On September 8, the Sui Foundation held a "game" themed AMA on Twitter Space. The meeting was hosted by Rainier from the foundation's marketing team, and three guests, Coert Voorhees, Anthony Palma, and Bill Allred, were invited to share their views. Coert Voorhees is the co-founder and CEO of Arden, whose products provide infrastructure for blockchain and enhance user experience. Anthony Palma has ten years of experience in the game industry. He was a partner at a well-known game partnership company and is now responsible for the game partnership of Mysten Labs. Bill Allred is responsible for Mysten Labs' game products and is also a core contributor to Sui Blockchain. He has previous experience in mobile game and VR game development.

Please tell us how you got into the gaming industry and what attracted you to it?

Bill: My first job in the games industry was working on social games. I've loved playing games since I was a kid, although I never considered myself a very avid gamer. But what really appeals to me about gaming is that it's a great training ground for learning how to build digital products for people. The iteration cycles are very fast, you learn a lot from players, you can try out new ideas and build them, and you get feedback in almost real time. So gaming was a really fascinating education for me in building digital products. I think that's why I continue to be interested in this industry, is to build great experiences that satisfy a broad audience.

Anthony: In college, I was studying for a degree in Computer Science and Computer Engineering, and then I realized gaming could be a career for me. So, I enrolled in Carnegie Mellon University's entertainment technology master's program, and we made several games for different clients. I worked at Disney, but what fascinated me more was working with friends on a game design course to make a game and being part of it from start to finish was so much fun and satisfying. After graduation, I founded a game company. Although the results were not satisfactory, I accumulated rich experience in game production. I understood that I was not the best programmer, and after a period of exploration, I found a role that suited me better and better combined my interests, passion for new technologies, and love of games, which I now have at Mysten Labs The job is a perfect fit.

Coert: My background is as a novelist, and I was a teacher and then joined a tech company teaching grammar to elementary and middle school students. About 6 years ago, I started a publishing company at a media company in Texas that covered games, books, and movies. Although my experience with games is completely different than Anthony's, from a creative perspective, games are different ways in which narrative can happen, which is very fascinating to me.

What is the difference between Web2 games or traditional games and Web3 games?

Bill: When it comes to user experience, there is almost no difference between Web2 games and Web3 games. The fun of the game and the player experience are the most important. But they are very different in terms of technology, payment channels and digital asset ownership. Developers need to decide whether to expose more Web3 features to players. Some Web3 native players may be more interested in the economics of the game, but casual players may not care. Therefore, developers have many options when it comes to delivering the best experience.

Why do some Web3 games have a bad reputation among traditional gamers?

Anthony: That's a good question. Some Web3 games may be too focused on making money, especially Play to Earn games, where their goal is to make money rather than enjoy the game, which results in some games being of low quality. To change this, we need to build truly fun games that focus on entertainment and not focus too much on Web3 tags.

What role do you think blockchain technology will have on the gaming industry?

Coert: Blockchain technology is in the experimental stage, and people are trying various methods, such as tokens, asset ownership, etc. Currently, we don’t know what the best practices are, but blockchain as a database system adds a lot to existing systems. True ownership of assets may be the future, giving in-game items real value. We are in an era of innovative possibilities.

What are some interesting use cases in Web3 games?

Bill: Web3 games provide players with the concept of digital asset ownership, allowing them to manage in-game items as if they own physical items. This opens up more possibilities for social interaction, allowing players to share and exchange game assets in a more direct way, which is very engaging for players. For developers, Web3 provides the opportunity to redefine the relationship between creators and consumers, allowing them to share the value of creation more equitably, rather than relying solely on the platform. This is an interesting prospect for both creators and developers.

How does Sui support these features in Web3 games?

Bill: A key difference with Sui is that everything is an object, with the properties, protections and rights of an NFT. This enables in-game items and digital assets on Sui to be managed and interacted with as flexibly as real-world assets. This architecture gives players and developers more room for innovation, allowing them to build more complex and advanced games. In Sui, each object has independent properties and relationships, which gives developers greater freedom to create modern gaming experiences that are different from traditional Web2 games. This is one of Sui's strengths and provides more possibilities for future game development.

Anthony: Sui leads the way in scalability, speed, cost, functionality, and abstraction for the core pillars necessary to power games . We have undergone stress testing and processed more than 200,000 transactions per second, which is fast and low-cost, with an average gas fee of only $0.000005. This allows developers to better plan within the cost model without having to worry about soaring gas costs during times of high network traffic. In addition, Sui's object model is embodied in the game, making dynamic NFTs that update in real time possible, which helps players have more freedom and interactivity in the game. Most importantly, Sui’s architecture supports associations between items, allowing players to freely combine and trade game assets without fear of destroying the value of the original NFT.

Coert, can you explain how the infrastructure you are building supports on-chain gaming?

Coert: One of the reasons we chose Sui is because of its ability to mimic the Web2 experience on Web3, which is very important for our game. We built a triple client with a nested architecture that allows players to freely combine in-game items, much like customizing their ships. We also have some test projects, such as a poetry-inspired casual game where players can purchase words and create poems, then embed those words into poems and share them with others. We are working hard to integrate Sui's features into our games to give Web2 users a Web3 experience that engages them by showing rather than telling. Our goal is to make Web3 more understandable and acceptable to them.

Are there any games currently under development that you are particularly interested in and could you share some details about?

Coert: The specifics of the games are probably more appropriate for Anthony and Bill to share, but I'm excited by the concept of being able to enjoy Web3 games without realizing they are Web3 games. Moving more game content on-chain is one of the possibilities in the future.

Anthony: We are at a unique moment where three key factors are converging to bring about major breakthroughs in blockchain gaming. The first is Sui, which provides the extensibility and abstraction needed for games. Secondly, it is easier for ordinary users in the market to get started without going through a complicated education process. Finally, developers are actively building games, and some have made it to the watch list. These three are integrating at the right time, bringing unprecedented opportunities to on-chain gaming activities, with a focus on improving user experience and value.

Are there any games that you particularly like, or games that are being developed on the Sui platform, whether they are already online or in production, can you share them?

Anthony: I could mention a few games. Most interestingly, we're seeing games of all shapes and sizes being developed on Sui, from casual experiences to hardcore games, covering different platforms and domains. Among them, there is a game called Panda Dogs, which can be played on browsers, iOS and Android, and its transaction volume has reached an incredible tens of millions of dollars in the past few days. In addition, there is also a game called WorkComment, which will use the IP of "The Walking Dead" and will be launched soon. I believe everyone will like it very much. Additionally, there are a number of unannounced games that will also make for a very exciting experience, especially given the size of the partners involved. All in all, there’s more exciting news to come in the gaming space.

Bill: One more thing I would add is that I played a really fun game, it was a casual, very accessible game, but once you start playing it, you probably can't stop.

What would you like to see happen in the gaming industry in the next 2 to 3 years that would make you feel good about the progress being made?

Bill: I hope players will truly embrace owning their own game assets, not just as a way to become part of a larger community, but as a unique social bond that connects many people they've never met. I look forward to seeing more of this in games, with players coming together to build larger communities around their gaming properties. Thank you so much to everyone for participating, especially those building in this space. Please move on.

Coert: I'm very excited about the future of decentralized creative and user-generated content, especially around dynamic objects. This is not just a fan creation, but more of a verified and updateable fan creation. I'm looking forward to how this creativity can be implemented on the blockchain and how people can benefit from it, which is very promising for our future.

Anthony: What I’m most looking forward to are what we call case studies. This will be a game that justifies the value players place on owning assets. We hope this improves the player experience while also benefiting developers. The entire industry will pay attention to this case, because it is crucial to providing a better player experience, and it is also better for developers. This time will come eventually and we are working hard to make it happen, hoping that it will become a reality soon. This will likely be the starting point for the industry, and just like free play, we'll see player ownership evolve and how it can be leveraged to improve the overall player experience in the coming years.

About Sui Network

Sui is an L1 public chain redesigned and built based on first principles, aiming to provide creators and developers with a development platform capable of hosting the next billion users in Web3. Applications on Sui are based on the Move smart contract language and are horizontally scalable, allowing developers to support a wide range of application development quickly and at low cost. Get more information: https://linktr.ee/sui_apac

Highlights of Sui Gaming AMA