivering the reality of the situation is pal world is a game that its core
mechanics are like full stop copied from existing titles, right?
You've got the Pokemon elements, you've got teams, you've got captures.
When you look at the inventory and the progression system in the game,
it's literally arc, the graphics aren't great.
The mechanics aren't great, but it's good enough.
The overall polish of the game is not great, but it's good enough and it's
something that from a web three speculator point of view shouldn't have
worked, right? You're, you're, you're using templatized assets.
You're using systems that exist in other games.
You know, you're frankly full out copying things.
You're trying to be a clone.
You're trying to add shock value.
These are all things that web three tells you cannot work, but I think the
lesson, the thing to take away here is what's more with the most important
thing, and it's crazy that this needs to be said is a fun game.
It needs to be something that people want to play that has some amount
of progression, everything else is second and third.
And it's, you know, it's, it's not even important if your game and your
core gameplay loop is not fun.
Web three developers who are working with triple or quadruple the budget
that the power world team built that game with, I think it was $7 million should
look at this and thank you.
I should look at this and realize that one of the most important things to
take away from power world is it's good enough, but that's good enough.
As long as the game is fun, none of these tertiary items matter.
You don't need to have the highest fidelity graphics.
You don't need to have the best sound.
You don't need to have the most Polish.
As long as the core gameplay loop is good and attractive, people will want to play
your game, and I think that that's something that a lot of the time, maybe
because of the speculative nature of web three, we sort of lose sight of.
Fresco tagging in you and then Gigi.
Yeah, I think one of the things that, um, just to totally piggyback off of
what Knox said, there's one other thing that's, that's huge in this, right?
Is that it's a game that's better enjoyed with people that you know.
So one of your friend buys, one of your friends buys it right for $26.
And then next thing you know, that person's told somebody and then that person
has told somebody and you know, and we've seen these sales just totally,
And I think one thing that, um, people aren't really talking about enough when
it comes to power world is launching on Xbox game pass and it, but it launched
in a very limited way on game pass.
And I think that's, I don't know if this was intentional, but I think it was genius
and it might've been accidental genius, but you know, it's not really feature
complete even for like an alpha or beta, you know, on Xbox game pass, what you
have to do to play with your friends then is go buy it on Steam, right?
So it, it gives you a free introduction to the game, but if you really want
to play and really have those moments, you know, with people, you have to go buy it.
And I think that's genius and I think it was accidental genius,
but it's genius nonetheless.
Um, last thing I think that was really important for me as a takeaway
from pal world is like new games, getting users to play runs through creators
and there's, that's never been more apparent.
And I think, you know, with pal world, all they did, as far as I can tell,
I did a lot of reading on pal world over like the last couple of days.
I haven't played it yet, but it seems like the only marketing they really did
was give free codes to people who make content.
And I think like just the premise of the game, almost at that point,
like has sorted such an interesting premise, right?
It's Pokemon, which we all loved just growing up.
And I think, you know, just giving access to creators to be able to get into that.
It's a game that you like have to make content on.
You want to stream it because it's so fucking funny and it's so unique.
And I just think that that's like one of the huge takeaways for me is that,
you know, user acquisition for new games in 2024, creators are going to drive that.
As soon as I saw a clip of somebody picking up what the equivalent of a
Charmander is and using it as a flamethrower, I was like, all right,
I'm sold, I don't care what the price is, I'm buying that thing.
Yeah, I mean, I totally agree with those takes.
I hear a lot of people say the creator economy is dead and that it's like a fad
that had already passed, but if anything, we're just seeing how creators are
really leading the way, like content is game, creators are king, and they
are a great distribution model, right?
And with PowerWorld, you see how just creating a game that's fun can create
that social effect of sending it to your friends, wanting to do it together.
And obviously, like also doing a little bit erratic and a little crazy
So I think it was really well done.
Now, instead of rip off, we'll have to see what ends up happening on that side.
But I think if you like, like Pokemon, you kind of wanted to win
and see if something comes out of it.
Well said, Jonah, I'll give you the last word, then we'll move on from this topic.
Yeah, I'm going to actually disagree.
I don't think content creators drove this game at all, and I have
the numbers to support why.
So if you go look at Steam, Steam charts, or like Steam DB, that's what it is.
You'll see that from the 20th to the 22nd, actually the viewership
numbers did not correlate with player acquisition.
Actually, it stagnated while player acquisition grew.
And I was just doing some reading trying to understand why this was happening.
And here's what I think is happening.
And here's what I think is going to happen more and more.
And this is something that content creators should really think about,
because if they don't take this with honesty, they're going to lose
to people who are smarter with this.
So here's what's happening.
The game was first shown or really went viral on IGN with the Power World trailer.
So it was actually a media trailer.
That Power World trailer was then syndicated by the top 1% content creators.
Then what happened as more people were making content or sorry, as more
content was being shown, and this was through their Discord and through
other means and through the through smaller creators, they then made
clips across TikTok, very short clips that had nothing to do
with the creator's influence.
It had to do with what a popular search term was, which is Pokemon with guns.
And they created clips that were shock value or very funny, but I had
no content creator identity on top of it.
This led to sales that that spun really quickly on top of like
the top YouTube creators, we'll get to that in a second.
After that happened, the content creators on YouTube and Twitch,
the top ones were like, holy shit, what is with this user growth?
And then they went and tried the game and instead of being a leading indicator,
they were actually a lagging indicator.
So TikTok was the leading indicator for normal creators who have no real
influence other than good search.
And then what happened is after big content creators and the 1% played it,
they gave a confirmation bias where people who bought the game were like,
I wonder what Aspen Gold thinks.
I wonder what Moist Critical thinks.
I wonder what my favorite gamer thinks.
And if the gamer thought it was good, it confirmed their desire to share the
content more if they thought the game was bad, then they would try and
understand why, and I think this is a really interesting shift in game
marketing because it's, it's showing that sometimes TikTok actually does
have a good conversion rate because historically games on TikTok do not
In fact, TikTok and Twitch have been lagging indicators and the leading
indicator has been Steam Wishlist.
And then from the Steam Wishlist, creators pull from the Steam Wishlist
So I like to think about who's the leading indicator that creates the
lagging confirmation bias, and I could talk about this further, but there's
no need to really deep dive for it.
Yeah, really interesting stuff.
I would love to get into that on a private conversation sometimes.
We don't unfortunately have the time today.
Matt, I want to send it over to you to kick off a question that we have
about PixelVault from Gfunk and essentially simplifying ecosystems.
Yeah, so it sounded like Jonah was saying to embrace the memes.
That's a bit of what we've been doing at PixelVault.
I think in the last bull run, we were sort of synonymous with complexity
and having multiple different layers to our ecosystem.
And now that we're, you know, gaming company first,
NFT company, blockchain company sort of secondarily,
our focus is really just about creating fun experiences.
Fortunately, our early not just metrics, but direct feedback from the
community is that we've built a really fun game.
And so if you have something that's fun, the rest will ultimately take
care of itself, you know, leaning into content creators, leaning into
some of these aspects of our virality, making sure that those that are
bringing value to an ecosystem, i.e.
the players, content creators are rewarded for expanding the audience
and finding ways for people to take real value out of ecosystems
that they're spending time in, in a way that's different than what we
saw in the last sort of play to earn model, right?
This sort of constant grinding mechanic where your skill directly
correlates to your yield in game.
So, you know, trying to evolve from the metas of the past, fortunately,
I think we were, fortunately or unfortunately, we were early to a lot of
those in the last run and planning to do so again this time, trying
to make, trying to like meet people where they are, give people a
reason to come into web three, into the blockchain space, you know,
leveraging credit card onboarding, email onboarding through companies
like Privy, but right now in these early stages of the game, just trying
to like really refine it, ease the onboarding process for our existing
community and then, you know, Q2, Q3, Q4, we'll start go out, going
out and tackling larger, more like web two based audiences.
Just real quick, I got to jump in.
It looks like Peyton from the Wolves Dow, the founder of the Wolves Dow
was SIM swapped, unfortunately, which means he's lost access to his
Twitter account and he's, of course, as happens whenever that happens,
posting a bunch of shit about scam coins because it's not really him.
So with that said, if you see anything from Peyton for the next, until
you hear us say it's all clear, just don't interact with it.
There is no Wolves Dow coin.
There is no Wolf or Fur or whatever the fuck.
The only thing that's actually coming out is about the Wolves Dow house
at GDC, but I'm not quite ready to announce that yet.
More to come, but that won't include a coin at all.
Matt, I know you have some more questions as one of
the big holders behind PixelVault.
First of all, Gfunk, good to see you again, man.
It's been a long time, my friend.
Oh, yes, you know, Gfunk knows, but I was really early in a PixelVault.
I've always loved the project.
And, you know, one of the things on this, this show being
simplified is that for a lot of projects, especially ones like PixelVault
that have so many different layers to them or, you know, a Neo Tokyo,
things that have been around for a while, there's NFTs, there's tokens,
there's games, there's so many channels in the discord.
What is, in your opinion, the best way for someone that, you know, maybe
is new to this space and wants to be involved?
Is it to play Battle Plan?
Is it to hold some of the GG token?
We know you guys also have Wolf game now under the umbrella.
So what's, what's in your opinion, the best way for someone to be involved,
get a little exposure and kind of enjoy what's going on with PixelVault?
I mean, moving forward, I really think it's going to be just leading
with the fun of the game.
After that, the rest sort of takes care of itself, right?
Even if you're not in crypto, let's say you spend some time playing
the game, you yield real rewards and it comes time to withdraw, right?
Now you're an actual motivated participant with reason to learn
about, you know, how to take value out of an ecosystem.
Then you're hopping into discord.
We've really started focusing on trying to push everyone towards the common
channel. So, you know, last, last cycle, we had our, our PixelVault founders
down, which is obviously a tremendously important part of our ecosystem.
But we realized, you know, most people, when they were coming into our,
our chat, we're not seeing this incredibly vibrant community
because it was all token gated.
So, you know, trying to deliver value for community and participants
without gating it to sort of the outside world, because really
that's when you're going to be creating real value that is beyond,
you know, sort of like these endless airdrop mechanics that we saw
go so horribly wrong last cycle.
So I think just, again, funneling people to where the fun is.
And once people have this enjoyable experience, they'll naturally
want to bring friends in, make friends surrounding these titles.
So, yeah, I'd say lead with the game first, always.
That is the ethos that we've been taking with us out of the bear market.
All right, we're going to move on to Play to Airdrop.
We have Nifty Islands going bananas the last few days.
Actually, Jonah, one of the minds behind their Play to Airdrop campaign.
I'm super curious to hear from the panel for the simplified audience.
Is it worth it to get involved in these campaigns?
Whenever you see a Play to Airdrop campaign, do you think it's going to be worth
Like, what is the thought process that goes behind this?
Tony from Shrapnel has the hand up first.
Yeah, I love to see if this was bullish or bearish or whatever the other
that segment is, I'd be so bullish on this.
And I think that from my perspective, and the guy who was just talking
that owns Wolf Game now, I think there's a lot to be learned from this
with regards to that is like the Play to Airdrop campaigns.
They just seem really fun, right?
Like getting just like double clicking on just focusing on the fun.
You know, people like completing quests and getting rewarded for that.
I think I've told you this before on other spaces, Sam.
I'm like the worst parent ever.
And my daughter plays a shitload of VR and I get updates all the time
that are like, congratulations, you've been promoted to head cashier
in fucking Job Simulator 18.
And like I just I think the more that we can help people like feel
like they are becoming more deeply embedded in the products that we're
building rather than the the potential financial instruments
that may underlie those products, the better off we're going to be.
And I think that, you know, you know, we're taking a note
out of the Play to Airdrop book.
We're going to do a ton of it, you know, coming into 24.
And, you know, you've seen us already start talking about our
the competition we've got coming up.
We're going to have one hundred thousand dollars in pricing up for
and sorry, in pricing and like money pricing, not like fake prizes,
that you'll be able to win every two weeks playing, you know,
playing Airdrop in our game.
And we we plan to extend that beyond that, you know,
the things that look like, you know, missions, requests and other games.
But those will be an integral part of our experience.
I'm trying to show shrapnel, but I really, truly believe
that this play to play to Airdrop experience is going to be out of this world.
And I think if you if you look at some of the some of the cool
applications that go beyond just the game,
you get you get some really interesting stuff.
Eli's in the crowd down there.
And I'm sorry, I'll stop here.
But Eli's in the crowd down there and he's an incredible musician.
And I think there's going to be all kinds of opportunities for people
to do listen to Airdrop or or play and listen or like do
do something in the gaming ecosystem that is not necessarily
be good at the game and Airdrop.
And I think that there's like this this model is bringing us closer to that,
which is really exciting.
I'm going to send it to knock next.
But first, from the audience, I would love to hear from you guys.
What games have you played and gotten Airdrops from?
What games are you looking at to earn from play to Airdrop?
What's your opinion on it?
Is it just play to earn with extra steps or a new name knock over to you?
I think it is play to earn with extra steps,
but I don't think that that's a bad thing.
I think teams who execute well will have a ton of success with this.
And I think that for your average consumer in the space,
the whole player to Airdrop meta that we're about to enter
is probably a waste of time for like 99 percent of the games
that will have some opportunity where it's not a waste of time
is when you have established games that have real gameplay
looped and real content to explore like Planet Mojo, like shrapnel,
like Nifty Island, you can hop into those games
and actually explore what's going on within the world.
There is content to be had, right?
There is something that you can do within the realm of that world
that doesn't just feel like you're at a job.
I've got to play for 15 minutes and I've got to earn my one coin.
That's going to be worth absolutely fucking nothing
because this isn't a real game.
That's what we're going to see a lot of over the next six months.
Nifty Island did an excellent job, one, because Jonah is a fucking genius,
but two, because when you actually got involved with that ecosystem,
there was a ton of content for you to explore.
Teams were building custom maps.
People were building things that you could have fun with.
And it didn't feel like you were there to earn an Airdrop.
It felt like you were enticed by something,
the promise of something that might have some value,
but you stayed because the content was excellent.
And I think the reason why I'm overall bearish in the short term
on this meta is because I think it's going to be really difficult
for teams that actually do have content to differentiate themselves,
because it's more difficult for them to say that this asset
is going to have some perspective value because your game is live,
because you've got NFTs that are live.
There are things that people can look at and say, hey,
this is what it's currently worth.
We know what this product is.
I don't know that this will be super valuable for me long term.
So maybe I want to take a guess on something that is a little more speculative.
And I think people will end up playing really shitty games,
hoping that they're going to deliver something that's special.
But I think the real alpha here is if a real game runs
a play to airdrop campaign, that's where you should be spending your time
because you're going to have fun.
You're going to play something that is a real tangible product with depth.
And maybe you earn something on the back end, but either way,
at least you progress within that ecosystem.
I have really mixed feelings about the entire player to play to airdrop pass.
I think it can be effective for teams that are great.
I think it's going to be disastrous for most teams.
I'm cautiously optimistic.
Eli in the audience that was just mentioned says I haven't
partaken in play to airdrop stuff, play to earn in a different phrase,
but just have to figure a way out to make it not a race to zero.
I don't feel like most of the games are fun enough and the amount to make
from hundreds of hours of playing would be better off trading or building something.
Definitely, if you're looking at it like that, instead of just playing
a game that might be fun, you're probably better off without it.
Just for some context, I talked to a team the other day and they were like,
yeah, we're trying to figure out how much money it would be worth to make
a play to airdrop campaign and then not disappoint people.
And I the number that they settled on was like 20 bucks.
I was like, I don't know, guys, if we're like getting down to making
it that much of a math equation, maybe this isn't the right strategy for you.
Knock, I saw the hand go up quickly.
I'll let you respond to that and then we're going to move
our way through the rest of the hands.
Yeah, I think what ends up happening just on Eli's point, just wanted to expand.
And this isn't gamified, so I don't care.
I'm going to mention the game.
In RuneScape, you can purchase bonds that have real world value.
And what ends up happening is a lot of players play the game
for like 60 hours to acquire enough gold to purchase the bond.
Then they use that bond and then they spend the next two weeks
literally just earning enough gold to maintain their membership.
And most players realize that was fucking stupid.
And what we should have done was paid the seven dollars
for the two weeks of membership.
And we would have had way more fun with the game experience.
To me, that feels like the path that a lot of people are going to go on
when they start trying to farm play to airdrop.
Speaking of airdrop, so I'm going to send it over to Crypto Gorilla,
one of the most educated on airdrops in the space.
Yeah, I guess I look at it, an investment of time for when it comes to games.
It's like Knox said, like I actually want to play the game.
I look at pixels, which I see a lot of people grinding.
And I was just I don't know, it's not my type of game that I want to play.
Even I do think the airdrop could be worth something.
I look at a lot of these campaigns like meme coin did one
where all you have to do was was tweet some stuff.
People's expectations are way too high.
Everybody thinks they're going to be airdropped like ten thousand dollars
just for retweeting something.
Those ones, to me, they're not worth it, especially you can get your Twitter
account banned because Twitter now thinks you're a bot.
So I never partake in those.
The airdrops I do are things like ZK Sync, Linnea, Starknet, Layer Zero,
those ones where I'm actually paying money in gas because in the past,
they have paid out thousands or tens of thousands of dollars,
especially if you're doing like a farm strategy and you plan it well
to not get identified as a cycle for games.
I think it was like a nice bonus.
Like if I can make money, if I could win money doing it, I love that.
At the same time, I get a lot of the playing the game.
If it's a I'm playing Nifty Island literally right now, building an island.
I filmed some clips before with Ash.
I'm getting content out of it.
And if I can get paid on top of it, people visiting my island,
I'm going to get paid for that.
That's that's amazing to me.
Like, I really like that.
And it's going to make me pick this game over another Web three game.
Is it going to make me pick this game over a Web two game?
Like, I want to test out how world what we were talking about before.
Am I going to how much time am I going to invest into power
world versus Nifty Island?
I don't think that potential air drop is going to be a difference maker for me
if I prefer the the power world game or whatever Web two game I'm picking.
Well said, I'm going to send it over to Gfong.
Gfong with battle plan on the rise.
Any thoughts on play to air drop?
Yeah, so I think Gorilla makes a good point.
You should be looking at it as added incentive.
Right. It's just a bonus.
I said this before, but leading with fun.
That's how you're going to get people coming to these games.
It shouldn't be just about a farm.
In the case of our game, right, it's wager based.
You you're paid out based on your skill.
But as part of the protocol itself, we've developed something called arcade score.
You can check it out at score dot reboot dot GG.
And it actually incentivizes all of the different mechanics
of the protocol itself via seasonal air drop.
So whether that's something a Web three participant might be interested in,
you know, farming, you know, providing liquidity validation or games
and across games, which is sort of the key to unlocking
this concept of a decentralized arcade.
But right now you see all the different ways you can interact with battle
plan soon. That'll be the different ways you can interact with wolf game.
We've gotten a commitment from Chimpers, which is a team and ecosystem
completely different from our own.
But going to this sort of centralized hub for the arcade,
you can see different ways that you can interact across ecosystems
and still generate that that common, quote unquote,
yield for playing games that should already be fun.
Amber, the MP CEO joining us from the audience, sending it over to you next.
You know, so I don't want to beat a dead horse here,
but I gave a pretty savage take on this earlier today on your earlier space.
And I mean, from the lens of through simplified,
I think it's a little bit of a different take.
And like, yeah, I don't think that play to air drop is like the cast pajamas
and every what everybody is making out to be like Knox said,
like it's play to earn with a couple extra steps.
But I will say through the lens of simplified,
I'm pretty excited about the concept of playing a new game that you like
and being introduced to Web three in a really exciting and fun way.
And I think it's going to depend a lot on how a game has their wallet
and their account set up, you know, the functioning
so that you can introduce players to a wallet system in a way where it's like,
hey, look, you got this new item, you got this new skin,
you got this new gun, you got this new game currency, whatever it is.
If that user flow happens seamlessly,
that's a really exciting that's a really exciting concept for me
when it comes to mass adoption of Web three.
Great stuff. We're going to Gigi, then to Jonah.
I have to completely agree with with the onboarding process
in most games are completely deterring normal players
that would I love the game ideally, right?
Like when you talk about setting up a wallet,
understanding private keys, acquiring crypto,
that's you lose half the battle there
because a lot of people don't want to have to create more friction
And even with the gaming like with the gaming experience,
you want to have a game that it's really fun to play,
that you are following a good storyline that is entertaining
and not something that feels like as soon as you get that airdrop,
you're going to lose your entire user base because they no longer
they never really like playing the game.
They only wanted to farm the points.
Well, said, Jonah, your take on played airdrop.
Yeah, someone who's uniquely attuned to it
and have helped on Nifty Island strategy.
I'll explain the reason why
and how this stuff actually works
and what the actual use case for it is.
So it's not like play to earn.
It's intuitively not like play to earn for a couple of reasons.
Play to earn has no call to action.
And that's part of the problem.
The idea is you log in and you get some money.
That that doesn't drive any metrics
that the developer can point to as a growth target
and as a way to test game loops in game design.
So thinking about played airdrop,
the idea for Nifty Island is quite simple.
It is a open metaverse game,
which means we need to incentivize island creation.
And the play to drop Eric campaign is not meant to last forever.
It's meant to incentivize people to build enough islands
that when the Web 2 campaign is ready,
people from Web 2 are not coming here with empty islands
and don't have like an idea of what can be built.
And there's a theory of either we pay land builders directly
at a premium, which is very expensive,
and they also don't always do a good job,
or we pay the creator and an independent directly in some way
and that person can get rewarded for their skill
and eventually potentially grow their own studio.
And so what are you doing? You're using play to airdrop
in a way that reinforces certain loops you want.
So, for example, if we want people to create 50 islands,
well, we need to create an airdrop campaign
that warrants like allocation based on 50 islands.
If we want a campaign in which we want people to log on
on Saturday night at 7 p.m. to play a specific game
when we need to have an allocation for that particular time.
And what we're doing is rather than having an airdrop
for just logging in or a player to log in,
you are driving traffic towards game design loops
you want to test before they go to mass market
because mass market doesn't care about earning, right?
And I think of play to airdrops as a strategy
where you actually decentralized game testing,
not decentralized game earning.
And there is a very big difference between the two,
and there was a very unique intention
behind the strategy that we worked with Charles on.
Now, Charles has a very good team.
It's not like it's just me.
And I will also tell you,
I don't think every game should copy it.
In fact, I'm working with a game right now
where they're one of our clients.
No one even knows about it.
They don't know about the raise.
And we're working on an airdrop strategy
that most people haven't thought of at all.
That's an alternative model to play to airdrop
that I think people will find quite interesting
specifically for a mobile game.
Like I don't apply a model sheet to every game.
It doesn't work that way.
I want to give out the first Dark Frontiers white list
to my man, Eli, in the comments.
Eli slide in with your Ethereum address.
We have to submit it tonight though.
So please make sure you do it right away.
I'm going to send it over to Nock
and then we're going to chime in with another topic.
Yeah, I think just to wrap up on the topic,
what Jonah just described is the exact reason
why for the overwhelming majority of teams
and for people who are trying to farm, play to airdrop,
this meta is going to be a disaster.
Jonah just described something that was very well thought out
with real tangible goals, with a multi-step process.
They understand exactly what they're trying to incentivize.
Those goals are aligned with the players
and the types of people who are participating in the maps
either through creation or through playing.
This is something that is very well thought out.
and I think I want people listening to be cognizant of,
is you're going to have plenty of teams
who will want to incentivize user numbers
so they can either go back and raise
or make their game look a little bit better.
But what's going to end up happening
is it will become, like Jonah said,
play to earn just with extra steps.
There is not going to be a real call to action.
There will be no tangible metrics
for the overwhelming majority of teams
who are trying to execute on something like this.
I think if you're a consumer
and you want to get involved in the games in this space,
games as part of these campaigns,
you should ask a couple of questions.
What are the goals from the game developer's perspective?
Are they being public about those goals?
Do I understand how I can earn
within this airdrop ecosystem within the campaign?
Is it something that makes a ton of sense to me?
And on top of all of that, is it fun?
If the answer to any of those questions are no,
it's probably going to be
a little bit of a time trap for you.
And I think your time is spent better elsewhere,
but there's always going to be teams like Nifty Island
that are very well thought out with their goals,
and it's going to reward users who participate there
proportionally to the effort
that they're putting within the ecosystem.
So I think that this is a really exciting path,
but I also think it's so much more complicated
than just come play your game and earn some shit.
Well said, and I've been a little bit behind
We got 15 or 20 minutes left in this space,
so I'm going to give away the next two
to people that are giving us a retweet,
helping us get some more exposure on the space.
Big shout out to everybody in the comments.
Matt, you have a question for us
on building a Web3 Gaming portfolio.
Yeah, I want to shift gears a bit
and just bring up one of the questions
that I get a lot from newer people
particularly with Web3 Gaming, right?
There are a lot of things happening,
as we all know, short term, long term.
There's games, there's tokens, there's NFTs.
I would just love to go around the horn one time
and get your advice for a newbie
kind of coming into the space.
I think one of the biggest mistakes
that I made last time in the last run
was getting distracted by a lot of games
and not investing into enough projects
that were supporting those games,
whether it be launch pads
or things that were more on the development side
and I narrowed myself in on some games
that either just never released
or released and weren't what they were promised.
So what's your guys' advice
on how someone sort of avoids that this time diversifying?
Do you think it's better to go tokens, NFTs?
Just curious where everyone stands on that.
Jonah, I got the hand up first.
Yeah, I think there's like different circles of risk.
I think if you want exposure to games,
then you're going to pick an L2,
like an Avalanche token, right?
Then the next one under that is an ecosystem token.
So for example, shrapnel token, right?
Because I imagine if the first shrapnel game goes well,
they have the proper capital.
Do they make more of their own games?
So you call that like an ecosystem token.
And then under that you do game native token
and then under that game native NFT.
The only time the game native NFT itself yields larger value
is if you're actually going to use it in such a way
that it will reinforce your own IP,
either in their ecosystem or through some third party.
I think people make the mistake
of confusing a gaming NFT with a profile picture project.
and both have their own risk associated.
And if you want very little risk at all,
simply buy L1 tokens and stake L1 tokens
on various services that promote airdrops.
And if you want no risk at all,
then be in the cabal and insider trade
Solid advice, solid advice.
I love how the no risk at all point ends
So I would say the way that I build a gaming portfolio
and what works for me is I try to think about
capital deployment in Web3 Gaming
in a similar way that I play games.
And what I mean by that is
I tend to have two or three multi-year titles.
Games that I know I'm going to be playing this year,
games that I played them last year,
going to play them this year,
I'm probably going to play them next year as well.
For me, it's RuneScape, it's League, it's Valorant.
Those are three titles that I spend
the overwhelming majority of my time.
And proportionally, I spend the overwhelming majority
of my capital on two or three long-term bets.
One of those bets, as an example, is Wildcard for me.
The way I look at short-term plays is similar
to how you have short-term experiences with games.
Palworld might be a flash in the pan.
We've seen this happen in the past.
There was recently Fatal Company, I think it was called,
or something similar that just recently launched.
Those are games that you tend to play for a weekend or two.
Maybe they last as long as a month.
Think of those as your short-term flips.
These are the types of games that really are a flash in the pan.
They're a game that does a really good job of marketing.
They have this really strong campaign leading up to their mint.
Typically, you tend to move out of those games relatively quickly.
The way that I structure my portfolios
is you pick two or three of those long-term plays.
You understand that these are games
that will take literal years to build and you slowly acquire.
You rotate some of those flips,
the profits that you make from a flip flash in the pan game,
into something that you believe in a little more long-term.
And you trade and you understand
that games take a long time to build.
It's even harder to really add depth to that ecosystem.
But if you're right on one of those long-term bets,
you're going to outperform pretty much everybody
who decided that they were going to try
and catch every single flash in the pan.
So for me, I think about it in the same way that I play games.
You lock in on two or three titles
that you're going to care about for the next couple of years.
You pay attention to some of the flash in the pans,
but you realize that they're just that,
a flash in the pan, an opportunity
to maybe make some capital.
Don't lose sight of the long-term goals
because that's where outsized returns will be.
We're going to jump in with some degeneracy
to cap off a level-headed topic.
Paleo versus Bloodloop versus Play Ember.
Three big gaming mints coming up.
Bloodloop actually minted today.
Last I checked, it was sitting around 15 Avacs
which is the equivalent of like $400 or $500.
Play Ember has been super hype.
They have a whole host of mobile gaming products
and then Paleo, an AI game from the minds of Exterio,
actually going to be doing a space with them after this one.
So I'll be staying up late and grinding a little bit.
Curious which one you guys think will have a higher floor price
I'm going with my boys over at Play Ember.
They've got a good team over there
that's going to be super communicative with their audience
and they have a product that it feels like
is touchable and feelable now
and it feels like those two things together
are going to help them win over the next few weeks.
I think that it'll be Paleo
just because it's a narrative that everybody's excited about.
I think that Play Ember, people...
Maybe this is foolish of me to think
that from a games industry insight,
but I think Hypercasual is kind of in a weird place
and Bloodloop, I think, is just way too competitive.
I'm not super big on hero shooters.
I don't think that a hero shooter
can really have a lot of long-term success right now.
And I think Paleo is just so interesting
and I think that the best thing that they're doing
is not really saying much about the project
and I think that's going to make people super excited
Ember, what do you think?
because I am an exterior maxi.
They've been absolutely crushing it.
Jeremy and exterior could launch a fart in the wind
and it would hit one E's right now.
Fucking weirdest analogy.
I think all three of these are actually really good plays.
I think the Bloodloop team has shown
that they can maintain a fairly strong floor price,
so I've got some pretty significant confidence
that that asset holds out well over the next couple of weeks.
I think John Hook and the Play Ember team
I've known them for about a year now.
That is a team that continues to deliver.
They're doing an excellent job with their marketing campaign.
They've teamed up with really smart people in the space
who understand how to play the Web3 game.
That is definitely a strong team to take a bet on.
I think the only answer here, though,
is Paleo for a couple of reasons.
The first, as part of the exterior family,
if Jeremy's got his hand on something,
I tend to be pretty bullish on it.
He understands the Web3 game just about better
than pretty much any founder in the space right now.
He is somebody who really deeply understands
how to say enough, but not so much
that you start putting comparisons on the price of asset.
You try to nail down what this price might look like.
I think there is enough information about the game
that people are going to get excited.
There's a couple of interesting narratives around AI
that should do well from a speculative perspective.
But the biggest thing for me is that
they have not told you everything.
That suspense, the ability to draw that out,
that is something that should help to sustain floor price.
I'm pretty confident that that one does well long term.
Which one's going to win out Paleo,
Bloodloop, or Play Ember two weeks from now
when it has the highest floor price?
Not Bloodloop, even though I think
that they look really good.
It's clearly a good game,
but I think mobile is just generally the move.
I think Paleo will have a better floor price,
even though I would like to see Ember
have the higher floor price.
Not that I have a dog in the race necessarily,
but they're both on exterior,
except one's a premier partner and one is a launch partner.
When you build a marketplace business,
so everyone wants to be an exclusive first party partner.
That means delineating between the floors.
If you don't think that Jeremy is not going to...
I don't like the word manipulate,
but move floors based on what his business objectives are,
I think that that would be a mistake.
On the flip side, there's a saying
that everything's priced in,
and if everyone thinks that Paleo's going to be the big thing,
then I'm going to have to go Ember
because I like going against the grain.
And if everyone thinks it's going to be hyped,
then everyone also wants to sell.
All right, yeah, fair enough.
Yeah, it's easier to say now for Bloodloop.
I never expected it to go crazy.
I think a lot more people are bullish on the token,
launching through Cetaphy.
Becker's sold it a bunch of times.
People full sent in the presales that they got.
I guess Paleo hasn't done too much whitelist stuff yet,
so I'm not seeing it on the secondary market.
I do know people were buying Ember whitelist for $1,600,
So I do expect it to be at least somewhere there,
But I'd agree that Paleo, it's through Exterio.
I mean, to me, it's a no-brainer.
I saw some people flooding the Age of Dino auction
just because it was set up that it sells out at 0.6.
At the top, people were saying,
oh, the price is too expensive.
To me, it was a no-brainer.
The success of Exterio in my mind,
part of it depends that they want to have their own token
and all these projects are going to have their own token.
They all need to do well.
Like if not, people are going to lose bullishness on Exterio
and that's not going to look good for them.
So they just have to keep it going.
So I'm just trying to get whitelist
for every single one of the project
and I'll just full send every single one.
So I do expect Paleo to perform really well.
I guess I'll say I expected to perform the best,
but I'm not sure how high it goes,
especially after Age of Dino.
I think people are going to be a little reluctant.
At least the men price is way cheaper now
So there's a lot more room for people not to be scared
and just start panic selling as the floor goes down.
Age of Dino just revealed.
Luckily, we're not seeing it go too far down,
but I agree with the whole, we'll call it floor manipulation,
but just market making, dude.
Apple buys back their own shares.
Like I don't see it as a big deal
if they're market making their floor.
They need to raise money.
VCs need to see them as success.
So I personally don't mind and whatever.
If you care about it, just sell.
So yeah, I'd go with Paleo as well,
but I'm also really bullish on plans.
I don't have an opinion on how Jeremy moves his market.
I'm just saying that if people think he will,
they're ignorant to the reality of business
because his business is making sure
that he competes against Magic Eden,
not even OpenSea, it's Magic Eden.
And Magic Eden is going to outspend
the living shadow in this year.
So his only defense is propping up floors
beyond what they're probably worth.
Interesting discussion there.
Last question of the episode.
Play Ember is a hyper casual game creator.
I believe there's like nine titles
that they have out already.
Hyper casual, there was a big narrative
that it was dead in Web2 about a year ago,
primarily because of the, let's say,
changes in privacy policies
that made it significantly more expensive
for them to acquire users.
Does that mean it's also dead in Web3
and should that affect Play Ember
or what they have going for them?
Tony, from Shrapnel, over to you.
I think it's insane to say
that hyper casual games are dead.
so much money that still flows through these games.
It's not like because the privacy,
because it became more expensive
that those customers still don't have value.
It just means that you acquire fewer of the ones
that don't have as much value,
but there's still the play a game on the bus
or in the bathroom or whatever market.
The games that code you from parallel
if you play for three hours straight.
They're not going anywhere.
As we've been sitting here talking,
I've been playing several hyper casual games.
The idea that we have bazillions of people,
however many humans live on the earth
that are walking around with a phone in their pocket,
which is effectively five Super Nintendos
are going to stop playing stuff
for five to eight seconds at a time
at the same time that TikTok
is skyrocketing to new heights.
Again, I don't see that as a real narrative.
What I do think you're seeing
is that this is what I think it's good.
I think it's what we're seeing in web three
is that a lot of the bullshit
is going to get scraped out
because you're not going to be able
to go buy a bazillion users
at half a penny or a tenth of a penny each
not Kim Kardashian, B-level,
Reeskin of the Kim Kardashian game.
But the hyper casual games
that are well thought out, well-designed,
and those aren't oxymorons.
hyper casual games out there
that have really compelling loops
that deserve to be played and supported.
Those games will continue to rise to the surface
and they will continue to do
what those games did for the game industry,
which is inflect the amount of money
The League of Legends did a great job
the monetization mechanism
and streams in the gaming industry.
But Paul Bettner is the one
who added billions and trillions of dollars
with things with word with friends.
That over the last 10, 15, 20 years
has been what has made the industry
and it's not going anywhere.
It's insane to think that it is.
I'll send it over to Gona again.
Yeah, I completely agree.
is actually a really amazing sweet spot
I mean, I think of Twitter
So the actual metagame is Twitter, TikTok,
At least that's my thesis
and then games around those themes.
I think that's the evolution
because effectively Twitter
is a hyper casual video game.
I log on for about 20 minutes.
Effectively, I have now played
So I think that if you think about
everything as a game loop
The problem isn't hyper casual.
It's just it's a retargeting question.
And I think there is a world here.
it will be the next Zynga.
I'm not sure if Zynga is the next Zynga
and that's why I'm excited
for things like Play Ember
because they have a lot more
Zynga is a multi-billion dollar company.
It doesn't have that much left to prove
what they're doing at Sugar Town
this is really good for the space
because Sugar Town, Play Ember
and all these other hyper casual studios
are going to compete against each other.
And it's going to not only be a game,
a competition of game design
addressable market and like search.
Someone's going to figure out
the new model for acquiring users.
And I think they're going to
figure it out here first.
Matt, I want to tag you in real quick
before we go to Mike from Planet Mojo.
What are your thoughts on the Twitter game loop?
I mean, I love the way Jonah just described it.
That really is what it is.
with all social media platforms.
I think that's why TikTok exploded
is because it didn't just have people
being bystanders that were watching content
and encouraged you to actually create content
even if you were bad at it.
Even if you had no talent,
you didn't have a good camera.
See what trends people are doing.
You put something in the oven
and it burns and then you taste whatever.
It made it fun for people to get involved.
I think it's really not that different
from like Jonah said a lot of the games
that are being created now.
You need that feedback loop
to keep people interested
and basically, at the end of the day,
Your thoughts on Hyper Casual
and how it might affect Play Ember?
on Hyper Casual in general,
like when you're just tapping mindlessly and stuff.
I mean, one thing to keep
into perspective with those that's happened
is, you know, with the big changes
in IDFA and things like that,
those games really had very low retention.
It was all about moving people
and really driving revenue from the ads.
And what's really happened
is a lot of those developers
are trying to move those players
into more mid-core titles
because you can then have
So it is a great entry point into games.
I think that's what it's served
But I think as developers,
into more mid-core games.
And really, like, you know,
we worked with one of the best
free-to-play experts in the world
has worked with Supercell
And, you know, the central theme
really behind the most successful games,
whether they're Hyper Casual, casual,
you can say the same thing
He says this is, you know,
you have to be able to sit on the couch
with your significant other watching TV
and be able to play the game, right?
Like, there are just these moments
where like you're on the bus,
So that market is always shifting.
And, you know, I think, yeah,
there's always going to be a space for it.
But I think really games want games
with higher retention value
to keep the players in for longer.
That's tough to do with sort of,
at least the first generation
of what these Hyper Casual games were.
Noc, I'm going to give you the last word
before we put a bow on today's space, man.
What's your thoughts on Hyper Casual?
Yeah, I mean, it's here to stay.
I think a lot of the conversation
about Hyper Casual over the last little while
is due in part to some of the headlines.
You know, it's decreasing in profitability.
It's not as popular as it once was.
But I think it's important to understand
that if you're 50% larger than the competition
and you decrease 15% year over year,
which is definitely cause for concern,
you're still significantly larger
than the guy in second place.
And I think that that is an important piece
of the context that often doesn't get talked about.
Hyper Casual, even in a declining state,
is still larger than most verticals
when you're talking about types of games.
And it's definitely something that,
like Tony mentioned, everybody's got access to,
which is can't be said for things
like console gaming or PC gaming.
Almost everybody has a phone.
There are literally like five or six billion people on Earth
that have access to a mobile phone.
Those people have access to Hyper Casual games.
If they're going to game,
chances are it's going to be one of those titles.
And we've seen that true over the last little while.
I think the trickier thing
is something that Mike mentioned.
It's now more difficult than it ever was
to acquire users to a Hyper Casual game.
So things are going to get more competitive.
It's going to cost more to bring users in.
And all that really means
is teams need to spend a little more money
understanding how to create more sticky gameplay loops
from the fewer years that they have.
But just because it's been declining
doesn't mean that it's going to stop in King tomorrow
Hyper Casual is 100% here to stay.
It's just a little bit more
of a tricky ecosystem to play in than it once was.
There used to be a time where
Hyper Casual was literally spend $100,
It's not like that anymore,
but there's still plenty of money to be made.
Those last two whitelists
are going to go to non-fungible Taylor.
He's been helping us out in the comments
quite a bit over the last few shows.
He says also have to consider daily active users
like Pixels, for example.
I think you have to be in the top 7,000 or so
This, of course, on our play to airdrop segment earlier
with the amount of players already in the ecosystem,
let alone people that will come in and farm.
You have to consider if it's worth your time.
And then Huncho Mike also been killing it.
Gotta give a big shout out to him.
You guys can slide in my DMs
that will hook you up with some dark frontiers whitelists.
And as we holster our weapons at the close
of today's electrifying expedition through Simplified,
let's blast a final resounding triumph
to the titans behind our tactical triumphs.
The official game of Simplified in the realms of FPS,
shrapnel reigns supreme, orchestrating an overload
of ordinance where every strategist schemes,
sculpts the stories and stripes and successes
in the shadows of shattering shells.
Embark on an expedition to shrapnel.com.
Gear up in your digital garb.
Load your ledger with lethal loot
and lock in your coordinates for the next combat conquest.
And remember, warriors, shrapnel's strategic saga
unfolds on the sturdy slopes of avalanche.
Jesus have fallen apart at the end of the day.
We'll be back same time, same place next week,
but just a heads up, me and Matt are actually
gonna be making content at the Pro Bowl
with the NFL in Orlando in a couple of weeks,
which is gonna be super hyped.
We're gonna be making some Super Bowl
or some touchdown dances,
and I'm not gonna be the only one dancing.
Sam's gonna get in on it.
So you guys might see a world's first premiere
I thought that was gonna be Eli Manning taking my spot, bro.
Well, we'll see if we can supplement it, maybe.
But a big shout out to everybody on the panel.
Of course, my brother, the man who puts the D
in decentralized in the change, a brony.
The play shrapnel account.
Go follow T-Valk, his personal account as well.
Dude's an absolute stunner.
Crypto Gorilla, one of the absolute best content creators
I wish I could let talk for an hour all by themselves.
G-Funk, amazing to have you on a space
for the first time, and thank you so much, brother.
Jonah, thanks for dropping him in.
It's absolutely amazing to get your input
especially when it comes to marketing.
Your mind is impeccable in the space.
Gigi, absolutely crushing it.
Another new entrant into the simplified arena
and appreciate you tremendously.
We'd love to have you back yet again.
Knock, of course, our co-hosts with the most, man.
absolutely wonderful to have you on the space yet again.
Catch us the same time, same place next week.
Damn, I can't really end it better than that, bro.