Research opportunities in the application of blockchain in video games: A scoping review

Abstract

The study of blockchain (BC) technologies has been applied to a wide breadth of research fields in recent years, chasing the realization of its full potential. Among them, video games have become a very eager adopter of blockchain in many of its different facets: cryptocurrencies, Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), and smart contracts. This paper presents the results of a scoping review in order to answer the research question "What is the current state of academic research in blockchain applied to video games?". After a thorough search in a diverse set of scientific databases, a total of 39 fitting publications were methodically retrieved, studied and categorized. The results draw a clearer picture of the current state-of-the art, as well as the identification of relevant trends and opportunities in this topic.