Dev Blog #46
Dev Blog Summary
a) Game and Web 3 Development
Our game development efforts are currently focused on improving two key metrics: onboarding and retention, and daily active users (DAU). Here are the highlights of our current priorities:
- Enhance the onboarding experience: We are working on improving the user experience from browsing our collection on OpenSea to engaging with our Discord community and participating in the game. This includes revamping Gen 1 2D Art, creating better video content, and introducing in-game tutorials
- Increase DAU: We plan to make the PC client available on more platforms to boost daily active users
- Amour System: We’re developing a system where different face-traits provide various stats to the fighters, adding another aspect to consider when choosing a fighter
- Updated Toon Visual: We’re optimizing the game’s visuals for the upcoming PC version
- Updated UI: We’re revamping the entire sci-fi style UI theme for a fresh new look in upcoming game builds
- Improved Cloud Content Delivery (CCD) system: To optimize the game client’s size, we’re implementing real-time cloud data synchronization for models and materials
- Tournament Mode with Fractal Studio: We’re collaborating with Fractal Studio to implement tournament mode features, including the API for admins to create custom tournaments.
b) Business Development & Marketing
- We partnered with Hasbro to release a limited-edition Monopoly game, with release plan details to be shared soon
- We also introduced Discord Forums to streamline information accessibility and improve the user onboarding experience last week as part of our efforts to improve onboarding
- Rolling out access to new Forums in the Discord Server, starting with BattlePass holders, and gathering feedback for improvements
- Actively seeking qualified content creators to expand and enhance social media presence across multiple platforms
- We are preparing to roll out a fresh content strategy in April, aiming to build a footprint in the overarching gaming space and attract gamers beyond the web3 community
c) Community
- We are announcing upcoming events and providing tournament sign-up links for our community, offering opportunities for engagement and competition
- Processing shipping details for hoodies, with tracking numbers expected to be released soon
- Hosting March Twitter Competition with great prizes, including top-notch GEN2 items
- Sharing tournament results and celebrating participants’ success, fostering a sense of camaraderie and achievement within the community
- Gathering feedback and ideas from the community on game balancing, PFP art, weapons value, and general roadmap possibilities for continuous improvement
- We are adjusting the weapons points table for upcoming events to balance gameplay and ensure fairness, addressing the shield meta’s impact on gameplay
A: Game and Web 3 Development
There are a couple of key features we are prioritising on in chronological order divided by the objective to improve 2 key metrics:
Onboarding & Retention:
- Improving overall onboarding experience from seeing our collection on Opensea (art revamp) to learning more about us in Discord tutorials (better video content) to in-game tutorials (in-game tutorial and smoother gameplay)
- Gen 1 2D Art revamp as requested by the community
- Create social system and ability to queue with friends
DAU :
- PC client to get on more platforms and increase DAU
Below is some elaboration on the above and other features we are working on simultaneously
- Amour System
We have continued to work on the amour system in which we bring the other traits of the galaxy fighters into the game and provide value to them.
Different face-traits such as eyes, mouth etc, will provide different stats to the fighter, introducing another whole new aspect to consider when picking a fighter to purchase and use in the game.
Here are the list of in-game 3D-model that we have created since the last update:
- Eyes: 3D glasses, Albino Eyes, Alert Eyes, Alien Snake Eyes, Angry Eyes, Blue Beam Eyes, Closed Eyes, Combat Eyes, Crazy Eyes, Cyborg Eyes, Heart Eyes, Robot, Sad Eyes, Ski Goggles, Sleepy Eyes, Special Ops, Spider, Wheel Cycle Eyes, White Eyes, X Eyes, Zombie Eyes.
- Head: Beanie, Fedora, Headband, Knitted Orange Cap, Party Hat, Sailor Cap, Traffic Cone.
- Mouth: Alien, Animal Teeth, Atomic Charge, Battle Horn, Blow Dart, Bubble Gum, Cigar, Cigarette, Diamond Grill, Gas Mask, Gold Grill, Great Beard, Large Smile, Mustache 1, Moustache 2, Moustache 3, Mouth Holding Dagger, Pipe, Rage, Small Grin, Vampire Teeth, Vape Pen
The character armor system has been completed the logic side. Now we are modeling, drawing textures, and creating materials to include in the game. Our artists have completed over 100 components including models, materials, and textures.
2. Updated Toon Visual for PC version
In preparation for the upcoming PC version, we have updated the Toon visual system to bring a sharper, more vivid, and at the same time more optimised version of the game:
- Update Unity to a newer 2021.3LTS version
- Fixed issue with newer URP features
Universal Rendering Pipeline (URP) handles in-game image rendering. The mesh/material of characters and environments are processed by URP.
- Fixed “Depth Normals Pass” and related effects like SSAO
Screen Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO) is a shading and rendering technique used to calculate how exposed each point in a scene is to ambient lighting.
- Fixed issue where enabled GPU instanced properties in a layered property.
3. Updated UI
To prepare for the brand new 3.0 game client, heading to Bruna 8, we have updated the entire sci-fi style UI theme with blue and purple main colours and neon lines.
It will be coming in upcoming game builds, be prepared for a fresh new look!
4. Improved Cloud Content Delivery (CCD) system
Along with the upcoming face-trait system, we had to find a way to optimise the size of the game client as the amount of models, materials, and textures is becoming very large and it is unrealistic to have them bundled with the game client.
As a countermeasure, we have implemented real-time cloud data synchronisation as a demand system, this allows the game client to fetch models and material from cloud storage on demand and hence the files don’t have to be downloaded and stored initially on the device.
5. Battle Royale Animation Trailer
This week our animators continued to work on the final rendering of the previously approved draft, while also working on the visual and sound effects for the final footage. Final footage is going to be available next week.
6. Tournament Mode with Fractal Studio
Along with the features above, we are also continuing to work on the tournament mode. So far we have created the API for admins to create tournaments with custom rules, starting time and list of players. We are working with Fractal’s technical team to implement their API into the game mode and have the score posted onto the leaderboard on their website.
Tournaments created with this feature are only available by invitation, this allows us to create official events with it and have guilds/players sign up with us.
7. Other updates
As requested by the community this week, we would also like to re-share the latest logic on matchmaking, weapons balancing, and the creation of social features such as matchmaking with friends and adding friends
Matchmaking: After multiple iterations our current matchmaking logic have stayed constant in the last few builds, our current matchmaking system is only divided into two levels: beginners and skilled players because we want players to be able to find matches as fast as possible.
In the upcoming period, we will enable matchmaking based on players of the same rank, if no matches are found, the system will open a wider search with the closest rankings to ensure that players can start the match as quickly as possible while balancing the level between players in the same match.
2 game builds ago we also already introduced a completely separate logic for new players that is different ranked play, this logic for new players ensures they do only get matched with basic tier bots with a higher win rate for the players as to ensure a better initial experience before they join the beginner and advanced player pool for matchmaking.
Weapon balancing: We made a serious of weapon updates previously, there was neither a buff nor a debuff but an update to some weapon mechanics, no update on weapon stats have been made since. Certain weapons that were deemed too strong were also removed from the bots as requested by the community.
Social features: Social features like a friends system, an in-game chat system have all been developed and we are waiting for the right time to roll these features out. We are currently building a friends queue feature so you can play with your friends. This is on the roadmap but not top of priority as there are other features we are working on first as mentioned above.
B: Business Development & Marketing
Did you grow up playing Monopoly? It’s time to get back into it!
Together with our partners, Property’s and friends, we got the rights to release our own Monopoly game, published by Hasbro.
We, as partners, have secured 50 units of this limited-edition board game and will reveal the release plan for these soon.
Currently, our focus is our onboarding experience.
Even though we have plenty of information and resources available within our Discord, we recognize that many of them are very difficult to navigate and find.
To improve this, we are introducing Discord Forums.
We are compiling updated information from several channels within the ‘Start Here’ section into these Forums. This will allow new users and new community members to find the correct information with ease and consume it in bite-sized pieces.
Instead of having separate channels like the ones containing information on our collections, we will include them under one forum to make it more streamlined and less overwhelming.
Within the coming weeks, we will start rolling out access to the new Forums within our Discord Server to our community. We will start by rolling them out for BattlePass holders to get feedback on the structure and further improve them.
Simultaneously, we actively looked for qualified content creators to help us improve and expand our social media presence and content rollout.
You can expect a shift in both content and socials within the month of April, as we are currently in the process of preparing and finalizing our strategy, not only for Twitter but also for other social media platforms.
The goal is for Galaxy Fight Club to organically build a footprint in the overarching gaming space and attract gamers, even those who are not involved in web3, organically.
Furthermore, we want to address our rules and policies within our community once again.
We want to emphasize that we welcome constructive criticism but we don’t accept misbehavior.
Misbehavior can come in various forms. May it be harassment, sexism, racism, hate speech, or anything else that is seen as inappropriate.
Moving forward, anyone acting inappropriately will receive a 7-day ban. Depending on the severity, even a permanent ban may be executed.
We want to keep our Discord positive and enjoyable for everyone.
C: Community
Upcoming Events:
Players may pick one tournament on each day. There is a Holder only event on March 29 that scholars are not eligible to participate in.
March 29 Signup: https://forms.gle/49tbfiqDMtpkJoDa8
April 16 Signup: https://forms.gle/Q9cv4fkYKktKy3ud9
Hoodies:
Shipping details being processed by 3PL, expect tracking numbers this week.
March Twitter Competition:
We are wrapping the March twitter comp on March 31, reminder to use #marchMadnessGFC and #marchmadness to enter. There has been a ton of great gameplay footage hitting the airwaves, thank you for sharing and please keep at it!
Bonus Points for tagging big names in the NFT twittersphere or commenting your posts in gaming conversations you see going on.
We are loading up the account with top notch GEN2 and are eyeing a top 10 winners for this month. Still have at least one lightning blade up for grabs!!
Not much time left this month, let’s show twitter what we are made of.
Video footage if needed: Tournament Videos
Current Prize Stash:
March 17 + 20 Events
GEN1 Holder 9 Point Event: shorturl.at/beDF4
12 Point Event: shorturl.at/rDFJ9
We continue to see the KingBFusion team establish themselves as gameplay leaders in the GEN1 Holders channel with Holder OG’s a close second and Unleashed Hard 8’s firmly in third. If you are a GEN1 holder, definitely step in and start enjoying these events. They are competitive for a wider range of skills and still feature great prizes. Keep an eye here, these teams are improving and new alliances will be formed to challenge the current top of the leaderboard.
In the 12 Point event we saw the new pecking order that has been established among GFC’s best take form again with Zen (WIlliam, Dennis, Yami ) taking first, Anson Family (Kev, Spite, Donz) taking second, and D2D Newbie rounding out the top 3. The Doctore Crossbow proved to be the META with Yami absolutely dominating his opponents wielding it while William slung green asteroids all over the Jungle Map. We continue to see matches at the highest level played with precision and strategy with single mistakes or great plays determining outcomes — every move and shot matters.
March 24 Events: shorturl.at/hmwBJ
With two simultaneous events we saw the ZEN sweep for the first time in the dual event Era — massive congrats to the current leading guild. Ser William, Dennis and Yami win another tournament (15 Pointer) after a valiant effort from the Anson Family (aka the supers) of Kevv, Spite and Donzzzzz taking the first match in the Championship round before ultimately losing a tight one. These were clearly the two best teams of the day featuring some seriously high powered weaponry including a nice cube sighting for the winning team.
The 8 point Event was very hotly contested and actually the more popular event on the day! Great to see scholars battle OG holders in this one with most matches going down to the wire and many different character and weapons combos… love to see it. Shaaaaaaan dominated the competition featuring mostly a candy gun on Sands map before transitioning to the echo chamber for the final round on Jungle Map.
We are seeing a number of guilds breaking into the upper sphere of GFC greatness battling for a championship belt including DEGEN (2nd + 4th) and D2D (3rd Place) with Jungle (tie 5th) poking around a bit behind them.
General Notes and Weapons Points Table
Great speaking with Doctores and Battlepass holders to hear ideas and connect. We will continue to speak directly to the community to engage them as we build out the GFC universe. Lots of great ideas about game balancing, possible new ways to engage players, PFP art, weapons value and general roadmap possibilities. Thank you to all those who tuned in and contributed to the conversation.
We have made some slight changes to the weapons points table for upcoming events. The shield meta will now cost more to take advantage of during cash events!
