Today, we’re discussing a trending project - My Neighbor Alice, also known as Animal Crossing on the blockchain. The project experienced a 50% surge in one day, bringing its current market value to 160 million US dollars. In fact, this project has been active for a while, initially launching in the Binance launchpool in 2021. The game saw a significant surge upon its release three years ago. Being a blockchain game, all NFTs within this game have also seen a substantial rise. Let’s delve into an analysis of this game today.

1. Background Description

“My Neighbor Alice” is a multiplayer construction game inspired by Nintendo’s wildly popular Animal Crossing: New Horizons. (As of the end of March 2023, Nintendo’s financial report showed that Animal Crossing had sold a total of 41.59 million copies worldwide, making it the second best-selling Nintendo Switch game, behind Mario Kart. At a price of 200 yuan per copy, this means that it has also generated 8 billion yuan in sales.)

My Neighbor Alice’s gameplay is similar to Animal Crossing. In the game, players can design their own characters, build houses, decorate their islands, and interact with friends and other non-player characters (NPCs). The design team’s original intention and vision for Alice was to create a “second space” for all players, allowing them to relax and enjoy the game while also monetizing their time and effort.

2. Introduction

Alice’s World - a large island group located in the Lummelunda Archipelago. This is where animals and humans share space, make friends, and work together. Anyone can join this community by purchasing a piece of land and participating in various activities such as fishing, catching bugs, and beekeeping. Alice shares the archipelago with her friends - Bjorn the Bear, Bob the Beekeeper, Ivan the Merchant, and Jose the Shipwright. By interacting with neighbors and helping Alice complete her duties and daily activities, players can earn rewards that can be exchanged for in-game items to use on their own land.

After purchasing land, players can design and decorate their own property to make it unique and special. To do this, users can try changing the landscape, use in-game assets such as NFTs in the form of vegetation, furniture, buildings, or animals, perform daily activities, and participate in competitions and quests to earn more rewards.

My Neighbor Alice is the first attempt to create a truly public application with an engaging storyline that can attract casual gamers, blockchain enthusiasts, and DeFi geeks. It has an easy-to-use interface and a variety of features to explore. In My Neighbor Alice, users can decide to what extent they want to participate in the game’s decentralized features and DeFi.

3. Game Basics

Currently, the game requires a client download. The minimum configuration requirements are:

• Operating System: Windows 7 or higher
• Processor: Intel i5-6400 / Ryzen 5 1600
• Memory: 8 GB RAM
• Graphics Card: Nvidia 1050 / AMD RX 560
• DirectX: Version 11
• Storage Space: 6 GB available space

To log in, you need a piece of land. Currently, you can buy land on its marketplace. The current floor price for land is 250 ALICE (625 USD, calculated at 1 Alice = 2.5 USD). If you find the land too expensive, you can also play by renting.

Currently, pets are also quite expensive, with the cheapest ones costing 500 Alice. There are also other items, such as land decorations and character decorations, such as clothes, shoes, etc.

4. Core Gameplay:

Land: In the game, the Lummelunda Archipelago consists of six islands, each with its own unique characteristics, including Snowflake Island, Medieval Plains, Nature’s Rest, Lummestad The Town, Sandy Coast, and Submerged Islands. Players can purchase virtual land from Alice or on the market. The game has a limited supply of land, and each piece of land is represented as an NFT token.

Marketplace: Players can buy and sell their own land and other in-game items such as houses, fences, animals, and plants on the market.

Characters: Players customize their character’s appearance based on their preferences and can interact with other players or NPCs.

Game Assets: These include houses, animals, plants, decorations, etc., which can be traded.

Incentive Mechanism: In the game, players will be able to complete some mutual activities or tasks. Good players will be rewarded.

On-chain Forum: A decentralized forum where users can discuss game activities, schedule votes, make friends, etc.

5. Game Core

• Backend: Chromia

The project’s first layer is the game backend infrastructure. The project is built on the fundamental idea that it will run exclusively on the Chromia platform.

The backend is a Chromia relational blockchain database that is used together with Unity to operate accounts, token transfers, relational data, and user progress, etc. It aims to keep up with the development of cross-chain playability and interact with NFTs. Chromia’s unique database features make it possible to perform complex backend logic directly on the blockchain without spending too much development

-Frontend

The second layer of the Unity project is the client, developed using Unity. The most important part of this is the procedural building system. This is crucial because it needs to be fun, feel good to use, and compete with other building games on the market.

-The third area of the project is the economic infrastructure, which includes “property/land” auctions, asset trading, and token trading.

-Integration: ERC20 and Steam

The ALICE token will be transferable between ERC20 and native Chromia tokens. This bridge is developed by Chromia outside of this project. The Steam marketplace and its sales will be connected to Chromia.

-Governance DAO

This project will not only create a game but also code for a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) called the Community Council. The team has identified ChromaWay as the initial partner.

6. team

Anna Norrevik CEO

He has 7 years of experience in the gaming industry, including 5 years at Paradox Interactive. Led a team of 7 developers for one of Paradox’s biggest projects, Crusader Kings 3 (consisting of over 20 people). Achieved a score of 91/100 on Metacritic. Holds a Bachelor’s degree in Business and Economics from KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.

Lenny Pettersson CMO

He has over 15 years of experience in the media and entertainment industry. Served as Senior Market Manager for the Nordic and Baltic regions at Turner under WarnerMedia for over 8 years. Extensive experience in launching original IPs for Cartoon Network and General Entertainment brands in multiple countries. Marketing Director for CNN in the Nordic and Baltic regions. Holds a Master’s degree in Business and Economics from Uppsala University.

7. Tokenomics

The project’s native token is Alice, issued on Ethereum. There is a total supply of 100 million tokens, with 67,913,333 currently in circulation (68% circulation rate). As of today, the price is around $2.50 USD, with an all-time high of $44.0747 (March 15, 2021). Although the price went up 50% in one day, it’s still near its bottom compared to its peak. Here’s a breakdown of the token distribution: Token Sale (21%), Ecosystem (16%), Reserve Fund (20%), Team (15%), Play to Earn (8%), Community (15%), User Incentives (5%).

In conclusion, this project is a case study of mimicking a very successful web2 game. This is a good strategy because such games have already proven to have a market and user base. Bringing it to the blockchain and allowing players to “play to earn” is a great concept, similar to Mavia, inspired by COC, that we discussed previously. However, when I checked the game, the social media following for My Neighbor Alice seems low, with only around 10,000 followers on Twitter and a few thousand on Discord. Additionally, there’s an issue with the current setup. The governance token Alice is on Ethereum, while other NFTs are on BSC. This requires a cross-chain bridge, which might suggest they issued the token too early and later partnered with Binance to leverage their platform, potentially creating a less smooth user experience. Finally, some might argue that slow-paced, relaxing games like this aren’t the best fit for the “play to earn” model (my personal opinion). Ultimately, the decision of whether to play is yours. If you find the game enjoyable, then it might be worth continuing. However, don’t play solely for the “play to earn” aspect.

Disclaimer：

1. This article is reprinted from [书中自有大饼屋]. All copyrights belong to the original author [朱老师321]. If there are objections to this reprint, please contact the Gate Learn team, and they will handle it promptly.
2. Liability Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not constitute any investment advice.
3. Translations of the article into other languages are done by the Gate Learn team. Unless mentioned, copying, distributing, or plagiarizing the translated articles is prohibited.