As part of the launch of Ubisoft Quartz — Ubisoft’s new NFT platform — in early December, the company announced three NFTs in the form of in-game gear that Ghost Recon Breakpoint players on PC could redeem for free. While the equipment is available at no monetary cost to the player, some items require you to commit a great deal of time to Breakpoint. One such NFT, the “Wolf Enhanced Helmet A,” can only be redeemed by those who have played Breakpoint for 600 hours or more, according to Ubisoft Quartz’s site.
Trying to claim the helmet before reaching the 600-hour mark results in a message from Ubisoft claiming that the in-game helmet is only available for Breakpoint’s “most engaged players.” It’s worth noting that HowLongToBeat estimates that completionist players will exhaust Ghost Recon Breakpoint of its content in roughly 88 hours — over 500 short of this item’s minimum threshold.
Bloomberg journalist Stephen Totilo posited on Twitter that given the high barrier to entry to even claim this item, those who have played more than 600 hours might hike the prices of this item upon resale. Ubisoft Quartz allows players to resell NFT items on third-party blockchain marketplaces, such as Rarible or Objkt.
Ubisoft’s first step into the NFT landscape hasn’t been the smoothest. NFTs, in general, are a contentious issue given their intangible nature. In theory, NFTs serve digital receipts to prove ownership over a particular product. However, the ease with which an NFT can be minted has proven controversial; there are several instances of online artists who have had their artwork stolen and minted by an NFT seller, who then turned a profit. The carbon emissions caused by the NFT minting/selling process have also been a point of concern among NFT critics.
