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Just curious, is there really a "trading" aspect or is it more for deck-building type games? Trading card games usually have a notion of rarity, collection, an

by GuB-42 2y ago

Just curious, is there really a "trading" aspect or is it more for deck-building type games? Trading card games usually have a notion of rarity, collection, and, well, trading. It is a controversial aspect so I understand that you want to stay away from that as much as possible. But if you embrace this aspect, how would it be implemented?

edye 2y ago
I imagine: Hardware side: custom card frames and boards. Software side: cards with custom images and games.
dllthomas 2y ago
IIUC (and I haven't RTFA but from my recollection of my conversations with Jonah around that same time frame) there is not really a game yet, it's more of a platform, with "trading" intended to be a possible feature of some games.
- jonahss 2y ago
  :wave: Yes, still no game, I spent the last year delivering the crowdfunded devkits.
  - tomrod 2y ago
    This is a fantastic idea, Jonah, and I hope you see it gain widespread adoption! Have you connected with folks like board game geek or other groups that might be a way to shift towards a large platform?
    - jonahss 2y ago
      I've done a little bit of that, but not as much as I should. I took it to a boardgame convention and a GDC event, but not much came from it. If anyone has introductions or advice there, I'd appreciate it.
NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
Yes, all cards will be like this soon. So if you wish to keep your rare baseball card collection, you'll have to continue to pay your subscription price. If you miss a payment, you might be temporarily locked out of the collection, but repeated missed payments risk the collection being deleted entirely.
- r00fus 2y ago
  Great. the DIVX(tm) of collectible cards. I don't foresee a large uptake of this.
- jonahss 2y ago
  I'm hoping to monetize the Shadow Realm
jonahss 2y ago
Hi, Wyldcard creator here, thanks to HowToWare for the interview :) The cards can store data, and I imagine that things which happen to the card during a game leave a lasting impact, which is carried from game to game. The cards grow and change over time, and so when you trade one, you're trading an entire legacy :D
- nerdjon 2y ago
  That sounds more like a legacy style board game than an actual trading card game. Which seems to me like the better implementation of this technology, anything else due to its digital nature just feels like it is going to be exploited making any value disappear completely. I think this would be an amazing idea for a legacy style game, especially since it opens up the possibility of resetting the game and it really simplifies picking up and playing later. But I really don't think it will work as a TCG.
  - jonahss 2y ago
    Ah yeah. TCG is just a quick way to explain it to people so they get what I'm going for. I personally dislike the whole "rarity" aspect of TCGs, though it was fun when I was a kid. Living Card Games like Netrunner are more fun to play IMO. My elevator pitch usually goes something like: MTG meets Yu-gi-oh meets Pokemon (the RPG) meets Tamagotchi.
    - fragmede 2y ago
      No Sabacc?
    - ramses0 2y ago
      Tamagotchi is the best metaphor. Take a look at this old school BBS game "The Pit" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iK69uCBtI18 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iK69uCBtI18 Could you do a janky version of "Street Fighter" where your dude (and assistant/second character) both had permanent stats + inventory + needing to "rest" or "heal over time" to recover after the battle? Same, but it's more of an RPG "character card + inventory card" vs. "opponent character + opponent inventory"? The concept of 1x$100 base, and 4x$15 playing cards seems approachable (vis: MTG booster packs). Definitely look to have some sort of replaceable / lay-in play mat (see the little cards on this toy: https://www.amazon.com/VTech-80-178200-Drill-Learn-Toolbox/dp/B01COSEDKS/ https://www.amazon.com/VTech-80-178200-Drill-Learn-Toolbox/d... ). You could have a "Street Fighter" 2v2 playmat, or "Texas Hold-em" flop/turn/river mat. "Scan the QR Code, bluetooth connect to the base, load the 'game' into the device's memory", and then you're phone-free (forever) to negotiate between the base and the cards. You're "missing" some sort of cover/door on the cards themselves (eg: configure the base station for texas hold'em, and how do you "shuffle" the two player cards w/o revealing their values to others? Actually, what you should do is to put some sort of pin-pattern on the top that can be accessed from the front or the back (eg: four pins "as rivets" on left and right sides, two pins on top/bottom), so you could "load" or "shuffle" the card face up or face down. Face-Up + buttons 1/2/3 => the display changes, you take your action, etc. Face-Down + buttons 1/2/3 => the display changes, but the result is "hidden until revealed". Another useful tool would be to allow some sort of spinners/selectors on the "cards" themselves (vis: el-grande's spinners: https://boardgamegeek.com/image/105293/el-grande https://boardgamegeek.com/image/105293/el-grande ). Being able to have some sort of dumb switches or a rotating selector on the cards themselves that are then "read" by the base station will let people do their thinking and take their turns "in their own hand" is super powerful (eg: let people select punch/kick/block on the cards in their hands vs. having to "dock" the card and only then being able to select punch/kick/block) is super-important to enable a smooth-flowing game instead of a novelty toy. Overall, there's tons of cool options with it!
samatman 2y ago
I'm aware that mentioning this tends to get you crucified on HN, but making something like this fun is a good use for blockchain technology. Blockchains create digital scarcity, and in fact, are the only decentralized way to have digital scarcity. So having the "cards" represent tokens on e.g. Ethereum would be a clever way to do that, I'm sure the processors can provide a secp256k1 signature, and the rest is read-only. I'd suggest not keeping your playing cards on the same wallet as other valuable stuff though. I think some of the deep antipathy which certain commenters on this site exhibit towards the blockchain, is a hangover from the proof of work days. Sure, Bitcoin still uses it, but Ethereum doesn't. So it's decentralized digital scarcity, which is a useful property, at a reasonable environmental price. There's plenty left to criticize about some uses of Ethereum, sure, but this wouldn't be one of those uses.
- itishappy 2y ago
  Why choose this approach over a traditional centralized database?
  - samatman 2y ago
    Because you have to pay to keep a traditional centralized database running, you have to trust the people running it, and when those people don't want to run it anymore, it's gone. With a blockchain, you pay to modify it, so moving stuff around costs cybercoins, but even if no one wants to mint blocks anymore, you can still read your copy, which has your cards in it. And in that event, if you want to move stuff around, you still can, because anyone can set up a validator, even if they're the only one interested in keeping it going. But I think this is reasonably unlikely to happen to any of the top blockchains on a reasonable timeframe. Whereas a game company shutting off its servers is virtually assured.
- spywaregorilla 2y ago
  > decentralized digital scarcity, which is a useful property Complete loss of control over your game's ecosystem is, in fact, not a useful property.

by GuB-42 2y ago

edye 2y ago

I imagine: Hardware side: custom card frames and boards. Software side: cards with custom images and games.

dllthomas 2y ago

IIUC (and I haven't RTFA but from my recollection of my conversations with Jonah around that same time frame) there is not really a game yet, it's more of a platform, with "trading" intended to be a possible feature of some games.

jonahss 2y ago
:wave: Yes, still no game, I spent the last year delivering the crowdfunded devkits.
- tomrod 2y ago
  This is a fantastic idea, Jonah, and I hope you see it gain widespread adoption! Have you connected with folks like board game geek or other groups that might be a way to shift towards a large platform?
  - jonahss 2y ago
    I've done a little bit of that, but not as much as I should. I took it to a boardgame convention and a GDC event, but not much came from it. If anyone has introductions or advice there, I'd appreciate it.

NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago

Yes, all cards will be like this soon. So if you wish to keep your rare baseball card collection, you'll have to continue to pay your subscription price. If you miss a payment, you might be temporarily locked out of the collection, but repeated missed payments risk the collection being deleted entirely.

r00fus 2y ago
Great. the DIVX(tm) of collectible cards. I don't foresee a large uptake of this.
jonahss 2y ago
I'm hoping to monetize the Shadow Realm

jonahss 2y ago

Hi, Wyldcard creator here, thanks to HowToWare for the interview :) The cards can store data, and I imagine that things which happen to the card during a game leave a lasting impact, which is carried from game to game. The cards grow and change over time, and so when you trade one, you're trading an entire legacy :D

nerdjon 2y ago
That sounds more like a legacy style board game than an actual trading card game. Which seems to me like the better implementation of this technology, anything else due to its digital nature just feels like it is going to be exploited making any value disappear completely. I think this would be an amazing idea for a legacy style game, especially since it opens up the possibility of resetting the game and it really simplifies picking up and playing later. But I really don't think it will work as a TCG.
- jonahss 2y ago
  Ah yeah. TCG is just a quick way to explain it to people so they get what I'm going for. I personally dislike the whole "rarity" aspect of TCGs, though it was fun when I was a kid. Living Card Games like Netrunner are more fun to play IMO. My elevator pitch usually goes something like: MTG meets Yu-gi-oh meets Pokemon (the RPG) meets Tamagotchi.
  - fragmede 2y ago
    No Sabacc?
  - ramses0 2y ago
    Tamagotchi is the best metaphor. Take a look at this old school BBS game "The Pit" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iK69uCBtI18 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iK69uCBtI18 Could you do a janky version of "Street Fighter" where your dude (and assistant/second character) both had permanent stats + inventory + needing to "rest" or "heal over time" to recover after the battle? Same, but it's more of an RPG "character card + inventory card" vs. "opponent character + opponent inventory"? The concept of 1x$100 base, and 4x$15 playing cards seems approachable (vis: MTG booster packs). Definitely look to have some sort of replaceable / lay-in play mat (see the little cards on this toy: https://www.amazon.com/VTech-80-178200-Drill-Learn-Toolbox/dp/B01COSEDKS/ https://www.amazon.com/VTech-80-178200-Drill-Learn-Toolbox/d... ). You could have a "Street Fighter" 2v2 playmat, or "Texas Hold-em" flop/turn/river mat. "Scan the QR Code, bluetooth connect to the base, load the 'game' into the device's memory", and then you're phone-free (forever) to negotiate between the base and the cards. You're "missing" some sort of cover/door on the cards themselves (eg: configure the base station for texas hold'em, and how do you "shuffle" the two player cards w/o revealing their values to others? Actually, what you should do is to put some sort of pin-pattern on the top that can be accessed from the front or the back (eg: four pins "as rivets" on left and right sides, two pins on top/bottom), so you could "load" or "shuffle" the card face up or face down. Face-Up + buttons 1/2/3 => the display changes, you take your action, etc. Face-Down + buttons 1/2/3 => the display changes, but the result is "hidden until revealed". Another useful tool would be to allow some sort of spinners/selectors on the "cards" themselves (vis: el-grande's spinners: https://boardgamegeek.com/image/105293/el-grande https://boardgamegeek.com/image/105293/el-grande ). Being able to have some sort of dumb switches or a rotating selector on the cards themselves that are then "read" by the base station will let people do their thinking and take their turns "in their own hand" is super powerful (eg: let people select punch/kick/block on the cards in their hands vs. having to "dock" the card and only then being able to select punch/kick/block) is super-important to enable a smooth-flowing game instead of a novelty toy. Overall, there's tons of cool options with it!

samatman 2y ago

I'm aware that mentioning this tends to get you crucified on HN, but making something like this fun is a good use for blockchain technology. Blockchains create digital scarcity, and in fact, are the only decentralized way to have digital scarcity. So having the "cards" represent tokens on e.g. Ethereum would be a clever way to do that, I'm sure the processors can provide a secp256k1 signature, and the rest is read-only. I'd suggest not keeping your playing cards on the same wallet as other valuable stuff though. I think some of the deep antipathy which certain commenters on this site exhibit towards the blockchain, is a hangover from the proof of work days. Sure, Bitcoin still uses it, but Ethereum doesn't. So it's decentralized digital scarcity, which is a useful property, at a reasonable environmental price. There's plenty left to criticize about some uses of Ethereum, sure, but this wouldn't be one of those uses.

itishappy 2y ago
Why choose this approach over a traditional centralized database?
- samatman 2y ago
  Because you have to pay to keep a traditional centralized database running, you have to trust the people running it, and when those people don't want to run it anymore, it's gone. With a blockchain, you pay to modify it, so moving stuff around costs cybercoins, but even if no one wants to mint blocks anymore, you can still read your copy, which has your cards in it. And in that event, if you want to move stuff around, you still can, because anyone can set up a validator, even if they're the only one interested in keeping it going. But I think this is reasonably unlikely to happen to any of the top blockchains on a reasonable timeframe. Whereas a game company shutting off its servers is virtually assured.
spywaregorilla 2y ago
> decentralized digital scarcity, which is a useful property Complete loss of control over your game's ecosystem is, in fact, not a useful property.