Mojang Studios bans Minecraft NFT integrations

cointelegraph.com:

On Wednesday, Minecraft's developer Mojang Studios said that it would be excluding the integration of nonfungible tokens, or NFTs, alongside blockchain technology as a whole, in its popular namesake game. In explaining the decision, Mojang wrote:

As told by Mojang: "To ensure that Minecraft players have a safe and inclusive experience, blockchain technologies are not permitted to be integrated inside our client and server applications, nor may Minecraft in-game content such as worlds, skins, persona items, or other mods, be utilized by blockchain technology to create a scarce digital asset."

The company also criticized the "speculative pricing" and "investment mentality" around NFTs that take away from the game experience and encourage profiteering to the detriment of long-term game playability. Furthermore, it pointed to rug-pulls surrounding certain third-party NFT integrations as well as NFT wash trading, or fraudulent price manipulation to support the ban.

Under the new rules, third-party blockchain technologies cannot be integrated with client and server applications within Minecraft. Nor may they be utilized to create NFTs associated with any in-game content, including worlds, skins, persona items or other mods. Although the changes do not affect most Minecraft gamers, it is likely to have significant consequences for a small subset of gamers who are also profiting from in-game NFTs. Third-party for-sale NFT collections digitizing Minecraft in-game assets may therefore be in violation of such terms and could potentially face legal consequences.

Rip NFT worlds? pic.twitter.com/5bEy5oqtjm