Every word below is important.
This message has a lot of sections, yet everything is shared quickly.
This may be our most important announcement of all time on EXODE.
EXODE shares today its new model and announces a 15k first fundraising to help develop it.
The model is inspired by "Rise of Cultures" which is a high revenue PVE application.
Its developer, InnoGames, makes models of games individually gathering > 1 billion lifetime revenue.
We pick Rise of Cultures as a model to analyze because it's a successful PVE model compatible with our colonization approach. We were able to imagine how to implement it, as shared below.
This means we will finally be compatible with new visitors and free-to-play, thanks to adapting a similar approach that is highly successful in F2P.
EXODE will decentralize its premium currency.
We will reward our WEB3 players by redistributing 70% of all web2 player purchases to our web3 supporters.
Fundraising will actually start on Wednesday 29th, 5 PM UTC.
Players will be rewarded with 3 times the USD value of they take or pledge then (you can pledge currency you already have too, and take more), until all is taken and pledged.
We will distribute 45k usd value in monetary value for this 15k fundraising, thanks to what we will sell to players.
Player collection value is also going up, with cards becoming high value assets.
This gives even more value to players who purchased our currencies before.
There is a lot more information to share.
Read below to find out more!
How does this work?
Our previous works placed us with the unique opportunity of having immense contents and programs (we have many unique card models!) but which lacked a proper gameplay model after evacuation.
We experimented a number of models before. We tried a simulation experience with commitment and longterm reports, then made their presentation more advanced. We were basically grinding down every obstacle! We were always going forward, albeit slowly.
Meanwhile, other games have transformed visitor audience, even in WEB3.
Nowadays, the audience has different expectations.
So we are adapting our concept - this was needed - and are now ready to defend EXODE and our player value differently.
Fortunately, our progress and content can now be leveraged in it.
Our mission to our players is now to apply what we find proven and successful in "the vast world", and adapt it to the world of 2325. This means the end of some attempts and the import of a model that works.
By applying this kind of model, we are using a rewarding model, highly competitive with other applications and F2P content, and still compatible with our PVE priority. And our colonization :)
As you can guess, it took some time to find one proper!
We are high on ethics and wanted something that will actually make our content shine.
We also conducted visitor tests this summer: this event made us gain knowledge about new player expectations, confirming what needed to be addressed.
We can now only expect success per visitor playing the game with this new model of gameplay once released: because it is free, and it is highly addictive.
We have been at work in October on this, and we released Colonization Challenges, which took half of our month, while working on our new approach.
We stand strongly against "free-to-play directly mixed with play-to-earn" (such as clicking on a simple button to earn a currency) and this has not changed. This approach of many games rely on a predatory scheme that works on marketing power with a constant influx of players, until it explodes right after it reaches its peak.
But we acknowledge that free-to-play is now required to gain players.
So we conducted research for some time about how to avoid P2E + F2P.EXODE has developed a successful retention model of assets thanks to varied factions, multiple areas of value, individual value of every player collection, niches of value. It never needed to rely on marketing power to maintain player value. As all of our players understood, they were sitting on a huge increase of value as soon as we would get more players.
Our new process will add a WEB2 population, invisibly playing in a web2-to-web3, and we will decentralize its rewards to WEB3 players.
This looks highly reliable as it will be automatic (you won't have to do much to receive our web2 purchases!), and we rely on a free-to-play approach - so the game will be free, with a high visitor-to-account ratio. We only look to have players and connect them to "a lot of content".
This streamlines our content into very edible bits of progression. We even remove the requirement of evacuation (more about that below). This new gameplay no longer applies filters, it is pleasing and still deep into our theme.
The new gameplay
The new gameplay is deemed very accessible.
It transforms your colonists into a common pool of "workers".
It also introduces several resources, such as research that receives a +1 every hour until it maxes its stockpile of 10, when it stops automatically generating, which encourages to use your research and invest it somewhere.
You use your available pool of workers for your construction needs.
By clicking on the hammer, you access a list of buildings from your current techs.
You then validate by placing this construction somewhere on your colony.
This construction will auto-assign a few workers to it and it will be constructed in a few minutes.
Note that we will also add a fun adjacency bonus, similar to a backpack battle model, where placing a building near another gives a bonus.
Leisure buildings, for instance, will be useful when placed near houses and living spaces!
Once built, you can left click on the building, which will reveal its production slots.
You can then drag and drop workers into it to start production of what is allowed in this building.
Most of our timers will also be very "player-friendly", to be adapted to every style of play. This is something that this school of game brings: a way to respect any kind of speed for the player.
This is very similar to german boardgames with a worker placement.
Buildings are, like in a german-school boardgame, a place with worker slots, and you assign your pool of existing workers to them. You will select and build food the same way, by drag and dropping workers into a cooking area.
Normally in this model you receive more workers by building Housing.
You also unlock more Housing capacity with tech.EXODE also has a Housing model of course (look at our Happy Five and Octohome! :) ) so this is highly compatible. Your ship wreck is also considered as starting Housing capacity.
Only difference is that you won't generate new workers this way: you already begin with them. EXODE has a highly valued "worker approach" where every worker has its personal bits.
EXODE also has a happiness model where you can drag and drop workers to leisure activities too.
There will be more about that later!
There are additional mechanics to invent and introduce, some examples:
- Your ship wreck will allow to place workers in a slot to convert them into "away team" characters instead of workers, removing them from worker pool while they are busy in an away team.
- This means away team assignment becomes "graphic and gameplay"! which makes it more fun!
- Away team people are the ones you can send on mission when clicking on the "map". The "map" and our away teams will replace the exploration/conquest of these F2P models in a way we find extremely fitting.
- Your ship wreck also allows a "debriefing/decompression area": you can drag and drop away team members there, to convert them back into workers!
- This transformation of assignments is very similar to what you have to do in EXODE Manager to build a team and send them, but is so more graphic and fun to use.
Use of free currencies
Our freely earned currencies are food, materials, water and energy, used for construction, production and buildings.
Quests can also reward you sometimes with "exospresso", a premium currency that can be used to end any construction timer or restore stamina to characters.
To avoid lenthening this article, we will share more about another item in our Wednesday article.
Some of these new items will be automatically distributed to our WEB3 players according to their collection power, as a gift (a gift that has from 5 to 99 USD value toward WEB2).
Other units will be distributed during the fundraising.
Use of premium currencies
The main premium currency is used for about everything in these models. As their model is not really PVP, this is essentially to avoid some of the grind and to have "a better progression".
We don't want our designer views to play as a strong limit to these game sales (understanding they benefit player value). But we also want to keep our ethical views.
For the success of the model we still need to make sure F2P players have access to considerable payable progression. So there will be. This will give value to WEB3 just as well.
But we will make sure to make a lot of content available to them too and to be generous about it.
This could lead to a less predatory model, with a bit less revenue per account in a way, and also having A LOT of unlockable characters, characters fragments, and purchasable content. EXODE definitely has a lot of models, and this new gameplay gives a tremendous value to it, as you'll read below.
We don't "need" a billion dollar money, but we will still "aim" at millions, considering EXODE already stands at 300k sales.
We will use EXOCREDITS as a premium currency.
So your existing EXOCREDITS have immediately gained a lot of value!We will accept a pledge in EXOFUEL the same way as we accept EXOFUEL below (all EXOFUEL and EXOCREDITS have a valuation to USD).
There is no loss by owning EXOFUEL compared to EXOCREDITS ; and vice versa.
A lot more player value too
There is a lot of elements to announce today!
All of that information take time to understand. All these news are positive.
We will basically deploy a WEB2 gaming environment that will be powered up by your existing WEB3 assets and giving them a huge value.
- Workers for F2P players are "basic workers". They are individual game character slots but without a character card.
- F2P players can gather fragments of characters during gameplay, and receive bound cards this way once they gathered all fragments of individual characters.
- Players can also pay premium characters (taking your cards and others).
- Once they get a card, they can assign it to one of their worker slots, replacing it with "this skin" and the bonuses of this card (such as faster research, faster construction, etc).
- Skins are an existing mechanic in models like Rise of Cultures, they are a cosmetic with a mechanical bonus, lasting usually last 10 days. But here an EXODE character is a "permanent skin": permanent skins" have a huge, huge value in this model (they mostly don't even exist).
- This means all cards now have a minimal value of a few USD, considering they can otherwise be earned with a lot of grinding (and most of them won't even be accessible this way).
A character card for instance, now becomes a permanent assignable bonus customization for a basic worker.
This leads to 2.99 USD being considered a base value for a minimal card.
Boosters (a pack with 5 permanent random worker or building skins) are now premium packs with a lot more value, from 9.99 USD to 19.90 USD.
Starters (a pack with 9 permanent worker skins) will have a 29.90 USD value. but we'll deploy them later, and in events, once we have a good enough playerbase.
Contract packs which produce cards will all be removed from shop: they have an uninimaginably high value in this new model, so we won't sell them any more after Wednesday,a nd if/when they come back it will be once we have many players and at a huge value. Because they produce cards.
ALL the content above will be removed from our shop on Wednesday.
Our website shop will be basically closed after the fundraising event, and will only sell the fundraising packs during the event.
SOME content will be re-proposed at a superior value later, in an ingame shop ; such as some Starters and Boosters, in events, at the increased value mentioned and maybe with a promotion.
In addition, content purchased by WEB2 players, such as cards, will be removed from web3 once purchased, diminishing the number of circulating mints every time. This means that we are, right now, entering a huge valuation gain circle. I think we need time to let that information sink in!
Note that starters may also unlock a cosmetic theme for colonization buildings - later, we won't have it at first - fitting the Origin theme. Because it makes sense. And this style gives it further value.
Huge modifications to value
I use this word so much in this article, but this is true.
We can share it now, and not before, because the concept becomes final.
After this article we will focus our upcoming gameplay.
Colonization Challenges
Colonization Challenges is a gameplay that was released this October to our testers.
It will continue and be reserved to our WEB3 players, and will have rewards.
You can read more about them in this post by @veryanprime, or this one.
This new content is unchanged. F2P players will not have access to Colonization Challenges at first, but they will unlock their first challenge when they have high level accounts and enough "cards".
Players with planets can access this content right after logging in:
Then view their Challenge list:
10 challenges were generated for this first test!
every player received a few random ones.
Then send characters to participate:
You can check VeryanPrime's article for more info!
Contract Packs
I can't begin to share the value of contract packs once this model is deployed.
Genetician Packs
Oh Lord. Huge value here again, because assets you make will be unique. And also value for Challenges, identifying missing trait combinations.
Selling cards
Selling to WEB2 will be automatic.
We will cover how later.
There is no need to set an individual price.
You'll just need to activate a status on your card, the system will tell you the price you'll receive once sold, and then you can just wait.
Aramea Station
As we hinted, there will be a Colonization Challenge model too for Aramea players.
So Aramea owners basically have more reward slots already!
Evacuation will become a special gameplay reserved to WEB3 players and high-level F2P accounts, which will basically add a premium colony at the end of evacuation.
Cards rent from Aramea will also become a base flow of "temporary skins", lasting 10 days, that you can apply to your workers and buildings ; so they will be purchased by WEB2 players even more. More about that later!
So much to assimilate!
This is a lot to unfold!
Potential player value is overflowing from every sentence here!
Note that it is normal that WEB3 players are considered privileged when compared with WEB2 payments.
WEB3 ownership is of course of very high value in current gacha systems.
Imagine the value of legendary characters, when in some gacha games players pay hundreds of usd in rolls to gain a card they don't even own.
As a summary, all your cards are becoming premium assets, and new ones will mostly be released to WEB2 now, so everything seems to fit very neatly into our new approach for an increase of your collection value: few new mints, and more gameplay already valued through web2.
As announced, all shop content will be removed on Wednesday - so you still have some time to take them and gather more WEB3, because there won't be time for it after.
We also fixed this morning another paypal delay error.
We will work to make our content enjoyable.
Given the new approach on a "growth game", it will be hard to miss.
Our colonization content will be spread over many quick layers that the player will go through, leading to repair your ship, explore your planet, master it, master your own productions, trade, and then expand. There is a lot to play here!
And we have a lot of work, but we already designed our techs before.
On Wednesday, we will deploy our 15k fundraising, basically distributing EXOCREDITS and taking pledges of this currency.
Last details
Fundraising will begin at 5 PM UTC on Wednesday October 29th.
This will remove all other existing shop content - no more Genetician lab points too. You can imagine the huge value of genetician packs in this new model, so you only have until Wednesday to complete it. If we see a phase is completed, we will work on unlocking the next one as soon as possible.
Fundraising will last until 15k new USD of EXOCREDITS are taken and pledged and when it happens it will close automatically the next day at 5 PM UTC.
Otherwise, it will close at November 10th 5 PM UTC at the latest.
You will be allowed, during fundraising, to pledge your credits, existing or new. Each pledge will soft-lock your currency until WEB2 is released ; we will deploy a feature later to unlock it if you want, but if you do, you won't be able to pledge it again.
Each pledge will keep your currency sold for 3 times its USD value in the new F2P model for new currency taken during the event ; and 2 times its USD value for all pre-existing currency you had and that you pledge during the event (at no cost now: lucky you, you scored this bonus for free today!).
Note that this pre-existing currency also already benefits form an increase of value (we always like to make players gain value, as you supported us!).
The USD payment will be made once the WEB2 version is released and as soon as someone pays, distributing 70% of the payment into this pool by taking credits from owners randomly.
A payment is accrued and sent once it becomes > 5 USD for single player, triggering then a HIVE payment with a realtime conversion to HIVE currency, and sent automatically to your wallet. We'll cover these details later.
This means after pledging, you won't have anything to do - you will just receive your money automatically!
We will allow players to optionally input their email, to receive a notification everytime a payment is made.
That's all pilots!
Wow!
Now I can't take some rest - I have some Colonization Challenge code to complete, to share your final score! Thank you pilots!
EXODE is a science fiction game in development and currently played on HIVE.
It can be played with just 10 USD by taking any of the beta starters!
This gives access to all of current gameplay.Or, while supplies last, you can engage in other packs to get rarer factions.
Feel free to try it here, or to join our Discord if you have any question!
70% shared revenue! 🚀 That's huge! The Rise of Cultures inspiration sounds promising too!
I liked seeing my name multiple times :p
I'll have to look at Rise of Cultures, I'm not familiar with it offhand. I think I know the type of game though, and I do like German style board games and worker placement.