Thanks! A lot of work went into it over several weeks; and I still had to make lots of revisions due to feedback from several people that I shared the online draft with.
That’s a valid concern, and one that I keep hearing off and on. Let me explain why I am hesitant to do it that way.
1- The project would be reliant on a third-party to continue funding it.
In the 40+ years that I have been doing it, regardless of the team or project, it tends not to end well. Projects tend to fail, get canceled etc. for various reasons - most of them relate to funding.
As I have mentioned to others who also brought up this point, trust issues aside, I’m not in the least bit inclined to keep coming to the Ape Foundation for funding tranches - even if the payments were contractually mandated and not subject to additional voting ala ThankApe. I simply won’t do that because it’s far too risky for the project and the team. Plus, I’ve heard far too many stories about this salient point with other proposal authors who have had to run that gauntlet.
If I were ever going to entertain such a plan, it would have to be via an escrow setup whereby the full funding is deployed to an escrow team, and they are required to disburse the funds based on specific milestone deliverables. We do this in game dev as well when there are trust and/or similar issues that prevent parties from agreeing on terms.
2- The structure of the project and the fact that it has multiple pieces all of which have to be done in parallel, means that I have to carefully structure the payments to specific milestones. And that’s a challenged in an of itself. Let me give you an example which, as an entrepreneur yourself, you are sure to understand.
So, it’s a $5M, 12-14 month project that we want to split it into milestones. First, we have to take a top-down look at the span of the project. Below is a copy/paste of the scope.
SCOPE
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Create ApeCoin Community Engagement (ACE), a unified community engagement platform.
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It will be an ApeCoin DAO community project managed and led by a Project Director, and consisting of several people, including a Project Manager, recruited from within the DAO community based on their skillset, experience and availability. -
The ACE team will create a multiplayer online world, ApeCoin Online Worlds (AOW), using a pre-existing licensed engine designed specifically for this type of environment.
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The AOW platform will also use a licensed pre-existing DePIN tech platform which uses a node-based approach responsible for the integrity, security and interoperable nature of the AOW platform. -
The ACE team will create a unified identity system, ApeID, for use on AOW as well as across all dApps deployed on the platform and on ApeChain.
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External communities will be invited to implement support for ApeID with rewards for participation.
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External partner programs such as Animoca via their MocaID initiative, will be invited to participate in the ACE platform integration.
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The ACE team will also deploy a fair launch Engage-To-Earn (E2E), utility token for use on the platform as rewards for engaging in various activities.
NOTE: There are 4 parts to the project - and they all have some level of dependency. Which is specifically why everything has to be done in parallel - like you would any software project.
So, lets break those down into components. Without going into too much detail, I will use other projects as a reference so that it’s easier for people to understand.
ACE PLATFORM
This is a web destination that hosts everything about the project. This includes a web frontend/backend, data/docs, art, videos etc - everything about the entire project, including the teams, scope etc.
Ref from online world platforms:
Sandbox, Entropia Universe, Second Life
Ref from recently passed AIP:
AIP-434: Other Page: A Player Network & Rewards Hub for ApeChain —> https://other.page/
AIP-433: Ape Express - Next Gen degen tools for building instantly on ApeChain —> N/A
AIP-209: Ape Accelerator powered by ApeCoin —> https://forj.network/
APEID
This is full-blown identity system which also has to be supported by the ACE platform. Far too many references to cite, so lets pick one closer to us: MocaID
APECOIN ONLINE WORLDS
Though this will use an off-the-shelf game engine stack, most of the work is in the content creation because at the start it won’t have any content. No 2D, no 3D, no audio, no scripts - nothing. It’s basically a blank canvas not unlike the game editors in Unity or UE5 - except, unlike those which need to be extended via plugins to do various things, this engine already has everything built in.
What that means is that an entire level has to be created along with all its assets. This requires design and planning. Then a list of all the assets which will be used has to be made - and then they have to be created.
I invite you to read this tech thread from my [failed] AIP-316 to have an idea of what is involved here.
All of the above has to be done in parallel. Even with the use of third-party teams to start with, all involved have to be paid - regularly.
And the reason for all this work is because we’re not re-skinning an entire game. Imagine you take any game, then remove all the content leaving only the empty map level. That’s our start point.
If we were actually using the Alganon game from my AIP-316, and just re-skinning it like I originally planned last year, that’s a $2M expense all by itself. But that ship has long since sailed due to other commitments that I have made for that project - and which would be too costly and risky to exit at this point. In fact, it would basically cost me over $1M to do that.
TOKEN + EVERYTHING ELSE
Everything else is standard fare. Doing tokenomics, launching a token, building a rewards system etc. isn’t rocket science. You just need people who know what they’re doing.
If I were to break all that down into milestones and deliverables payments, not only would each [milestone] chunk need to be a minimum of around $1.5M, but the milestones themselves would end up being contentious, leading to a payment not being approved.
Which brings us to this: How much can we get done for $1.5M and in what time frame? And to answer that honestly and without the usual dev speak nonsense, I would say, we’d likely have the ACE web platform and ApeID done, maybe some parts of a level - and not much else. Why? Because there is no way we’re going to be able to take a 4-prong parallel approach and get anything tangible done with $1.5M - and in short amount of time. And what’s the remedy? We would have to extend the time to market. And time is one commodity that we don’t have.
So, for there to be any meaningful progress in which we can have ACE + AOW + APEID up and running inside of 6-9 months, with a 12-14 month span for full rollout, we either need all the money up front or at least 50% of it. And in the case of the latter, we then have to deal with the associated challenges and risks that come with doing it that way.
Can it be done? Under normal circumstances and with ample time - of course. Split the project into 4 x 6-month chunks, each with a $1.25M milestone and hope that each milestone deliverable gets done as per the contract and according to the timeline. Anything short of that, and the project is dead. No question about it.
No, I have not considered other tech stacks - and I don’t intend to. In my experience, it always looks great on paper - until it doesn’t. I am familiar with my tech stack and my ability to use it. If I were going to be looking at other tech stacks, it certainly wouldn’t be this when we can just as easily go use UE5 + plugins to achieve even better results than anything built on/with Godot.
Plus, the last time that I looked at that particular engine, it wasn’t even 1/10th of what’s in the AGE tech stack. And it’s not production ready.
To be clear, I am not discouraging anyone from writing a proposal that mirrors mine and which uses some other tech. As I mentioned above, I am fully aware that this proposal is likely to fail at vote. And if/when it does, since this is a public proposal, anyone is welcome to put up a proposal to go build everything in my proposal if they so choose - and with whatever engine they like. Competition is always great.
That’s the unknown with any project. This is no different.
That’s what rewards are for. And they’re documented in my proposal.
There’s nothing typical about that - as evidenced by the rapidly declining token value.
ACE platform rewards will be tied to the platform token. And $APE is just the cryptocurrency of choice for revenue funnel within the platform and AOW.
While some may think that a game token adds friction when we can just as well use $APE, I invite those people to go back and study the history of MMO games and their economics. Or better yet, any of the leading Web3 games out right now.
That’s the entire point and scope of this project.
It will be powered by $APE - but I don’t envision it as being the rewards funnel. That aspect can obviously be revisited when the tokenomics + economics of the platform are being designed and discussed.
I believe that I already addressed this over here. I have copy and pasted it below in case it got lost in the volume of data that comprises this proposal.
WHY DO WE NEED ANOTHER TOKEN INSTEAD OF $APE?
We are building an engagement platform that is tied to rewards created to incentivize said engagement.
Using $APE, aside from the fact that we’d then require a liquidity pool of $APE set aside to fund such rewards, defeats the purpose. Also, it not only creates various regulatory problems, but will also completely wreck the economics in AOW which has to ultimately be tied to a new tokenomics model that complements its economics model.
The AOW token (name TBD) isn’t for governance because we’re not getting involved in that particular minefield. And we’re not going to use it as a [primary] funnel for funding.
The token is specifically for utility that is tied to the AOW platform. It’s final tokenomics model will be designed by third-party experts who are better experienced to do it in a manner that sustains the AOW platform.
NOTE: If you wonder why Pirate Nation is currently making over $70K per day, go take a look at the game and their tokenomics model. There’s your answer. Oh, and there’s this too.
ApeID is the core of the vision that I had for this project. If it wasn’t, I would have made it a separate proposal. Saying that it shouldn’t be part of this proposal is like saying that the user account system in AOW should be a separate AIP.
Yup, I gathered that. 
- The cost is $5M; that’s relatively cheap considering that there are no costs for the use of my tech stack over a period of 2 years
- The tech risk/cost is a part of every project, and this one is no different. Trying to make it cost less doesn’t reduce the risk. And it certainly is no guarantee of success or PMF
- ACE is the platform. AOW is the playground - and it will be powered by $APE / ApeChain
I am always open to suggestions and willing to consider any/all contingencies.