The first ‘NFT game console’ has been announced

A new console aimed at ‘Web 3 gaming’ has been announced and met with immediate opposition from some players.

Web 3 company Polium claims that their ‘Polium One’ system will be “the world’s first multi-chain game console” that will be able to run games built on different blockchains.

“The console will be powerful enough to run high-performance games and will be easy to use for a traditional player who does not understand Web 3,” claims Polium.

The console, which Polium says will be released in Q3 2024, will only be able to be pre-ordered by players who buy a ‘Polium Pass’, an NFT on the Ethereum network of which 10,000 will be affected.

According to Polium, the console’s controls will include a fingerprint scanner for security, and a “wallet” button to give players quick access to the console’s multi-chain wallet designed to “trade, exchange, bet and receive cryptocurrencies”.

Despite Polium admitting that only four people work with the hardware, it also claims that the console will be capable of 8K HDR at 120 fps and ray tracing.

The announcement has been met with a lot of criticism and skepticism from a number of players who at best are not yet convinced of the benefits of blockchain gaming, and at worst think it is a scam.

Some have also pointed out that the console logo appears to be an upside-down variation of the GameCube logo.

“It looks familiar, but GameCube has a G and the cube represents their name,” the company responded on Twitter. “Our cube represents blockchain and P stands for Polium.”

Not even the newly established Polium Discord server, which seemed to start without moderation, has been free of criticism.

In Discord’s ‘scam alert’ channel, presumably set up to let users report potential NFT scams, a number of users simply replied “this whole project”.

In the ‘ideas and feedback’ channel, the first comment simply says: “give up”.

Polium has now posted a statement on Discord that addresses the first answer, and accuses someone of “RD & D”, an acronym meaning “fear, insecurity and doubt”.

“We have received RD & D and criticism regarding our ability to perform,” the statement said. “To be precise, four of us are building the functional prototype for the console and controller.

“We have experience in developing hardware and software. We are currently working on the power tree for the console board. We should have a functional prototype by November or before.

“We will show the prototype live on YouTube or have a reliable influencer show you all. The prototype will prove that the console can run games that are on different blockchains and built with different programming languages.

“We will not take any pre-orders / financing until we show the prototype and whether society is interested. When we have a functional prototype, we will build the console for production.

Regarding the lack of confirmed games, the statement states: “There will be games on the console, and we will soon make some announcements. We are currently talking to game developers.

“For the logo, we did not copy Nintendo’s GameCube logo. But we listen to society, and we will hire a new illustrator to design a more original logo for us.

It concludes: “Some of you are not passionate about Web 3 and are only here for entertainment and RD&D. But we want to start banning people. Anything is possible when you are passionate about a problem. We must deliver. Watch.”