Today, after being reminded by a friend from a fund, I found an opportunity to invest in a Web3 project for free: Sonic, a layer2 dedicated to blockchain games on Solana, is conducting an Odyssey mission on the test network for early users.
Sonic is the first layer 2 on Solana, and it is a layer 2 infrastructure dedicated to the blockchain gaming track, which is worthy of a special introduction.
Since many of my readers are Web2 gamers, I would like to explain here that Odyssey tasks are usually novice guidance tasks for the first test of Web3 projects/products (especially Web3 infrastructure infra projects). The purpose is to allow new users to experience the various functions of the project and become familiar with the use process through one operation after another according to the process set by the official project, and at the same time assist the project party in testing the fluency of the network and discovering bugs. It should be pointed out that Odyssey tasks usually occur in the Web3 project/product test network stage, so test tokens are used. Test tokens can be directly obtained for free, and users do not need to spend real money on eth, btc or other tokens. There will be no gas fee consumption during the test, and there will be generous rewards after completing the task. It is a rare opportunity to get nothing.
Mirror World, the development team of Sonic, is an old face in the blockchain game track. Before launching Sonic, the team has been operating blockchain game products and a one-stop B2B blockchain game platform since Q4 2021. The earliest Mirror World team was actually the blockchain game project party, developing and issuing its own chain game products such as Brawl of Mirrors and Mirrama, and fully experienced the various pain points faced in putting a game on the chain, including which chain to choose for game assets, how to get investment and grant support from the public chain, how to connect with the public chain technology, how to issue coins after going on the chain, which CEX/.DEX exchanges to use, which wallets and payment methods to connect to, how to introduce and operate Web3 and Web2 players, how to negotiate funds for investment, etc.
I can imagine how difficult it was for the Mirror World team to release several of their games on the chain in 2021 when all Web3 infrastructures were very early. They should have gone through all the pitfalls and talked to all the public chain wallet payment infrastructure and foundation VCs. Even now, three years later, this set is still very troublesome. It may take more than half a year for a brand new blockchain game project team to negotiate the business docking work with all necessary partners. Therefore, after Mirror World released its own casual blockchain game, their one-stop B2B blockchain game platform Mirror World came into being. It is similar to a SaaS product, using a business project optional packaging service to make an apk, helping other game teams to quickly release and operate games on the chain.
Figure 1: Services provided by Mirror World Smart Platform
When I met Chris, Jialin and Robin of Mirror World, they were already at the stage of promoting their one-stop B2B blockchain game platform. During the Hong Kong Web3 Conference in April 2023, Mirror World held its own Side Event in Hong Kong to promote the service content of Mirror World's one-stop B2B blockchain game platform to the invited blockchain game project parties. The venue was packed. I arrived at the venue a few minutes late and had to stand from the beginning of the event to the end. During Token2049 in Singapore in September 2023, Mirror World also held its own seminar separately. At that time, the blockchain game project I served was invited to the stage as a panelist to share views with heavyweight guests in the blockchain game track such as Matrix, Binance Chain, and GM Network.
Figure 2: Invitation to the Mirror World Wasteland Style Seminar during Token2049 in September 2023
Figure 3: Mirror World seminar during Token2049 in September 2023
Now the Mirror World team has launched a game-specific Layer2, which conforms to the development trend of the blockchain game track and perfectly demonstrates their rich experience and ecological accumulation in the field of blockchain games. Investors are very knowledgeable. In March 2022, when Mirror World was a blockchain game project, they received a $4 million investment led by Galaxy Interactive, Alameda Research and Republic. Last week on June 21, when Mirror World launched Sonic, it announced that it had received $12 million led by Bitkraft, Galaxy Interactive and Big Brain Holdings to develop a game engine on Solana.
After getting the Odyssey mission of the Sonic test network today, I went to the faucet to get water, received the sol tokens for testing, and started to complete the mission. Interested players can go to Sonic’s official Twitter account @sonicsvm to see the introduction of the Sonic test network Odyssey mission. Don’t miss the opportunity to get it for free.
We still need to continue to observe how Sonic's technology and product performance is through testing. Here are some of my opinions:
1. Mirror World team’s strength and rich experience in blockchain games, as well as their spirit of adapting to the times and pioneering, are absolutely perfect for making a blockchain game Layer2.
2. It is a wise choice to choose Solana for Layer2
--There are already a lot of layer2s for EVM. Arbitrum of the EVM system has even released layer3s such as XAI. In the non-EVM system, Solana's TVL and TPS are currently the best. Others such as APTOS/SUI are not yet so mature, and it is not yet time to focus on layer2.
--It is well known that Solana is very powerful in Europe and the United States. I have been playing some purely European and American games on Solana, such as Honeyland. The games are very well made, and the European and American player communities are very active. The Mirror World team has been tied to Solana, which once again proves that they have strong technical and BD capabilities. Now Solana is vigorously developing the Asia-Pacific market (there will be a Solana developer event in Shenzhen on June 26). Connecting the blockchain game player communities in Asia-Pacific and Europe and the United States is the only way to go. Mirror World has been deeply involved in the Asia-Pacific blockchain game player track and community in the past few years. It is also very wise for Solana to cooperate with Mirror World to do Layer2. The two can be said to be a strong combination.
3. If Sonic can become the first Layer 2 blockchain on Solana, the expectations for coin issuance and listing will be very high. Refer to the FDV and price of XAI, the first Layer 3 blockchain on Arbitrum, on Binance.
Having said the advantages, let's also predict the challenges that Sonic will face:
1. There are many competitors in the blockchain gaming industry.
--IMX, a game-specific public chain with huge investment, based in Australia, has been in operation for several years. There are already many excellent chain games on the IMX chain. At the same time, IMX has deployed BD operation teams and ecological network construction around the world. Last month, IMX's headhunters also found Sister Cathy to recommend the BD Lead position in Singapore, and strongly promote the BD of Chinese chain games. Recently, the Chinese heavy chain game Blocklords, which I bought NFT, has also been listed on IMX. At present, IMX has launched its own zkevm layer2.
--Ronin, a public gaming blockchain started with Axie Infinity, its strength is self-evident.
--Wemix, South Korea's Wemade's dedicated game public chain, has been running for almost 3 years since Legend 4 in November 2021. Its technology and product support have been polished to a relatively mature level. In addition to the chain games MIR series and Night Crow developed by Wemade itself, it has also launched hundreds of third-party chain game products from Europe, the United States and Asia-Pacific, and has accumulated a lot of experience in ecological construction.
--Other blockchain gaming platforms, such as Xterio, Carv, etc.
2. All the public chains dedicated to blockchain games have made industry and international influences, and there is a first-class blockchain game product paving the way. The first and second blockchain games of IMX mentioned above are Gods Unchainded and Guild of Guardians, which brought huge traffic to IMX, and then more third-party blockchain games were launched on the IMX platform/public chain; Ronin built its influence with Axie Infinity, and after the hacking incident, it gradually resumed full cooperation with a large number of third-party games; Wemix had two first-party blockchain games, Legend 4 and Legend M, paving the way in the early days, which increased its popularity and established the Wemix player community, and then other third-party blockchain games were launched on the Wemix chain.
Sonic will also need a hit blockchain game to pave the way for Sonic's layer2 popularity and player community. This hit game is difficult to achieve through business cooperation with third-party blockchain game project parties, because any powerful blockchain game project, as long as it is slightly successful, does not want to be bound to a single public chain, especially when the current Web3 modular infrastructure allows any project party with a little technical accumulation to quickly build a public chain. Many powerful blockchain game projects plan to build their own public chain from the beginning of the project. Ideally, Sonic would invest in a blockchain game itself, which requires very high financial and business costs, so Sonic's investors must act quickly and help find such a hit game seedling.
3. Solana chain should not crash again, the speed should be faster, and the gas fee should be lower. The first one is the most important, haha, you know what I mean.
