Play-to-own Polygon blockchain farming simulation continues comeback with open beta
The Sunflower Land open beta is starting on April 7th. Following DappRadar’s report on the game’s recent revival, news now comes that it’s opening up to an even wider audience as it continues its comeback from near-total extinction.
Summary
- Bots trained to abuse platform’s principle of openness
- Sunflower Land revival continues with open beta to launch on April 7th
- Only 100,000 users can join the open beta
- DappRadar data shows on-chain activity has been uneven for past week
Born in fire
From the ashes, Sunflower Land was born. When its predecessor, Sunflower Farmers, went down in flames under bombardment from malicious attacks and abuse of its smart contracts, the community was forlorn and lost. But as scorched earth allows for new growth, so the charred carcass of this play-to-own farming game has given life to fresh hope.
Perhaps a little melodramatic? I agree. But if you read accounts from Sunflower Land lifers, it’s hard not to feel slightly sentimental for the loss of a game that genuinely meant something to them.
The farming simulation was built on the principles of equality and openness. The game’s developers started their farming careers from scratch, just like everyone else. And thoughts of liquidity pools, speculation, profits and rug pulls didn’t seem to enter the minds of the early adopters.
But the game became a victim of its own success and the vultures began circling once they saw the inherent vulnerabilities in the platform. There was no limit on the number of farms people could set up. So bots were soon starting thousands of them and harvesting assets at an unsustainable rate. Then someone found a flaw in the code that allowed them to create an infinite amount of pickaxes.
In short time, the bottom fell out of the economy and the game was put on pause. This was back in January of this year.
Upcoming beta signals continued revival
Now, the game has relaunched as Sunflower Land and the developers have rethought their philosophy of radical openness. It seems that not everyone can be trusted to behave.
According to the game’s developers and the select group of people currently testing the early-release version, ‘there has not been a single person that has played the beta that hasn’t been blown away’. Now Sunflower Land is ready to go to the next stage by opening up to an even bigger audience. The beta will begin on April 7th and has 100,000 places available for players.
Some things to know:
- The game is currently in its private beta stage with approximately 1,000 players carrying out testing.
- The game is on the Polygon blockchain and it costs 1 MATIC to play. This is equivalent to roughly $1.63 at the time of writing.
- There will be a new focus on token stability and community education. The goal is to create a sustainable ecosystem, not a speculative one.
- You will need to carry out a few steps in preparation for the open beta. So with two days to go until it launches, make sure you give yourself plenty of time to get your wallets, tokens and access sorted.
- The platform is launching its native SFL token on April 15th. Players can earn SFL by crafting items and selling them on secondary NFT marketplaces. They can then keep their SFL or exchange it for fiat currency.
- Sunflower Land’s official roadmap gives an in-depth overview of how this year will look and plans to ensure the game remains community-focussed.
To join the beta, head over the Sunflower Land’s Discord server where the team has clear instructions on how to get started.
DappRadar data shows Sunflower Lands’ bumpy progress
Despite the general mood of positivity and hope around the game, nothing is ever completely smooth. Taking a look at DappRadar’s on-chain analytics for Sunflower Lands, we can see the past 30 days have been slightly volatile.
The spike we can see occurred around the same time that Sunflower Lands announced the game’s ‘first ever treasure hunt’ on Twitter. The first 1,000 people to solve the puzzle would get early access to the game and the chance to mint some farm NFTs. This is a good indicator that the game can still lean on its devoted fanbase for support despite the difficult times they’ve endured.
Sunflower Lands currently sits at number 13 on the DappRadar’s Polygon games rankings and you can keep track of its progress here. Expect a climb up the list as the open beta goes live. You can also keep up to date with the game’s ongoing story by following DappRadar’s blog and Twitter feed. Once the Sunflower Land token SFL launches, you’ll be able to see how it performs by using our Token Explorer, which has loads of information and data to help keep you informed about hundreds of cryptocurrencies.
