Today we are going to talk about a popular project, Animal Crossing: My Neighbor Alice on the blockchain, which has soared 50% in one day and its current market value has reached 160 million US dollars. In fact, this project has been in the works for a long time. It was first launched on Binance's launchpool in 2021. Now, three years have passed and the game has been launched, so it has soared. Because it is a blockchain game, all NFTs on it have soared. Let's analyze the situation of this game today.
1. Background description
"My Neighbor Alice" is a multiplayer construction game inspired by "Animal Crossing: New Horizons", which became a big hit after Nintendo released it last year. (As of the end of March 2023, in the financial report released by Nintendo, "Animal Crossing" has sold 41.59 million copies worldwide, ranking second on the Nintendo Switch game sales list, second only to Mario Kart. Calculated at 200 yuan per copy, the sales volume has reached 8 billion yuan).
The gameplay of "My Neighbor Alice" is similar to Animal Crossing. In the game, players can design their own characters, build houses, decorate their own islands, and interact with friends and other non-player characters (NPCs). The design team's original intention and vision for ALice is to create a "second space" for all players, allowing them to relax and enjoy the fun of the game while monetizing the time and energy they have invested.
2. Introduction
Alice's world - a large group of islands located in the Lumerendas Archipelago. This is a place where animals and humans share space, make friends and work together. Anyone can join this community by purchasing a plot of land and engage in various activities such as fishing, insect catching and beekeeping. Alice shares this archipelago with her friends - Bjorn the bear, Bob the beekeeper, Ivan the businessman and Jose the boatman. By interacting with neighbors and helping Alice with her duties and daily activities, players can earn rewards that can be exchanged for in-game items that they can use on their own plots.
After purchasing the land, players can design and decorate their property to make it unique and special. To do this, users can try to change the landscape, use in-game assets such as NFTs in the form of vegetation, furniture, buildings or animals, carry out daily activities, and participate in competitions and tasks to get more rewards.
My Neighbor Alice is the first attempt to create a true public application with an engaging plot that can attract ordinary gamers, blockchain enthusiasts, and DeFi geeks. It has an easy and intuitive interface and a variety of features to explore. In My Neighbor Alice, users can decide for themselves to what extent they want to participate in the game's decentralized features and DeFi.
3. Game Basics
Currently the game needs to download the client, the minimum configuration requirements are:
Operating system: Windows 7 or later
Processor: Intel i5-6400 / Ryzen 5 1600
Memory: 8 GB RAM
Graphics: Nvidia 1050 / AMD RX 560
DirectX: Version 11
Storage space: 6 GB available space
To log in, you need a piece of land. Currently, you can buy land on its marketplace. The current floor price of land is 250 ALICE (625 US dollars, 1 Alice = 2.5 US dollars). If you think the land is too expensive, you can also play in the ancestral way.
Currently, pets are quite expensive, with the lowest cost being 500 Alice. There are also other items, such as land decorations and character decorations, such as clothes, shoes, etc.
4. Core gameplay of the game:
Land: In the game, the Lummelunda Archipelago consists of six islands, each with its own characteristics, including Snowflake Island, Medieval Plains, Nature's Rest, Lummestad The Town, Sandy Coast, and Submerged Islands. Players can buy virtual land from Alice or on the market. The supply of land in the game is limited, and each piece of land is presented in the form of NFT tokens.
Marketplace: Players can buy and sell their land and other items in the game, such as houses, fences, animals and plants, etc.
Character: Players customize their own character based on their own preferences and can interact with other players or NPCs.
Game assets: including houses, animals, plants, decorations, etc., which can be traded.
Incentive mechanism: In the game, players will be able to complete some mutually beneficial activities or tasks, and players who complete them well will be rewarded.
On-chain forum: A decentralized forum where users can discuss game activities, determine voting schedules, make friends, etc.
5. Game Core
-Backend: Chromia
The first layer of the project is the gaming backend infrastructure. The project is built on the basic idea that it will run exclusively on the Chromia platform.
The backend is a Chromia relational blockchain database that is used with Unity to operate accounts, token transfers, relational data, user progress, etc. It is designed to follow the development of cross-chain playability and interact with NFTs. Chromia's unique database features enable complex backend logic to be done directly on the blockchain without spending too much development time.
-Front-end: Unity
The second layer of the project is the client side, developed in Unity. The most important part of this is the procedural building system. This is crucial because it has to be fun, feel good, and be comparable to other building games on the market.
- Game Economy
The third area of the project is economic infrastructure, including "property/land" auctions, asset transactions, token transactions, etc.
- Integration: ERC20 and Steam
ALICE tokens will be transferable between ERC20 and native Chromia tokens. This bridge is developed by Chromia outside of this project. The Steam market and sales within it will be connected with Chromia.
- Governance DAO
The project will not only create a game, but will also write code for a decentralized autonomous organization called Community Council. The team has identified ChromaWay as an initial partner.
6. Team
Anna Norrevik CEO
He has 7 years of experience in the game industry, including 5 years at Paradox Interactive. Team leader for 7 expansions, including Crusader Kings 3, the largest game project at Paradox (with over 20 people). 91/100 on Metacritic. Received a B.A. in Business and Economics from KTH Stockholm School of Economics and Computer Science.
Lenny Pettersson CMO
15+ years of experience in the media and entertainment industry. 8+ years at Turner, a WarnerMedia company, as Senior Marketing Manager for the Nordics and Baltics. Extensive experience in launching original IPs for Cartoon Network and General Entertainment brands in multiple countries. Head of Marketing for CNN in the Nordics and Baltics. Master of Business and Economics, Uppsala University.
8. Token Economy
The project's native token, Alice, is issued on Ethereum. The total number is 100 million, with 67,913,333 in circulation, a circulation rate of 68%, and the current exchange rate is US$2.5. The peak was $44.0747 (2021-03-15). So although it has risen by 50% in one day, it is still at the bottom overall. Looking at the distribution of tokens, token sales 21%, ecosystem 16%, fund reserves 20%, team 15%, play to earn 8%, community 15%, and user incentives 5%.
Finally, to summarize, this project is a case study of a very top game in web2. I think it is a very good follow-up strategy, because this kind of game has been proven to have a market and a user base, and it is a very good concept to replicate it in the blockchain and let users play to earn. As we mentioned before, Mavia is also an imitation of COC. However, I went to see the fan data of the game on its social platform, which is relatively average. There are only more than 10,000 people on Twitter and only a few thousand on Discord. This order of magnitude is not good enough. Then there is a problem that the governance token Alice is on Ethereum, and other NFTs are on BSC, which requires cross-chain. Is it too early to issue the token at the beginning, and then find Binance thighs, and then issue it on the Binance chain, the user experience will not be very good, and there is another problem that this kind of slow experience game is not suitable for play to earn (personal opinion), and as for the token, I think everyone can play it first, and then continue if you think it is fun, and you must not play it for play to earn.