Blockchain Information

What is a Blockchain?

A blockchain is a growing list of records, called blocks, that are linked together using cryptography. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of the previous block, a timestamp, and transaction data. The timestamp proves that the transaction data existed when the block was published in order to get into its hash.

In short, it is a technology which creates a secure public ledger of information that can be used to record and confirm transactions, or store information for later retrieval. It is therefore ideal for creating financial and official records, and as we have seen increasingly as the basis for digital currencies.

The ability of some blockchains to also tokenise (digitally store) data such as images, sounds and video clips has an obvious implication for the gaming industry, by taking player save data and collectibles out of a game and placing them into a permanent record that the player owns and can access, even out of the game. In short, players can take their game items and hold them forever, or even gift, trade or sell them to other players for a possible financial gain. This exciting development in gaming is still in its early stages, but rapidly evolving.

Which Blockchain and Why?

A number of blockchain games have adopted tokenisation of gaming assets using applications that attach to underlying blockchains such as Ethereum (ETH), using these applications then as a new form of currency for their games. While this may well be the future for gaming, it is not yet something that has full legal clarity and a number of financial regulatory bodies including the SEC in the united states have stated that they may consider such fully tokenised applications to be unregistered securities if they offer financial returns (security tokens) as opposed to only offering a function, such as access to the gaming metaverse (utility tokens), but there is still a real lack of clarity and much remains to be determined.

You can read more on this issue here: https://www.sec.gov/news/public-statement/statement-clayton-2017-12-11

In an effort to avoid such uncertainty with Mektropolis, we took a decision early on to comply with all known rules and public guidance from regulatory bodies in regard to tokenised gaming assets. After careful consideration, our solution was finally to adopt the existing Ravencoin (RVN) cryptocurrency rather than tokenise our own, unique in-game blockchain, which we did for the following core reasons:

We are supporting in-game features of an existing game, not selling shares or offering financial products, RVN provides all the functionality we require and there is no reason to duplicate these in a new blockchain.

• RVN is based on Bitcoin (BTC), and its codebase is available for everyone to see and audit for security purposes.
• RVN has a decentralised and consensus-driven infrastructure, meaning no single powerful group can control it, instead all the users do.
• RVN has a proof-of-work security mechanism, meaning the data is secured by many, many computers working together.
• Even though it is a digital currency with real and gowing value, RVN had no pre-mine or initial coin offering (ICO) and no development team (or other unknown ‘investors’) are waiting in the background to cash-in huge amounts of RVN at a later date.
• RVN has been actively operating and developed since 2018, it has a track record we can therefore be sure of, and future that looks bright.
• RVN was created for the very purpose of tokenising assets on its blockchain, and does not require an additional software applications to make this possible. This removes a lot of software complexity, while improving reliability, security and network transparency.
• RVN has a very low ‘gas fees’ (costs of use), being currently set at 0.1 RVN per transaction (only about US 1 cent ($0.01) at time of writing).

If you want to know more about RVN please take a look at the foundations website, here: https://ravencoin.org/ or search other resources online, RVN has a very passionate, friendly and active community supporting it.

RVN in Mektropolis

The in-game economy of Mektropolis allows users to find, create or purchase (with RVN) assets for use in the game. These assets are recorded as tokens on the RVN blockchain, and while accessible in-game they are also available to the players in their own RVN wallet outside of the game. Users are able to do what they wish with these tokens, meaning that if you do not wish to use them in game, you can instead store them into your RVN wallet as a keep-sake or collectible, trade them or even sell them to others for more RVN.

Trading items is one possible way to obtain RVN to use in-game, however RVN can also be earned in game by completing missions, or hiring yourself out as a mercenary to other players, crafting and selling items, and so on. Besides in-game means to obtain RVN, players can also import existing RVN balances from their external wallet, or generate RVN by mining it using a suitable graphics card (GPU), such as the one that may already be in the players computer.

To buy RVN with fiat (paper) money, there are many available exchanges that support RVN, including: https://sequoir.com/