In the 1997 movie “The Game,” Nicholas Van Orton (played by Michael Douglas), a wealthy investment banker, participates in a game that integrates strangely to his everyday life. As the movie progresses, the lines between real life and the game are blurred. Progressively, Nicholas and the audience are sucked into believing that the game is real.
The movie creates conflict between the things Nicholas thinks can happen in his everyday life and what he experiences. Magicians use the same principle in their tricks; they know magic is not real, but the more refined the act, the more their brains cannot separate reality from fiction. [1]
Lootverse aims to put you in Nicholas’ shoes and is crafted to give you that authentic, real-life feel as you play. You are the protagonist in this fantasy parallel world accessible virtually or in person.
They did not follow the script of today’s metaverse projects. Rather, Lootverse offers all the features expected from metaverses without requiring you to control an avatar within a 3D world, build imaginary digital houses, water a virtual garden, or wear a cumbersome headset. There, the real you interacts with a fantasy world like you would in the real world. [2]
The design of their world is a balance between their goal of achieving a decentralized ecosystem, the state of today’s technology, ease of use, and regulatory compliance. The compromises made in this balancing act are fluid and can change in time as technology and regulations evolve.
A Gated Ecosystem, Carefully Controlled
At a 27,000 ft view, Lootverse borrows and expands on some elements of past innovative businesses and uses their path as a precedent. For example,
[A] The 15-second timer reset in their time-based auctions was inspired by Quibids. Quibids’ business model was attacked between 2010 and 2015 but is now accepted. They studied them, made sure they didn’t repeat the same errors, and then significantly extended it for a novel use case with the Proof of Play protocol.
[B] The Linden Dollar (L$) exchange from Second Life is the framework for Lootizens to sell LTT. On Second Life, users can sell L$ for USD; transfers are made in-world. In Lootverse, Lootizens can soon sell LTT for Credits and may also sell them through third-party gateways for digital currencies. In this process, LTT remains in-world.
[C] Like in a gaming arcade, users can use tickets (LTT) earned while interacting in Lootverse to redeem for scarce in-world items and benefits. They can also redeem LTT for physical and digital items to extract off-world; these cannot be brought back in (NFTs, Collectible Cards, etc.).
[D] In line with the ethos of decentralization, users will soon be able to send LTT to their custody for security purposes (on various chains) and send it back into Lootverse whenever they want to use it.
[E] Lastly, borrowing from theme park designs/branding licensing, they can tie licenses to legal instruments granting rights such as “gateways” in the real world for people to access and continue the Lootversian experience in person (think of decentralized mini theme parks or franchises).
The above required the repurposing of the HABN blockchain to create a gated ecosystem to control how LTT, NFTs, USDC, and other items are extracted from and reintroduced in-world.
Economic Activity
Loot Arena is Lootverse’s central bank and regulates the issuance of its native token, the LTT. Where central banks regulate the supply of units of account based on economic productivity, the LTT issuance is derived from driving value to talented creators. It is akin to the US Dollar being issued from the level of support for a sporting team which in turn pays the players.
Each LTT mined and in circulation has contributed to talent or good causes around the world. On the other hand, LTT are burned when users redeem them for something valuable. Hence, the circulating supply of LTT directly correlates with demand, engagement, and, therefore, economic activity. This rewards free market activity in an autonomous manner.
More importantly, their design opens us to a world of possibilities with NFT-powered attractions such as NFT plots, NFT stories, wearable NFTs, the creation of alter egos, fantasy businesses such as in-world media companies, funds, banks, insurance companies, exchanges, and much more. They can deal with LTT as a unit of account by tapping into Lootverse’s core systems.
In addition, Lootizens may be able to “invest” and receive “dividends” in Lootversian companies within the gated world. They can introduce hardship elements to Lootizens such as losing LTT in the case of catastrophic events or acts of God.
Their ecosystem allows Lootizens to have an alter-ego (as opposed to an avatar) and immerse themselves physically into the parallel world. This ensures that the world can be used as a testing ground for real-world applications of all sorts as users play the game.
The fact that they have sold 40 NFTs to date with an internal economic activity of over $1/2M after a few months in pre-launch, in addition to LTT mined and used, their fantasy fund and the world released (for all types of zoning except type W), and their upcoming Satoshi’s Lounge shopping district soon to be unveiled, makes this a business more than a project.
The God Matrix
When creating a realistic feel to their fantasy world, one of the main ingredients is uncertainty. Life must navigate risk, opportunities, luck, progress, regress, and a suite of emotional reactions. Few of us are interested in living without ups, downs, fun, and excitement.
As Mother Theresa once said: “Life is a game, play it.”
Now they can disclose the final design piece for Lootverse: the God Matrix.
This is a matrix of events that can affect Lootizens in various ways. For example, natural disasters, conflicts, theft, death of their alter ego, good surprises, and much more. As their ecosystem builds out, plot owners may run Lootversian businesses that can protect against these, such as insurance businesses, banks, police, or armed outposts.
Each Lootizen can either be a tourist, plot owner, or renter. Tourists are more susceptible to catastrophic events. For example, if a plot is hit by a tornado, tourists may lose LTT at a higher rate (however, plot owners cannot lose plots). Plot owners can choose a registered address on their plots.
Renters can pay LTT to plot owners for an address and safety from such events. Rent can vary based on whether the plot owner insured it against acts of gods. Various Lootizen traits, such as nobility, can also be implemented in time.
In other embodiments, armies and mercenaries may be formed to attack and loot residents on plots. More, having a place on a beach may be prone to tidal waves. Still, those plots may at the same time be prized as residents may have a higher chance of getting exceptional benefits (such as randomly assigned lowest mining ratios). This can cause rental values in these plots to be more expensive.
Some possible snippets of future news:
“We heard that a tornado just hit plot L0234, no deaths were reported, but the damage is estimated at 560 LTT. We pray that the Lootizens registered there were insured.” — LNN
Or
“In this week’s Lootery, John Alfredo was invited to a pioneer status and a mining ratio of 13:1. They contacted Mr. Alfredo, and he recounted how delighted he was, especially after having lost 150 LTT in last week’s King Kong attack on plot L1223.”
An Unusual Structure
Other than the standard applications (Loot Arena, The Fund, Loot NFT World, Satoshi’s Lounge, X by SL, and LNFTxHABN), all other applications in Lootverse are built by Lootizens who own the relevant licenses to tap into APIs (or webhooks). Selling a license revokes access to those APIs.
The applications they build are authentic and accessible as a webpage or apps (or in-person through a real-world gateway). They may make these to test real-world applications in Lootverse (much like in a business incubator) or specially designed for Lootverse (for example, a real-world business that is extended or repurposed for Lootverse that may lead to some exciting partnerships in the future).
Case in point, they are already seeing demand from their early adopter community for funds, insurance, exchange, media, data analytics, and other exotic Lootversian licenses. Each license is an NFT tagged to a plot (think of it as a business that needs a registered address).
They can do the above because of the way they built their technology, which now has a burgeoning economy with a stable coin (Credits) and a native currency (LTT). Different activities (or events) can be added over time, like in a crowdsourced, real-life version of Sim City, Monopoly, or Decentraland without the artificial immersion. Everything in Lootverse feels real because, at the core, they are (albeit built for a fantasy world).
They hope that one day, Lootizens can wake up, read stories on LNN or Fooxverse, take care of business inside the world, vote in the parliament, improve their plots, manage their business, and deal with opportunities and setbacks, as they do on Earth. By opening up Lootversian portals on Earth linked to their plots, they can also invite others to visit a parallel world in person.
Lootverse can become the first grand-scale parallel world game where everyone can experience crowdsourced human ingenuity and get significant value. Maybe new businesses flourish in this innovations incubator of sorts that are transplanted or bridged for earthly applications. Or maybe, it’s the other way around. Or both.
That’s all, folks. Get your passport today t.me/lootnft
References:-
[1] For those interested, “A Framework For Using Magic to Study the Mind.” https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.01508/full
[2] They are halfway between Fantasy Baseball and Icelandverse. Check out the humorous Icelandverse: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enMwwQy_noI
