Yield Guild Games Partners With Space Strategy MMO, Influence

YGG is thrilled to announce its partnership with Influence, an innovative, new play-to-earn space strategy MMO with true player ownership of all in-game assets.

Influence is an immersive, persistent strategy game set in the Adalia star system’s asteroid belt where the citizens aboard the Arvad, a multi-generational ship, have made their homes after fleeing a dying Earth. By combining strategy gaming with the benefits of blockchain technology, Influence is bridging the gap for gamers who want to engross themselves in deep, compelling, strategic, and tactical game mechanics while being in full control of their in-game assets.

YGG has purchased the 46th largest Asteroid in Influence, (KJ-44947), specifically, a C-Type carbonaceous asteroid for 32.86 ETH (approximately 78,000 USD at the time of purchase). In addition to this, YGG also acquired approximately 30 smaller asteroids for a total of around 10,000 USD.

One of the most compelling strategic elements, and a novel game mechanic to the multiplayer space, is the implementation of realistic orbital mechanics resulting in the real-time movement of 250,000 asteroids, and a dynamic, ever-changing strategic setting. Players compete through multiple avenues including mining, building, trading, researching, and fighting, and interact in an immersive 3D universe through third-person control of their ships and the installations they build.

Another feature of the space strategy game is true player ownership. According to Chris Lexmond, creator of Influence, “The idea of Influence was inspired partially by my time helping to lead a large alliance in Eve Online. I couldn’t help but notice just how much life the players breathed into the universe through their efforts and the stories they created. Even before ‘play-to-earn’ was coined, I wanted to build a game in which the players could capture some of that value.” As all in-game assets are blockchain-based and reflected as fungible, non-fungible, or semi-fungible tokens supporting the ERC-20, ERC-721, and ERC-1155 standards, respectively, Influence not only rewards players who identify their perfect gameplay strategy, but does so in a way that supports play-to-earn.

Through the introduction of their token, SWAY, which players can earn through gameplay, Influence allows players to facilitate in-game transactions for resources, components, ships, and asteroids. SWAY will be the single point of entry/exit to ease friction in participating within the game and will facilitate play-to-earn. Some of the ways that players will be able to earn SWAY through gameplay include leasing plots of land on their owned asteroids, starting successful markets on their asteroid, mining their asteroid’s unique composition of resources, refining these materials into various products for sale or trading them on the open market.

One of the most significant benefits to the blockchain-enabled technologies that Influence is built upon is the ease with which players will be able to collaborate with each other. Influence encourages the formation of organizations (corporations, guilds, alliances, etc.) to allow players to collaborate with each other, and will enable players to do so by supporting existing DAO (decentralized autonomous organization) tooling, such as Aragon and Colony. Influence is a perfect fit for YGG’s vision, enabling our play-to-earn gaming guild to bring players together to earn via Influence’s rich, blockchain-based economy.

Influence’s focus on community, the interaction between players, and its robust in-game economy make it a great partner for YGG. Through this partnership, YGG will be able to provide yield generating opportunities to its massive and ever-growing player base. Jeff Holmberg, Head of Investments, YGG, said “Influence is a space strategy MMO that has you thinking deeply about every move. It caught our attention at YGG as the game mechanics are extremely well designed, providing a fluid and true gaming experience for our player base. Additionally, Influence co-founders Chris and JP are clearly passionate about involving the community in the direction of the game, and with their strong focus on developing proper economics, we can see a strong case for sustainability in their play-to-earn ecosystem.”

Influence has already had two public sales and releases. The first, “Arrival”, took place in April and the second, “Populate the Belt”, in early September. The team is now working diligently to expand its operations to support the release of “Exploitation” which will contain travel, marketplaces, building, mining, refining, and the launch of the in-game token SWAY. Exploitation will take advantage of Ethereum “layer 2” ZK-rollups to allow for scale, and the significant reduction of fees, all while retaining 100% of the security of the Ethereum blockchain.

For more information about Influence, check out their Website, Wiki, and Discord.

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