Dark Forest v0.5 - Decentralise #71
Dark Forest v0.5
While crypto Twitter was overloaded on Christmas day with the 1INCH airdrop Dark Forest’s v0.5 release snuck under the radar.
The release adds 1000 new invite key, as well as unique NFTs (None-fungible tokens) that can be found in the game.
The new release also sees a further 1024 DAI available for the top fifteen players.
Dark Forest
Dark Forest is a Massively Multiplayer Online space-conquest game (MMO) set in an infinite procedurally generated universe.
Players have to claim and then hold planets. All data such as claimed planets is submitted on-chain, but as the game uses zkSNARKS this is hidden in a cryptographic fog of war. Other players cannot see where your claimed planet is, having to search across the universe and track planets down.
Currently Dark Forest is running using the xDAI network, an Ethereum sidechain giving faster and cheaper transactions. The game provides a free 0.5 xDAI to new accounts, which should pay for your first five moves.
Jordan Spence made a nice tutorial video on the game mechanics, including how to capture planets, it’s definitely worth checking out.
Dark Forest has been getting rave reviews on Twitter and is already building an active player base.
zkSNARKS
Dark forest uses zkSNARKS to submit proof of correct data on-chain, without having to reveal what the exact information is. The guys use the analogy of a chess move: the zkSNARK tells the world that you have submitted a correct move, e.g. knight moved in an L, without revealing what the move was.
If you want to learn more about the technology behind the game make sure to listen to Dark Forest creator Brian Gu’s appearance on one of my favourite DeFi podcasts, Zero Knowledge hosted by Anna Rose and Fredrik Harryson. They dive into the cryptographic fog of war generated by zkSNARKS.
Conclusion
Ethereum gaming is growing at an exponential rate. I’ve already discussed the phenomenal progress being made by Axie Infinity with their NFT battle pets, and even had Axie’s Jiho on Decentralise to talk about their developments.
I think it’s highly likely that gaming will play a significant role in Ethereum adoption, providing new experiences and empowering individual players.
Dark Forest’s early success with its first waves of users shows that there’s a clear need for this new technology.
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