Understand the 3A New Chain Game Earth From Another Sun in One Article

Author: Gametaverse

Two Development Branches of Blockchain Games

The purpose of games is to provide emotional value to people, such as the beauty often brought by games, the sense of achievement when completing tasks, and the excitement when defeating enemies.

Games are usually classified based on their economic models into "zero-sum games" and "non-zero-sum games." The former is represented by gambling games (like Texas Hold'em), where one party wins money while the other must lose, and its economic system primarily relies on external players. The latter is represented by various MMORPGs (like World of Warcraft), whose economic systems depend on internal circulation, with in-game currency continuously generated from PVE and consumed in various aspects, forming a small independent economy.

The combination of blockchain technology and games is currently believed to have two approaches. One approach is to put in-game assets on the blockchain, forming various tokens, including character and item NFTs, as well as in-game economic circulation tokens, which is the concept of GameFi. The other approach is to put both game logic and assets on the blockchain, forming "fully on-chain games."

Fully on-chain games have made significant progress in the past year, creating unique infrastructure and are considered Crypto Native games. However, challenges arise: after all, the fastest on-chain virtual machines currently only perform at the level of servers from 30 years ago. If all game logic is placed on-chain, only projects with relatively simple game logic and UI can be developed. AAA-level games, at least for now, can only choose the "GameFi" route of asset on-chain. Therefore, we believe that in this bull market, GameFi and FOCG will develop simultaneously and evolve in two directions.

So how can GameFi break the Ponzi attribute and have relatively long-term value? The answer lies in playability. In the last bull market, blockchain game projects focused more on financial aspects, creating various GameFi (combining games and DeFi, emphasizing profit while weakening playability). In this bull market, we can see more traditional game companies entering the blockchain gaming industry, introducing a more mature AAA game production supply chain, achieving "coin reform" based on traditional games, thus ensuring the quality and playability of the games. "Earth From Another Sun" is such a well-crafted blockchain game masterpiece.

Game Introduction

According to the official introduction, "Earth From Another Sun" is a sci-fi adventure game developed by the Multiverse team. The virtual world created on this basis includes large battlefields, a real universe, strategy, RPG, and storyline content. In this fantastical future world, the power struggles of factions, the difficult survival of small characters, and the ups and downs of racial destinies are all up to you to decide!

The core gameplay of "Earth From Another Sun" is the grandest sci-fi first-person shooting combat, followed by commanding armies, conquering worlds, and building nations, personally participating in a first-person shooting game with numerous cool weapons, abilities, vehicles, and units. Players can choose to enjoy the game alone or in a cooperative or competitive multiplayer environment. The adventure starts from Earth and explores the entire galaxy, discovering treasures within the galaxy, meeting various characters, interacting with different nations, and facing the world-destroying invasion of the Void Bugs. Players are free in the game, able to exert influence, recruit officers and armies, overthrow corrupt nations, rule the galaxy, and kick the Void Bugs out; or act as frontline commanders, personally slaying foolish rebels and Void Bugs.

Main Features of the Game:

• The grandest sci-fi combat;
• A galaxy map that continuously expands with versions, with countless unique areas to explore;
• Large-scale battlefields supporting up to 4 players and 500 AI units fighting in the same scene;
• A well-crafted and engaging first-person shooting game;
• Hundreds of unique weapons, weapon modifications, abilities, and enemies, providing a fresh combat experience each time;
• Mechs, tanks, hovercraft, ships, aircraft, starships, and space fortresses for you to operate and fight;
• Well-designed NPCs and a task system within the galaxy;
• An exquisite Waifu system;
• Your own galaxy land to build and farm as you wish.

The above content is extracted from the official introduction, but based on my personal gameplay experience, it is overall similar to the traditional game Elden Ring, leaning towards single-player gameplay. Although the official has mentioned that a PVP system will be opened in the future, the current test version only supports PVE. In comparison to blockchain games, the overall style is more akin to the mech sci-fi adventure game "Phantom Galaxies," produced with investment from Animoca Brands, featuring similar mech styles, space exploration, shooting levels, and so on.

Like most GameFi games, the Web3 integrated "Earth From Another Sun" emphasizes the concept of digital ownership, allowing players to own digital assets in the form of NFTs, such as characters, skills, weapons, mechs, and more. These digital assets can be developed and used in various in-game activities, such as trading items and utilizing the game's extensive crafting system. This integration provides players with new ways to own, trade, and utilize digital assets within the game. During my gameplay, I found the first pirate-hunting mission relatively easy, but later missions required higher-level weapons and armor to succeed, laying the groundwork for the demand for NFT assets.

Game Review

After receiving the test serial number, I immediately downloaded the game installation package, which had a slow download speed, taking 3 hours to complete. The installation of the game was straightforward, and I could log in using various existing social accounts, so I chose to log in with my Gmail account.

Next was the game's opening animation, where the protagonist floats in space and is rescued by a spaceship. Then, the protagonist is tasked with various missions, such as flying to another planet to replenish supplies and fighting pirates. The game perspective is from the protagonist's view rather than a third-party view, and the storyline unfolds through dialogues. For a few questions, players can choose from several fixed answers, but the extent of their impact on the storyline is uncertain.

Controlling the protagonist's movement is done using the conventional WASD keys, making it easy for players to get started. To control the actions of the warship, simply right-click on the target. It is worth noting that in FPS shooting scenarios, because team combat (AI) is introduced, there are certain coordination requirements. The following image shows a scene of fighting alongside an AI team:

Another commendable aspect is that each time a new skill is acquired or a new task is received, a "guidance video" automatically pops up to help players familiarize themselves with the new skill and task, thereby reducing operational difficulty, as shown in the image below:

By pressing the ESC key, you can bring up the settings page, including mech, backpack, and legion (AI) settings, etc. The following page easily displays the basic information and level of the equipment, health points, shield values, and other basic data.

Clicking on the Leaderboard reveals two types of ladder data set by the game to encourage player competition: Battle Pass Ranking and Attribute Ranking, one for battle net levels and the other for game character levels. As shown in the image below:

In summary, the game runs smoothly overall, with beautiful graphics close to AAA level, a coherent story, and detailed prompts for completing tasks. These are the advantages of traditional game companies. Fighting pirates starts off relatively easy, but the difficulty of later pirates increases sharply, which I suspect is to encourage users to purchase NFTs to upgrade weapons (the current test version has not yet opened the NFT trading market). Overall, in terms of playability, "Earth From Another Sun" ranks among the top ten in blockchain games, while the subsequent token economics will need to be evaluated after the official version is released.

It is reported that EFAS raised $2.6 million on June 16, 2022, and subsequently completed another $4.5 million funding round, with participation from Solana Ventures, Alameda Research, and Lightspeed, among others. The token is also expected to be issued on the Solana blockchain. Given this, with strong technical capabilities and backing from well-known investment institutions, and with a good performance in the test version, EFAS is worth looking forward to for another wave of small explosions in this bull market.