On the first day of the new year, BTC was trading sideways at 46,000, having fallen by 30% from its peak two months ago. The studio has a newly raised $8.5 million on its books, the Final Form prototype is running, and Tyson NFT is in preparation. No one thinks this will be the first year of winter.
365 entries
2022-01
January 2022
31At the end of the holiday, there is no one in the office and the test server is quiet.
Start work. The first round of recruitment after financing: client, art, contract engineer.
The Final Form card value table was changed to the seventh edition, and the planning process continued late into the night.
The Fed minutes were hawkish, BTC fell below 43,000 overnight, and risk assets all fell.
The market is down. The studio held a card balancing meeting as usual, and no one was watching.
BTC lost 42,000. Someone in the group asked, "Is the bear coming?", but no one answered.
weekend. The first batch of LAMOverse battle royale concept drafts are released.
The night watchman posted a screenshot of the 2021 admission on Discord with the text "Stay with me to the end."
Tyson's team's licensing terms have passed another round, and legal officials have announced that they will soon.
Final Form was the first full-process internal match, and it passed but dropped frames.
BTC rebounded back to 44,000, take a breather. The art team started painting pigeons.
Regular engineering meeting: On-chain interaction delays are complained about again, and the old problem has no solution.
Friday review: 31 bugs were fixed this week and 40 were added.
Weekend community voice, hosted by the night watchman, about 40 people attended.
Calm Sunday. Someone promoted local dogs in the group and was kicked out by the management.
Two new artists were hired, and their induction gift was a test deck.
The art style of Tyson Cards has been finalized: a realistic boxing ring and a mixed match.
Final Form server stress test, an alarm will be issued if the concurrency reaches 500.
BTC is swinging around 42,000, and market sentiment has turned negative.
U.S. stocks fell sharply, with BTC falling below 37,000 in a single day.
Panic spread, BTC once fell below 35,000, and the group chatted "buy the dip or run".
The market was slightly stable over the weekend. Night Watchman: If it falls, it falls, and the game does so.
BTC hit 33,000 intraday and then went back to 36,000. It was a rollercoaster day.
The market cannot scare the schedule: Tyson Cards has entered the contract development stage.
The Federal Reserve hinted at raising interest rates in March, tightening liquidity is a foregone conclusion.
Internal discussion: What should I do if the release hits a bear market? Conclusion: Take care of your hair.
Final Form has added a deck saving function, which has been well received in internal testing.
weekend. Ah Zhen worked overtime to reconstruct the matching service and fixed the memory leak.
Registration for the first community competition is open, and the prizes are whitelisted.
End of January: BTC closed at around 38,000, about -17% in a single month. Recruitment continues.
2022-02
February 2022
28February started: BTC 38,500, taking a breather from the decline. The studio is fully staffed at 70%.
LAMOverse project review: first come out with gameplay verification demo.
In the finals of the community competition, the Night Watchmen stopped in the quarterfinals and lost to a high school student.
BTC rebounded to reach 41,000, and the group became lively after a long time.
weekend. The interior of the first batch of finished pictures of Pigeon Cards amazed the audience.
Smooth. Some community members spontaneously created a deck simulator web page.
The Tyson NFT card is named "Mike Tyson's Iron Pigeons". A boxing champion and a racing pigeon were put together in a combination that no one expected, and the meeting room unanimously approved it after laughing. The release window is locked in spring, and the material schedule will be released today.
The contract is subject to internal audit, focusing on casting caps and randomness.
BTC touched 44,500, the high point of this round of rebound.
The U.S. CPI exploded at 7.5%, and the rally came to an abrupt end.
ETHDenver opened, and two engineers watched the agenda remotely.
weekend. The problem of frame dropping in Final Form is located in the particle effects.
The community card guessing activity was launched, and the night watchman won three yuan in a row.
For Valentine's Day, the art team painted a pair of couple skins for the pigeons.
With rumors of easing geopolitical tensions, BTC returned to 44,000.
The first draft of the Iron Pigeon whitelist rules: community contributions are given priority.
Risk assets turned lower, and BTC returned to the 40,000 mark.
Regular meeting on Friday: Three product lines are running in parallel, and manpower is beginning to be tight.
Calm weekend. Ah Zhen confirmed the delay on the intranet posting complaint chain.
Community voice: The gameplay of Iron Pigeon was revealed to the public for the first time, and the response was enthusiastic.
The geopolitical clouds were overwhelming, and BTC fell to 38,000.
Risk aversion is strong, the market is falling, and no one in the office is talking about the market.
Contract audit interim report: Two locations were in moderate danger and were repaired overnight.
Russia and Ukraine go to war. BTC once hit around 34,500, and then pulled back above 38,000 in the evening, which was a shocking day. War, interest rate hikes, and bear markets are stacked together. The industry group is full of grand narratives, and the studio group has only one sentence at the top: follow the schedule.
The market is still in shock, and Iron Pigeon Art is all finalized.
weekend. Ukraine’s acceptance of crypto donations is in the news, and the industry has mixed feelings.
Community night chat: The night watchman said that he had traveled through 5·19, and it was the same this time.
Short squeeze at the end of the month: BTC violently pulled back 43,000 in a single day. February was almost flat.
2022-03
March 2022
31March starts: BTC is around 44,000, short-term excitement. Iron Pigeon enters the release preparation period.
BTC fell back after failing to reach 45,000, and volatility remains high.
The countdown page of Iron Pigeon’s official website is online, and the number of mailbox subscriptions exceeds 1,000.
Sanctions and risk aversion are intertwined, and BTC fell back below 40,000.
weekend. The community second creation competition has begun: draw the iron pigeon in your heart.
The market bottomed out in the 38,000 range. Sixty submissions have been made to Erchuang.
The surge in oil prices dragged down risk assets, and BTC was once at 37,500.
BTC is hovering at 38,500; the whitelist warm-up activity starts today.
Biden signed an executive order on encryption, setting the tone for "responsible innovation", and BTC surged to 42,000.
It fell back after rising high, but is still oscillating below 40,000. The final contract audit was approved.
The first round of internal sealing and testing: the full-link drill of the foundry process was successful.
weekend. The night watchman won the Popularity Award of the Second Creation Competition, and the prize was whitelisted.
Smooth. BTC 38,000, blockchain game sector generally cut in half and then fell.
The LAMOverse Demo is playable for the first time, and the ten-player melee is a mess but fun.
The first round of the whitelist was announced, and Discord had an influx of 2,000 new people.
The Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 25bp, and BTC rose back to 41,000.
The release date is internally locked on April 12th, leaving only an official announcement.
Friday. All members trial-cast the testnet version and fixed three borderline bugs.
weekend. BTC stands firm at 42,000, the long-lost green weekly line.
The community was full of voices asking about the release date, but the host remained tight-lipped.
The server expansion plan has been reviewed and prepared for the release day traffic.
BTC exceeded 43,000, and the market shouted "the bear market is over", but no one took it seriously.
Iron Pigeon officially announces the schedule, and the warm-up begins: a countdown is added to the boxing ring poster.
BTC is approaching 44,000. The release material schedule is posted all over the wall.
Friday stress test: Concurrency is withstood, and payment channels are further optimized.
weekend. Ah Zhen was on duty to monitor the service and conveniently wrote a monitoring script.
BTC reached 46,000, and blockchain gametoken collectively recovered.
BTC hit a high of around 48,000, a new high in two months. Someone in the group shouted "Hui Niu".
Axie's Ronin cross-chain bridge was stolen for $620 million - it was discovered six days after it was hacked. blockchain game security became the focus of the entire industry overnight, and the studio reviewed its own contracts and multi-signature permissions overnight. The night watchman said in the group: blockchain game's wallet is the real health bar.
Review conclusion: authority convergence, cold wallet isolation, false alarm.
End of Q1: BTC closed at 45,500, flat for the quarter. The iron dove is on the string.
2022-04
April 2022
30April starts: BTC is above 45,000, no one dares to joke on April Fool’s Day. 11 days countdown to release.
I worked overtime on weekends and released the first rehearsal, with eight changes to the process sheet.
The second round of the whitelist was announced and the total quota was finalized.
BTC fluctuated around 46,500; the first draft of the media release passed review.
BTC hit a high of 47,000 and then turned around. The macro trend has cooled down again.
The Fed's balance sheet reduction minutes scared the market, and BTC fell back to 44,000.
The second rehearsal of the release, payment, casting, and card opening are all green.
BTC lost 43,000. Release team mentality: Let it go.
weekend. Community countdown activities, night watchmen serve as volunteer administrators.
The official trailer was released and was viewed over 100,000 times in 24 hours.
BTC fell below 40,000, and the market poured ice water on the release day.
Iron pigeon takes off
At 10 a.m., "Mike Tyson's Iron Pigeons" officially goes on sale. Boxing champion authorization, pigeon racing theme, card collection and battle reserved interface - this is the studio's first product that is truly launched to the public, and it is also the answer that has been prepared for more than half a year.
The start was not auspicious: BTC had just fallen below 40,000 the day before, and NFT market transactions shrank by more than half compared with the beginning of the year. At the meeting on the eve of the release, someone proposed an extension, but it was rejected - "In a bear market, you can only test the real demand when you launch something."
The results were better than everyone expected: the whitelist stage was sold out, the public sale was cleared within a few hours, the server withstood the peak, there was no downtime, no casting stampede, and no contract accidents - in the history of NFT sales in 2022, this is already a model. That night, the floor price of the secondary market reached the casting price, and the number of people online on Discord reached a record high. The night watchman has a full hand, saying that this is his "only time in the Bear market".
Author's note: The most important lesson the studio learned this day is not how much money can be sold for on sale, but the patience of players who are willing to queue up for a cyber pigeon, which far exceeds the industry's imagination of the word "bear market". Whether the product works or not is different from the market situation.
The first day of the secondary market: the floor price was stable above the casting price, and transactions were active.
A small amount of metadata showing bugs on the card surface was reissued, and the community praised the transparency.
Friday’s review: Retention during the release week exceeded expectations, and the gameplay schedule is ahead of schedule.
weekend. The holder's exclusive channel is open, and the night watchman shows off a complete set of pigeons.
Easter. The market is light, with BTC around 39,500.
The closed beta version of the card battle gameplay is pushed to whitelist players.
BTC rebounded by 41,500. Iron Pigeon is on the NFT weekly transaction list.
Engineering Association: Players who complain about the wallet process are asked to quit and will be recorded in the demand pool.
BTC failed to rush to 43,000 and fell back to 40,000. Powell was hawkish.
Friday. The number of pigeon owners exceeded 5,000, and the community started an online pigeon racing commentary.
Smooth weekend. Ah Zhen optimized the card opening animation to load, making it one second faster.
BTC dropped 39,500. blockchain game sector transactions continued to shrink.
Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of Twitter was completed, and the timeline exploded.
U.S. stocks fell sharply, and BTC fell below 39,000.
Internal meeting: The focus of Q2 is to retain the gameplay and not chase sales.
BTC seesawed at 39,000. Tyson expressed satisfaction with the release of the data.
Friday. Final Form and Iron Pigeon share a battle engine plan.
End of April: BTC closed below 38,000, about -17% in a single month. Issuing bonuses hedges the market.
2022-05
May 2022
31The start of May: BTC is below 38,000, macro interest rate hike week. The community is still reeling from the post-release excitement.
BTC 38,500 rebound is weak. The second round of the gameplay closed beta begins.
On the eve of the interest rate meeting, the audience held their breath and transactions shrank.
The Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 50bp, Powell ruled out more radical options, and BTC violently pulled back to 40,000.
The sugar from last night is back today: BTC plummeted to 37,000 in a single day.
The market wails. The studio released a trailer for the new card, which didn’t make any splash.
weekend. Strange things happened on the chain: UST loosened its anchor slightly, and the giant whale moved strangely.
UST is struggling around 0.99, the Curve pool is tilting, and Twitter is starting to get noisy.
UST fell to 0.99 and then slid all the way to 0.97. LFG sold its reserves of Bitcoin to protect the market. The selling pressure of billions of dollars scared the whole audience, and BTC broke through 31,000 in a single day. For the first time, someone in the group seriously asked: Is this thing considered a stable currency?
UST hit the intraday low of 0.6, and LUNA cut in half again in one day. The partner studio "Starport Interactive Entertainment" that often comes to online testing - 40% of the treasury is allocated to UST - has been silent in the group for a whole day. BTC once fell below 30,000, and the whole market was in panic.
Luna collapse: industry earthquake
The death spiral comes to an end today. UST fell into the $0.3 range, and LUNA fell from over $80 a week ago to around $1. The mechanism of unlimited issuance to protect the anchor has now become a money-printing and shredding machine. The more it saves, the more it collapses, and its market value evaporates by tens of billions of dollars. Panic swept across the scene: BTC broke through 28,000 intraday, a new low since July last year; various stablecoins were tested in turn; the liquidation line of the lending agreement was broken in succession. The top ten market capitalization projects dropped to zero within a few days, which is the first time in the history of the industry.
The earthquake wave quickly reached the studio door. Star Interactive Entertainment's treasury evaporated along with UST. The five-person team lost its runway overnight, and the online test scheduled for next month was canceled indefinitely. What hurts even more is the players: Iron Pigeon’s daily activity has begun to drop visibly to the naked eye. It’s not that they don’t love it anymore, it’s that their positions are gone. The number of pending orders in the secondary market increased sharply, and the floor price fell back to near the casting price for the first time.
In the community channel, the night watchman changed his signature to "The chain is still producing blocks and the game is still being updated" and turned on the voice chat all night to talk to the people in the quilt. Someone asked him if he would run. He said: People are always running, not projects.
Author's note: The death of algorithmic stablecoins is a lesson to the entire industry with a tuition fee of 40 billion US dollars. What the studio remembers on this day is not fear, but a simple lesson - don't bet your life on a mechanic designed by someone else. This seed will sprout at the end of the year.
LUNA entered a race to zero. The unit price fell to "cents" and the additional issuance was completely out of control. USDT once broke its anchor to 0.95. BTC dipped below 27,000 intraday. The number of people online at Iron Pigeon dropped by 20% in one day. The operations team looked at the retention report again and again, but no one said anything.
The Terra chain was shut down twice, and major exchanges delisted LUNA. The US$40 billion ecology has dropped to zero in a week, and the number of rights defender groups exceeds the official group. The studio held a full-staff meeting: all cash was transferred to Steady Trust, the schedule remained unchanged, the advertising budget was cut in half, and no one was laid off.
weekend. The night watchman chatted with the newlyweds until early in the morning.
The aftershocks are not over yet: BTC saw a tug of war near 30,000, and all NFT transactions were cut in half.
Xingang Interactive Entertainment officially announced the suspension of the project. The announcement only had three words: I'm sorry.
BTC rebounded back above 30,000. Iron Pigeon launches the "Return of Veterans" login reward.
The downturn continues. Internal data: Daily activity is -35% compared to the beginning of the month, which is poor but better than peers.
On the first anniversary of May 19th, the night watchman posted a long message: Last year I was afraid of returning to zero, and this year I am afraid that there will be no one.
Friday. News of layoffs are circulating among industry groups, with studios reiterating that they will not lay off employees.
Calm weekend. The artist quietly finished drawing a batch of new cards that no one was urging.
BTC fluctuated within a narrow range around 30,000, and volatility was rarely low.
Review meeting: Luna’s lesson is written into the first page of the risk control manual – stay away and be safe.
blockchain gameThe financing market was visibly frozen, and two peers terminated their A rounds.
The Final Form combat engine has been merged, and internal combat latency has been halved.
BTC dropped around 29,000. The second community competition will be held as usual.
Friday. Monthly financial report: There are still more than two years left, but the premise is to save money.
weekend. The Night Watch team reached the semi-finals of the community competition, and the team was named "Team Not for Sale".
Smooth. After Ah Zhen finished reading Terra’s post-mortem analysis, his notes were posted all over the intranet.
BTC rebounded by 31,500, rebounding immeasurably and no one was chasing it.
End of May: BTC closed at around 31,500, -16% in a single month; more trust in the industry has evaporated than market value.
2022-06
June 2022
30Start of June: BTC 31,500, the rebound failed halfway. The studio’s focus shifted to gameplay retention.
The public beta of Iron Pigeon battle gameplay is online and the server is stable.
Friday. The data in the first week of public beta is acceptable, and paid conversions are average.
weekend. BTC 29,500, the capacity is exhausted.
In the second phase of the community commentary competition, the audience was 30% less than the previous phase.
BTC counter-drew 31,500. Recruitment freeze order issued: only out but not in.
Smooth. LAMOverse's schedule has been postponed indefinitely, and the main line should be protected first.
Dark clouds in the industry: Many lending platforms are rumored to have tight liquidity.
The Final Form card pool’s third season numerical value seal.
The U.S. CPI hit 8.6% in May, and BTC fell below 30,000.
Panic spread over the weekend, BTC reached 28,500, and copycats were bleeding like rivers.
Late night thunder: Celsius froze all withdrawals, igniting a run panic.
The day after the Celsius thunderstorm, BTC fell 15% in a single day, breaking through 23,000, and ETH fell below 1,200. stETH discounts, serial liquidations, and lending dominoes all fell together. The market was guessing the name of the next one to fall—and they quickly guessed it.
Coinbase announced that it will lay off 18% of its employees, and the wave of layoffs in the industry has officially begun.
The Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 75bp, the most aggressive move since 1994. Three Arrows Capital was rumored to be liquidated.
Three arrows fell: the winter of financing
Three Arrows Capital, which once had a management scale of tens of billions of dollars, was proven to be unable to cope with margin calls from all parties - starting from the losing position on Luna, the leverage collapsed like dominoes. One of the industry's largest crypto hedge funds went from "smart money" to the biggest bad debt on any lending ledger in just one week. BTC is hovering on the edge of 20,000, and no one is talking about buying the bottom anymore.
For the studio, the impact is not on currency prices but on financing: one of the two funds that were still in contact lost contact directly, and the other politely withdrew its investment terms - "waiting for the market to clear up." The finance manager told the truth at the weekly meeting: the US$8.5 million at the end of last year was the last train. From today on, the financing environment has officially entered a frozen period, and you can only save the runway by yourself.
Author's note: In a bull market, money chases projects, and in a bear market, projects chase money; but after the three arrows fell, there was no money left to chase.
BTC fell below the edge of 20,000, and the audience stared at the liquidation map overnight.
BTC reached a minimum of 17,600, falling below the peak of the previous bull market for the first time in history.
It pulled back above 20,000 on Sunday. Night Watchman: After the holiday is over, the cards will be played.
Survivor inventory meeting: Calculation, lending, and leverage funds all exploded, but spot funds did not explode.
BTC 21,000 rebounded weakly. At the lunch, someone half-jokingly talked about "building your own chain."
Smooth. The gameplay weekly activity increased by 5%, relying on the new season.
blockchain game peers have lost two more companies, and Discord has been flooded with "refugee" players.
Friday. Financial rearrangement runway: two and a half years, advertising budget cleared.
weekend. The community held a "Bear Tea Party" on its own, and the night watchman talked about the history of the event.
BTC 21,000, calm.
Sanjian defaulted on a $660 million loan to Voyager, and the aftershocks continued.
Internal technology sharing: Ah Zhen talked about "What is Rollup", and the conference room was full.
When news broke that the court had ordered the liquidation of Sanjian, the leading fund was delisted.
End of the first half: BTC closed at 19,800, Q2 fell 56% to a record. The studio is still alive and has not laid off any employees.
2022-07
July 2022
31July starts: BTC is around 19,000, and the half-year report is all green. Sanjian filed for bankruptcy protection in the United States that day.
weekend. The volume of Iron Pigeon's secondary floor has shrunk, but the number of holders is rising.
Smooth. The night watchman took in three pigeons from the "refugee sale".
On the National Day of the United States, the market was light, BTC was 19,300.
Voyager files for bankruptcy, and depositors’ rights protection timeline floods the screen.
BTC is back above 20,000. Consensus at regular meetings: Cash is king, focus on products.
Final Form novice guidance has been redone, and the churn rate has been reduced by 8%.
BTC 21,500, a rare weekly gain.
weekend. In the finals of the community competition, "Don't Sell the Team" won the championship, and the bonus was changed to peripherals.
Smooth. Ah Zhen reads Arbitrum documentation on weekends, just for fun.
blockchain game sector's single-week capital outflow hit a new high for the year.
BTC fell back by 19,500. The data during the season was stable.
Celsius officially filed for bankruptcy, leaving a $1.2 billion hole on the table.
In the aftermath of the CPI of 9.1%, the market became numb and could no longer fall.
Friday. Internal demo: abstract wallet prototype, playable in two clicks.
weekend. BTC 21,000, volatility dropped to the lowest level of the year.
Community Question Box: When will the new game be released? Official: I'm holding back.
ETH merger expectations fermented, and a single-day surge took the market higher.
BTC exceeded 23,000, a two-month high, and short sellers stampeded.
Tesla sold 75% of its Bitcoins, and the market digested it extremely calmly.
The project will quarrel: Does a chain suitable for games exist? No conclusion.
Friday. Iron Pigeon and Final Form linkage card is online.
The weekend was stable, with BTC in the range of 22,500.
The Night Watch laptop has an Ethereum light node installed, so I said I would practice it in advance.
The interest rate week has started, so we will wait and see.
On the eve of the U.S. stock market earnings week and interest rate hike, BTC struggled at 21,000.
The Fed added another 75bp, all the bad news, and BTC pulled back to 23,000.
The GDP of the United States has been negative for two consecutive years, and "technical recession" has been a hot search topic, but the currency circle has risen instead.
Friday's review: Product data in July stabilized across the board, a good month that has not been seen for a long time.
weekend. The community's numbers returned to pre-Luna levels, and the night watchman set off a firework.
End of July: BTC closed at 23,300, +17%, an incredible month of rebound.
2022-08
August 2022
31Start of August: BTC 23,000, stop after rebounding. The studio has started drawing up a roadmap for the second half of the year.
Pelosi visited Taiwan, took a one-day trip to avoid danger, and everything was fine.
The first version of the draft roadmap: focusing on games, with "infrastructure options" included in the appendix for the first time.
BTC is trading sideways at 23,000. Final Form art asset remaster launched.
Non-farm payrolls exploded, expectations of interest rate hikes were rekindled, and the rally stalled.
weekend. The holders spontaneously organized the "Pigeon Fanciers Club" offline gathering in three cities.
Smooth. Ah Zhen has finished reading the Nitro testnet documentation.
The U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Tornado Cash, marking the first time that open source code is on the sanctions list. Industry fryer: Is code speech or a tool? Each protocol blocks associated addresses overnight. The studio's legal affairs self-examined the compliance exposure, and the conclusion was two words: no involvement.
The aftermath of the sanctions is brewing, and the quality of decentralization is being questioned by the entire industry.
The CPI dropped by 8.5% in July, and the theory of peaking inflation has emerged, with BTC approaching 24,000.
BTC is approaching 25,000, the market is shouting "Bull Return", but the night watchman is unmoved.
Friday. The second season of Iron Pigeon has started, and the login data has recovered.
weekend. The ETH merger is scheduled for mid-September, and the countdown has begun.
BTC hit a high of around 25,000 and then stagnated.
Regular meeting: The goal for the third quarter is set as "stay alive and perfect the gameplay".
Smooth. Recruitment has been frozen for two months, and positions will be filled through internal transfers.
BTC fell back by 23,500. The roadmap appendix "Infrastructure Options" has been highlighted by management.
blockchain game Monthly Report: Industry-wide active wallets have declined for four consecutive months.
The macro trend suddenly changed, and BTC fell by -9% to 21,000 in a single day.
weekend. Falling back to the starting point, the community is quiet, only the battle channel is ringing.
Smooth. Night Watchman's Weekly Diary: On the Nth day of the bear market, the doves are still flying.
BTC 21,000 seesaw. The U.S. dollar index hit a 20-year high.
The first internal debate: Build your own chain, or continue to rely on others?
The second debate: The conclusion is "wait a little longer and settle the score first."
Final Form remastered closed beta: The graphics have received mixed reviews.
Powell and Jackson Hole were hawking for eight minutes, and global assets plunged.
BTC fell below 20,000, and the rebound was completely aborted.
weekend. Community loss is on the rise, and operations are planning reshoring activities overnight.
BTC dropped 19,500. The money-saving mode has been upgraded again: all business trips have been stopped.
Smooth. Ah Zhen handed in an assignment that no one assigned: Rollup selection comparison table.
End of August: BTC closed near 20,000, about -14% in a single month. On the same day, Arbitrum mainnet completed the Nitro upgrade, with increased throughput and lower costs. Ah Zhen forwarded the announcement on the intranet with only four words: The road is this way.
2022-09
September 2022
30September starts: BTC seesaws at the 20,000 mark, and everyone is waiting for consolidation. The reshoring activity is online.
Friday. The results on the first day of reshoring were mediocre, and operations were left scratching their heads.
Smooth weekend. The Night Watch helps newcomers prepare decks until midnight.
BTC 19,800. The number of blockchain gamefinancing projects hit a two-year low.
Smooth. The remastered version of Final Form is getting good reviews, and the graphics are awesome.
BTC plummeted to 18,800, the last scare before the merger.
The market stabilized. The art team started drawing concept art for the winter version.
With one week to go until the merger, the engineering team formed a group to watch the testnet drill.
BTC rebounded by 21,000, and the merger market is warming up.
weekend. The community organizes "Merger Night" to watch and sign up.
Smooth. BTC is 21,600, blockchain gametoken is unable to follow the increase.
The atmosphere was full on the eve of the merger, and ETH stood at 1,700.
In August, CPI exceeded expectations, and BTC dropped by -10% from 22,400 to 20,000 in a single day.
Still in shock, the merger proceeds as usual, with the entire network watching the countdown.
Ethereum merger completed: PoW ended, energy consumption reduced by 99.95%, multi-year project switched overnight with zero accidents. Everyone in the studio watched the work being done, and Ah Zhen sighed: The bottom layer can really be changed, as long as someone is willing to work hard. The price of ETH does not rise but falls - buy expectations and sell facts.
Aftereffects of the merger: ETH fell below 1,500, and the era of miners officially came to an end.
weekend. "Merge Night" review posts were busy, and it was rare for the community to talk about technology.
BTC dropped 19,500. The reshoring activity comes to an end, with net reshoring +3%.
As the week of interest rate hikes begins, global risk assets hold their interest rates.
Smooth. The gameplay team is promoting the second phase of wallet-less login.
The Fed has three consecutive 75bps, the dot plot is scary, BTC is 18,600.
After the fall, you will get numb: BTC fluctuated within a narrow range of 19,000.
Friday. The pound collapsed, and the global macroeconomic environment was even more stimulating.
weekend. Night Watchman's Weekly Diary: The market situation seems to be numb, so please read the update log instead.
Smooth. Winter version project approved: internal codename "Fire".
The British pound hit a record low, the U.S. dollar crushed everything, and BTC actually stalled.
The counter-draw of 20,000 BTC failed. The third session of the debate: The accounts have been settled, and there is still a fuse left.
The Bank of England made emergency bond purchases, and global assets rebounded for a day.
Smooth. Iron Pigeon appears on the cover of blockchain game Weekly: A sample of bear market survivors.
End of Q3: BTC closed at 19,400, sideways in the quarter. It cannot fall, nor can it rise.
2022-10
October 2022
31Start of October: BTC 19,300, volatility dropped to freezing point. Studio moves forward with "Hearthfire" version.
Smooth weekend. No one is playing the community price guessing game anymore, so guess new cards instead.
Smooth. A Zhen’s model selection comparison table has been updated to the fourth edition.
BTC rebounded back above 20,000, and global stock markets took a breather.
Smooth. Abstract Wallet Phase 2 Internal Test: 37 seconds from registration to entry into the game.
BTC 20,000 seesaw. Conference season is here, and invitations are half as thin as last year.
Friday. The BNB chain was hacked for US$570 million, and something happened to the cross-chain bridge.
weekend. The security team reviewed the cross-chain dependencies and concluded: Don’t touch them if you can.
Smooth. The night watchman pulled out the 2021 admission screenshots and lamented that one year feels like ten years.
Smooth. The art of the "Hearthfire" version has passed review.
BTC 19,000. blockchain game sector continues to be ignored.
Smooth. The opening of the internal hackathon, the theme: Let players forget their wallets.
In September, the CPI exploded again, with 18,300 BTC pins and then violently withdrawing 19,500.
Friday. Hackathon Champion: Experience the demo without gas, and everyone stood up.
weekend. BTC 19,000 remains motionless, known as the "ECG market".
Smooth. The third community competition opens, and registration picks up.
Regular meeting: Hackathon results are merged into the main line, and the wallet image becomes standard.
Smooth. BTC 19,500, the rebound in US stocks cannot move the currency.
Management closed-door meeting: infrastructure options moved from appendix to main text.
Smooth. Financial calculation: The first version of the self-built chain cost table is released.
Friday. BTC 19,000. The Night Watch team failed to defend the title and lost to the "Refugee United".
Smooth weekend. Ah Zhen popularizes the difference between L2 and L3 in the group.
Smooth. The winter version of "Hearthfire" enters QA week.
BTC 19,300. Three more companies have been added to the list of industry layoffs.
BTC volume exceeded 20,000, a two-week high.
BTC surged past 20,800, a long-lost strength, and the market smelled of a reversal.
Musk completed the acquisition of Twitter, and the topic of "web3 social" returned to the spotlight.
Friday. The gameplay weekly activity hit a new post-launch high, thanks to the community competition.
weekend. BTC remains stable at 20,800. The pigeon fanciers will gather offline for the second time.
Smooth. The management has announced that it will hold a strategy meeting next month and the topics will be kept confidential.
End of October: BTC closed at 20,500, +6% in a single month, a rare red month in the year. It was unnervingly calm.
2022-11
November 2022
30November begins: BTC 20,500 stabilizes, and the market is dreaming of "year-end trends." The strategy meeting is scheduled for the end of the month.
CoinDesk exposed Alameda’s balance sheet: $14.6 billion in assets are filled with self-issued FTTs. The article only has a few hundred words, like throwing an unlit match into an oil depot. The market is dubious and FTT is not moving at all.
Smooth. The "Hearthfire" version is scheduled to be released in early December.
Friday. BTC 21,000. Industry groups are reposting that balance sheet article.
weekend. There was a big quarrel between FTT bulls and bears, and no one in the studio took it seriously.
Binance announced that it will liquidate all FTT holdings for the reason of "risk control". FTT dived in response and the run began. The two giants exchanged blows from a distance, and the entire industry moved up to watch - no one thought that what they were watching was actually their own house on fire.
FTX withdrawals are visibly slowing down, but officials say everything is normal. BTC lost 21,000.
In the morning, FTX stopped withdrawing money; in the afternoon, there was a shocking reversal: Binance signed a letter of intent to acquire FTX. FTT fell from US$22 to below US$5 in two days, and BTC fell below 19,000. Financial self-examination overnight: The studio has no deposits in FTX, but the settlement payment from a channel partner is pending there.
The night of trust collapse
After only one day, the rescue script was torn apart. Binance announced that it would abandon the acquisition after completing preliminary due diligence, saying "the problem is beyond our control and rescue capabilities", leaving FTX alone in the spotlight. The figures that subsequently leaked out stifled the entire industry: the gap in customer funds was as high as US$8 billion—users’ money did not lie on the exchange, but flowed to related trading companies. Withdrawal channels were dead, and the assets of millions of users turned into bankrupt claims overnight.
The market voted in the most direct way: BTC fell below 16,000 overnight, hitting a two-year low; altcoins flashed across the board; the panic index was nailed to "extreme fear." This is not a Luna-style mechanism failure, but a failure of trust itself - the second largest exchange in the industry and the "most compliant and reliable" in the eyes of countless institutions has crushed the word custody to pieces.
It was a particularly dark night for the blockchain game track. The FTX system has been one of the most active investors and market-making ecosystems in blockchain game in the past two years. The treasury of many studios and the market stocks of many projects were staked in it, and they were cleared overnight. A colleague posted in the group: "Our game does not die because of the product, but because of the exchange."
The lights in the studio's conference room are on until late at night. The finance department checked the exposure of each exchange three times: the main treasury was fine, but the channel settlement payment was most likely in vain, and there was a red pen circle on the cash flow statement. The management did not sugarcoat the all-hands meeting: "There is enough runway, but every dollar spent should be treated as two dollars." Someone asked whether the game is still being made, and the answer was: yes, and it must be more ruthless - the industry is so bad that people who work seriously have no rivals.
In the community, the night watchman put the self-hosting tutorial at the top of the list, and it was retweeted thousands of times overnight.
Author's note: Luna's failure is the algorithm, FTX's failure is the people's hearts. Algorithms can be rewritten, and the rebuilding of human hearts takes years.
FTX admitted the gap and sought $9 billion in life-saving money, but no one took the offer. The infection list is on the screen in the group: BlockFi, Genesis, Grayscale... everyone is at risk. BTC rebounded back to 17,500, rebounding like a flashback.
FTX and more than 130 related entities filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and the founder resigned as CEO. From the design of the industry savior to the bankruptcy documents, it only took ten days. That night, hundreds of millions of dollars were "mysteriously transferred out" of the FTX wallet. blockchain gameThe largest capital and market-making ecosystem on the track has been cleared.
weekend. The panic continues, and the number of online communities hits a new high - people with nowhere to go gather together.
The night watchman had a voice chat for six hours, with only one theme: put the currency on the exchange.
Inventory result: The channel settlement amount was a total loss of six-digit US dollars. Management is silent.
BTC dropped 16,800. The studio freezes all non-essential expenses.
Genesis suspended withdrawals, and the chain of infection reached the doorstep of Grayscale.
Smooth. "Hearthfire" continues QA as usual and can't stop playing games.
Friday. Trust in the industry has dropped to freezing point, and blockchain game financing has completely returned to zero.
weekend. Night Watchman Weekly Diary: For the first time, I am glad that I only stock up on game cards.
Smooth. Financial recalculation runway: There are still 20 months to go, and the rate of money burning is again slowing down.
BTC fell below 16,000, setting a new low for the year near 15,500. The market is devastated.
Smooth. The strategic meeting topic was exposed in advance, and there was only one word: "chain".
Strategy preparatory meeting: Make a list of demands from two years of grievances.
thanksgiving. Silicon Valley is on holiday, and the studio meetings continue.
The list converged into one sentence: The chain we want does not exist on the market.
weekend. Ah Zhen was called to speak to the management about Rollup for three hours.
Smooth. BTC 16,500. The strategy meeting will be held tomorrow, and everyone is vaguely aware of it.
Project establishment: Build a chain yourself
The strategy meeting lasted all day. On the left side of the whiteboard is a list: free gas fees on the player side, non-aware wallets, massive small-amount high-frequency transactions, larger contract sizes, and an economic model friendly to game studios - every grievance that has been tortured by the existing public chains in the past two years has become a line of demand. On the right side of the whiteboard are chains with recognizable names on the market. Compare them one by one and cross them one by one. Ethereum is too expensive, general L2 does not make way for games, and game chains are either so centralized that they are not worthy of their name, or their ecology is deserted. None of them passed.
In the evening, the conclusion was written in the center of the whiteboard: If you can't find a chain optimized for the game, then build one yourself.
Three resolutions: 1. Establish a project to build a self-made game chain, only pre-research, no official announcement, and the code name will be determined later; 2. Set up a chain-side pre-research team, led by Ah Zhen, who will be transferred from the Final Form back-end - the engineer who has been complaining about the chain for two years will finally solve his own work orders; 3. Prioritize contact with Offchain Labs, Arbitrum technology stack is listed as the preferred evaluation target, and Nitro's upgraded performance is the best in the book.
When the meeting ended, someone reminded: BlockFi also filed for bankruptcy today. The conference room was quiet for a few seconds, and then someone answered: The industry is burying the old era, and we are drawing new drawings, without conflict.
Author's note: From this day on, the proposition of this studio has quietly changed - it is no longer "making a good game", but "making a console for all games". The cold winter cannot give them a bull market, but it gives them something that will never be available in a bull market: time to think things through quietly.
The day after the project was established: the pre-research team formed an army of three, led by Ah Zhen.
End of November: BTC closed at 17,100, -16% in a single month. The studio seems to have just started working.
2022-12
December 2022
31December starts: BTC stabilizes at 17,000, FTX aftershocks turn to slow burn. Pre-study group retreat.
Friday. Preliminary selection: self-built L1 is out, too expensive and too slow.
weekend. Ah Zhen ran through the first Nitro local test node.
Smooth. There are three candidates left: Arbitrum series, OP series, and Cosmos series.
Send your first contact email to Offchain Labs.
The "Hearthfire" version was launched and received positive reviews from players. No one knew that the ultimate move was being prepared behind the scenes.
Offchain Labs wrote back and arranged a video meeting. There was a small cheer in the office.
Smooth. BTC 17,200. The pre-research notes are written on page 40.
Friday. Stress test comparison: Nitro stack cost and throughput leading candidate.
weekend. The night watchman asked the official what he was holding back, and the operator responded with a dove expression.
Smooth. Pre-meeting rehearsal: List of requirements condensed into one page.
First video meeting with Offchain Labs. After listening to the list of "sensorless wallet, gas-free, and massive small-amount transactions", the engineer on the other side said: This is exactly the usage we want to see. The two-hour meeting turned into three hours. When the meeting ended, no one mentioned the contract, but everyone knew that the matter was half done.
CPI fell back, and BTC fell back after hitting 18,000. No one was distracted, everyone was writing notes.
The Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 50bp, bringing the total to 425bp during the year.
Internal setting of the selection: leaning toward the Arbitrum technology stack, pending in-depth verification.
Friday. BTC lost 17,000. The pre-research team was expanded to five people.
weekend. Ah Zhen deployed the first game contract sample on the test network.
Smooth. On the night of the World Cup final, the community channels were all about football.
Second call with Offchain Labs: chat about orderer customization and fee model.
The Bank of Japan unexpectedly turned around, and global assets trembled three times, with 16,700 BTC.
Smooth. The internal code name collection for the chain project was held, and the ballot box was full.
Year-end review meeting: Survived, made pigeons, established projects, passed.
Friday. Half of my colleagues are on vacation, and all members of the pre-research team are on duty.
Christmas Eve. The night watchman launched a "Bear Market Watch" in the community.
Christmas. BTC is 16,800, and the test network will produce blocks as usual, even on holidays.
Smooth. The first draft of Ah Zhen’s preliminary research report is completed, and the conclusion points to Nitro.
The management has identified three things for next year: chain, final form, and community.
Smooth. BTC 16,600, the year ended with light trading.
The final draft of the pre-research report is archived, with the title line: "Building a Game Console".
Friday. The annual meeting was canceled and the dinner party was changed, and the money saved was used to buy a server.
Year-end: the deepest part of winter
Let’s first look at the industry’s annual bills: BTC fell from around 47,000 at the beginning of the year to around 16,500, about -64% for the whole year; ETH fell even more severely; NFT transactions shrank by 90% from the peak. The death list can be lined up in a column - Luna, Three Arrows, Celsius, Voyager, FTX, BlockFi - every name was still "too big to fail" at the beginning of the year. This was not a single collapse, but a series of collapses throughout the year.
Let’s look at the studio’s performance: “Mike Tyson’s Iron Pigeons” was released, the first out-of-circle product that sold out in the bear market; it survived three earthquakes without laying off anyone; the money on its books was burning, and the runway was being squeezed one after another, with only twenty months left; a channel fund was buried in FTX. But there is one more thing beyond the balance sheet - a more than 40-page pre-research report, two calls with Offchain Labs, a selection conclusion that favors the Arbitrum technology stack, and a chain-side team of five people.
The night watchman said in the New Year's Eve message: The biggest gain this year is knowing who is swimming naked and who is holding their breath while working.
Author's note: This year, the studio's ambition has completed a quiet upgrade - from "making games" to "making game consoles". In the depths of winter, no one is applauding or watching, so we are just immersed in making things. The chain doesn't have a name yet, but the drawings are already being laid out.
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