The WLD Show

Howie Zhang: Designing an NFT Game Economy as a Quant Analyst | Will, Lee, & Andrew Learn Web3: #33

Episode Summary

Will, Lee, and Andrew chat with Howie about the similarities and differences between designing economic mechanics for a stock exchanges vs a Web3 game.

Episode Notes

Howie Zhang is the Game Economy Designer for Guild of Guardians, a mobile RPG built on Immutable X - The first Layer 2 for NFTs on Ethereum. Prior to that, Howie worked at Chi X, an Australian Stock Exchange. First, as PHD Research Analyst on Pricing Mechanics and Governance. Then, as a Quant in Market Microstructure, Analytics, Strategy.

In this episode we discuss:

• Being a game economy designer of an NFT mobile-action RPG with play-to-earn mechanics
• The relevancy of his experience as a Quant for a stock exchange
• The differences between finance and Web3 industries.
• Going down endless crypto rabbit holes.
• Missed opportunities on his crypto journey
• His childhood trauma getting scammed in Diablo II
• Why the Diablo III auction house failed
• How to make games fun while incorporating the market
• Immutable X as a gaming platform and as a game studio
• Iterating past the freemium model with economic experiments
• How Web3 monetary policy can add a layer of fun gameplay
• Adding a decentralized economic component going to be quite powerful
• Gaming has needed the features that Web3 provides for a long time
• Despite the high barrier-to-entry, the excitement shows long term potential.
• Sign up for Howie's substack: https://yowitzer.substack.com/

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