First thing’s first; we can’t dive too deep into any discussion about War of Crypto (WOC from herein) without acknowledging the elephant in the room. Or given the scale of the concern, perhaps the mammoth in the room. Yes, War of Crypto does have “Crypto” in the name; it’s an integral part of the branding, and allusions to concepts like centralization even feature in the in-game lore. However, this is NOT just a game for hardcore Cryptocurrency and blockchain enthusiasts.

More Game Than Blockchain

It’s a game that features and introduces the benefits of blockchain to gamers (more on that in a bit) whilst actually being, you know, a game. That means gameplay, active graphics, strategy, decision-making, a storyline, hundreds of characters with specific skillsets and evolutions. In other words, a game that gamers will want to play.

Up until now, the concept of blockchain games has veered very heavily towards the “blockchain” side of the equation, with minimal considerations to gameplay. The entire “game” has been either the creation of a non-fungible token (think CryptoKitties), or trying to get in early enough on a pyramid scheme mechanic to get out with profit. Speculation has been the primary motivation to “play”, rather than a game actually being in any way enjoyable.

Does It Look Fun?

WOC on the other hand certainly looks like it will be enjoyable from what we’ve seen thus far. The team behind it (Lucille Games) has some pedigree, having built the Pokéfind Minecraft mod with nearly 1.5m players. There’s some influence of Pokémon apparent in WoC as well — it’s a PvP game where you set up Battle Squads of 5 different heroes to fight against other teams. Each hero character has their own specific strengths and weaknesses (nature type heroes would for instance be weak against attacks from fire types, etc). Fights gain you XP and Crypto Dust, which can allow you to evolve your heroes to higher forms.

There’s a fair deal of variance between the individual heroes too, so that no two Battle Squads should ever be completely alike even if they feature the same 5 characters. Whilst each character starts off with the same base stats, they also have IV stats and personalities that differentiate them from their brethren. Even if you have, for example, multiple copies of the water-type hero Equus, their different personalities and stats could lead to different outcomes when battling the same opponents. So, what separates this from all of the other PvP squad battling games out there?

Enjin Coin Providing Real Value

Given the theme of this site, it’s probably not hard to guess that blockchain technology plays a role. In traditional games, you never truly own your characters, items, or digital assets, you just access them. If a server shuts down, you get banned, or your game file corrupts, you can lose your character and progress completely. You wave bye-bye to all the hours and investment you put into a game.

With blockchain however, you control and hold them yourself. Digital assets are tokenized (minted with some cryptocurrency like Enjin Coin) to secure them onto the blockchain, which is constantly updated by a massive decentralised network of computers. This prevents single point of failures, like server shutdowns that games are currently vulnerable to. As long as you control the private key to your crypto wallet (and please don’t ever fall for anyone phishing you for it!), you have true ownership over all the game assets stored inside of it.

Even in the worst case scenario of a game or studio shutting down and going dark (MMOs have dropped like flies this year, Telltale Games is shutting down, and Wildstar developer Carbine are pulling the plug, after the game was live for over 4 years), you can go into your wallet and “melt” down the game asset that was “minted” with ENJ, thereby destroying it but recovering (at least 50% of) the ENJ that was used to put the item on the blockchain. So even if WOC is DOA, you’re not SOL.

Many blockchain items might have negligible amounts of ENJ minted into them, with minimum value being recovered by melting. The primary benefit of minting assets with ENJ will always be securing items on the blockchain and enabling true ownership. You can do what you want with your items thanks to this, including trading them directly with other players. In a best case scenario, your blockchain game items and characters can even be used in other games from other studios in a gaming multiverse — but more on that some other time.

Platform Switch

WOC was the first game announced using Enjin Coin (ENJ), back at the GDC in San Francisco in March. Since then, they’ve shifted plans from launching on PC to being mobile-first. This makes sense if you consider the type of game that it is. They’re the first game to deliver their assets to the Enjin Smart Wallet, a combination cryptocurrency and gaming wallet that renders all your game assets on-screen. You can read backstories of the individual WOC Heroes by clicking on their pictures. Players get transparency from statistics on how many copies of each asset were minted, and are in circulation. This gives a real insight into rarity, and can make or break trading decisions. Speaking of rarity; WOC was also the first ENJ game to hold additional fundraising via an IAO (Initial Asset Offering). What is an IAO?

Initial Asset Offering – a New Frontier in Funding

Players could buy crystals containing randomly allocated special pre-sale skins and characters, from Canarth the robo-beaver/mole to Mooner the flying dog (an exclusive character available only to presale participants). Character skins, like Lambo Mooner and the “Golden Potato Skin” Daagon — created from a meme in their Telegram group — are backed with massive amounts of ENJ. Lambo Mooners contain 2,500 ENJ, and the 10 PoDrags weigh in at 10,000 ENJ backing each. The chance at that kind of value can build enormous hype among a player base before a game goes live. This can even lead to IAOs as viable investments if the value of the crypto backing it grows strongly in the future. For developers, IAOs allow fundraising without disrupting game balance.

Pre-Sale Teething Troubles

As the very first IAO, WOC wasn’t immune to some growing pains. A DDOS attack rendered many unable to participate in the first stage before the developers took the site offline. In addition, a change of pricing structure to a flat fee when the pre-sale came back online angered some who had paid more in the first stage with an ascending price structure. All in all though, the biggest issue seems to have been that not enough people were able to participate, as the pre-sale sold out in less than half an hour when it came back online.

This lead to a recent announcement of a second pre-sale (featuring less exclusive and lower-backed skins and characters) to allow everyone the opportunity to get some heroes before the game goes live. Dubbed an “Early Access Sale” the sale goes live on the 10th of November. Compared with the 1,500 heroes available in the initial pre-sale, the Early Access Sale will feature 15,000 heroes, comprised of 13 new heroes. They will feature both normal and Early Access character skins, giving a total of 26 possible skins in a crystal, each priced at a flat fee of $25. Lucille Games will leverage their existing Pokéfind fanbase to drive more interest, and ENJ backing of Early Access heroes could total 1,200,000 ENJ if they sell out.

For now, I’ll be watching out for details on their continued development, with current plans for a beta playable in Q4 this year. It’s not going to go up against the likes of Witcher 3 in terms of depth or complexity, but WOC does look to be a fully-fledged game with lore and combat mechanics that should satisfy blockchain enthusiasts and gamers alike. And that is an important step forward for the legitimacy of gaming as a usecase of blockchain technology.

Full disclosure: The author took part in the WoC presale and is a longtime fan and holder of Enjin Coin. You can find more info on War of Crypto at https://warofcrypto.io and their social media channels like Telegram and Twitter.

Lucille Games | warofcrypto.io | Mobile, PC | Enjin Coin | Beta Q4 2018