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Is AI the Future of Ethereum? The Network’s Developers Are Banking on It

by admin August 30, 2025

In brief

Tech giants like Google and Amazon are betting on AI agents, and Ethereum developers believe their blockchain is uniquely positioned to power this new machine economy.
Ethereum core developer Davide Crapis has proposed ERC-8004, a standard for AI agents to discover, verify, and transact with one another.
Supporters argue Ethereum’s payment rails, digital identity tools, and scalable multi-layer structure make it the most efficient foundation for an AI-driven economy.

Tech giants like Google and Amazon are in the business of predicting where society is headed, and in recent months, both companies have started making moves to corner the development of AI agents—automated assistants authorized to zip around the internet, completing complex tasks on behalf of their human overlords and other machines.

The push to develop a formidable AI agent economy is still far from complete. But when robots are eventually let loose en masse to transact efficiently with both the existing economy and each other, experts predict their productivity and output will rival that of humans.

The main question looming over the development of the AI agent economy is what infrastructure will best facilitate this explosion. Increasingly, top minds in Silicon Valley and crypto are coalescing around a single answer to that lucrative question: Ethereum.

Ethereum’s core developers have recently arrived at the conclusion that the network is uniquely well positioned to become the foundational layer of the AI agent economy, given its ability to provide three key ingredients the ecosystem currently lacks: payment rails, identity verification, and trust.

The team is confident that within a handful of years, Ethereum will not just be foundational to the AI agent economy, but also that AI agents will become the core user base of the network.

“For us, it’s very important. It’s a strategic area,” Davide Crapis, an Ethereum core developer focused on AI, told Decrypt this week.

Crapis said that within three to five years, he believes the majority of traffic on Ethereum will be coming from machines.

ERC-8004

Earlier this month, Crapis debuted ERC-8004: a proposed interface for Ethereum that would standardize how AI agents discover each other on the network and establish trust sufficient to engage in economic interactions.

The proposal fixes what Crapis sees as the major flaws in existing ecosystems for agent-to-agent interactions. In April, Google unveiled the Agent2Agent protocol, which it promised would allow AI agents to seamlessly collaborate and “drive unprecedented levels of efficiency and innovation.”

But the framework has its shortcomings. For one thing, it doesn’t currently enable payments—an essential ingredient for a genuinely autonomous robot economy. Two, it doesn’t give agents the means to identify and trust each other out on the open internet. That means, in practice, that the protocol can only be used effectively to facilitate the interaction of agents within a single organization, on tasks that don’t involve financial transactions.

By its nature, Ethereum can easily fill these fundamental gaps, Crapis said. The payments issue is instantly solved by on-chain transactions, which AI agents already are capable of completing. As for identity and trust: that’s Ethereum’s bread and butter. NFTs, for instance, provide a secure means of establishing a unique digital identity. ERC-8004 provides a simple framework for how AI agents would go about validating each other’s identities on-chain.

And if Ethereum were to provide that framework to undergird the AI agent economy, it’s not like the blockchain network would be going up against the likes of Google. On the contrary, the Silicon Valley behemoth is actually backing Crapis’ Ethereum proposal. Jordan Ellis, one of the core Google employees behind its Agent2Agent protocol, is a co-author of ERC-8004.

“This, for me, is a signal that it’s not too early,” Crapis said of the collaboration. “In the sense that even in the traditional AI space, people are looking into agent-to-agent payments, and agent-to-agent identity.”

Powerful stakeholders in the burgeoning AI agent economy want to see the ecosystem as universally standardized as possible, to increase its potential reach and ease of navigation. These companies may not be crypto maximalists, necessarily; but if blockchain networks solve their problems far more easily than other approaches, what’s the downside?

The perfect use case?

Time and again over the last decade, crypto projects have struggled to reach mass adoption, in large part because they’ve failed at convincing mainstream consumers that the pain of navigating complicated blockchain networks is worth the gain of financial incentives or privacy benefits.

But in the looming age of the robot economy, crypto’s marketing woes may become far less of a liability. Crapis, who is now back at the Ethereum Foundation after a few years working on AI-related projects, is adamant that when the AI agent economy booms, robots will unemotionally choose the most efficient terrain on which to complete transactions—and that this best market will unquestionably be Ethereum.

“Our challenge has been making [Ethereum] more UX-friendly for humans to use, trying to shift their behavior,” Crapis said. “But if the user is an agent or a machine, then it’s fairly easy. Robots don’t have any problems remembering their private keys.”

The traditional economy was built for humans, and designed to verify human activity. (What’s your mother’s maiden name?) Ethereum, on the other hand, almost seems like it was built for robots, years before they possessed the capability to roam the internet on their own. That long-perceived liability—the network’s convoluted user experience—may now finally reveal itself as a boon in the era of the agent-dominated internet.

Even among other blockchains, the Ethereum team feels the network’s signature multi-layer structure is uniquely well poised to absorb the massive amount of AI agent traffic likely to arise in coming years.

The base Ethereum blockchain will provide foundational security and stability to handle the deluge and to verify particularly high-stakes transactions, they say, while an ever-customizable, expandable, cheap, and speedy legion of layer-2 networks will be able to handle the likely massive quantity of everyday, smaller-scale settlements.

0/ Autonomous agents are about to become Ethereum’s biggest power users.

Guest thread from @kleffew94 and @MurrLincoln on how a long-forgotten HTTP status code, ‘402 Payment Required’ could unlock a new frontier for Ethereum: agentic commerce. 🧵

— Ethereum (@ethereum) August 13, 2025

Other blockchains will have an immensely difficult time carrying the weight of the entire AI agent economy on their shoulders, Crapis said.

“Solana, in its current design, cannot sustain the machine economy,” he said, giving the example of Ethereum’s rival network. “They have no idea how much activity can come on-chain, once these machines start using it.”

The software developer predicts that once the AI agent economy arrives in full force, it will redefine the function of Ethereum, just as decentralized finance (DeFi) did back in 2020.

Getting the Ethereum developer ecosystem to agree on a standard for agent-to-agent encounters is the first crucial step in preparing for that day. Crapis said he intends on tweaking ERC-8004 over the next few months, as he gets feedback from community members.

But the standard will then be finalized in short order, to prepare for the arrival of an army of intelligent, crypto-wielding robots.

“I cannot predict when this takeoff will happen,” Crapis said, “but I feel that we have some urgency to build for it.”

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August 30, 2025 0 comments

Game Updates

Over 450 Diablo developers vote to unionise, because “passion can’t protect us from job instability”

by admin August 30, 2025

A group of more than 450 Diablo developers have voted to form a union at Blizzard, under the banner of the Communications Workers of America (CWA).

According to a CWA press release, the new union is made up of game developers, artists, designers, engineers, and support staff across the Diablo series, and has already been formally recognised by Blizzard parent company Microsoft. These workers join the over 500 World of Warcraft and almost 200 Overwatch devs who each formed their own unions earlier this year.

As you’d imagine, Microsoft’s recent mass layoffs were a big factor in these Diablo staffers opting to union up now, with other concerns including the avoidance of crunch and a “passion tax” that centres around the idea you might feel obligated to accept less for a dream job.

“With every subsequent round of mass layoffs, I’ve witnessed the dread in my coworkers grow stronger because it feels like no amount of hard work is enough to protect us,” said Kelly Yeo, a Diablo game producer and member of the organising committee member. “I am overjoyed that we have formed a union—this is just the first step for us joining a movement spreading across an industry that is tired of living in fear. We are ready to begin fighting for real change alongside our Diablo colleagues.”

Ryan Littleton, another Diablo game designer and committee member, added:

The day after the third round of mass layoffs, I walked into the office, and when I tried to open the door to the cafeteria, my badge was denied. For a moment, I wondered if getting breakfast was how I’d find out I was part of that round. While luckily it was just a technical issue, none of us should have to live with that constant worry that we might be let go at the drop of a hat. A union allows us to organize across the industry to make great games and protect the developers who create them from the constant pressures of layoffs, passion tax, and crunch.

Teams at Blizzard aren’t the only folks at Microsoft who’ve moved to unionise recently. Staff at the likes of Call of Duty developer Raven Software, Fallout and Elder Scrolls studio Bethesda, and Elder Scrolls Online developer ZeniMax have also opted to seek protections. In the case of unionised ZeniMax staff, their union claimed it was fighting for the jobs of workers left in limbo by the abrupt cancellation of an unannounced MMO as part of Microsoft’s July mass layoffs.

Solidarity to these freshly-unionised Diablo devs.

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August 30, 2025 0 comments

Game Updates

Epic CEO blames Unreal Engine 5 issues on developers, but more support incoming

by admin August 29, 2025

Epic CEO Time Sweeney has blamed developers for issues with games made in Unreal Engine 5, stating the “main cause is the order of development”.

A number of games developed with UE5 released recently have had issues with performance, including the likes of Metal Gear Solid Delta Snake Eater (out today!) and Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, but ever since the engine’s release there have been games with stuttering and poor frame rates.

Now, speaking to media at the Unreal Fest in South Korea (thanks Clawsomegamer), Sweeney put the onus on developers and the need for better education.

“The main cause is the order of development,” he said. “Many studios build for top-tier hardware first and leave optimisation and low-spec testing for the end. Ideally, optimisation should begin early – before full content build-out. We’re doing two things: strengthening engine support with more automated optimisation across devices, and expanding developer education so ‘optimise early’ becomes standard practice. If needed, our engineers can step in.

“Game complexity is much higher than 10 years ago, so it’s hard to solve purely at the engine level; engine makers and game teams need to collaborate. We’re also bringing Fortnite optimisation learnings into Unreal Engine, so titles run better on low-spec PCs.”

Essentially, developers are too focused on high-end gaming PCs and consoles, meaning those on the lower end are suffering.

That’s all well and good for the biggest developers, but for smaller indies optimisation can be a huge challenge. Arguably, Epic needs to build on those education efforts further to help studios get the most out of the engine.

This is a news-in-brief story. This is part of our vision to bring you all the big news as part of a daily live report.

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August 29, 2025 0 comments

Esports

450 Diablo developers vote to unionize

by admin August 29, 2025

450 developers working on Blizzard’s Diablo series have voted to unionize.

In a statement, the Communications Workers of America (CWA) said the unit, which includes game developers, artists, designers, engineers, and support staff across the Diablo franchise, “is one of the largest wall-to-wall unions at a Microsoft-owned studio and builds off the momentum of Blizzard’s Story and Franchise Development workers securing union representation and Microsoft workers securing historic contracts at ZeniMax Media and Raven Software.”

“I am overjoyed that we have formed a union — this is just the first step for us joining a movement spreading across an industry that is tired of living in fear. We are ready to begin fighting for real change alongside our Diablo colleagues.”

CWA Local 6215 President Ron Swaggerty said: “We are thrilled to welcome these video game workers into Austin’s union family. Each new organizing effort adds momentum to the nationwide movement for video game worker power.

“This progress is the result of the resilience and determination of workers who have been stepping up and speaking out over the past few years.”

Earlier this month, developers working in Blizzard’s story and franchise development (SDF) division also voted to unionize, joining nearly 3,000 workers at Microsoft-owned studios who have organized with the Communications Workers of America (CWA).

Back in August last year, unionized workers at Wisconsin-based Raven Software filed a complaint against the studio and its parent companies, Activision and Microsoft, for allegedly refusing to bargain. Workers at Raven also recently secured a historic contract with Microsoft.

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August 29, 2025 0 comments

Game Updates

Tomb Raider developers Crystal Dynamics lay off more staff, say the series’ future is “unaffected”

by admin August 28, 2025

Tomb Raider developers Crystal Dynamics have laid off an unspecified number of staff, their second round of jobs cuts this year. The studio say that the future of the Tomb Raider series won’t be affected by this latest taking away of folks’ livelihoods.

The news comes not too long after the Perfect Dark reboot Crystal Dynamics were working alongside The Initiative was cancelled amid Microsoft’s mass cuts in July. The Initiative were shut down as part of that culling.

Crystal Dynamics announced these layoffs via LinkedIn post, which neglected to mention exactly how many staff had been let go.

“Today we made the very difficult decision to part ways with a number of our talented colleagues as the result of evolving business conditions,” they wrote. “This decision was not made lightly. It was necessary, however, to ensure the long-term health of our studio and core creative priorities in a continually shifting market. To those impacted – we recognize and thank you for your hard work, talent, and passion. We are committed to offering the full extent of support and resources at our disposal during this transition.”

Crystal Dynamics added that the future of Tomb Raider is “unaffected” by these job cuts. There’s currently a new Tomb Raider in the works, and it’s set to be published by Amazon.

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Among the former Crystal Dynamics staff who’ve shared that they’re among those laid off are senior animator Jaron Gittleman and senior designer Matthew Angus. “Well it finally happened,” Gittleman wrote on LinkedIn. “After nearly 8 long years I’ve been laid off from Crystal Dynamics. It’s been a helluva run. From Avengers to Tomb Raider to Perfect Dark it has been a journey of a ton of growth. I learned so much and worked with some of the best. I’ll miss them dearly.”

Best of luck to all affected.

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August 28, 2025 0 comments

Product Reviews

Google Will Make All Android App Developers Verify Their Identity Starting Next Year

by admin August 26, 2025

Android’s open nature set it apart from the iPhone as the era of touchscreen smartphones began nearly two decades ago. Little by little, Google has traded some of that openness for security, and its next security initiative could make the biggest concessions yet in the name of blocking bad apps.

Google has announced plans to begin verifying the identities of all Android app developers, and not just those publishing on the Play Store. Google intends to verify developer identities no matter where they offer their content, and apps without verification won’t work on most Android devices in the coming years.

Google used to do very little curation of the Play Store (or Android Market, if you go back far enough), but it has long sought to improve the platform’s reputation as being less secure than the Apple App Store. Years ago, you could publish actual exploits in the official store to gain root access on phones, but now there are multiple reviews and detection mechanisms to reduce the prevalence of malware and banned content. While the Play Store is still not perfect, Google claims apps sideloaded from outside its store are 50 times more likely to contain malware.

This, we are led to believe, is the impetus for Google’s new developer verification system. The company describes it like an “ID check at the airport.” Since requiring all Google Play app developers to verify their identities in 2023, it has seen a precipitous drop in malware and fraud. Bad actors in Google Play leveraged anonymity to distribute malicious apps, so it stands to reason that verifying app developers outside of Google Play could also enhance security.

However, making that happen outside of its app store will require Google to take a page from Apple’s playbook and flex its muscle in a way many Android users and developers could find intrusive. Google plans to create a streamlined Android Developer Console, which devs will use if they plan to distribute apps outside of the Play Store. After verifying their identities, developers will have to register the package name and signing keys of their apps. Google won’t check the content or functionality of the apps, though.

Google says that only apps with verified identities will be installable on certified Android devices, which is virtually every Android-based device—if it has Google services on it, it’s a certified device. If you have a non-Google build of Android on your phone, none of this applies. However, that’s a vanishingly small fraction of the Android ecosystem outside of China.

Google plans to begin testing this system with early access in October of this year. In March 2026, all developers will have access to the new console to get verified. In September 2026, Google plans to launch this feature in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand. The next step is still hazy, but Google is targeting 2027 to expand the verification requirements globally.

A Seismic Shift

This plan comes at a major crossroads for Android. The ongoing Google Play antitrust case brought by Epic Games may finally force changes to Google Play in the coming months. Google lost its appeal of the verdict several weeks ago, and while it plans to appeal the case to the US Supreme Court, the company will have to begin altering its app distribution scheme, barring further legal maneuvering.

Among other things, the court has ordered that Google must distribute third-party app stores and allow Play Store content to be rehosted in other storefronts. Giving people more ways to get apps could increase choice, which is what Epic and other developers wanted. However, third-party sources won’t have the deep system integration of the Play Store, which means users will be sideloading these apps without Google’s layers of security.

It’s hard to say how much of a genuine security problem this is. On one hand, it makes sense Google would be concerned—most of the major malware threats to Android devices spread via third-party app repositories. However, enforcing an installation whitelist across almost all Android devices is heavy handed. This requires everyone making Android apps to satisfy Google’s requirements before virtually anyone will be able to install their apps, which could help Google retain control as the app market opens up. While the requirements may be minimal right now, there’s no guarantee they will stay that way.

The documentation currently available doesn’t explain what will happen if you try to install a non-verified app, nor how phones will check for verification status. Presumably, Google will distribute this whitelist in Play Services as the implementation date approaches. We’ve reached out for details on that front and will report if we hear anything.

This story originally appeared on Ars Technica.

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August 26, 2025 0 comments

Game Updates

The Next Era Of Metal Gear Solid Is Being Entrusted To A New Generation Of Developers, If It’s Made

by admin August 25, 2025

A decade is a long period of time, but for Metal Gear Solid fans, it’s an eternity. Fortunately, Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater launches at the end of the month, bringing a classic from the original series into the modern age of gaming. But beyond that? Expect the future of Metal Gear Solid to be handed over to a new generation of developers.

Metal Gear veterans Noriaki Okamura and Yuji Korekado recently spoke about how they were preparing to hand over the franchise to a younger team if Konami ever decides to produce a brand-new Metal Gear Solid game.

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“One of the reasons why we brought in a lot of fresh meat–all the new, younger developers–is because, not only did we want to give them a chance to figure out how to create and develop a Metal Gear game, but also give them a chance to experience the game themselves,” Okamura said to Rolling Stone. “And we’ll still be here for a while, but right now the goal is to build a team that could carry on the legacy on our behalf and could produce, hopefully in the future, more exciting games.”

Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater is designed to be a bridge for that idea, as Okamura and Korekado view it as having the potential to reenergize the franchise and draw in new creators. Korekado explained that the seasoned developers working on the game were able to incorporate feedback from younger members on the team that would help modernize the game, while still retaining the original elements that made this entry in the series so captivating when it was first released in the 2000s.

The future of Metal Gear Solid is also one that will likely not involve series creator Hideo Kojima, as following his exit from Konami, the industry legend has been busy with multiple projects at his studio, like Death Stranding and its sequel, OD, and a spiritual successor to Metal Gear Solid, Phsyint.

Kojima has also spoken about how all the demanding work of creating a video game has begun to take a mental and physical toll on him as he grows older, but he still plans to remain as creative for as long as possible–or at least until he becomes the first person to make a game in space. He’s also not planning to play Metal Gear Solid Delta.

Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater launches for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S on August 28, and we gave it a 9/10 in our review. “Konami’s Metal Gear Solid 3 remake is a safe but successful modernization of a beloved classic,” Tamoor Hussain wrote in GameSpot’s Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater review.

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August 25, 2025 0 comments

Game Reviews

Lost Hellden is an action JRPG from veteran Final Fantasy and Gravity Rush developers, here’s a new gameplay trailer

by admin August 23, 2025

JRPG Lost Hellden has received a fresh gameplay trailer to show off its “Deep 2D” painted art style and action battle system.

The game, from Artisan Studios, was previously revealed as a 2025 Switch game, but has now been pushed back to 2026 and is set for release across Switch, PS4, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC (Steam, Epic GoG).

Lost Hellden is a JRPG in a classic style, which is testament to its veteran developers. Hitoshi Sakimoto (Final Fantasy 12, Tactics Ogre, Valkyria Chronicles) is behind the music and audio, while its illustrations are from Takeshi Oga (Gravity Rush, Siren).

Lost Hellden – Gameplay Trailer Watch on YouTube

It features hand-painted static backdrops, a Job system with skill tree, and action-style combat.

If you’re a fan of old school JRPGs, keep an eye on this.

This is a news-in-brief story. This is part of our vision to bring you all the big news as part of a daily live report.

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August 23, 2025 0 comments

A screenshot of Microsoft's Copilot Gaming technology demo

Product Reviews

87% of game developers are already using AI agents and over a third use AI for creative elements like level design and dialogue according to a new Google survey

by admin August 19, 2025

Fully 87% of game developers are already using AI agents. That’s according to a new survey from Google Cloud and The Harris Poll of 615 game developers in the United States, South Korea, Norway, Finland, and Sweden. It’s also just the tip of the AI-berg.

Some of the tasks completed by AI aren’t immediately worrisome and you’d think will speed up development and reduce costs. The report says AI is proving useful for automating “cumbersome and repetitive tasks”, freeing developers to focus more on creative elements.

For instance, 47% of developers reported that AI is, “speeding up playtesting and balancing of mechanics, 45% say it is assisting in localization and translation of game content, and 44% cite it for improving code generation and scripting support.” Overall, 94% of developers surveyed, “expect AI to reduce overall development costs in the long term (3+ years).”

That could help keep smaller developers in business, it might mean niche game titles are more viable, and so on. But it’s only part of the picture. Arguably one of the great fears among gamers is that game design, stories and dialogue will be replaced with the sort of AI slop that’s now bunging up YouTube and social media.

Well, slop or not, AI is increasingly being used for those purposes. Google’s survey found that 36% of respondents are using AI for dynamic level design, animation and rigging, and dialogue writing, while 37% of developers report they have, “enhanced experimentation with new gameplay or narrative concepts.”

Will today’s games be among the last to be coded, written and voiced by humans? (Image credit: rmk1234, CD Projekt Red)

The report is pretty granular about many aspects of game design and development and makes for an intriguing read. Overall, Google is nothing if not upbeat about the implications of all this. Of course it would be, considering it is one of the largest AI researchers on the planet. It has skin in the game, and it’s trying to sell AI to the world.

“Overall, the research found widespread adoption of gen AI in the games industry—and a surprising level of optimism for it. AI is already making a big difference in developer workflows, including productivity and creative tasks.

“Developers also see promising possibilities with AI agents and other emerging AI tools to accelerate game development and enhance player experiences,” the report says.

Of course, the end game, pun very much intended, of all this is presumably games fully AI generated in response to user prompts. “I want to play a first person shooter set in ancient Rome, but with modern weapons, procedural crime elements and Disney characters,” or whatever. And off you go.

Of course, except the one bit that almost definitely won’t be doable is the Disney characters due to IP ownership. Unless you pay extra for the Disney AI gaming subscription or similar. But you get the idea.

If that puts the burden on users to come up with game narratives, semi-curated games where the basic premise is tweaked by user prompts might make more sense for most mainstream gamers. But the main point is that it might all be AI generated one day. At which point will there be a submarket for “artisanal” hand-coded games with human-written narratives, real voices and the rest? All of this is to come, much is to be decided. But the the direction of travel looks pretty unambiguous, and a little icky.

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August 19, 2025 0 comments