Unlocking the Power of Blockchain Game Development
The world of blockchain development has experienced rapid growth in recent years, with its influence extending to various spheres of software development. From decentralized applications (DApps) to decentralized finance (DeFi) software, NFTs, and DAOs, blockchain technology has permeated a wide range of industries, serving numerous use cases. In this article, we’ll delve into the emerging trend of blockchain game development, also known as chain games.
Understanding Blockchain Fundamentals
Before we dive into blockchain game development, it’s essential to grasp the basics of blockchain technology. A blockchain is a chain of linked lists, or unique “blocks,” each linked to the previous block and pointing to its predecessor. This chain of linked lists is, in itself, a list of transactions. The process of agreeing on these blocks is facilitated by a protocol, which enables the network to decide how blocks are added to the chain. This decentralized mechanism has given rise to the decentralized nature of blockchain, with proof of work (PoW), proof of stake (PoS), and proof of authority (PoA) being examples of such mechanisms.
Web3 Game Development: A New Era of Gaming
Web3, in the context of blockchains, refers to decentralized apps that run on the blockchain. These apps allow anyone to participate without monetizing their personal data. With a solid understanding of a programming language supported by any blockchain, we can start writing smart contracts to build game applications as DApps on the blockchain. The blockchain ecosystem is constantly evolving, giving rise to new paradigms like GameFi, which introduces a player-owned economy and enables players to earn cryptocurrencies or assets valuable within the game’s metaverse.
Building Games on the NEAR Blockchain
For this tutorial, we’ll demonstrate how to build games on the NEAR blockchain by creating a sample game project. We’ll explore how to set up the codebase structure and the programming languages needed to write smart contracts that run on the NEAR blockchain. We’ll start by cloning a starter kit codebase, which provides a basic boilerplate for writing more smart contract code as we build the various features of our game.
Creating a Lottery Game on the NEAR Blockchain
Our game will involve a lottery system, where players can participate by generating a random number within a set range of integers. We’ll define the play feature of our game, which will contain the code snippet responsible for generating a random number using the RNG object. We’ll also define the reset function, which enables players to reset the lucky number to a new random number.
Defining Core Game Functions
We’ll create an index.ts file inside the assembly folder, where we’ll define the core functions of our lottery game. We’ll define a pickANum function, which verifies a deposit of 0.5 NEAR tokens before any player can invoke a call to play a game on the smart contract. We’ll also define a function that handles paying a winning player by randomly generating the right number equal to the lucky number.
Building and Deploying Smart Contracts
We’ll build the smart contract using the asb command, which generates a build folder containing a lottery.wasm file inside the build/release/ folder. We can then deploy the smart contract using the near dev-deploy command, which provides us with the contract name or ID, allowing us to interact with it on the frontend or through a shell file.
Testing Our Blockchain Game
We’ve written two unit tests to confirm that our application is functional. These tests create a lottery game and reset the lucky number variable to a new random number. We can run the test suite using the yarn test command.
The Future of Blockchain Gaming
Blockchain-based games can be played as multiplayer games or solo, and can be extended to include a metaverse – a digital world – around the game. Players can team up, create governance, and even create currencies as a means for value exchange. The possibilities are endless, and we’re excited to see what the future holds for blockchain game development.