Playkey: The Cryptocurrency that Democratizes Gaming

I was once a PC gamer, way back in the days of adjusting your config.sys and autoexec.bat files. I have played since, and the experience has been much better than I ever remember it being. There’s a new development in cryptocurrency, however, that may improve things even more for PC gamers that can’t afford the latest hardware: Playkey.

Playkey recently concluded both a pre-sale and an initial coin offering (ICO) that raised a combined total of around $14.4 million. That’s no small amount, but it’s what Playkey looks to do with the cash that should prove impressive. It’s planning to use the currency as a means to give people with low-end hardware the ability to play the latest games without having to invest a pot in pricey upgrades.

Basically, users will be able to use Playkey to rent processing power that translates the gameplay to a low-end system. In turn, those with more powerful systems will be able to rent out said systems and get paid for their largesse in Playkey tokens. Those users can then spend Playkey tokens on other cryptocurrencies or even straight-up cash.

The payoff isn’t exactly huge right now; reports from Playkey itself suggest calculations featuring one hour of play on a GTX 1080 system costing just $1, and if the system runs 12 out of 24 hours, after fees, the owner realizing $10 per day.

Considering the costs of a GTX 1080 system are starting in the high-$900s and going up from there—thanks to a brief look at Google Shopping—the notion of renting these out for $10 for a 12-hour day kind of sounds ludicrous. Granted, the payback period might only be around three to four months, which could leave quite a bit of time left on the system, but how much time?

For people who can afford top-end gaming PCs but only have time to use them on the weekends, this might be a better solution than some would think. Making $50 a week leasing out a PC during its otherwise-downtime might well be a good way to knock the cost off a new gaming PC later on. If the system lasts long enough to make its costs back, then Playkey might be worthwhile.