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‘Wasteland’ Director’s New Blockchain Gaming Store Signs up 22 Publishers
Co-founded by veteran game developer Brian Fargo, Robot Cache will purportedly be the first blockchain-based digital marketplace for video games.
Brian Fargo Launches Blockchain-Based Steam Competitor
The PC games platform is set to launch sometime in 2019 but has already signed up 22 publishers and 700 games for its blockchain-based competitor to Steam.
Robot Cache has several unique features. It plans to offer the option for game users to re-sell their game purchases and mine a “virtual currency” called IRON when their machines aren’t in use.
Lee Jacobson, CEO of Robot Cache, told VentureBeat:
“Reselling games is huge, with the publishers getting a cut, and gamers being able to make money. Some users want to monetize their digital library. They can play a game for a few months and then sell it back. Then they can use it to buy more games.”
The new platform has also committed to giving game publishers and developers in the region of 95% of the value of new game sales. In comparison, Steam gives back 70%. Selling used titles on Robot Cache will still reward the publisher with 70% of the revenue and give the gamer 25%.
Robot Cache is based in San Diego, California, and co-founder Brian Fargo has also created game developers Interplay Entertainment and InXile Entertainment. He has delivered titles for Activision and Apple and directed the wildly popular “Wasteland” RPG.
So far, the platform’s Partner Portal for game publishers to register is open, and it hopes to offer a combination of big and indie labels.
The latest publishers to join Robot Cache include 1C Publishing, Bigben Interactive, Ci Games, Dankie, Devolver Digital, Headup, Hyperkinetic Studios, Revival Productions, and Running with Scissors. They join 14 others. Jacobson says Robot Cache is talking to “everybody in the industry” and that the platform will “have the largest launch library in the history of video games.”
IRON Won’t be a Cryptocurrency
The company had planned to create an ERC20 token called IRON but has shelved those plans as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) cracks down on utility tokens and initial coin offerings (ICOs). Jacobson explained to VentureBeat:
“We didn’t want to go down that road of upsetting governmental authorities.”
IRON will instead be a virtual token limited to the Robot Cache platform, any IRON users “mine” on the platform can be used to pay for game titles.
The SEC classes most ICO tokens as securities, despite the increase in the use of the term utility token. It has promised to look at each ICO on a case by case basis, deterring even credible ICOs from launching due to the complication of securities legislation. The latest statistics on ICOs may also indicate that the funding model is a dying trend.
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