EDIT: 3-8-2023 *** So update on Star Atlas, because its needed, last week they announced that they have downscaled their team from After FTX they already downscaled from 200, but now from 165 to 45 people because the overhead cost were too high to keep running like this, 39 of the people are still working on a UE5 game.
But they do pivot a bit in their approach, instead of creating the entire metaverse at once they will now release parts of the game mechanics into separate games. As example their first game will be a ground racer game like the Star Wars Podracer game, a different part might be a FPS shooter, in different parts of the map. This allows them to create the required game mechanics, assets and already build a player base, have revenue generated by those separate games and later connect these games into the metaverse they finally want to create. Where all gamers need to come together and be able to play their own kind of game in a open universe.
They also opened their IP and allow community members to build their own games, tools and products with their assets. The first 1 mil revenue is without fee towards SA. After that they provided a list with fees based on product types. Yesterday they announced that also the WebGL assets are included in this package.
This change gives them a runway of 1,5 year if no new revenue is generated. This however should not be the case because they are releasing the V0.01 of their on chain game mechanics that will come with a simple webUI but atleast it would allow people to start using their assets and open the marketplace for more resources to be traded.
END: 3-8-2023
Somewhere around 04-06-2023 ***** I will just list a couple of roadmap items they have reached in the past year, and you can decide how much progress has been made. Lots of work has been done with third-party studios, so not all credits go to them. But still, massive progress nonetheless. I will name the biggest ones:
- Built a UE5 Sandbox for game environment testing, with public access through Epic Games.
- Built Solana Wallet integration into UE5 for direct access to the chain.
- Modeled all 49 ships and are now filling the inside and texturing, but they are already playable (if you own the ship).
- Built a test case for real-time gaming on-chain and tested the blockchain and smart contracts needed for this.
- Launched the Star Atlas DAO Foundation, which will become the final owner of the Ecosystem, governed by POLIS.
- Opened IP for usage by third parties.
They claim to have 200 people working for them, including internal and external teams, with 56 developers focused on UE5. This is an expensive build, and I hope they can keep up this pace. They believe that now that they have figured out the physics of the ecosystem, they can accelerate their development even further.
They plan to release UE5 models, and their first playable multiplayer game will be a Ground Racing Game that reminds me a lot of Star Wars Pod Racer (1999) but with Star Atlas assets.
In the meantime, they will release SAGE, a webGL game that will require people to participate with their in-game items instead of the current staking mechanism (SCORE). This approach will bootstrap their economy and gradually introduce future game loops such as mining, crafting, building, etc.
There are many reasons to be optimistic, and it's exciting to see if they can achieve light speed in their development with UE5, setting a new standard while utilizing two new technologies (UE5 and Blockchain). Show Less
