Why are bots dominating cryptocurrency games? Developers looking for money incentivize them

Think of the communities you’ve been excited to be a part of throughout your life. It is possible that these are groups formed on the basis of common interests, right? This is because we have a sense of belonging when we join other people for something specific that we feel special about. For example, I love to play games and never tire of exploring or creating communities where I can meet other players.

Therefore, I know that the current GameFi space is not a breeding ground for gamers like me and my fellow enthusiasts: It is a breeding ground for bots..

And the main problem at stake is structural.

A strong community is a sign of potential for venture capital funds, which is why GameFi projects are trying to raise funds at the community level before meeting with investors. That’s why they sell NFTs and other cryptocurrencies to jump through the early stage hoops and try to make enough money to continue building. The more they sell, the more chances they have. It’s easy to see how this makes builders inherently vulnerable to what a little deception can do: It can literally make or break a project.

So they get their incentives, accept the challenge of the industry they love, and fall victim to the lure of empty advertising through no fault of their own.. They name influencers to spread the good news about teaser trailers and how this will lead to a $200 million movie, whereas in reality it only costs $10,000 to make. They create fan communities and use them for their own benefit. They distribute their gaming assets through sweepstakes in a system. similar to a multi-level marketing scheme and that it often promises unreasonable returns that it cannot deliver.

This further fuels an economy based on influences and incentives that drive projects not to build truly innovative products, but merely to show numbers. For example, Star Atlas: Three years of promises have passed and nothing has been made public.

Also, when people join because of incentives rather than genuine interest, they fail to build real, strong communities. Check out 90% of GameFi’s Discord servers and you’ll find nothing but empty talk and a distinct lack of enthusiasm that could pass as genuine enthusiasm. With over 100,000 members and just four people speaking, it’s clear that operators interested in designing a positive brand image are renting mattresses to make their communities appear more crowded than they are.

This leaves both builders and ecosystems fragile as they are on very shaky ground: Without a reliable track, everyone’s share is for sale. Give an influencer a better deal than they’re promoting right now and they’ll have no problem jumping ship. Often, so will builders who are ready to flee as soon as the coin price gets as high as they want. This exact scenario occurred when the value of the Squid cryptocurrency, which is not affiliated with the Netflix series but hoping to profit from the partnership, rose as high as $2,800 and then dropped to nearly zero after it was discovered to be just a scam.

In this case, the scammers missed out on $3.38 million, so it can be argued that empty advertising and incentive-based MLM-type schemes are valid. Are they working?

But don’t the players deserve better?

Real players, those who are loyal to their community and come together for something they truly believe in, will avoid these dynamics as much as possible. People who love what they do, not the incentives it can bring to them, will have no reason to join the GameFi economy as long as this is the reality presented to them when approached. Those who have built real communities for a long time have no reason to mislead their followers with exaggerated numbers, and they know it’s a losing game (a word game, for sure).

As interesting as the economic incentives are the psychological aspect of the dynamics at play. We as humans managed by emotions (that is, motivated and activated): “Our value system consists of an emotionally created hierarchy of feelings that ranks what is important to us,” meaning our brains are physiologically ready to seek emotional rewards even more than financial rewards. . Think fun, reliability, and a sense of belonging. If there is no emotional attachment beyond investing and giving money to a particular game, players will do just that. They will earn whatever they can earn throughout the game, then they will remove their local tokens and move on to the next incentive.

Who do you think would find this more attractive? Who benefits the most from this crazy treatment? That’s right, bots.

Bots are specifically “programmed to harm the gaming ecosystem by taking advantage of incentive structures to generate value,” and they represent a major barrier to mainstream adoption for blockchain games. It is not very difficult to calculate how many bots a particular game can attract, because data companies can link wallets belonging to the same person and cross the list. Antibot company Jigger has analyzed more than 60 games and services using this method and found 200,000 bots. Jigger also estimates that bots make up 40% of all GameFi users, while for some games (MetaGear, AnRkey X, and ARIVA) the percentage rises to a staggering 80% and for Karmaverse Zombie to 96%.

That’s almost the entire user base. And this is unacceptable.

Until this deplorable situation improves, the GameFi industry will be vulnerable to bots, scams and exaggerated incentives that fail to move projects forward. This will keep the players away real and enthusiasts like me.

This article is for general informational purposes only and is not intended and should not be taken as legal or investment advice. The views, opinions, and views expressed herein are solely those of the author and are not required to reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.

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