Hi everyone!
This is our first post here - been lurking in the forum for the past couple of days. Maybe you’ve seen our Tweeter thread on AGLD over the weekend: https://twitter.com/GagraVentures/status/1433912696412454914?s=20
A lot of discussions around AGLD take as a given that future development needs additional incentivization and there needs to be some DAO/Treasury and issuance mechanisms around it to properly allocate funds and incentivize growth of the ecosystem.
We think this is a misconception. Here is why:
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Loot already has massive network effects and will only grow from here thanks to mLoot - it is one of the most widely distributed NFT projects already and will end up being the widest distributed in no time. Hence its network effects make it very attractive for devs to build on it already in order to gain a broad and engaged user base. It is the shortest path to success if only you know how to make a good game - no need to worry about adoption (which is usually a big hurdle for even the best games for years).
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There is currently no IP for Loot. Effectively any gameshop can come up with a really good project on top of Loot and be sure to leverage it’s network effects (given no real competition) without any costs associated with use of IP. Instead, they may end up creating very valuable IP that gets adopted by the community and monetize it for years to come. Current quick community grass-root efforts are cool for the most part (if not just copy-pasta money grabs), but they’re not the end goal. We think there are great incentives in place already for the a-level game devs to jump in and development will take time, which is ok and hence those quick community solutions will be very needed to keep people engaged.
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Developers are currently not restricted by any implicit in-game econ mechanics other than by issued Loots/mLoots. If they want to use a Play-to-Earn model or not, or have no in-game economy whatsoever - they may be free to do as they please. Not having to consider already issued assets other than loots and having those implicit restrictions affect gameplay. Economics are the gameplay or blockchain-based games, restricting creativity around it due to hasty, profit-driven decisions is a suboptimal solution.
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AGLD has already been accepted as the Loot hyperverse currency. No need to change that. It can remain the gold of the inter-game world, a base asset that game devs may peg their newly issued assets to, including fungible tokens, just like national banks used to peg their currencies to gold. They may be incentivized to acquire more of it as they grow - as an SoV - into their treasuries, e.g. to back their tokens, but won’t be limited by it. Effectively, AGLD can serve as the inter-game currency and a SoV asset in the hyperverse and also an index for the combined Loot economy as passive investable asset. It should remain neutral in the sense that it’s not governed or operated by any one party or DAO and doesn’t have any explicit functionalities on top of it. We understand that this is not what the creator intended, but we also see how their perspective may be highly subjective here due to professional focus on on-chain governance structures.
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The distribution of Loot and AGLD are already running their own separate ways for the most part, no need to try to marry them for the sake of creating a cohesive structure, as majority of people behind those proposals are mostly pursuing own agendas. Some are incentivized to “pump” their OG Loot, some their AGLD, others want to be included as they could only afford minting mLoot and would also like some free money on top of it etc. None of these are long-term motivated ideas and they also take inspiration from other crypto communities, thus limiting Loot to become just one single community run by one specific group that gets to decide whom to back, whom to incentivize etc… whereas in reality it doesn’t have to. There is no fair way to resolve this. The majority of actual Loot players hasn’t even emerged yet, why decide for it.
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Letting the free market decide which games are the most attractive ones and which game’s assets are the most valuable in the Loot hyperverse incentivizes the biggest competition, which results in the better end products. Loot has already bootstrapped itself, now let the best game devs compete for players’ attention, instead of limiting gamers choice to only the devs that were chosen/incentivized by a DAO that is prone to error, special interest capture etc. We already have all the basic assets we need, let the rest be taken care of by the market, the incentives to build are already there.
The community will find ways to invest in growth and build without any specific structure behind it, just as Bitcoin did - because Loot is the Bitcoin of gaming (a complete paradigm shift). We’ve then had Ethereum and other projects with more explicit leadership/power structures/funding etc. built on top of it, not the other way around.
If you are an A-class game dev shop looking to build on Loot feel free to reach out 