NFT Worlds was compelled to move away from Minecraft, but now known as Hytopia, the project is preparing to launch the game on its chain.
When Minecraft said it would ban NFTs from one of the world’s largest games in 2022, one blockchain project specifically was hit the hardest: NFT Worlds. Two years later, the rebranded Hytopia aims to make a huge splash on its own – and maybe try to take the spotlight away from the Web2 gaming boom.
With a personalized Minecraft server as its home world, NFT Worlds has minted and sold scarce plots of in-game land as NFTs on the Ethereum scaling network Polygon. They sold for up to tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of Ether on the secondary marketplaces, creating $163 million worth of trading volume before the ban was confirmed.
NFT Worlds encountered lots of mockery in some corners, with critics stating that Minecraft would never allow any third-party creators to monetize in-game content. But as pseudonymous NFT Worlds co-founder ArkDev told reporters recently, the game’s end user licensing agreement (EULA) did not particularly ban using crypto technologies on third-party servers at the time.
He reiterated, as he had following the ban announcement, that he had communicated with Microsoft’s EULA team before the decision and that Microsoft appeared primarily interested in understanding how they were utilizing the technology. According to him, there were no warning signs. However, he stated that Microsoft suddenly ceased communication without any advance notice of the impending ban.
Minecraft is one of the world’s most popular games, and publisher Microsoft’s sandbox-style affair has just grown since its initial 2009 launch. But developer Mojang is not keen on seeing its blocky hit used in conjunction with independent NFT projects and has served public notice that Minecraft will soon ban the use of the technology.
The Microsoft-owned studio currently shared a news post about forthcoming changes to its Minecraft usage guidelines, and they are all about NFTs. Minecraft will soon ban… ArkDev said:
“They just wouldn’t reply to us anymore. We were like: OK, cool. I guess we’re just getting a backhanded smack in the dark. We’re not even aware of what’s going on.”
But instead of folding, NFT Worlds pivoted.
Since then, the project started building its game instead of relying on one from a centralized behemoth with a closed network. On that note, the rebranded game, Hytopia, is nearing its release – and its developers are launching their chain, Hychain, for other game studios to build on. Notably, it has a token as well.
This weekend, Hytopia is making a significant move with the launch of a Hychain Guardian Node sale, following a model akin to Xai. Xai, a layer-3 gaming chain on the Ethereum scaling network Arbitrum, executed a substantial airdrop in January, benefiting node key owners. Notably, Hychain is also constructed on Arbitrum technology.
🎉 HYCHAIN Node Key Sale Starts Tomorrow 🎉
You'll be able to mint your nodes at: https://t.co/qSWUds5ZBU
Whitelist Mint/Sale: March 2nd @ 2pm PST (10pm UTC)
Public Mint/Sale: March 3rd @ 2pm PST (10pm UTC)— HYCHAIN (@HYCHAIN_GAMES) March 1, 2024
Hychain will sell NFT-based Guardian Node keys beginning March 2, 2024 at $0.1 ETH (around $340), although the price will slowly increase over time as every tier of keys gets sold.
50,000 such keys will become available, and users who operate the network software will qualify for a share of 250 million TOPIA reward tokens in the next three years. Guardian Node operators also get a share of 25% of all the network transaction fees.
Similar to Xai’s Sentry Nodes, Hychain Guardian Nodes monitor the network and are required to validate the state when faced with challenges. According to ArkDev, although their current utility is somewhat constrained, an imminent Arbitrum network upgrade anticipated within three to six months will enhance their importance. This upgrade will enable users to actively contribute to Hychain’s expansion as it evolves.
Xai’s Sentry Nodes key sale generated millions of dollars of revenue for the fledgling network, and Hychain’s sale might do the same.
Xai, the layer-3 gaming network designed on Ethereum scaler Arbitrum, started 2024 with a bang, launching its XAI token to the early investors and then announced that noted NFT game studio Laguna Games will introduce Crypto Unicorns and related titles to this network.
What comes next? More games, as expected. Ex Populus, which co-founder and CEO Tobias Batton described as the “labs company that serves the Xai Foundation,” is a game studio – and its games are perfectly set to be the first ones to be released and dominate the market.
For ArkDev, as well, it is a way of letting users invest in supporting the network and get rewards for work that actively benefits the chain. It assists in the alignment of all the incentives around the network.
After the node sale, it will not be long before Hytopia itself becomes playable: ArkDev plans a beta launch in early April.
