What is the future outlook for gaming guilds as infrastructure for GameFi?
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What is the future outlook for gaming guilds as infrastructure for GameFi?
As long as everyone works together, a bright future for Web3 gaming is possible.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsWritten by: Embernodes
Translated by: TechFlow intern
Gaming guilds are places where numerous players come together.
In World of Warcraft (WoW), guilds formed to enable organized cooperation for raiding bosses with groups of 10, 25, or even 40 people. After new content releases, top-tier guilds often compete for the “world first” kill. WoW guilds frequently operate like large companies, assigning various management roles to senior members. Within the game, selected guild members take charge of different tasks based on individual skills and preferences.
In Eve Online, guilds function much like real-life corporations, where you can recruit, rent office space, and participate in research, production, or material gathering. Guilds strive to accumulate resources to grow their fleets, collaboratively plan fleet operations/battle strategies, and engage assets from other guilds. Each guild emphasizes different focuses—for example:
Social or recreational purposes—members gather simply to play online or chat with friends
Commercial or profit-driven goals—people collaborate on in-game business activities
Esports
Within the context of Web3 gaming, guilds can fulfill all of these needs and more. We will delve into what guilds can do to fully realize their potential—but first, let’s examine the current state of Web3 gaming guilds.
Current Perception of Gaming Guilds
In most discussions within the Web3 gaming space, the prevailing view of gaming guilds is that they are groups primarily focused on P2E games and extracting value from them. This behavior stems from token mechanisms built into the games themselves, which ultimately create unhealthy virtual economic cycles.
While most guilds have operated this way in the past, several have consistently focused on creating value for various stakeholders—including those dedicated to building infrastructure for the broader game ecosystem.
The Future Path for Gaming Guilds
The ultimate goal of a gaming guild should be to become a value-adding system within the game ecosystem. Guilds should also allow players to benefit collectively, just as traditional gaming guilds do.
One major reason players want to join a guild is to become part of a community, especially in games that encourage social interaction. The desire to earn greater rewards (in-game) and truly win competitions also motivates individuals to join a guild. Guilds should aim to enhance player experience within the game ecosystem, which in turn helps increase the game’s value by improving player retention, guiding diverse player types, and sequentially increasing player satisfaction.
Let’s explore how guilds can achieve this:
How Can Guilds Add Value for Players?
Building different tools within each game’s ecosystem to enhance player experience:
1. Knowledge Hub
Guilds will have skilled players who quickly learn games and then share knowledge on how to get started. Community-generated tutorials or video guides can supplement official game tutorials to improve the first-time user experience (FTUE). Additionally, guilds could provide an internal content creator center to help certify, train, and support game content creators.
2. Gaming Media
Guilds can support streamers, build streaming platforms, or even co-host streaming tournaments with partner games. This adds entertainment value for players and may drive user growth. Watching a streamer play an engaging game might inspire someone to try it—or push existing players to perform better. Entertainment-focused players can also make a living through streaming and other potential benefits.
3. Web3 Infrastructure and Tools
As mentioned in A16z’s outlook on crypto’s future, GameFi is believed to contribute significantly to DeFi development and expansion. The typical flow for Web3 gamers includes creating wallets such as MetaMask or Phantom. When players sell certain items—or NFTs earned across different games—they are easily funneled into various DeFi platforms, exposing them to a wide range of services within the crypto ecosystem.
4. Player Data Management
Guilds can develop products that help players accumulate achievements across multiple games. These achievements act like a player’s “resume,” beneficial in the long run. Guilds can also group players and leverage their individual talents for various uses, while adding value to individuals by allowing them to participate in early beta tests or contribute to game content creation.
5. Game Discovery
Ultimately, as Web3 gaming evolves, there will be hundreds or even thousands of games for players to choose from. Larger guilds could develop algorithms that match players with game genres they might enjoy—such as FPS or MMORPG—similar to how Netflix recommends movies.
6. Strong Communities
Referring to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, love and belonging are fundamental human needs. A strong community gives players a sense of belonging and fulfillment. In traditional games, it's well known that some players log in solely to chat with guild members because they feel a sense of “home” with their online friends. Community is one of the most important pillars of human society—and even more so in gaming guilds.
7. Commerce
In World of Warcraft, successful guilds offer accelerated services for new or less-skilled players who want to acquire high-quality in-game items (gear) but must pay a fee. Essentially, players pay the guild. The collected fees are either shared among members during Raids (a game mode), or stored in the guild treasury to purchase resources and/or consumables (like healing potions) for future Raids.
How Can Guilds Add Value for Partner Games?
1. Help Players Transition from Web2 to Web3
Web3 gaming is still in its infancy. Guilds can help Web2 gamers transition into Web3. For example, guilds in games like Sipher could consider ways to attract FPS/Top-down FPS players from Web2 to try Sipher and eventually retain them. This process could begin by sharing the ethos of Web3—from ownership to NFT composability.
2. Game Design
Professional gamers often possess exceptional skills because they know how to “break” the game. This ability can aid game design by offering deep insights into how expert players think, what actions they take, and ultimately reverse-engineering the gameplay experience.
3. In-Game Beta Testing
Beta testing is a crucial phase in game development, aimed at identifying bugs, providing feedback on game mechanics, and suggesting improvements for game balance. Typically, professional gamers are ideal candidates for beta testing due to their skill and intuition. Guilds with robust player databases can select their best FPS players to test Web3 FPS games, and players can be rewarded directly through the guild or partner games.
4. Help Build the Initial Game Community
Guilds can assist in establishing a player community for new games, potentially reducing go-to-market (GTM) costs for partner games. Since games need to spend money on user acquisition, why not incentivize the right communities from the start?
5. Improve Player Retention in Games
Guilds can help games retain players by:
Organizing events for players
Hosting competitions for skilled players
Providing a tightly-knit community that fosters social immersion
Ultimately, the more active players are, the greater their sense of achievement—and the higher the chance they’ll stay.
6. Esports Team Management
As the Web3 gaming space matures, games will feature team-based competitive modes. Axie Infinity has hosted 3v3 tournaments, and Crypto Raiders plans a $1 million prize tournament. While only the top 0.01% of players may have sufficient esports capabilities, guilds with large player bases are naturally best positioned to identify talent and form esports teams for these games.
7. Fan Management
When Web3 gaming reaches a stage where pro players and streamers have large followings, guilds can manage fan communities around their players—much like football clubs manage fans. Guilds can sell merchandise, NFT tickets, and generate cash flow. While this stage may seem distant, communities can begin developing now in preparation.
From Value Extraction to Value Creation
In the future, guilds may stop looking at scholars’ profit-and-loss statements and instead focus on entirely different metrics (KPIs). These KPIs could include tracking new recruit numbers, monitoring player Day 1/7/30 retention rates, hours played, and performance metrics.
Take Valorant as an example: third-party platforms already exist that provide overviews of your in-game performance—tracking stats like K/D ratio, win percentage, headshot rate, and more. Such features add value for players and boost engagement, as players are motivated to keep improving their stats. Guilds with technical teams could consider developing similar tools.
Conclusion
Game developers provide the product, while gaming guilds can help supply demand (player communities). The game mechanics or incentives created by Web3 projects play a significant role in shaping guild behavior. When game incentives are abundant—as in many P2E games—guilds naturally lean toward value extraction. With fewer incentives, guilds are more likely to focus on value creation.
For the future of the Web3 gaming space, fostering stronger collaboration between game projects and gaming guilds—to align incentives, exchange feedback, and help the industry reach its full potential—is mutually beneficial.
With collective effort, a bright future for Web3 gaming is possible. With the right team, strategy, and ample resources, gaming guilds have the potential to add value throughout a game’s lifecycle. At that point, we can envision some gaming guilds meeting the “fat application” thesis standard in the gaming industry—where the majority of value in the gaming ecosystem accumulates at the platform level.
Their end-state would resemble a gaming platform, where much of the industry’s value consolidates.
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