Case Studies – Crucible

Industry

Online Gaming, VR/AR

Products Used

Verity

Use Case

In-Game Identity Verification

Bringing verifiable identity to online gaming

We first met Crucible in early 2019, and it was immediately clear that they were onto a massive opportunity: To bring verifiable credentials into the worlds of online gaming and virtual reality.

Founders Ryan Gill and Toby Tremayne observed how self-sovereign identity could finally provide the digital trust layer the Internet has thus far been missing. They saw credentials discussed in the contexts of online banking, academia, and government-issued identity, but these developments had not yet reached online gaming—an industry that had just started to invest in federated solutions.

At the same time, they realized the gaming industry (projected to be worth $196B by 2022) has one of the strongest needs for verifiable and portable credentials. The recent rise in free-to-play games, in-game transactions, and peer-to-peer trading has spurred dramatic increases in money laundering, hacking, and identity fraud that have forced developers and parents alike to rethink the importance of security.

Crucible Emergence SDK

A mockup showing Crucible’s in-game player controls, in a graphic interface familiar to fans of online games.

Bridging the SSI & gaming worlds

Crucible realized early on that in order for the gaming industry to adopt verifiable credentials, two things would have to happen: 1) Game developers would need to be able to integrate market-ready solutions, without having to invest heavily in IAM or undergo steep learning curves, and 2) players would need to be completely free of having to worry about the underlying technology.

Commenting on these needs, Crucible’s Chief Technology Officer, Toby Tremayne, added:

Our aim is to provide an abstraction layer not only for developers, but for players as well. We don’t expect players to care about crypto, digital wallets, or securing their credentials; we want to make it so that you don’t even have to think about it. We want people to just turn up, start playing, and have fun.”

Powered by our Verity credential platform, Crucible’s solution takes the form of an SDK that developers can integrate into popular game engines. Players can then engage with this solution through an in-game overlay, which takes a familiar interface similar to that of many role-playing games and travels with them from game to game. From this overlay, players can manage their data, specify how they want to be seen by others, and create virtual avatars that can be different for each game.

Integral to this system is a ‘proof of humanity’ credential, which verifies the real-world attributes needed for trusted in-game commerce while maintaining the option for players to remain anonymous.

Crucible’s solution, the Emergence SDK, entered alpha in Q3 2020 and offers a host of benefits, including:

  • More trusted in-game relationships
  • Passwordless single-sign-on, with full KYC
  • Smarter parental controls, and the ability to know with confidence that your child is playing only with kids their age or even kids from their school (while preserving privacy and anonymity)
  • The ability for players to set how they want to be contacted and how they want to appear to others

While the project is still in alpha, Crucible is already exploring applications beyond gaming, including augmented and virtual reality and the greater ‘Open Metaverse,’ a term the team uses to describe the digitization of everything.

To learn more about Crucible and the Emergence SDK, visit crucible.network or watch our recent customer showcase webinar: