Brothers of Synthetix founder announces new blockchain game

Illuvium will see players traverse an alien world to battle and collect NFT characters called Illuvials

Kieran and Aaron Warwick, the younger brothers of Synthetix founder Kain Warwick, announced on Saturday they were founding a decentralised autonomous organisation (DAO) governed game called Illuvium. It takes the form of an auto battler game built on the Ethereum network and a decentralised non-fungible token (NFT) collection.

The game, which incorporates a number of biodiverse regions that will expand over time, is an open world, narrative driven exploration game. Combining fight mechanics with elements of traditional role-playing games (RPG), players roam the fantasy world battling and capturing Illuvials to form a strategically sound and diverse team.

The Illuvials NFT is the fundamental game asset. Illuvials are deity-like creatures with varying powers that grow and evolve. When defeated in battle, players can collect them in Shards stored on the blockchain, as well as purchasing them from other players on the Exchange.

Illuvium released more details about the gameplay yesterday, which will feature a yield farming program for the native ILV token. Illuvials have different Affinities and Classes which affect how they battle, so once the battle arenas go live, spectators will be able to wager on the outcomes of the matches.

Kain Warwick tweeted over the weekend: “Extremely excited that after years of pressure two of my brothers are launching a crypto NFT game @illuviumio.”

The NFT characters are designed by some of the top artists in the space, and include rare shiny and gold Illuvials, as well as some made with never before seen 4D holographic shading techniques.

The game, which operates with user maintained custody, is integrated with a hyper scalable L2 solution from Immutable-X – the development studio behind hit NFT card game Gods Unchained. Players of Illuvium gain access to sub-second transaction times and zero gas fees for the minting and exchanging of assets. The DeFi (decentralised finance) staking mechanisms also mean that the fees earned within the game can be paid out as ongoing rewards to staked token holders who provide liquidity.

Illuvium is intended as a launchpad for a series of game titles tied to the Illuvials NFT, spanning many genres. With more details yet to be released, the Illuvium token Genesis event will take place towards the end of the first quarter of 2021, with the release of the game itself expected in Q3 this year.