As Web3 games recede from the excitement and bubble of 2021, the questions left behind become more direct: Is there still an opportunity for games? Will AI become the next variable? How should community, KOL, growth, and investment logic be re-understood?
This issue's interview features well-known investor and content creator BitWu, discussing personal investment systems, bull and bear market perceptions, AI agents, stablecoins, RWA, and the retrospective on the failures of Web3 games and the opportunities for the next round—a very authentic conversation about the industry's second half.
This dialogue resembles a deep discussion on "how to survive, how to judge opportunities, and how to avoid repeated pitfalls," rather than merely chasing narratives.
Guest: Well-known investor BITWU
Host: GMA Apple, GMA nann
Interview time: June 18 (Thursday) 3:00 PM
GMA Talk Q&A
Q1: If you were to define yourself, would you consider yourself more of an investor, content creator, researcher, or entrepreneur?
BitWu: I see myself more as an investor and a practitioner of long-termism. Because in this industry, you can't avoid the term "investment." Whether you're creating content, conducting research, or doing other things, ultimately, you will have to return to how to do investment better and better, how to find a suitable investment path, investment model, and establish your investment system. As for long-termism, I have always viewed my life system as a very long-term map. I have many things I want to accomplish and hope to meet like-minded people along the way. Whether it’s building trust, finding friends to work with, or doing investment itself, long-termism is an unavoidable symbol. I don’t think the label of entrepreneur suits me very well because my personality is not really suited for starting a business; I’ve tried, but the results were mostly failures.
Q2: Why have you chosen to stay in the Crypto industry over the years? What attracts you the most?
BitWu: I want to stay in this industry because it allows me to see the fastest changing side of the world. Crypto showcases many cutting-edge concepts and technologies, which, in one way or another, will converge with Blockchain, including AI, which is currently the most discussed topic and has an inseparable connection with Crypto. Another reason is that this industry reveals the most naked facets of human nature. Crypto is not just a speculative financial market; it encompasses technology, finance, social psychology, global liquidity, as well as narrative dissemination and the game of human nature. It's hard to find so many things combined in other single industries.
Q3: After experiencing several rounds of bull and bear markets, what is the biggest change in your understanding?
BitWu: I think there are three major changes. First, it has shifted from pursuing instant riches to pursuing "survival first, then the pursuit of compounding." When entering the circle, many people feel that this industry can earn money that other industries cannot; this mindset of pursuing wealth is very normal. However, I later realized that there are indeed many opportunities, but the premise is that you cannot die. You need to have capital and survive in this market to continue pursuing compounding with each profit you make. Second, it has transformed from only believing in stories and narratives to being more willing to verify structures. In the early days, it was easy for everyone to be moved by a certain story or narrative, but if you want to be a qualified investor, you cannot stay at the story level; you need to verify it and think deeply about whether the structure behind it is valid. Third, I have begun to truly establish my investment system. After experiencing bull and bear markets, undergoing asset zeroing, I genuinely reflect on whether I should establish an investment system and how to create one that suits me.
Q4: What pitfalls are newcomers most likely to encounter in Crypto?
BitWu: The first mistake that newcomers are most likely to make is mistaking the rewards of a bull market for their own abilities. Most people enter the circle during a bull market, where various wealth myths circulate when the market is good. Many people make money right after joining, possibly earning in one or two months what they couldn’t make in Web2 for years, leading them to mistakenly believe they are exceptionally capable. Once they have this understanding, they are likely to lose money afterward. The market will not always go up; when a bull market turns into a bear market, it can be ruthless. Many people end up not only losing the money they made during the bull market but also their own capital. I have had similar experiences; I made a lot of money during the ICO phase in 2017 and then thought I was a great investor and started making reckless investments, ultimately losing all the BTC and ETH I had earned. The second mistake is lacking position management skills. Without position management, it essentially means having no discipline, making it easy to operate positions based on emotions. Many people do not grasp this issue until they have lost money themselves. The third mistake is focusing solely on returns when seeing opportunities, without considering risks. I believe the biggest difference between OGs and newcomers is that OGs look at risks first rather than solely focusing on returns.
Q5: What abilities should newcomers focus on developing?
BitWu: I think newcomers should primarily develop risk recognition abilities. The ability to research projects, trading skills, and information retrieval skills are important but should come afterward. This industry does not lack opportunities; as long as you don’t die, opportunities will always appear. Risk recognition ability can be slowly cultivated. For instance, you can record your feedback, judgments, decisions, and the results that followed each day you encounter various pieces of information. Through constant comparison and reflection, you will gradually develop risk prediction and recognition abilities. A better approach is to establish a small group, find one or two slightly more capable friends to help you with risk recognition, which is also very important.
Q6: What do you think is the biggest difference between this cycle and 2021?
BitWu: The biggest feeling I had in 2021 was that it was still a retail-led Crypto market. At that time, many projects could take off based solely on a concept, a community, or liquidity sentiment. We saw what's called a "shitcoin season," with many altcoins increasing dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of times. However, the biggest difference in this round is that Crypto is slowly transitioning from a speculative market to a financial infrastructure market. Now, the most discussed topics are AI, stablecoins, RWA, ETFs, institutions, and compliance. This indicates that Crypto is no longer just a cycle of retail investors within the crypto sphere but has become part of the global financial market, albeit still a very small part. This also means that it will be harder for ordinary people to make money in the market. In 2021, it was likely that as long as you had the guts, you could make a lot of beta. But now, you not only need to understand the Crypto market but also the global financial market. You need stronger information filtering skills and better position discipline to make relatively significant profits.
Q7: In the next 2-3 years, which directions will you focus on?
BitWu: I will focus on three areas: stablecoins, RWA, and AI. First is stablecoins. Stablecoins are currently one of the few things in Crypto with real demand, real users, and real trading volume. They address global payment settlement, dollar liquidity, and internet finance issues. Compared to many other concepts that are still stuck at the story level, stablecoins have come out ahead. Second is RWA. RWA is not simply transferring assets onto the chain; it has the opportunity to help traditional finance and other sectors prepare assets for being on-chain better. This is a direction that traditional finance is also willing to adopt. Third is AI. Especially in the next 2-3 years, if AI agents can become widespread, they will require identity, accounts, wallets, payments, asset management, and incentive layers, and Crypto can provide these infrastructures for the agents. Therefore, the intersection of AI and Crypto will become increasingly evident.
Q8: Where do you think AI will have the biggest impact on Crypto?
BitWu: I think AI may transform Crypto from "assets for speculation" to "financial rails for machines." If in the future, large numbers of AI agents serve us, then Crypto will likely become the channel for the flow of funds for AI agents. In the future, AI agents might hold Crypto, call on-chain protocols, buy data and computing power independently, manage assets, automate settlements, and even perform risk control. So I believe the biggest impact of AI on Crypto is to make Crypto the most suitable financial system for machine usage in the AI era. It is a 24/7, global, programmable financial system without borders.
Q9: What kind of AI + Gaming products are you looking forward to?
BitWu: I would anticipate an evolving game. This game can reshape scenarios, explore, battle, manage, and social interaction based on the player's experiences and preferences. You can think of it like an AI director; everyone might be playing the same game, but the content each person experiences is not exactly the same. It may be based on the same storyline, but different players' main lines are not identical. The integration of AI and GameFi, I think, can be viewed from three levels. The first level is reducing development costs. For example, I have created over 20 different games with Codex recently with my child. They can create games that suit their own preferences and ideas, modifying anything they find uninteresting. The second level is creating more realistic AI NPCs. In the past, NPCs in games were very stiff and lacked humanity, but AI can make NPCs have more natural conversations and companionship, and help players complete tasks. The third level is forming a "living game world." AI can drive long-term memory, record player behavior feedback and mental responses, ultimately causing the world status to evolve. That might be closer to the metaverse we imagine.
Q10: Will KOLs be replaced in the AI era?
BitWu: Some KOLs will be replaced. If a KOL is merely relaying information or repeating what is already available in the market, allowing AI to fetch, classify, and summarize, that type will be largely replaced by AI. Since AI is faster, cheaper, and more stable, there is little significance for humans to do this. However, truly valuable KOLs will not be replaced. Truly valuable KOLs do not just relay information, but they have their own experiences, judgments, aesthetics, and expressions after experiencing risks. AI can help you collect information and summarize data, but it cannot replace your experiences through bull and bear markets nor can it replace the psychological feelings you endure with real money in response to volatility. AI can imitate some things and collect some things, but it is difficult for it to replicate the style and credibility that a person has accumulated over a long period. In the future, the threshold for KOLs will only become higher and will not be completely replaced by AI.
Q11: Why did many Web3 games fail in the past? Why will players stay in the future?
BitWu: GameFi was quite hot in 2021, but it arose and disappeared very quickly. The true logic of games should be: the game is particularly fun, leading users to stay, the community naturally forms, and then a certain economic system and asset states gradually develop. However, many Web3 games in the past turned into Play to Earn. People came purely to farm, the project parties frantically financed, hurriedly issued tokens, or used airdrop expectations to attract users for farming. Eventually, a massive sell-off occurred, and the projects entered a death spiral. This process essentially replaced the joy of the game with economic models. If GameFi has an opportunity to rise again in the future, I think three directions are important: AI, social interaction, and UGC. AI can make the game world more dynamic and make NPCs more human-like; social interaction can retain players; UGC can ensure continuous content growth. Good Web3 games should first engage users enough to find it fun, then retain more people to form a positive cycle rather than return to a death spiral.
Q12: If you were to invest in a Web3 game now, what would you focus on?
BitWu: If I were to invest in a Web3 game now, I would not primarily focus on project backgrounds, token design, dual-token models, earning mechanisms, or airdrop expectations like before. The most important thing now is whether the team has the capability to create a long-term game world. I would look at whether the team has previously developed impressive games, whether they understand players, whether they have genuine gaming experience, and whether they have the funds and patience to endure a bear market. Many past Web3 games were essentially not making games but rather creating financing products, with the game being merely a shell. PPT full of economic models, NFT pledges, dual-token revenues, and airdrop expectations do not highlight what makes the game truly fun. Therefore, what’s critical now is whether the game is genuinely enjoyable and playable, and whether the team can actually deliver. In terms of data, I would not only look at the number of registered users, wallet counts, or NFT purchase records. These may only indicate that early marketing was effective, but such users can come quickly and leave just as fast. What is truly important is the game duration, replay rate, player composition, and whether the game primarily drives financial behavior or gaming behavior. It must be dominated by gaming behavior rather than financial behavior. As for token design, I believe it should be as simple as possible in the early stages. Many projects do not need to design tokens just for the sake of having them. In the mid to late stages, they can design accordingly based on the game’s development, rather than complicating the economic model from the start.
Q13: Why do many projects seek KOL collaborations, appear to have exposure, but fail to achieve actual growth?
BitWu: First, the project team needs to ask themselves whether they have clearly thought about which area of growth they want to achieve in this round of propaganda. Different objectives can lead to completely different results. If the goal is to expand brand awareness in Chinese-speaking regions, then the strategy needs to be designed around exposure, looking for channels and KOLs that can generate brand volume. If the goal is user retention, such as CEXs and DEXs needing a large number of users to stay and trade, then community-oriented KOLs must be sought; those who can genuinely bring user behavior and conversion. Secondly, the platforms must be correctly chosen. Some content suits Twitter, some suits Instagram, others suit YouTube, while some work well with news media. Different products require different exposure channels, each yielding different effects. Thirdly, choosing the right KOL is essential. If you want to achieve growth, seek KOLs with strong community capabilities; if aiming for exposure, find KOLs with high market recognition and long-standing reputation and trust. Often times, failure to achieve growth may stem from unclear project goals, poor platform selection, or incorrect target audience.
Q14: In the next three years, will communities be more important or less important?
BitWu: I believe communities will become increasingly important, but they will also differentiate. In the past, when people mentioned communities, they might think of airdrop communities, pump-and-dump communities, and task communities. These types of communities will slowly disappear in the future. Users enter these communities not because they believe in the project but for some monetary opportunity, such as exploiting yields, information arbitrage, or wealth secrets. They may appear numerous, but fundamentally they represent a fake prosperity. The truly valuable communities in the future will need to have three factors. First, they must establish a sense of trust. This trust can be based on certain individuals or certain beliefs. The key to a community is consensus, much like the early Bitcoin community. This will not change. Second, there should be a common goal. For instance, everyone could seek the next breakout opportunity together or focus on one or two projects for long-term investment. Communities need to persistently work around a theme. Third, they need to transform online relationships into more long-term, real relationships. Better communities in the future should build stronger, more long-lasting interpersonal connections through offline activities. The truly valuable aspect of a community is its people, hence communities that can retain people will become increasingly important.
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