Team17 abandons MetaWorms NFT plans following backlash

Worms creator Team17 has announced it’ll end its controversial MetaWorms NFT project just over a day after originally announcing it.

The British publisher released a statement to press and its fans last night to declare the news. “Team17 is today announcing an end to the MetaWorms NFT project. We have listened to our teamsters, development partners, and our games’ communities, and the concerns they’ve expressed, and have therefore taken the decision to step back from the NFT space.”

Team17 had announced MetaWorms as NFT collectibles based on the company’s longest-running series. The publisher had teamed up with Reality Gaming Group and claimed the blockchain items were supposedly “environmentally friendly”.  However, the project drew widespread criticism from fans and studios alike almost immediately.

By yesterday afternoon, several indie developers with games published by the company had made public statements distancing themselves from NFTs and Team17’s plans. These included Overcooked! studio Ghost Town Games and Yooka-Laylee studio Playtonic Games. Going Under developer Aggro Crab even said it would not work again with Team17 until the NFT plans were scrapped.

It’s not the first games company to quickly make a U-turn from the controversial NFT technology. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 developers GSC Game World quickly gave up on its own NFT plans following fan backlash back in December. Ubisoft’s own NFT platform Ubisoft Quartz announcement, meanwhile, quickly became one of the company’s most disliked YouTube videos ever.

However, it seems the latter may not have entirely learned their lesson, as one of Ubisoft’s execs recently claimed in an interview with Australian NFT site Finder that they thought gamers “just don’t get it for now”. Oooft.

Team17 is today announcing an end to the MetaWorms NFT project.

We have listened to our Teamsters, development partners, and our games’ communities, and the concerns they’ve expressed, and have therefore taken the decision to step back from the NFT space.

— Team17 (@Team17) February 1, 2022

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