After success of CryptoKitties we can see a huge wave of new crypto games nowadays. Some developers just copy the idea of kitties while the others try to expand the idea and create something new and fresh. There is an opinion that 2018 is the year of the crypto games. I think that it is a very promising industry - that’s why I’ve decided to make blockchain games reviews on Steemit. And the first game I choose to look at is World of Ether.

World of Ether

Short info about the game

Official website: https://worldofether.com
Medium: https://medium.com/@worldofether
Twitter: https://twitter.com/worldofether

World of Ether is a new crypto collectibles game that was announced on Jan. 15, 2018 and is going to be released in private Alpha on March 28, 2018 (it seems to me that the game will have public launch in the second half of April).The game is centered around collecting and breeding of monsters with some duel fighting opportunities.

What is interesting about “World of Ether”?

• More than 1950 eggs (first in-game monsters will be hatched from eggs) were bought at presale (almost $500k were paid by users in first 48 hours of egg presale);
• No Gen0 monsters will be created by developers. All monsters will be hatched and breeded by players;
• Breeding monsters: you need both male and female monsters to breed. Male monsters can be sired if you don’t have any.

Monsters (Etherians)

In-game monsters are called “Etherians” and they are broken into 4 grades of rarity:

1. Common: the most frequently occuring and weaker than the rest;
2. Uncommon: more rare than common Etherians, medium power;
3. Rare: hard to find and very powerful;
4. Legendary: most powerful of all Etherians, are sterile and cannot breed;
   
   

Besides rarity monsters are divided into 5 types (each type is generally more powerful than the last):

1. Sun: Representing light, warmth, flying, and fire.
2. Ocean: Representing water, depth, and mystery.
3. Life: Representing fertility and vegetation.
4. Death: Representing demise, undoing, and finality.
5. Astral: Representing intelligence, psychic ability, and the metaphysical.

Discovering and collecting Etherians

Initially after the game launch there will be 200 different monsters to discover. All of them will be undiscovered by default. Players will discover them by breeding or hatching.

If you’re the first to discover a monster, your username gets stored and shown to all the proceeding players. Also you get a gold version of that monster (Gold Etherians are incredibly infrequent and have the highest possible power)

Breeding monsters

Breeding in World of Ether is how Etherians are created. Breeding requires 1 female and 1 male, both of the same type.

All players, upon release of the main game, due to their beginner levels, will only have access to the Sun type. You will need to battle with other players, get experience and grow your level to access more powerful types.

Hatching monsters (buying eggs)

The other opportunity to get a monster (and the way the first monsters are discovered in the game) is hatching eggs that you can buy now on presale or later in the game marketplace. With every sold egg the price of the next one increases by 0.00035 ETH (at the moment of this review posting the price of an egg was 0.6832 ETH). And on launch the price will increase by 15% to encourage new players buy monsters from marketplace instead of buying eggs.

The “World of Ether” team proclamate that the price of an egg will never decrease.

Battling with Etherians

Battling in World of Ether is how players gain experience and level up. Each monster has a varying range of possible battle points and even if one monster has more battle points than another, the weaker monster will still have a chance of getting lucky and winning a battle.

Monsters don’t level up, players do. Players gain experience through battles. As the level increases, the player’s chance of breeding rare monsters improves.

How will players earn ETH?

There are two ways for players to earn ETH:

Siring

Players can sire male monsters for ETH (or pay ETH to have another player’s male monster) to breed with a female monster.

Selling monsters

Players can sell their Etherians on the marketplace for ETH.

World of Ether’s game mechanics are fully decentralized and free from market manipulation - this means that the market (players willing to sell and buy monsters) sets the price.

Egg presale

Egg presale started on Jan 15, 2018. The price of the first egg was 0 ETH. Each egg sold causes the price of the next egg to increase by 0.00035 ETH. At the moment of this review posting 1951 eggs were sold (1500 eggs sold in a week after presale start) and the price of an egg was 0.6832 ETH.
The egg presale buyers are the ones who will be initially populating the marketplace with monsters. The eggs that World of Ether sells rise by 15% on launch, which encourages new players to no longer buy eggs, but instead buy monsters from the marketplace. The idea of the team is that the early adopters stand to be heavily rewarded.
When the full game launches, eggs will hatch into first monsters. Then players will start to breed and battle to make new and more rare monsters.

Quick facts

• Private Alpha will be released on 28.03.2018 only for 50 participants;
• Beta version will be released after Alpha and only for eggs holders;
• More than 850 eggs were sold in 24 hours after presale start, more than 1500 eggs were sold in a week (from Jan 15 to Jan 21);
• Almost $500,000 were paid for eggs by early adopters within the first 48 hours;
• The price of the first egg was 0 ETH;
• There was a buyer who spent $22,000 on presale eggs;
• 5,000 eggs will be reserved on a 1 year vesting schedule for marketing purposes;
• World of Ether partnered with Coinbase’s Toshi (mobile browser for the Ethereum blockchain) to offer mobile game version (and you need MetaMask to play on desktop);

The team behind the game

World of Ether is founded by two brothers: Alain Goldman (Co-Organizer of “Beginner Programmers” meetup (the biggest Ethereum meetup group in the world according to Meetup.com) and Ruby on Rails developer) and Stanley Goldman (Senior Developer at GitHub).
In addition to the above-listed founders there are 8 more team members listed on the World of Ether home page.

Disclaimer

I’m not a member of “World of Ether” team and not familiar with anyone from it. The information provided above is a result of my studying data from open sources like blockchain news portals and “World of Ether” game official website and social media accounts. The goal of my reviews is to make community familiar with new blockchain based games.

Remember that crypto world currently is a Wild West. So don’t invest in crypto games more than you can afford to lose.