Welcome to Crypto Arcade-ia🕹️ - by Skibles

What if I told you: the harder you gamed, the fatter your APR?

That's the goal of SpartaDEX: Arbitrum's first gamified, decentralized exchange.

Instead of chasing the whims of bribing whales, or scouring Telegram for a day's worth of drained-dry rewards -- soon you can secure your hard-earned yield by deploying troops, upgrading ancient Greco buildings, and smashing some pesky barbarians.

Their first collection of NFTs (5555 in total) sold out in 2.5 hours. The price doubled a day after trading opened (.06 ETH -> .12 ETH)

The project is ambitious, there's real buzz, and we're here to break it all down.

What’s Different?

• Gamified Yield - the yield liquidity providers receive is directly dependent on their progress in the game

• Incentivized Launchpad - the status of new, promising projects on the DEX's launchpad will be determined by the game's highest-ranking players

• Dual Revenue - DEX fees and in-game currency swaps will go back to $SPARTA token holders

• Community-Driven - no seed, pre-, or public sale. The motto is "community-first," with all eyes on a May 2023 TGE

So How Does it Work?

It all starts with the Polis. This is YOUR city, your official entry point, and tracks just how lucrative your in-game progress could be. All you need is $100 -- provide that amount to a SpartaDEX liquidity pool, mint your NFT, and now you have your very own money-making city, an ancient GRECO LLC of sorts. Once your Polis is established, you can begin to gather resources, enhance infrastructure, and conquer territories.

"plebs are needed"

Every Polis starts out equal, but through an assortment of strategies -- like upgrading buildings (Market, Temple, Academy, etc.) or investing in troops (like Acolytes, Cavalry, and Minotaurs!) -- the success of each enterprise begins to diverge.

The overall objective is to continue to improve your Senate standing, your rank within the game. This is what gets you higher returns/better yields. The SpartaDEX Discord is already filled with testnet players sharing their approach for leveling-up as efficiently as possible.

Two most important buildings, the Senate and the Market, link the blockchain realm and the game.

Ultimately, in-game success is measured on the battle field. Keep fending off and conquering barbarians and the more MAP NFTs you earn. More NFTs = more native token ($SPARTA).

Speaking of $SPARTA, players and non-players alike will be eager to assess its utility and distribution.

By single-asset staking your $SPARTA you get real yield: your share of transaction fees, in-game fees, and NFT token claims. Stakers also get to participate in monthly votes on projects they believe should receive higher APR in the form of $SPARTA tokens. These tokens can also be converted into Gems, the non-blockchain currency that allows you to perform all these fancy in-game maneuvers.

The $SPARTA token is anti-inflationary. 1/3 of all transaction fees get burned, and staked $SPARTA is subject to locking terms. Just like $GRAIL, 50% of your holdings get burned if you unstake too early. But unlike $GRAIL, that penalty isn't binary, it decreases linearly over 100 days, until you can pull the full amount.

The current buzz is for the recently released NFTs, the Spartan collection. The ones that immediately sold out (all 5555 of them). Holders now await their upcoming rarity reveal (date still TBD). The utility of this collection is still a bit opaque -- but as of now holders will be airdropped $SPARTA, get early access to new add-ons like multiplayer, and strategic advantages with in-game quests.

Future Hoplite, Spartan, or God

Things to Like:

• Narrative mashup - DEX, Real-Yield, Gamification - the framework is innovative. And though a better version might come from a future fork or concept copycat -- this is an experiment worth watching closely

• Community support - grassroots projects like this have staying power, a lot will depend on how the product delivers, but the project is building attention the old-fashioned way and that could be a boon

• Clean white paper - once you read it, it's clear the team has put a good deal of thought into how to make a game and a token that might truly support each other.

• Historical Precedent -- "Think of it as @DeFiKingdoms, but with a real yield narrative," one influencer said. Sure would be nice, who can forget JEWEL's famous run-up to a billion dollar market cap in early 2022 (not FDV either) . You might also remember that Defi Kingdoms was on Harmony One, not Ethereum.

Unknowns (so far):

• Quality of DEX - there's still a lack of clarity on what pairs will be swappable and at what liquidity. It's no secret, for a DEX to be successful, people need to want trade coins on the platform. If the UI/UX doesn't inspire people to do so, then we can dig another plot in the Arbitrum graveyard (looking at you Oreoswap).

• Sustainable gameplay - is this game worth continuing to return to? The dev team hopes so, but the reception of the gameplay (like any and all) will dictate the

• SAFU - no audit yet, ideally coming soon

• Asymmetric strategy -- are certain players going to exploit game theoretic holes (and quickly)? For example, the "premium account" (details are fuzzy) is an unknown that might asymmetrically advantage certain players, leaving others in the yield dust

Concerns:

• Fickleness of video games - in today's gaming culture, the meta is always shifting. If someone hacks the system too early or 'Bored in Borderlandom' kicks in then watch out.

• Fickleness of crypto - A lot of the latest and greatest crypto incentives are in-place, still, shiny-object syndrome still always looms.

• Gas Fees - Arbitrum is cheap, but there is a reason past gamified blockchain efforts have had to live on alternative L1s. The game itself is semi-insulated from gas creep, but there will still be a frequent chunk of transactions.

• Multiple Failure Points - Whether it's the DEX not delivering, the gameplay failing to inspire, or the launchpad being unable to generate interesting/profitable projects, there's a lot of different ways for the mid-to-long-term success of SpartaDEX to meet serious roadblocks. Let's hope not, but a lot of balls need to be kept in the air, and one drop could be fatal.

Bottom Line

$SPARTA will get some serious attention and potentially exciting price action. Whether or not it can be sustained is a question for another day -- the baby is always easiest to poke (or spear) when it's in the nursery. For now, the $100 liquidity entry seems overly modest compared to the potential gains. There's still opportunities to get whitelisted for the testnet (check here), and that seems, in the grand scheme of crypto.

Who knows, in 6 months time SpartaDEX could be another Web3 ghost-town....or we could find ourselves like this.....

...slaying our way to even fatter APR.

Website: https://spartadex.io/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Spartadex_io

Discord: https://discord.gg/spartadex

Telegram: https://t.me/SpartaDEX

Medium: https://spartadex.medium.com/