Ubisoft has a history of experimenting with Non-Fungible Tokens in gaming, and the company is set to further explore NFT gaming space with a new release. The Paris-based publisher, that makes popular triple-A titles like Assassin’s Creed and Far Cry, launched Champions Tactics: Grimoria Chronicles, a new free-to-play turn-based RPG with NFT integrations, on Wednesday. The competitive multiplayer title brings together traditional gaming and elements of Web3 to Ubisoft’s player network on PC. Champions Tactics: Grimoria Chronicles is now available to download via the Ubisoft Connect launcher.
Champions Tactics: Grimoria Chronicles is a multiplayer tactical RPG set in the dark fantasy world of Grimoria. In the NFT-integrated game, players build teams of digital collectible “Champions” that come with unique abilities. With their Champions, players can take part in strategic, turn-based battles against other players online. Champions are NFTs and can thus be sold or traded on the marketplace. Players can also combine two existing Champions to create a new one by paying a crafting fee.
“Champions are magical playable figurines in the dark world of Grimoria. Each one of them is a living relic, an intricately crafted embodiment of Grimoria’s history, a testament to the legendary Champions who once shaped its fate,” the official website of the game said, explaining the premise of the game.
To access the game, players would need an active Ubisoft account, be at least 18 years of age, and have a supported Blockchain wallet like Metamask or Sequence.
Ubisoft said that there are 75,000 NFT “Champions” available at launch. These NFTs can be minted on the gaming-focussed Oasys public blockchain network that relies on proof-of-stake consensus protocol.
The NFT “Champion” characters are priced starting at $6.33 (roughly Rs. 532) worth of OAS – the native token of the Oasys blockchain – on the game’s official marketplace. Ranking at the 340th spot on CoinMarketCap’s crypto index, the OAS token is currently trading at $0.03582 (roughly Rs. 3.01).
Players can invest in NFT Champion characters and use them in the game’s ranked mode to earn rewards. As mentioned earlier, with the help of the game’s Forge system, two existing champion NFTs can be merged together to create a new character with special qualities to help the players in combat. According to Ubisoft, the crafting fee can be paid in Gold, the in-game currency, or in crypto ($OAS).
Champions Tactics was revealed in 2023 and received closed and open betas earlier this year, ahead of its official launch on October 23. The free-to-play PvP title is only available on PC via Ubisoft Connect.
This is not the first time Ubisoft has dabbled in NFTs. In 2021, the gamemaker launched the Ubisoft Quartz platform for players to purchase Digits. These playable NFTs were launched in beta with Ghost Recon Breakpoint. After player backlash and limited interest, the company said it was winding down Quartz Digits in 2022.
NFTs are blockchain-based digital collectibles that often carry underlaying monetary benefits, trading value, as well as rewards and special benefits in gaming ecosystems. The push to bring NFT monetisation to gaming, however, has met with widespread criticism from gamers. Nevertheless, several game publishers have attempted to integrate NFTs in their titles.
As per Global Markets Insights, the global gaming NFT market size stood at the valuation of $2.76 billion (roughly Rs. 23,204 crore) in 2023 and is estimated to grow by over 60 percent between 2024 and 2032.
A separate report by Fortune Business Insights last year forecasted that the blockchain gaming market would be churning up to $614 billion (roughly Rs. 51,07,086 crore) in the next seven years leading to 2030.
While NFTs in games have faced backlash in the gaming community, Web3 games allow internal trading of game related NFTs that promise players passive income. The data of in-game asset sales have shown growth at the rate of 21.8 percent between 2017 and 2021.
In April this year, Samsung joined forces with the Wilder World Metaverse Game to offer NFT rewards as part of its Web3 TV bundle.