Battle Royale Not Ideal

[mental night]

The Battle Royale genre is overcrowded Competing with Fortnite, COD Warzone, and Apex Legends isn't wise. Web 3 enthusiasts might be interested, but many Web 2 companies have failed in their attempt at making a live service battle royale.

I trust the team to make a fun game but I worry why someone would play an illuvium BR over Fortnite/Apex/Warzone

A extraction co-op shooter ala a Helldivers-like game has better chances of success. This game type is much less saturated. However; live service games require large server costs. They require consistent revenue streams to be maintained. Any live service game is risky. Especially a saturated market in Battle Royales.

With being on the Epic Games launcher I don’t believe it would be wise to try to directly compete on their platform/launcher with Fortnite.

Doing a basic google search you will find many examples of recently failed web 2 live service games.

A recent IGN article states: “It’s incredibly tough to launch a new live-service game. In 2023 we’ve already seen a bunch shut down for good, including Rumbleverse, CrossFireX and Knockout City. But at least they all got their shot in the limelight – Hyenas, the hero shooter from Creative Assembly, was canceled by publisher Sega last week, after years in development. It never even made it to open beta, let alone a full launch.”

Battle Royale is not the right choice in my opinion. Let me know what you all think?

[abstract mantle]

Well if illuvium makes it with the quality of the current 3 games I'd rather play that than warzone with constant bugs, server crashes and cashgrabs. But idk much about the other ones, might be a tough competition to enter yeah

[wraith rock]

Too much work to produce an end product that competes with web 2 titles. I feel we have many other options to explore for a new game/title that uses already existing assets rather than go at an fps/battle royale. Shrapnel is a good example of how much work a shooter takes, after all the hype around it the game just sucks and is very far off from the competition, mildly put.

[golden grotto]

I agree. It can also easily boted and is very tough to operate. That's at least what Faraway, a web2/web3 company who produced Mini Battle Royale. And it doesn't give focus to Illuvials, our main IP.

[sweet mauve]

Hey @mental night im glad you are bringing this up for community discussion

Just to make things clear for those who didnt listen to the recent AMA. Kieran said that internally, the team is excited about the idea of having the 4th game being a battle royale. This is nothing official, we wont consider another game until we successfully launch and have revenue. When the times come to consider another game, research will be made and any idea will have to be approved via IIP with a proper GDD

That being said, personally i was excited to hear this. The genre being the most popular isnt a negative, its a positive to me because if you get only 2% of the pie you win extremely big

Imagine fornite kids hearing that their 20k inventory could be worth 20k. That they could potentially earn in game and that this new battle royale game comes from an entire ecosystem of games (the new pokemon world, illuvium)

I havent played fornite, but i think pubg and warzone are quite bad games to be that popular

Im curious to hear other community member opinion on this idea. Again nothing is official, its just to talk

[wraith rock]

Well judging from the lore we saw in the trailer, an fps definitely makes sense. If the team wants to have a go at the genre they can make it work. As long as it's at the right time, it can work within the IP easily.

[somber garden]

battle royale make most sense with our maps

we have tried developing a very niche product like the arena, and it didnt get the traction i expected even with a TL collab

at the end, we are doing TFT mode with the gauntlet
we doesnt have to reinvent the wheel

[wraith rock]

It's too early to judge the autobattler, not even live yet. The beta numbers are not bad at all.

[somber garden]

Overworld numbers?

yes overworld is naturally more popular

[wraith rock]

It's the initial stages, of course people will play mostly that at first. It's also where most of the airdrop points come from. Doesn't give you any real data towards arena, you would need 3-4 months post official launch to judge properly, if not more.

[somber garden]

we incentivized arena and only had ~200 eligible over 1000.
and why did we develop the gauntlet?

as kieran mention in his tweets, arena is a niche of a niche, or too niche, hoping the gauntlet can solve this

[wraith rock]

That whole thing was set up for failure, the format sucked, people with 5 smurfs taking leaderboard slots, catching illuvials was also not part of the picture, which after playing the testnet is absolutely part of the magic. 1v1 was always gonna be somewhat problematic, most casual players don't like this format.

All that being said I still think it's early to judge on the standard autobattler. What's gonna trigger the revenue for the next 2 years if not that? Purely for collecting purposes?

[somber garden]

more airdrops imo

[golden grotto]

How would a Illuvium Battle Royale be better than say Fortnite ? I assume we want to attract new gamers into the Illuvium ecosystem and not just develop a new game for the existing Illuvium community ?

[wraith rock]

Dunno, I feel it's too early to give up on the autobattler, it can be made to work. In the past I played TFT for 15 min and deleted it, boring as hell.

In our case there is something special about catching an illuvial to use it in your build, without that I don't even know what we are trying to be. Would be a shame if we dump the 1m tokens on airdrops.

[wraith rock]

It doesn't have to be better than Fortnite, it can be its own thing, especially with the new lore you can make it work with many features. The only question mark is how to incorporate illuvials into it.

[golden grotto]

I could see a Battle Royale with Illuvials as the player characters, as this would make Illuvials center stage, but not with rangers. I would love to play as a Rhamphyre or any other Illuvial. This also creates the personal bonding between players and NFT characters, which is the main differentiator between web3 and web2 games in my opinion.

[wraith rock]

😀😀 how is that gonna work, what's atlas role going to be in a battle royale?

[golden grotto]

You mean, because it can not fight ? No weapon ? We just have to think about it and find a way. Seriously, any new game idea that doesn't make Illuvials center stage is just insane. Why develop such an IP and then develop a game that any other studio could develop ?

[wraith rock]

Yes it is a melee tank, what's it's role gonna be and how you gonna make other players attack you instead of kill your teammates first

[abstract mantle]

Companion, helping in battles, upgrading armour/weapons or something based on which illuvial you choose/find

[golden grotto]

Yes, you could command a team of Illuvials.

[wraith rock]

Yes but he meant play as the illuvial, not a companion etc

[golden grotto]

I could be the commander of one Illuvial, the others in my team follow me.

[abstract mantle]

Idk if playing as illuvials would be ideal since we have running and shooting mechanics for the ranger, not illuvials

[golden grotto]

Yes, but we have to make an important decision about makes the Illuvium ecosystem special. It is not the rangers.

[somber garden]

it wont.
i believe the aim shouldnt be better than the web2 counterpart, but to be the best in web3.

[golden grotto]

We always wanted to be the best new NFT Pokemon, better than mainstream Pokemon. Now we want to be the best Battle Royale in web 3 ?

[wraith rock]

We already are best in web3 tbh, as a game. Everything else sucks as a game and is only played as a short time investment.

[somber garden]

in what sense?

[wraith rock]

In a sense that without the money incentive, no one would be playing these games at all. We are not in that spot, personally I'm having fun right now in testnet.

[golden grotto]

I am just saying this again: A new game that does not have Illuvials at the center is a waste.

[somber garden]

but we are doing the biggest airdrop in history.
we cant claim "without money incentive"

550 ILV mega hunt prize

the best metric to use is revenue

[wraith rock]

The game at it's core is not about making money, that's what I mean. You can have fun even without these things, which cannot be said of the rest. Huge quality gap between rest of web3 games. How they structure the revenue model is another story, nothing to do with gameplay.

[somber garden]

im just setting my expectation on web3 market. i dnt believe web2 will come anytime soon, unless for a short period during bull peak

[golden grotto]

Oh, it has to and it will. We are a project that went for mainstream from day one on. This is the only way forward. NFTs need to be a cosmetic and for high reward leaderboatds, everything else has to be so good that someone has fun playing it for free and without financial motivation.

And the Illuvials are already the best looking characters I am aware of, web 3 and web 2.

[somber garden]

how is it not about making money.
catch these illuvials, win 550 ILV, win 30K ILV.
Buy a bundle of fuel
Buy D1sk
Invest in land to sell fuel

Find blueprints, sell them, or craft skins and sell them

Create content, win some ILv

[wraith rock]

First is a marketing tool, hopefully no more give aways. The others are spending to play, profit is not guaranteed.

[golden grotto]

Didn't know about this. This could actually be a really good game. Hunting Illuvials under time pressure and then a battle, either autobattler or combat.

[wheat hollow]

This is the game genre I could spare my thoughts to.

As someone who has spent a lot of time with traditional gaming, I value the marketplace features where players can exchange and trade items, which isn’t possible in the older gaming model. The capabilities of web3 gaming attract me, and that’s why I’m exploring this new domain. Illuvium, in particular, has caught my interest.

Hence, players in web2 games ARE NOT investors nor traders. Most are organice kind of gamers.

That's why, I find it unnecessary to compare games like Fortnite, COD Warzone, and Apex Legends with Illuvium’s potential in the battle royale genre. These traditional games lack the blockchain technology that Illuvium incorporates. You don't need to force every web2 gamers to play web3 games. Just show them how good the game is, how truly enjoyable it is. And that's really it.

Creating a battle royale game within the web3 framework is an ambitious endeavor that hasn’t been fully realized yet. While there are some attempts, none have achieved the level of polish and allure that Illuvium delivers. There are bunch of BR in web 3. I tried some of them (not the ones with paywall). But not as exquisite like Illuvium.

I came from heavy Multiplayer / Battle royale games both mobile & pc games. I prefer to spend my free time only on games that truly appeal to me. Among the many games in my Steam collection (70+), I maintain just a handful that deliver both quality and enjoyment. Call of Duty (shooter) and Forza Horizon (racing) are just among my top picks that provides both quality and satisfaction.

Also, Fortnite is too cartoony for me. Apex is too roboty for my taste. Call of Duty: MW/WZ is my go-to shooting game for its character movements & weapon handling. I prefer Call of Duty: MW/WZ because it feels just right with how the characters move and the weapons feel.

If Illuvium can match the enjoyment that shooter games like COD offers, it might just become the leading shooter game in the web3 space.

I guess, roi is a huge deal for most investors. But for organic gamers, it's always about the geniune satisfaction and growth they can experience in-game.

[timber osprey]

Any Web3 Shooter is destined to fail due to cheaters

[golden grotto]

It is a problem, but we already have it with Overworld.

[timber osprey]

[wraith rock]

What's to cheat in overworld? Shoot the cackling bugs? You also have to pay money to enter, so it's more or less fine (still don't know what you need a cheat for in overworld but yeah).

It's a good point, every single shooter is infested by cheaters, combine that with ownership, p2e, etc and it's a nightmare

[timber osprey]

I guess auto-scan whole map, maybe increased damage in fights? But this could kinda be detectable, much easier than wallhackers or others in shooter.

Cause if there's an account that always goes straight to the best fights, beating it with a team that shouldn't stand a chance.

But wall-, ESP and other type of hacking in shooters are so much harder to detect.

[golden grotto]

I am not sure how combat will work in the Overworld. I also heard that there is only Riot with a good kernel based anti cheat system. Any fast paced real time game makes it supposedly hard to detect cheating.

Faraway has a Mini Battle Royale web3 game and from their playerbase I heard that it is almost no fun playing anymore since it is infested with bots.

[wraith rock]

Riots anti cheat has been the topic of alot of controversy and many issues around it, also it's far from perfect and cheaters do still exist.

[golden grotto]

It is almost an existential problem to some of our games. I don't think we take it seriously enough.

[wraith rock]

It's already pretty straightforward, I wouldn't risk getting banned for something I can do easily myself. Much more useful to run a bot in overworld than to cheat in my opinion

[wraith rock]

It's pretty much a problem in any shooter, and it sounds much worse for a web3 shooter

[golden grotto]

I thought if maybe streaming the game is the solution, at least for high stakes leaderboards and rewards.

[wheat hollow]

le sighhh.. I guess making a BR in here gathers more fear than hope. Maybe fear that your investment wouldn't flourish. Fear of having a genre that you haven't even put an effort to the core in web2 games will happen to this game as well. If I were a game developer, I will took these as a challenge instead, to build a BR that none of other game dev do because they are afraid of loss. Most only want fast, small map, roi, and that's all. If Illuvium wants to be a lifetime leading game changer in this world of fly-by-nights web3 games, it only takes one united DAO to push it with courage and right amount of research. I admire some of the web3 games that really put an effort to what their building.

No wonder web2 BR gamers are willingly paying to play a game that provides quality, because they are funneled with the product, and not with all the complexity of web3. Also cheaters are well-known to every game, even to commercialized game and indie games. What if Illuvium with the blockchain tech can revert that, and it's the only game that prevents player from cheating. This is the real revolution in gaming.

All I can do is hope. I don't have much power, lol

[somber garden]

u guys play MPH or nyan ? They are fun

[wheat hollow]

been there. it's a multiplayer mode. not really BR

i like moonray, much of my taste. it's exotic looking multiplayer

[somber garden]

im rooting for OTG too

[wheat hollow]

i don't have access on otg, sad. it's only available in us and eu.