This Meltlebrot chats with Nick from Kepithor Studios, founder and developer behind the Enjin powered blockchain cross-platform game, Kingdom Karnage. It’s described as a turn-based, animated combat game where you choose your deck, conquer faction campaigns, explore dungeons for NFT rewards, and revel in the glory of PvP. Kingdom Karnage has been creating NFT since 2018 letting you use them as playable items ingame on both PC & mobile. Let’s hear more from this Enjin Early Adopter!
Hi Nick, can you tell us what Kingdom Karnage is about?
Kingdom Karnage (KK) is a cross-platform virtual Trading Card Game developed by indie game studio Kepithor Studios. The game is available today and can be played from both PC and Android devices.
The Kingdom Karnage ethos has always been to make a fun game that you want to play continuously for years and can actually profit whilst playing. KK’s growing player base and consistently top 3 player to player sales on Jumpnet suggests we’re currently achieving that goal.
All assets in the game can be withdrawn as tokenised FTs/NFTs and are infused with Enjin Cryptocurrency. We’re now on Enjin Jumpnet which means there are no gas costs at all when depositing/withdrawing/selling any of our assets.
How did you get into gaming?
I’m fortunate to have been gaming since I was a young child in the 80’s, my mother dabbled in coding in those early computer years so we had a computer at home. I’ve been an avid gamer for over 30 years, from games like Chuckie Egg to Dune, Command & Conquer to the modern MMOs.
I was frustrated by the closed economies of current games, who actively punished players for trading the assets they acquired. Additionally, rather than driving players to black markets where they can be easily scammed, endorsing crypto gaming is a far more positive way to handle such an economy. Enjin’s game driven NFT development was a no brainer in providing players with a safer, more fun, and lucrative way to game.
Why did you settle with Enjin as your nft gaming platform?
When I first looked into Enjin I liked how the focus was on mainstreaming NFT gaming for everyone, not just the usual dapp experience. We all want this space to grow, and for mass adoption to come. I believe Enjin is more focused on that than other platforms.
Play to earn is a big thing with blockchain gaming these days, do you agree with it? Why?
Play to earn has been around for a long time, just unofficially with players making a profit behind the game companies backs. Official play and earn is a sensible path. Even advertising gave way to cashback scenarios, why shouldn’t gaming do the equivalent. I think ‘play to earn’ is great for players who are not as wealthy as others, and helps games grow bigger communities for the paying players to play against. It does however create complications for economies and anti-cheat methods, but anything worth having doesn’t come easy.
Actually earning by playing has received some heat for some games of late, can you give readers one clear example of how a player can earn real rewards in Kingdom Karnage?
This is something we hear a lot in our Telegram & Discord, players are often surprised that they can literally start in Kingdom Karnage with nothing and earn relatively quickly, without the initial investment required in other big blockchain games. You can register and play the campaign to get a starter deck which is bound to your account. Shortly after that start playing PvP and Dungeons to get NFTs you can trade on the Enjin Marketplace. Within just a few hours you could get your first sale.
Sitting at 88,000 & 567 types. What’s the drive to have created so many NFT?
The drive is more to create a fun game you want to keep coming back to. The NFTs are a bonus that empower the true ownership giving players the means to trade game assets officially without persecution from game companies and through legitimate marketplaces which protect both the buyers and sellers.
Having started your game back in 2018 through the Enjin Early Adopter Program, looking back how has that helped get your game to be blockchain ready today?
Having Early Access provided more learning time to test the waters with NFTs and FTs to see which ideas work and which need improvement. Even now new ideas are being tested to see what new fun things we can do with NFTs.
Enjin Jumpnet has really sparked its gaming ecosystem of late with quick and free transfer of NFT. Not all games have moved across yet, how are you situated with being Jumpnet ready?
I knew Jumpnet was going to be great for the players so I dived in fast and was one of the first games to switch to Jumpnet. Everything from Mainnet was moved to Jumpnet back in May, we’ve been on Jumpnet for over 5 months already!
Right now you can withdraw NFTs from Kingdom Karnage to your Enjin Wallet on Jumpnet and trade on the marketplace, use those funds to buy characters/equipment you want and play with them in game.
Jumpnet has been a very positive experience for most who have used it, with people in complete shock at how fast it runs compared to mainnet and with 0 gas fees it blows their minds.
Being in the space for years now, what’s the pitfalls and what’s the loot?
Ethereum is the first thing that springs to mind. Gas fees are ludicrous for mainstream gaming, doesn’t hurt the wealthy trading $1,000+ NFTs but for the average person trading NFTs worth $1-$10 gas is a problem. Yet another reason for loving Enjin and Jumpnet.
The other major pitfall is most definitely greed. As soon as real money is involved there’s a small percentage of people that will try to take advantage in any way they can which can be detrimental to legit players.
The loot..
Empowering people, being able to play a game for a few years, then sell what you bought/earned so that you can invest into the next game. When gamers have been doing this for 5-10 years instead of throwing money at games where they literally don’t own their assets, they’ll wake up 1 day and realise they have an actual Portfolio, 5-10 years from now gamers will be using their NFT portfolios as collateral to buy houses, whilst their non-gaming friends will be jealous.
Whatever levels the playing field is great! Which NFT is your favourite? Why?
Crimson Paladin – I created dynamic NFTs where the power, level & card rarity of the character (nft) increases as its true rarity increases. To explain, there will only ever be 1000 Crimson Paladins, so as the number of Kingdom Karnage players increases, the Crimson Paladin becomes rarer, not some hypothetical rarity pulled out of some crazy devs backside, but actual rarity, number in existence vs the number of people that play the game. Crimson Paladin will eventually become a Legendary Character! I love this feature and will be adding 1 dynamic NFT to each Kingdom Karnage Character Race.
Which NFT is fans favourite? Why?
Either the Pioneer which is both a playable character and an NFT which unlocks monthly challenges with Card Pack rewards, or the Dynamics, players get super excited when dynamics are close to leveling up.
What’s coming up?
We have a new race coming very soon, Lycans.The race will feature 19 new characters including a Legendary, 2 Epics and a brand new Dynamic (Velkan). The Lycans are going to feature all new abilities too so it should see players having to adapt their strategy.
On the 30 of September 19:00 UTC we will be releasing a new shop item on our website (KingdomKarnage.com/shop) which will be a Lycan bundle featuring Velkan and two rare packs of Lycans for $35. Players need to be aware only 2000 of Velkan will ever be produced.
Kingdom Karnage with its cards, consistent style, and combat battle has a really great atmosphere I feel. Can you tell us a little about the lore behind the game?
I’m the worst person to ask that question, I personally feel the gameplay is everything, I don’t read stories in games, if I want a good story I read a book, I play games for the gameplay.
If I wanted to play right now, what would I need to do?
Kingdom Karnage is available to play right now on Android, Browser & Steam. Just head over to KingdomKarnage.com/#Play for links to all 3.
When you’re ready to link your Enjin Wallet you can do so on the account page on the website.
Always a pleasure hearing what’s being created in the Kingdom Karnage camp 😉 Any last thoughts?
Something big is coming in addition to multiplayer, scaling, and Elves, so stay tuned for more details over the coming months.
Beauty, will keep an eye out, should others want to stay tuned or find out more please check the socials. They’re a friendly bunch! Big Thanks to Redd for all the pics too 🙂
Website: KepithorStudios.com
Telegram: https://t.me/KingdomKarnage
Discord: discord.gg/VJtbCAH
Game Twitter: https://twitter.com/Kingdom_Karnage
Dev Twitter: twitter.com/KepithorStudios
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Kepithor-Studios-499761503876226
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChb8rRJHlD_XXgp3J4RVMew
