The Steam platform puts a ban on containing or entertaining games based on NFT or blockchain.
The entire world is hearing ample things about NFTs and crypto every other day. While some people stand against this idea, others are assured that these digital mediums are the future. More and more people are coming up with newer ways to integrate their business with Non-Fungible Tokens or NFTs.
Among the many varied categories, gaming is one of the most-willing genres that is seeing the maximum attachment with this latest blockchain technology. Even this collaboration has not remained far from controversies. On one hand, game developers are welcoming blockchain, and on the other, people are being loud with negative feedback.
Valve’s Gabe Newell thoughts on NFTs
Currently, Gabe Newell, the co-founder and President of Valve is in news for backlashing NFTs. He has made several lengthy remarks where he is all downbeat about using NFT and blockchain. His wrath has gone up to the extent where he announced banning NFT and blockchain-based games on his platform Steam.
The more intriguing thing is that Gabe is indulged in continuous interviews where he is condemning the usage of blockchain at this time when the Steam Deck is under the review stage. Steam Deck is the newest variant by the company Valve, which is a portable gaming PC.
It is quite a bold decision to ban crypto and NFT games on their platform, especially when the strongest competitors like Epic Games are welcoming the same concept wholeheartedly. However, Steam was taking payments by way of digital currency that is crypto at one point.
But, Gabe sent a clarification message during a chat with James Archer from Rock Paper Shotgun. Gabe in this conversation said that “Steam was accepting cryptocurrencies for payments. And it turned out that it just made customers super mad. There was the issue of volatility: you don’t want your pricing to vary when anchored to people’s wages.”
He said that the annoyance of using crypto is not of any worth, either for the company itself or for its customers. His agitation could be seen on his face and was loud enough in his words when he said, “Why did I spend $497 one day to buy a game, and the next day I spent 47 cents, what’s going on here? Volatility is a bad thing in a medium of exchange. That was one problem, that sort of volatility was creating more pain for our customers than the value of having the option of using cryptocurrencies.”
Gabe did not just mention crypto, but NFTs also while showing his dismay with this technology. According to him, Non-Fungible Tokens are in the wrong hands, and he says that “it is a criminal activity having a lot of sketchy behaviors, and are not people you really are wanting to be doing business with.” Newell feels that people are putting crypto and blockchain to misuse.
