{"id":23027,"date":"2022-06-09T07:38:07","date_gmt":"2022-06-09T07:38:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/?p=23027"},"modified":"2022-06-11T00:59:57","modified_gmt":"2022-06-11T00:59:57","slug":"initial-game-offerings-a-failed-initial-grifting-opportunity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidgerard.co.uk\/blockchain\/2022\/06\/09\/initial-game-offerings-a-failed-initial-grifting-opportunity\/","title":{"rendered":"Initial Game Offerings: a failed Initial Grifting Opportunity"},"content":{"rendered":"

By <\/i>Amy Castor<\/i><\/a> and David Gerard<\/i><\/p>\n

The cryptocurrency world has always revolved around one fundamental promise: you too can get rich for free! Just send us your dollars, and we\u2019ll send you magic beans. Watch them go up in value (on paper). Soon you\u2019ll be rich, like us. We\u2019re just letting you send us money \u2018cos we\u2019re nice, see.<\/p>\n

Crypto boosters often drive flashy cars and live in flashy houses to show you how rich you could become. (We saw these in the crypto piece from 60 Minutes Australia<\/a> that David was in last Sunday.) [YouTube<\/i><\/a>]<\/p>\n

The trouble is that there\u2019s no get-rich scheme that\u2019s real, because magic doesn\u2019t happen. And the suckers sort of realise that. So the excuse has to change regularly to tap into a fresh pool of suckers \u2014 and a fresh pile of scarce actual-dollars fed into the cryptoverse.<\/p>\n

This has been the case all through Bitcoin, altcoins, initial coin offerings<\/a>, NFTs, and the many smaller crypto grifts along the way. Draw the crypto speculators in; try to draw the general public in. Throw memes at the wall to see if they stick.<\/p>\n

And here we have a shiny new meme: \u201cInitial Game Offering.\u201d<\/p>\n

Coined in the wake of the media coverage of play-to-earn (P2E) game Axie Infinity, the phrase “Initial Game Offering” (IGO) is an attempt to create the next crypto grift after NFTs. Or at least extend the NFT grift for a while.<\/p>\n

IGOs are probably not a happener, though \u2014 any more than the rest of play-to-earn ever was in reality.<\/p>\n

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What is an Initial Game Offering?<\/h3>\n

An Initial Game Offering raises money for an early stage play-to-earn game. The idea is similar to ICOs. An IGO lets you pre-purchase a game\u2019s in-game tokens (generally NFTs) before the game goes live, before any development has begun, or when the product only exists as a bubble in someone\u2019s head. Just buy the tokens, OK?<\/p>\n

Game assets offered in an IGO range from characters to skins, weapons, accessories and mystery boxes. These assets are represented by NFTs. The tokens are often required to access the game.<\/p>\n

If the game becomes a huge success \u2014 and the only play-to-earn game that has ever had any success at all was Axie Infinity \u2014 the tokens surge in value, and you get rich for free! In theory, anyway.<\/p>\n

The promise is always the same \u2014 buy our tokens and, once the game goes mainstream, you will become fabulously wealthy.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s easy to use the \u201cInitial Something Offering\u201d template to claim you\u2019ve innovated a new form of magic bean to speculate on. Past examples include \u201cInitial Exchange Offerings\u201d and \u201cInitial Security Offerings,\u201d and some even tried to make \u201cInitial DeFi Offerings\u201d a thing. The middle word changes, but the phrase can always correctly be read as \u201cInitial Sucker Offering.\u201d<\/p>\n

NFTs are doing fine, right? Right?<\/h3>\n

Art NFTs have fallen by the wayside. Collectible NFTs (CryptoPunks, Bored Apes) were big in 2021, but the speculator market has cooled for them as well.<\/p>\n

But we don\u2019t think the NFT hype train is stopping any time soon, despite the lack of any evidence of public interest outside crypto speculators<\/a> \u2014 there\u2019s still just too much money flying around.<\/p>\n

We think the grift is evolving, and putting “Web3” (whatever that is) into gaming is the next focus. IGOs are part of that, but it\u2019s a term that\u2019s being pushed by the Binance crypto exchange, and not really by any of the other big players. It\u2019s a little too cringy for Andreesen Horowitz (a16z)<\/a> to capitalize on. But you can find other takes on the idea.<\/p>\n

Justin Kan\u2019s Fractal just raised $35 million for a game-focused NFT marketplace. Backers include Coinbase and a16z. [Venture Beat<\/i><\/a>]<\/p>\n

Bored Ape Yacht Club did a huge land sale for their Otherside virtual world in late April<\/a> \u2014 they were selling NFTs for a game that doesn\u2019t exist yet, with the pitch \u201cget in early.\u201d<\/p>\n

The new Salesforce NFT cloud sort of leads in this direction \u2014 where Salesforce tries to sell you a platform that you can sell NFTs on. We\u2019ve also seen the term \u201cInitial NFT Offering\u201d being thrown around in the scope of NFTs used in games. [Techcrunch<\/i><\/a>; <\/i>GameFi Boost<\/i><\/a>]<\/p>\n

How IGOs got their start<\/h3>\n

In June 2021, Axie Infinity was starting to get significant mainstream press coverage as an alleged use case for blockchain. By August 2021, play-to-earn was the new craze in crypto, especially amongst investors who\u2019d bought into Axie \u2014 including Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, billionaire investor Marc Cuban, and a16z. The cute little Axie characters in the game are represented by NFTs, and you need to own \u2014 or rent \u2014 at least a few to start playing.<\/p>\n

Binance launched its NFT marketplace in June 2021. DeRace, a virtual racehorse platform, was the first game NFT offering to use Binance\u2019s NFT platform. The promotion for DeRace, starting on 20 August 2021, is the first example we\u2019ve been able to find of the phrase \u201cInitial Game Offering\u201d in the wild. [Medium<\/i><\/a>]<\/p>\n

DeRace describes itself as: \u201cA complete NFT horse racing ecosystem where you can participate in horse races, breed NFT horses with unique characteristics, host races in your own NFT hippodrome and earn profit while doing it.\u201d OK.<\/p>\n

Within weeks, the phrase \u201cIGO\u201d had taken off \u2014 at least in bottom-of-the-barrel crypto blogs whose audience is only the most dedicated of crypto suckers doing their own research.<\/p>\n

(Researching this section of the crypto media sphere is very like trash diving for the right<\/i> piece of worthless trash.)<\/p>\n

After this, the coverage has aimed to promote the concept to speculators, and latterly to aspiring token issuers.<\/p>\n

Two weeks after the DeRace announcement, Altcoin Buzz ran a video on 4 September, touting IGO as a \u201cMAJOR CRYPTO TREND!\u201d You definitely need to get in now! [YouTube<\/a><\/em>]<\/p>\n

An advertorial in HackerNoon dated 6 October 2021 advises you on how to pick a sound IGO to invest in: [HackerNoon<\/a><\/em>]<\/p>\n