“Where one world ends, another begins,” her melodic voice whispered.
The way she talked was beyond me. I’m a hunter, not a shaman.
Her hair was dyed in different shades of black and night blue, with bright white and yellow dots. Each member of her tribe had their hair colored in a very similar fashion.
‘’The Tribe of the River in the Sky’’ got its name from dozens of billions of lights that burned the heavens of this world. Their hair was, to some extent, the picture of the sky at midnight.
And here I was—a stranger lost in this dark valley, listening to this otherworldly, green-eyed goddess’ song about legends and myths.
Dance of the fire painted shadows on her face as she continued her story.
‘’Worlds beyond worlds. Many lives, lived as one. That is your dest…’’ she uttered and fell to the ground.
Blood dripped down her tattooed neck as she tore down her amulet and placed it in my hand.
“Destiny,” she whispered with her dying breath.
Screams. An arrow that grazed my arm.
Warcries in the dark.
I grabbed my spear—made of wood and ancient stones, and engraved with my name.
I stabbed. Roared in anger. Broke my enemies bones, pierced their skulls.
Then an arrow hit me, and the world went black.
"Worlds beyond worlds. Many lives, lived as one. That is…’’ she uttered before I pushed her to the ground.
I threw my spear at the bowman, shattering his chest into a crimson dance of broken ribs. The rest met their fate in the form of my obsidian axe separating them from this world — and their limbs.
I traveled for many moons, slayed countless beasts and enemies — and died more times than I can remember.
All my deaths led to her.
“Destiny,” the green-eyed girl said as she handed me her amulet.
She disappeared in the dark, as I was consumed by light.
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“Left flank! Advance!” someone yelled. Those words had no meaning.
“Are you deaf, private? Move!” a man in strange robes screamed at me, his gaze a sight of pure, determined insanity.
I had a piece of wood in my hands. It was bound with some other, strange material.
It had my name on it.
I felt a sting and fell to the crimson mud.
I remember a previous life.
One of dark woods, hidden valleys, and giant beasts.
A life of hunger, fear, and stone.
It’s nothing like this life — one of mud, flying machines, and barbed wires.
I stopped counting the number of times I fell in this world.
It all seems like a never-ending battle, the same bloody nightmare bound by an invisible border.
The amulet around my neck is now made of metal. “Dog tag,” my brothers-in-arms call it. They all have it, each inscribed with a unique engraving.
I learn something new every day. Who the Germans are. Why are we fighting them. What is a tank. How my stick…
How my rifle works.
I shoot, I die.
My rifle gets a new scratch mark from time to time.
Battle of the Somme was the first time I lasted until the very end.
It was the second time I saw her.
She strolled around the battlefield like an angel from a dream, healing the wounded and comforting the dying.
“Worlds beyond worlds,” she said and touched my dog tag.
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“What… Where… How…” I uttered, confused and locked inside a metal box.
There she was, again, now as a ghostly apparition flickering in front of my eyes.
“Have patience, it will take just a few more seconds for your implant to fully sync,” she said.
Words unknown.
Database synchronization complete.
“Incoming projectile, vector nine-four-six, seven minutes,” the alarm sounded.
“Account for time dilation,” I told my ship.
A galactic civilization fell centuries ago. Thousands of neo-feudal kingdoms rose from its ashes, many still using the technology their forefathers built, some even reverting to coal instead of fusion.
“Is there a mercenary with point-defense cannons… within six light-minutes?”
“Fourteen ships identified,” echoed through the hull of my trading corvette.
“Nice! Transmit a contract then. Up to 700 credits to save my ass, lowest bid wins, as usual. I’ll throw in a class-C fusion reactor if I don’t get a scratch. ”
Minutes after, the battle was over.
“Hey man. Thanks for handling that jerk. Trying to rob me blind this far into The Ascendancy turf… Cocky,” I said to my new friend.
“Sure bro, was glad to help. Where are you heading to?” he replied.
“Ah… Just shipping a bunch of panels and reactors to Yeolara IV. Wanna tag along? 400 credits if I get there in one piece.”
“Sounds like a deal.”
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This time, I wasn’t alone when the worlds shifted. My new friend accompanied me to this realm, a place of no rules.
A place of secrets, sorcery and peril.
My magic staff was dotted with numerous runes and inscribed with my name.
His hammer was chiseled by his.
Both our tools held the powers we gained in our previous lives.
At first, we traveled through the Thaisian Plains, collecting ores and mana gems, sometimes buying them in trading towns that dotted these lands. We used what we gathered and bought—to forge and enchant weapons and armor.
My friend would craft an item; I’d use my powers to imbue it with magical properties.
I remember a previous life.
One of mass drivers, wormholes and neural implants.
There was a story behind each enchanted piece of equipment. Our crafting and enchanting sprees usually happened after we participated in major battles, survived encounters with bandits, or managed to vanquish a demigod all on our own.
We would engrave the stories on the item themselves, to tell about the history behind their making. We used what we needed and sold the rest to wanderers we encountered along the way.
Soon enough, there wasn’t a single soul all the way from the Icaral Mountains to the Netupian sea that did not know our names. A sword we forged with steel and embedded with a soul of a dragon was used by the God-Emperor of Errisia himself.
My friend’s road led him to build a kingdom of his own.
Mine led to her, yet again—this time an actual goddess.
“Where one world ends…” her voice echoed through her hidden temple on the top of the world.
“...another begins,” I continued, and vanished into the light.
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I am one, yet I am many.
I am every man, woman, and child.
I am every building, tank, and unturned stone.
I am the Great Mayan Co-Prosperity Federation, and I shall bring the wrath of my gods to the heathen.
The first time my borders encompassed the world was the first time she appeared in this realm, this time as an advisor I could not control.
This time, I decided to wait. I’ve conquered the planet over and over again, starting with a new nation every time.
After living countless lives as a collective, I’ve finally activated the Gate Project.
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Here I was.
Again.
Listening to this otherworldly, green-eyed goddess’ song about legends and myths.
Dance of the purple-turquoise fire painted shadows on her face as she continued her story.
“Do you understand now, [Player Name]?” she said.
I grabbed my spear engraved with my name and almost countless runes.
Today, I’ll hunt mammoths.
Tomorrow, I’ll get a new spaceship.
Maybe, maybe not.
In case you’d like the explanation for the underlying tech behind this thought experiment, read on.
My (admittedly strange) first-person narrative rests on a single premise.
What if a group of game developers (or a single game development studio) decided to build games of various genres and settings — and used Enjin's platform to allow gamers to progress through multiple games with the same assets or characters?
I could play a sci-fi MMORPG today, a multiplayer RTS tomorrow, a FPS the day after, a single-player RPG the day after that — leveling up a single character all the while.
It doesn’t stop with the character — one could level up various items (the spear-rifle-spaceship-staff is an example of this).
Or only the item.
Or only the character.
Or it could be a character in one game — and an item in another.
Or finishing a quest or a goal in one game unlocks the other.
The possibilities are…
Worlds beyond worlds, really.
My story is just one example of the true power of blockchain technology.
It can fundamentally change the ways games are designed and bring a whole new way of cooperation between game developers.
Games that are otherwise absolutely unrelated by genre or theme could be bound by a single account, or even a shared meta-story.
Besides new ways of cooperation between game developers, it can also lead to some interesting ways players could work together in order to get the items they make to be objectively worth more. One player focusing on enchanting skills and the other focusing on crafting skills is one example of this.
Let me explain what is actually happening here, in terms of the actual code.
The Player is a non-fungible token (NFT) with a single metadata variable: level. Multiple games would render this token differently and interpret its metadata variables differently (obviously, can be more than one variable, but I used “level” for simplicity purposes). The token itself is tradable, meaning that a gamer could sell a high-level character for a more-than-a-decent price.
The Item is also an non-fungible token (NFT) rendered as a spear in one game, as a spaceship in another. It can also be leveled up.
I used the amulet as a plot device, and it has no real relation to the blockchain, but it could be an NFT of its own—say, in case you want to make it so that finishing a quest unlocks the next game, while upgrading the token. Do note that this same tech could be used for a series of games as well, not just for a multiverse (although I find the latter more interesting).
Some other referenced examples are using a smart contract in the sci-fi chapter, where the mercenary gets in-game currency (in the form of a fungible blockchain token) IF he saves the trader from the pirate.
Another example is the enchanter-crafter team using in-game currency to buy raw materials and using them to craft custom minted items of their own, which gain intrinsic value due to their skill-tree focus and attached a “personal touch" in the form of lore.
The main beauty of implementing this technology would be the shared value proposal that the game developers would profit from: play any of our games and progress in all of them.
Enjin already allows for a sort-of a solution to this, as one can easily “melt” all the in-game tokens into ENJ and use them to buy stuff in other games. However, this might not work for some monetization types (pure cosmetics, single player, etc.), and a “multiverse” solution seems like a nifty way to offer players an additional perk — as well as an epic gaming experience.
If you’ve come this far and still have no idea what the heck I’m talking about, or if you’d like to learn more, watch this video.
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