A recent AI-driven game, Shawarma Legends, has taken the internet by storm, amassing over 4 billion views across platforms and captivating countless players. With the tagline, "Working hard by day, running a cyber shawarma shop by night," this game offers a unique slice of entrepreneurial escapism tailored for the younger generation’s vision of "light entrepreneurship" in the digital age.
The Core Gameplay of Shawarma Legends: Familiar Yet Revolutionary
The core gameplay of Shawarma Legends isn’t groundbreaking. Similar simulation games can easily be found on platforms like 4399, with Flipline Studios’ “Papa’s Series” offering nearly a hundred titles where players manage various virtual restaurants.
And yet, this seemingly unremarkable 2D game with simple visuals has been elevated to the status of a “AAA masterpiece” by its players. Powered by AI for art, music, and voiceovers, the game has achieved remarkable milestones: it topped the iOS free games chart, surpassed 1 million downloads on Google Play, and garnered an impressive 9/10 rating on Steam. That’s just 1 point shy of the highly anticipated Black Myth: Wukong, a true AAA title.
As for whether the game genuinely utilized AI, the developers confirmed it on Steam, leaving no room for doubt.
Although only the main menu image is explicitly labeled as AI-generated, many players believe the game’s quirky four-fingered characters and its viral Chinese theme song are also AI creations.
For a low-budget mini-game like Shawarma Legends, achieving support for 14 languages—something even major studios struggle with—likely owes much to AI assistance.
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Low Cost, High Returns.It’s no exaggeration to say that the viral success of Shawarma Legends, dubbed a "AAA masterpiece," owes a significant debt to AI. While the industry dissects how to replicate the next breakout hit, the Degame team has already shifted its focus toward exploring the potential for "infinite games."
Degame, well-known among Web3 gaming enthusiasts, is a comprehensive platform featuring over 8,000 game projects. It offers specialized rankings, data analytics, and tools to help users discover games and communities. Additionally, it provides consistent opportunities for zero-cost earnings and airdrops. Beyond AI-generated content and AI NPCs, Degame’s long-standing expertise in gaming operations highlights another major application for AI within Web3 games.
Traditional game development is often limited by static assets and pre-designed storylines. However, large language models (LLMs) have revolutionized these constraints with their powerful generative capabilities and creative potential.
For instance, RPGs built on LLMs, like Google’s Infinite, allow players to fundamentally customize their characters and adventures. This shift signals a broader trend where developers leverage AI to build truly boundless virtual worlds.
AI can dynamically adapt game content to players’ behaviors and preferences, creating personalized gaming experiences. Domestic titles like Yandere AI Catgirl Girlfriend and indie creations like Infinite Craft exemplify AI’s immense potential for game innovation. Meanwhile, the openness of Web3 is poised to unleash this momentum even faster.
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An essential aspect of Web3 gaming lies in its collaborative nature, where users and platforms co-create the experience rather than adhering to a pre-designed, limited framework. In these games, the concept of Lore—traditionally a structured and predictable narrative crafted by game designers—evolves into something dynamic. By leveraging AI models, diverse inputs can be synthesized to generate unpredictable outputs, unlocking limitless possibilities in gameplay.
Imagine a future where AR/VR devices allow us to access stunning virtual worlds. With just a simple prompt, we could instantly create 2D and 3D objects—whether imagined or beyond imagination—as though casting a spell. These creations would be truly ours, securely stored on public blockchains. Players could interact with intelligent AI NPCs that dynamically shape the story of the entire game world, all supported by fully transparent, open-source infrastructure.
This vision of infinite creativity is what drives the Degame team to harness AI in telling the story of Web3 gaming.
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Storytelling is one of humanity’s oldest and most powerful forms of communication. When a story resonates with us, it captures our attention and leaves a lasting impression, making its meaning easier to absorb.
Compared to the now-mature AI-generated image sector, the development of AI-driven 3D assets in gaming is still in its infancy. As a result, funding for such projects remains relatively low. However, the gaming industry's market size far surpasses that of the image sector, and AI is set to play a transformative role in its evolution.
The Degame team firmly believes in the immense potential of AI-powered Web3 games. Yet, this journey of exploration will inevitably face challenges and hurdles. It is a path that requires widespread participation—not just from hundreds or thousands, but from millions and eventually billions of people. This participation must occur in an open, engaging, and tightly connected environment, which is the foundation upon which Degame was built.
Providing Web2 users with a seamless Web3 application experience is a core growth pillar for DeGame, resulting in a substantial accumulation of stable and authentic users.
Over years of operation, DeGame has progressively built 4,000+ independent communities centered around Web3, GameFi, NFTs, and Layer2 technologies. These communities enable any project or community to publish multimedia content, host live streams, set tasks, distribute rewards, and more.
Moreover, with the platform's AIGC tools and ready-made modules for tasks, rewards, and points systems, projects and communities can quickly connect with existing active users. This stimulates social interaction, bypasses cold starts, enables viral growth, and gradually nurtures high-value communities capable of deep, long-term engagement within the gaming ecosystem.
At DeGame, it’s not just about social interaction and gaming experiences. NFTs, virtual assets, on-chain incentive mechanisms, and revenue-sharing models empower every user to become a builder and a driving force in the gaming ecosystem. These elements allow high-quality projects and communities to reduce costs, shorten timelines, simplify operations, and unlock unprecedented freedom and possibilities.
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Looking Back at the Past Year
With the emergence of generative AI models like ChatGPT, AI has evolved from simple automation tools to complex decision-making and prediction systems, becoming a key driver of contemporary societal progress. AI-related products and applications have seen explosive growth. For example, ChatGPT has continuously launched innovative products like GPTs and Sora. Meanwhile, foundational AI infrastructure providers like NVIDIA have consistently exceeded market expectations, with its data center business accounting for over 83% of revenue in Q4 FY2024—growing 409% year-over-year. Notably, 40% of this revenue was attributed to large model inference scenarios, reflecting rapidly increasing demand for foundational computational power.
Undoubtedly, the convergence of AI and Web3 is one of the hottest topics today, garnering significant attention and anticipation from the market. Beyond the hype and price bubbles, the long-term question remains: can the fusion of AI and Web3 gaming create sustainable value, narratives, and industries?
Let’s work together to find the answer.
