Valve president Gabe Newell thinks NFTs are “super sketchy”
"There's a bunch of get rich quick schemes around metaverse."
More platforms and companies are starting to hop off the NFT train and call them out for what they are. Companies like Ubisoft believe their players just “don’t get it”, but other brands like itch.io aren’t afraid to speak their mind. One of those voices speaking out against NFTs includes Valve co-founder and president, Gabe Newell.
What Valve president Gabe Newell has to say
A little while back, Steam made the decision to ban all games that feature cryptocurrency and NFTs. While Ubisoft continues to pressure its players into its blockchain technology, Steam outright banning it on their platform really sets a stance for such a large platform. Many people in the gaming community praise Valve’s decision to do so.
Valve president Gabe Newell backs up Valve’s decisions in an interview with Eurogamer:
“The things that were being done were super sketchy. And there was some illegal shit that was going on behind the scenes, and you’re just like, yeah, this is bad. Blockchains as a technology are a great technology, that the ways in which has been utilized are currently are all pretty sketchy. And you sort of want to stay away from that.”
Another aspect Newell notes is the tendency for cryptocurrency to be fraudulent. Because of how volatile cryptocurrency is, the money spent for it often makes no sense. “People’s wages are not in cryptocurrencies,” Newell adds.
NFTs probably won’t last for too long, Newell thinks
In another interview with PC Gamer, the Valve President doesn’t seem too concerned with NFTs in the future.
“It will be interesting to see if anybody who’s sort of coming to the party late has much to add, rather than a desire to have a whole bunch of people give them a bunch of money for magic reasons.”
I’m happy to see someone with a large voice in the community commenting on what NFTs really seem to be; that being, a money-hungry scheme. Newell seems to care for what consumers really want. If we don’t want NFTs, then he believes that we’ll “win out” in the end.
Overall, Gabe Newell continues to back up what the majority of the gaming community believes in. If a company like Valve can put a stop to NFTs on their marketplace, then here’s to hoping other industry favorites will do the same moving forward.
