Create your own coin using a research tree. Complete research steps.
Select mining method (GPU-only, ASIC-only, or both)
Launch your ICO in which you sell coins to investors from an initial price. You also get some coins in ICO.
Launch coin to the public. After doing so, you can now mine this coin and buy & sell it from the exchange menu like regular coins.
After the coin is launched, your task does not finish. You have to do Maintenance and Marketing. There will be bugs in your code that you need to fix. Bugs will decrease the popularity of your coin. You also have to do marketing to keep your coin popular.
Try to keep the ‘Hype’ of your coin high for maximum profit.
There is no limit on the number of coins you can create. Other miners in your simulated world can also mine the coins created in ICOs. But, this depends on the popularity (Hype) of your coin. Price of the coins created in ICOs also depends on the Hype.
Fixes
Research experts does not earn research points if there are unpaid salaries.
Exchange menu is redesigned to show the price of all coins and amount of coins you have in the same screen.
Removed the initial 1million capital to buy the first warehouse. Now, you get the first warehouse for free.
Removed the individual coin mining selection on hardware units. You can now select to change what GPU’s and ASIC’s are mining separately in the shelf menu.
Changes to save file structure. This made the old save files unusable in the new version. Also, there won’t be ‘continue’ button in the main menu if the old save file is not compatible with the new version.
Hash-rate labels in HUD are now in separate labels under the HUD to support the new coins.
Trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MoIWgu6FoE
Alpha 2 Sneak Peek (ICO) & Roadmap Update
Alpha 2 is in development for two months. It will be available before the New Year’s if there are no major bugs preventing the gameplay.
Highlight of the update will be the new coin creation mechanic that will allow you to create your own coin and mine it. As you might have guessed, it is called ICO!.
You will have a separate tech tree to create your own coin. You can also choose the coin to be mineable with GPU-only, ASIC-only, or both.
The coins created with an ICO is selectable using a dropdown menu to be mined with the GPU and ASIC. Similar to BTX and ETX in the game, other miners in your simulated world can also mine the coin. This will effect the difficulty and reward calculations like in real life.
Price of a coin is determined by several parameters similar to default coins in the game. But for the ICO coins, you will have options to increase popularity of a coin, so that the price of the coin might increase over time. There will be more details in the update notes. There should be a mechanism that prevents you from owning all coins of the one you have created. If you constantly buy your own coin from other miners and try to increase the price to make more profit, you might get penalized for the behavior (like a price decrease because the coin is not popular anymore).
There will be no limit for the number of coins you will create in the first version of the Alpha 2.
Roadmap
The first version of the roadmap was showing depreciation system and hardware release system after the ICO update. Also, there will be improvements on the depreciation system later. The systems that have an initial version have half-stars. Roadmap will look like this after Alpha 2 update and the rest of the steps are the same for now.
Thanks to everyone who gave suggestions by forum and emails. Also, special thanks to everyone who patiently waited for this update.
Feedback and suggestions are always welcome.
Alpha 1.3
Alpha 1.3 is available today!
This update introduces a new GPU and ASIC product launch cycle. Instead of getting new units by doing research, there is a new product launching every year.
Each year, there is a new GPU and ASIC hardware model. New products have more hash rate and might be more expensive. As time passes, your current hardware depreciates and need repair. You have the option to renew your hardware or repair the old ones.
What is New?
Hardware launch cycle.
Fixes
You can change shelf colors after placing them.
Depreciation values in shelf dialog now updates in real time.
New hardware research node is removed.
Fixed an issue which prevents overwriting a save file in some cases.
Alpha 1.2
Alpha 1.2 is available today! Highlight of this update is the depreciation and repair system. GPU and ASIC units depreciate over time and after some time they need to be repaired to be used again.
What is New?
More color variations for shelf units (6 more colors)
New 3D models for power and air conditioning units
New 3D models for GPU and ASIC units
GPU and ASIC hardware units depreciate over time. The units become broken if depreciation reaches 30%.
Broken units cannot mine coins until they are repaired. They can be repaired from the shelf menu.
Selling price of the hardware units depend on how long they’ve been used.
There is a smoke effect showing that many of the units in a shelf needs to be repaired.
Fixes
Performance improvements made the objects in the game consume less GPU now.
Fixed a bug that made the lover half of the GPU model invisible in a shelf.
Early Access message pops up only once.
Information tooltip for shelf appears on top of the screen.
Hashrate information by the mined coin is included in the info tooltip.
Fixed a bug that prevented buying a shelf if the power usage was equal to capacity.
Improvements on the save file structure. This made old save files unusable with this version.
Alpha 1.1
First update is available now! What is in the box? Let’s see;
What is New?
Hardware units are visible and placed in open shelves. No more black server boxes.
Multiple item placement: hold left shift button while placing a GPU or ASIC to fully stack the shelf with the same item.
Multiple item deletion: hold left shift button while deleting to sell all items in the shelf.
New Coin! There is a new coin called ETX and it can only be mined using GPUs. Coin to be mined by the GPU can be selected while buying the GPU or by clicking on a shelf and switching the coin manually.
In order to sell the new coin ETX, just select the coin you want to sell in the exchange menu.
Events effecting the coin price was starting after the first year. They now start from the day 1.
Fixes
ASICs are more expensive now.
Hash rates are decreased.
Visible improvements on showing which spaces are available in a warehouse.
Mining difficulty increased for BTX.
Expert hiring prices are increased.
Double time is now a little faster.
Fixed an error in market capacity graph.
New game cash amount is decreased and changes according to difficulty.
Button click volume was too high, and volume is decreased.
Pressing ESC closes all open windows.
Fixed a bug that shows timer as stopped after loading a game.
Fixed a bug on hash rate increase research when loading a game.
Corrected worldwide electric consumption statistics.
Fixed a bug preventing the tutorial skip option in some cases
Removed single coin mode in the main menu.
Natural cooling values are decreased.
Fixed a bug showing random values in market capacity graph.
Maximum amount of coins you can buy is equal to the total coins mined in the world minus the coins you already own. If 1000 coins are already mined in the world and you have 300 of them, you can buy maximum amount of 700 more.
Trailer
There is also a new trailer now!
https://youtu.be/wkDwN5z4CvM
How Events and Difficulty Change the Game
Hello everyone,
It’s been less than a week since the Blockchain Tycoon was released for Early Access. The first thing we’ve been working on is the first set of fixes that will be available soon.
Some notes and explanations regarding the feedback:
Main goal of the first Early Access version is to show how the game works and its core mechanics.
The game includes other miners in the simulated world. The difficulty you select at the beginning of a game determines how aggressive other miners will be while mining the cryptocurrency. Difficulty settings strongly effects the worldwide hash rate count. If you select the HARD mode, there will be multiple times more miners in the world compared to EASY difficulty. Less miners (or total hash rate in the world) means you can mine more coins.
There are market events that increases or decreases the price of a coin. Since this was the first version, price events start after the first year. The reasoning behind having no events in the first year was to allow player some time to build and grow its business before the coin price suddenly hits from $1500 to $20 (as an example). It might be changed in the future according to difficulty settings. These events are called ‘major’ events and they effect the price greatly. The game will also have minor events that will change the price weekly, monthly. When both of them combined, major events will serve as an indicator for state of the economy and minor events will be smaller scale events like someone tweeting about a coin or a country banning a coin.
There is an error in the price of the daily consumed power in the world that will be fixed.
Monthly electric bills might be a little different for the same amount of power compared between months. This is because electric bill is calculated using the amount of power used daily using an approximation.
Early Access Launch and Roadmap
Blockchain Tycoon is ready for Early Access. It will be available in a few hours.
Here is the development roadmap:
[ REMOVED OLD ROADMAP IMAGE ]
Steam OS and macOS versions are also in development and will be available as soon as they are finished.
Game will be available in 11 languages listed in store page. If you want to help translating game to your own language, let us know.
We hope everyone has a good time playing the game.
Edit: Roadmap is updated on Feb 16, 2019.
What is Cryptocurrency Mining?
https://youtu.be/Jkek-ieg7ys
Since we are getting close to the launch date, we had to talk about the mining process. While talking about the Blockchain, it is mentioned that each block needs to be validated in order to be added to the Blockchain. Validation methods differ from platform to platform. Common validation methods are Proof-of-Work (PoW), Proof-of-Stake (PoS), and Consensus. Bitcoin uses Proof-of-Work to validate and add blocks to its Blockchain. In our game Blockchain Tycoon, we are assuming the coins you earned in the game are rewards of PoW and validation of other transactions.
In real life, earning coins is not as easy as it sounds. For example, in Bitcoin network, in order to earn Bitcoin rewards, you need to verify the transaction and you need to be the first miner to calculate the same hash value in the block. A hash value is calculated by solving a complex mathematical problem. This is the part that GPU and ASIC come in.
Why are we using GPU and ASIC?
In order to calculate the result of the problem that will give us the same value as in block, we need some processing power like a CPU or GPU. But, in order to be the first miner to calculate the value, we need much more processing power than the other miners. A CPU is slower compared to GPUs. At the early days of the Bitcoin, CPUs can be used to calculate the hash value, but as the number of miners increase, total processing power in the network also increased. So, the coins can only be mined with GPU and ASICs. An ASIC means Application-Specific Integrated Circuit which is designed to solve a specific problem. Different from CPU and GPUs, they are not efficient to use for general purpose problems. Instead, they can be designed to solve the exact problem that needs to be solved for earning coins. Processing power of the ASICs are much more greater than the CPU and GPUs.
Finance of Blockchain, Coins, and ICOs
Discussion topic of this week is Coins and ICOs.
A coin is a unit of a cryptocurrency and a medium of exchange. Coins are distributed among the network according to its own set of rules. For example, in Bitcoin network, a node is rewarded coins when it calculated the hash value that is used to validate the new block of the blockchain. This system is called Proof-of-Work. Bitcoin, Litecoin, Dogecoin, Ethereum, and Ripple are all coins. Each cryptocurrency has their own blockchain.
A token is a unit of value that can describe a cryptocurrency or a digital asset that is built on another platform. Some platforms create their own token using an existing cryptocurrency platform. Many applications use Ethereum Platform to create their own token and rely on the Ethereum Blockchain.
Why trade coins?
Because, similar to physical or digital assets, it has value. They can be bought, sold, or traded. Although the market prices of popular coins like Bitcoin and Ethereum have ups and downs, price is determined by basic supply and demand.
What is an ICO?
ICO means Initial Coin Offering. At the beginning of a new cryptocurrency project, organizations need to raise money to finance the project. So, limited amount of coins are reserved for initial coin sale that will help to crowdfund the project and allow further development.
https://youtu.be/lp6aTgY6A5o
What is a DApp?
In this post, we will talk about DApps. You can’t talk about cryptocurrencies and blockchain without mentioning it. DApp is short form of decentralized application. A centralized application is hosted by using one or more servers. The application owner is the centralized authority. Decentralized applications do not run on a single server. Instead, the application directly runs on every device it is used. Users of a DApp directly communicate between each other.
So, what are the use cases of serverless applications? First of all, it allows the users to use the application without censorship or approval of a central authority. The application can have its own rules regarding the content, but there is no centralized approval.
Second, application can combine money and information transaction without using a third party. As the money transaction between both parties is completed, information can be exchanged directly. Most of the services relying on a third party can be transformed into a DApp.
