be me
be 7
living at my grandparents' place
discover runescape
low poly world, terrible graphics, no idea what i'm doing
somehow it's the best place i've ever been
log in every day after school
the world is always there
that turns out to matter more than i understood at the time
be 13
mum passes away
world outside gets very quiet
world inside runescape does not
log in
keep logging in
log in more than was probably good for me
it was the place that still made sense
i don't really recommend the amount i played
i also don't know what i would have done instead
start messing with runescape private servers
zubersoft 508 source, open in notepad
no tutorials, no stack overflow, no idea what any of it means
just scroll until something looks like it might be the thing
find a thieving stall
find a number
385
that's a shark
change it to 11694
steal from the stall
armadyl godsword
an actual armadyl godsword
from a food stall
i am 13 and i have just performed magic
nobody told me how
i found it myself
that's the moment
everything after this is the same trick at larger scale
code is horrifying
keep going anyway
turns out grief and a compiler have a similar amount of patience for you
none
25,000 hours in runescape by the end
i tell people now it was market research
it was not market research at the time
also playing world of warcraft
5,000+ hours
fall in love with something different this time
the world itself
the ambiance
walking somewhere and it feeling like somewhere
the combat
the mounts
WASD
your body actually being in the place
realize i now want two games that don't exist at the same time
runescape's skilling, economy and freedom
grind a skill for weeks because you chose to
make something, sell it, matter to the economy
no quest telling you to
wow's world and feel
nobody has made that
file this thought away for roughly a decade
2013
go study game design properly
tell my teachers i want to build an MMORPG
"don't"
"too big"
"you won't be able to"
hear this for four years straight
2017
graduate anyway
still want to build an MMORPG
nine years later still building the thing everyone told me not to build
turns out "you can't" and "nobody has" sound identical from the outside
start an ICT bachelor
third year
have a decision to make
finish the degree, or build the thing
leave the degree
grandmother has questions
fair questions honestly
build the thing
be 20
grandfather passes away
the house i learned to play in isn't the same house anymore
be 21
move to leeuwarden
live on my own for the first time
very quiet apartment
very loud plans
known luca for 27 years
been building things together for 15 of them
most companies don't survive one funding round
we've survived each other's ideas since before we could drive
covid arrives
everyone bakes bread
we build a mafia game
mafialeader
players immediately begin betraying each other
working as intended
2020
luca: "have you looked at crypto"
me: "no"
luca: "look at crypto"
look at crypto
luca introduces me to a project called degentoken
meet pat
~20 years of experience, endless patience for a kid with questions
teaches me more than any course did
gives me something i didn't have yet
full focus
everyone who makes it had a pat
most of us forget to say so out loud
luca redesigns the degentoken UI
i integrate it in reactjs
first time i ship something into crypto that real people touch
then we build RSGP
yield farming is everywhere and all of it is spreadsheets
nobody is making it feel like anything
so gamify it
earn tokens
buy a key
open a chest
get an NFT
NFT boosts your multiplier and cuts your lock time
the loot drop is the yield strategy now
turns out 25,000 hours of opening things was applicable knowledge after all
build two more web3 games on the side for larva lads
flappy bird and angry birds
except you play as your own NFT
this is a normal thing to have on a CV now apparently
freelance web3 websites to keep the lights on
build someone else's site by day
build RSGP at night
self-funded means your own money
and your own weekends
RSGP has 50 followers
fifty
chainlink notices
chainlink
co-marketing with the people whose oracles i'd been reading docs about at 2am
stare at screen for a while
could have launched a token
everyone else was
would have raised more in a weekend than i made in two years of freelancing
didn't
the people who'd show up for that aren't the people i wanted to build for
two years into RSGP
jagex updates their terms
no NFT or crypto projects on their IP
project is over
two years, gone in a policy update
sit with that for a bit
then realize something
we'd been building on someone else's world this whole time
because we loved it
but loving a world isn't the same as owning the right to build in it
so
fine
we build our own
alerith
3D medieval fantasy MMORPG
runescape's skilling and economy
train what you want, make what you want, sell it to someone who needs it
the grind is the point, not the obstacle
wow's world and feel
WASD movement
a world bigger than runescape's
mounts instead of teleport spam, because teleporting everywhere means you stop living in the place you live in
you travel to the dungeon
you do not queue into it
second home, not second job
no play to earn
no extraction
if you have to be paid to play it, it's not a game, it's a shift
blockchain as a trust and persistence layer, not a casino bolted to a fantasy world
no classes
train whatever you want
your build is a decision, not a menu you picked before you knew anything
flat power curve
level 80 barely stronger than 75
your old gear never becomes garbage
your old effort never becomes garbage
economies die when the past stops mattering
monetization line set on day one
nothing you buy makes you stronger
nothing you buy skips a grind
cosmetics and account services
name changes, that kind of thing
nothing that touches progression
this costs us money
keep it anyway
everyone asks the same question
"wen token"
no token
"but wen token"
still no token
second project now where we've said no to the easy money
we are not funding a game by selling a coin and hoping the game shows up later
the whole point is building something people choose to stay in
you don't get that by taking from them on the way in
build the game first
this loses us a lot of attention
keep it anyway
"wen launch"
asked during a week where we shipped updates and posted about all of it
i understand the question
MMORPGs are not a weekend
you get updates every week because the alternative is a trailer and two years of silence
we'd rather you watch it get built
write the programs
arena, escrow, marketplace, guild, passport, achievements, shop, loot VRF
eight of them on devnet
eight different ways to feel extremely confident and then extremely wrong at 3am
duel arena has to feel instant
chain says "well actually"
so don't ask it to fight
pull a seed from
@magicblock VRF
game server rolls the damage from it
results posted straight back with their ephemeral rollups
fight resolves at game speed
provably fair, verifiable afterwards
combat feels like combat, chain does the part it's actually good at
players get .alerith.sol names
set it as your in-game name
checkmark next to it in chat
everyone can see it's actually yours
and you can sell it on the marketplace
a name becomes a thing with a history
somebody had it before you, somebody wants it after
small feature
not a small thing
solana privacy hackathon
1st place, RADR track
10k prize
they rug
no prize
win first place and get paid in experience
could have taken that as the sign to stop
ship the next build instead
also meet kai there
he stays
builds the world with us now
lost the 10k, gained the person building the thing the 10k was for
fine trade
backend is .NET 9 native AOT, postgres, redis streams
unity game client
unity game server
a launcher
the website
an admin dashboard for running an actual MMO
dashboard, analytics, user management, game config, server config, commerce, trust & safety, website portal, infrastructure
and the studio editor tooling to build the world with
because content doesn't make itself
you build the tools, then you build the game with the tools
none of that is the game
all of it has to exist before the game can
studios have a department for each of these
we are three people
fair question how three people build what a studio builds
the honest answer is we don't do it alone anymore
claude opus, fable, gpt astra
a decade ago this project was not possible for us
it is now
not because the work got smaller
because the distance between knowing what you want and having it built got shorter
still have to know what you want
that part nobody can do for you
still have to know when the thing it handed you is wrong
that part took 15 years to learn
the other half of the answer is less impressive
16 hour days
sometimes 30 straight when something has to get fixed
sleep schedule dies
flip it back with an all-nighter
lasts about two days
dies again
this is not a productivity tip
this is what it actually costs
i'd like to be the person who tells you there's a smarter way
haven't found it yet
colosseum frontier
5,400+ projects
1st place, RPC fast gaming track
5th, superteam NL sidetrack
okay
maybe this isn't just a delusion luca and i have been sharing since we were kids
toly quote-tweets us
then follows
two people from friesland
refresh the notification a couple of times just to be sure
SNS partnership
2,500+ playtest signups
actual on-chain revenue before launch, from names
people wanted to exist in the world before the world was finished
that one gets me
still an enormous amount left
audits before anything touches mainnet
but the part people expect to be hard is already done
escrow, marketplace, the whole ownership layer
list something on the marketplace, someone buys it, it's theirs
no wallet popup
no signature request
no "approve transaction"
just a sale
the chain is there, doing its job, and staying out of the way
a steam build where you never have to know a chain is involved
because you shouldn't have to
the best technology is the technology nobody has to hear about
people ask why not just make a normal game
or just launch a token
both are faster
both are easier
neither is the thing
the thing is this
when i was 7 a world let me in
when i was 13 it was the only place that still felt survivable
somewhere right now there's a kid logging in for the same reason
they will not tell anyone
i'd like the world they log into to be good
and to still be there tomorrow
and for the things they worked for to actually be theirs
that's the whole mission
everything else is implementation detail
my teachers said it was too big
jagex said not on their IP
a hackathon said congratulations and then disappeared
everyone said don't build an MMORPG
still building the MMORPG
still in leeuwarden
still building with the same best friend i've been building with since we were kids
still no token
still not done
still early
and luca
27 years
you've seen me at my worst more than once
the weeks where i wanted to stop, you didn't let me
no sympathy speech either
just told me to keep going and then kept building
everyone needs one person who refuses to accept your worst day as your final answer
i got lucky with mine
to everyone who signed up for the playtest, joined the discord, registered a name, or just said it looked cool on a day where nothing worked
you're part of how this exists
thank you
the world is there
you can walk around in it
most of the core systems are done
what's left is polish and content
which is its own kind of endless
more of it gets built every week
that's the part i want you to see
follow me and
@PlayAlerith if you want to watch an MMORPG get built in public
the good weeks and the broken ones
come help us fill it