Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN! | proposals.app

posted 2 years ago

When I see a comment like this, it reinforces my belief that the Arbitrum DAO plays a crucial role in making the future of this project different from other chains.

For those in the gaming market, the proposal is cohesive and viable, given all the indicators and validations of the power of games in today's society and their value on the internet.

When I see a comment like this, it reinforces my belief that the Arbitrum DAO plays a crucial role in making the future of this project different from other chains.

For those in the gaming market, the proposal is cohesive and viable, given all the indicators and validations of the power of games in today's society and their value on the internet.

However, this same skepticism from investors about the gaming market is understandable. Many have invested in games or studios that didn't perform well—not because the studio didn't deliver the software, but due to a lack of business maturity and management skills. Game studio leaders often lack the entrepreneurial behavior necessary for success, focusing more on development than on critical aspects like management and business strategies.

At Osten Games, we developed our own game to demonstrate the best path for the studios we accelerate. We've created an acceleration model that teaches entrepreneurial behaviors, emphasizing that making a game is only a small step toward a studio's success. Business and management are much more important for survival than just creating a blockbuster AAA game.

I suggest a very strict acceleration program for game studios, focused on the gaming market and business practices. This would create a sustainable ecosystem with validated milestones for funding, allowing better monitoring of company performance and distinguishing those truly delivering quality software from those focusing only on marketing.

In another chain we were part of before Arbitrum, we saw many unfounded projects developed by outsourced teams, which is extremely risky. Quality software delivery depends on committed teams directly involved in the product's outcome.

We are evaluating this behavior to create a sustainable growth space for companies in this segment, especially in Brazil, but it can be replicated worldwide. I'm accredited to apply a UN/UNCTAD program called EMPRETEC, designed to train entrepreneurial behaviors and increase business success rates, which I'm adapting for the gaming market.

The care GFXlabs is taking with its points, along with the dedication of Djinn and the team to create this program, mirrors the ongoing struggle between VCs and game studios worldwide. Both sides are right, but we need a validation model where everyone benefits and SYNERGY.

This gives me even more confidence to continue building on Arbitrum. I've participated in other chains, and this one inspires much more trust to invest my time and grow with you.

Elkronner

posted 2 years ago

When I see a comment like this, it reinforces my belief that the Arbitrum DAO plays a crucial role in making the future of this project different from other chains.

For those in the gaming market, the proposal is cohesive and viable, given all the indicators and validations of the power of games in today's society and their value on the internet.

When I see a comment like this, it reinforces my belief that the Arbitrum DAO plays a crucial role in making the future of this project different from other chains.

For those in the gaming market, the proposal is cohesive and viable, given all the indicators and validations of the power of games in today's society and their value on the internet.

This gives me even more confidence to continue building on Arbitrum. I've participated in other chains, and this one inspires much more trust to invest my time and grow with you.

samatsequence

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Proposal Name:

Response for Gaming Catalyst Program

Response:

Major props to the authors @Djinn et al, for driving this proposal forward and passing the first temperature check. We strongly believe that Arbitrum has the potential to be the destination for on-chain gaming, and the scope of the GCP outlined above looks to ignite this.

Proposal Name:

Response for Gaming Catalyst Program

Response:

A little about us: Sequence’s mission is to make web3 easy, fun, and accessible for players, developers, and builders. Sequence has been at the forefront of innovation in web3 game development since 2017 and is backed by leaders in gaming, technology, and web3, including Take-Two Interactive (owners of Rockstar/Grand Theft Auto, 2K, Zynga, etc.), Ubisoft, Xsolla, Bitkraft, Brevan Howard, Coinbase, and other visionaries. The team pioneered many of the standards and open-source software on which web3 gaming runs, including co-authoring ERC 1155 for game items, and authoring the standards of account abstraction and smart contract wallets like ERC 1271, ERC 6492, and ERC 5189. Other leaders in web3 gaming leverage our software such as Immutable and OpenSea as well. We know first hand the needs of game developers and players as we leverage the Sequence full-stack platform in building our game, Skyweaver, that has been live since 2019. Beyond Skyweaver, Sequence supports hundreds of games and thousands of developers with our comprehensive development platform. Since the company’s founding, Sequence technology has powered more than $5.3B of transaction volume and millions of wallets across the EVM ecosystem.

Beyond web3, we have brought on legendary game-industry veterans, including Greg Canessa as our President and COO. Greg was previously at Xbox/Microsoft where he created Xbox Live Arcade, the first digital distribution business on console; was the first VP of Mobile at Activision Blizzard; Director of Battle.net; and served in executive leadership roles at PopCap, EA, GSN, and Google; was instrumental in titles like World of Warcraft, Starcraft, Call of Duty, Diablo, UNO, amongst dozens of others; and played key roles in content development and ecosystem creation in the gaming industry for 30 years. We hired Greg to drive true gaming expertise in web3, build a bridge between the blockchain and traditional gaming worlds, and leverage his unique knowledge and network to expand the web3 ecosystem and venture partnerships.

We are heavily aligned with the Arbitrum ecosystem where we have played an integral role as not only an infrastructure provider, but a strategic partner. Examples include:

Advocating for prominent game studios & games to build on Arbitrum such as Mighty Action Heroes, soon to be announced AAA games, as well as servicing their infrastructure needs.
Brought TapNation, a leading mobile games publisher with 60M MAU and 1B+ downloads, to Arbitrum.
We're white-labeling our developer console Builder for ApeChain. The Builder is a portal for game devs to leverage the comprehensive Sequence stack to easily build games on ApeChain and Arbitrum.
Freely sharing our novel calldata compression tool to cut L2 fees by 50%, which is deployed on Arbitrum-ecosystem chains.

We want to discuss a few points for clarification on the proposal:

Distinction and overlap between the Infrastructure Bounties fund vs. the Builder Onboarding & Growth fund.
- From our perspective, there is overlap in that publishers or games will build infrastructure. Can games and publishers apply for both the Builder Onboarding & Growth Fund and the Infrastructure Bounties Fund OR do proposals for the Builder Onboarding & Growth Fund include infrastructure development as a cost? We believe that infrastructure should be a part of the overall request from the Builder Onboarding & Growth fund.
Significant historical contributions should be taken into account when considering requests for funds.
- Building high-quality and seamless infrastructure for web3 games is a high-skill, laborious, and time-consuming effort. It takes years to deliver properly. We recommend that infrastructure providers’ track records and contributions to the Arbitrum ecosystem are considered when allocating Infrastructure Bounties. We needn’t wait to accelerate the Arbitrum ecosystem. Many of the tools required to build, launch, and scale the biggest games are available today, and ARB allocation can be used to accelerate and enhance existing tools to better support game developers, and ultimately solidify Arbitrum’s position in web3 gaming.

Overall, the structure of the proposal is great, and we believe that the right GCP team combined with some elaboration on the above concerns, will help propel Arbitrum as the leader in on-chain gaming.

To further excite the community, we believe the total addressable market is actually much larger than described in the proposal. The author cites a projected $500B gaming TAM by 2030, and we believe it’s important to consider the $10T metaverse opportunity. Gaming and blockchain play a critical role in the metaverse, and establishing Arbitrum as a gaming leader also helps establish Arbitrum as a metaverse leader. We are excited to collaborate with the Arbitrum DAO and other stakeholders to participate in the GCP to drive the adoption, utility, and success of the Arbitrum ecosystem.

aepac

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from thedereksmart

Though sadly, unless there are games currently in the pipeline and from devs who aren’t already committed to other chains or who don’t need funding, it could take up to 12 months or more from GCP taking applications for us to see any games on ARB as a result of GCP funding.

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Quoted from thedereksmart

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I appreciate your optimism and share your confidence in ARB's direction. It's encouraging to note that several small gaming teams are already exploring development on Arbitrum.

While their success and player base may currently seem modest, especially when compared to traditional mobile gaming benchmarks, it's important to remember that these efforts preceded the establishment of the Gaming Catalyst Program. The potential for growth and traction once the GCP is fully operational is significant.

The frequent mention of AAA games, while ambitious, shouldn't overshadow the program's immediate goals. Our focus should be on attracting, guiding, and nurturing builders and game developers. This approach will not only enhance the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum, but also introduce more players to our platform. While AAA titles may emerge in time, our initial aim should be to foster "fun games to play" that resonate with a broad audience.

Ultimately, the goal is to seamlessly integrate web2 players into the Arbitrum gaming experience, making the technology transparent to the user. Achieving this will truly mark a milestone in attracting a wider audience and inspiring the next generation of builders.

Truth be told, Web3 isn’t exactly getting standing ovations in the core gaming space right now. So, instead of trying to win over the skeptics, our game plan is to reel in those builders who already see the vision, the ones who just get it.

The sooner Arbitrum can get started, the better.

aepac

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from thedereksmart

Can you explain how you see the potential for growth and traction being significant under the GCP?

Quoted from thedereksmart

Can you explain how you see the potential for growth and traction being significant under the GCP?

From my perspective and experience, I have always found that access to money isn’t a litmus test of success or failure. Most especially in gaming. The GCP is merely a funding vehicle which has no involvement in the viability, let alone the success or failure of a game project. I brought up this comparison before, in that a traditional publisher tends to do a lot more than just provide funding. It’s why indies self-publishing on Steam or EGS tend to have to do all the things - including marketing - that publishers would otherwise do. And yet still, it’s a hit or miss.

My view of the success of the GCP is transient to that of the games funded by it because at the end of the day, even those that don’t have an ROI requirement, won’t succeed by just their mere presence on ARB.

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I appreciate your insights and the emphasis on the multifaceted nature of success in gaming. However, my recent discussions with developers at different stages of implementation on Arbitrum paint a contrasting picture. These conversations revealed teams genuinely struggling to make ends meet, lacking not only the substantial resources necessary for extensive exploration and development but also, in some cases, the gaming expertise or third-party guidance that can pivot their projects toward success.

This is precisely where the value of the GCP, alongside the Council and the Catalyst Venture Team, becomes evident. They offer not just the financial support but also the much-needed guidance and expertise to navigate the complex landscape of game development on Arbitrum. It’s this combination of resources, expertise, and altruistic guidance that I believe can significantly impact, supporting developers to focus on their passion: creating engaging and fun experiences on Arbitrum.

Quoted from thedereksmart

Indeed. But herein lies the rub. ARB doesn’t [yet] have a [cohesive] gaming ecosystem. At least not in the traditional sense. And most of the games and their associated communities, are parked on Treasure; and soon others will do the same on XAI. And so, games being funded through the GCP aren’t going to somehow automagically create a gaming presence other than be featured among a list of slew of games on something on like Arbitrum Arcade.

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Indeed, the current state of ARB's gaming ecosystem may not yet be cohesive in the traditional sense, with many games and their communities gravitating towards platforms like Treasure and potentially XAI in the future. This reality underlines the importance of the GCP's main objective: to attract top-tier builders capable of creating compelling, high-quality games. These games are essential not just for their entertainment value but for their ability to draw in and retain new users within the Arbitrum ecosystem, thereby nurturing a vibrant and diverse gaming community. If they leverage Treasure or XAI (honestly it’s not a fair comparison right now), it’s beyond the core scope of GCP.

Quoted from thedereksmart

Anyone who believes that just throwing $400MM at this challenge is going to somehow yield expected results, really doesn’t understand how any of this works. I know that I already sound like a broken record in this regard, but it’s something that I am hoping sinks in as things move forward.

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Absolutely, I share your sentiment. Simply pouring $400M into the gaming ecosystem isn't a guaranteed recipe for success, and as someone deeply involved in mobile publishing with major IPs and substantial budgets, I understand the intricacies involved.

My experience includes collaborating with Upptic on projects we've either published or played a significant financial role in (i.e; we acquired the studio). The real potential of a $400M investment lies in strategic management and execution. The difference between speculating about what might be achieved and actively working towards making those achievements a reality is crucial. Our focus should be on leveraging this funding effectively to create impactful results.

Quoted from thedereksmart

Today, I saw David Taylor’s analysis of the revenue paid out to Fortnite creators. It’s all kinds of crazy. A total of $320MM (!) paid out - in the past 12 (!) months. Most of those gamers are neither making nor playing Web3 games. And you’re not going to attract them without a compelling game and a reason to even take a look, let alone play it.

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Indeed, the figures from Fortnite's creator payouts are astonishing, showcasing the incredible potential of successful game ecosystems. However, expecting Arbitrum or this program to mirror Epic Games' success or launch the next "Fortnite" may not align with our immediate goals or realities.

Given your extensive experience as an indie developer, I'm sure you appreciate that our focus is on fostering a diverse and vibrant gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum. The aim is to attract developers and gamers with the promise of innovative and engaging gaming experiences, rather than replicating the blockbuster success of established giants overnight. “We want to develop the next Fortinite or AAA game” is simply the wrong goal.

Quoted from thedereksmart

In my view, besides a $400MM play, ARB needs something else that gives it the edge that other game centric chains don’t have; and which, much like the noise of the GCP funding, makes gamers and builders take notice.

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What is it?

Quoted from thedereksmart

I will say this again, just throwing money at the challenge in a bid to see what sticks, will not yield the expected results.

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I understand your concerns about the effectiveness of financial investment alone. However, I wonder, what outcomes do you envision for the Catalyst Program to consider it a success?

We are establishing a Council and a Catalyst Venture Team for this very reason. If these entities do not fulfill their responsibilities, then indeed, the investment might not achieve its intended impact.

Nevertheless, I believe it's critical to start with a presumption of efficacy and the selection of a competent team. I maintain an optimistic perspective, viewing challenges as opportunities for growth. It's an ambitious endeavor, and maintaining a positive outlook is essential for navigating the journey ahead.

Quoted from thedereksmart

that even games currently in production aren’t likely to deploy inside of 12 months, finding ways to reach those devs in the interim, is probably a good idea.

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With all due respect, it might be worth taking a closer look at who's actually building on Arbitrum, past and present.

The idea that it's okay for games to take over 12 months just to see the light of day doesn't sit right. If that's what we're seeing after the first year, then it's clear – the Catalyst Venture Team and the Council aren't cutting it and should probably be shown the door. Quick development and getting games out there is key; we can't afford to drag our feet.

Quoted from thedereksmart

So, what would such a team do with $150K that’s worth going through the trouble of deploying on ARB? e.g. If I were to migrate my in-progress Web3 game to ARB from the chain we’re currently on, it would cost me in excess of $200K to do it. And so, of what use is even a $200K grant to me if that’s just going to go towards my migration/deployment costs?

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I must disagree with your figures regarding the migration costs. From my experience and current discussions, the notion that it requires $200k to migrate a game to Arbitrum is not accurate.

Many teams I've been in talks with are operating or planning to operate on Arbitrum with budgets starting at around $5k/month (let's x2, that's $10k a month...). These are developers deeply passionate about gaming, eager to explore or continue their journey on Arbitrum.

However, starting from incorrect assumptions can lead us down a problematic path, shaping a flawed rationale for the future.

What concerns me more are the expectations set for these teams by Arbitrum and the criteria for defining a game's success as perceived by the DAO.

If we're using metrics like monthly transactions as the primary measure of a game's success, then, in my opinion, we're not laying the right foundation. This approach is what I've gleaned from conversations that developers have had with Offchain Labs, and it worries me.

The Council must ensure the Venture Team not only understands, but also has a deep knowledge of the gaming industry. Being proficient in business development is not sufficient. My experience in game publishing has shown me that to draw in the best talent, you need an equally exceptional team engaging with them.

samatsequence

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Proposal Name:

Response for Gaming Catalyst Program

Response:

Proposal Name:

Response for Gaming Catalyst Program

Response:

We are heavily aligned with the Arbitrum ecosystem where we have played an integral role as not only an infrastructure provider, but a strategic partner. Examples include:

Advocating for prominent game studios & games to build on Arbitrum such as Mighty Action Heroes, soon to be announced AAA games, as well as servicing their infrastructure needs.
Brought TapNation, a leading mobile games publisher with 60M MAU and 1B+ downloads, to Arbitrum.
We're white-labeling our developer console Builder for ApeChain. The Builder is a portal for game devs to leverage the comprehensive Sequence stack to easily build games on ApeChain and Arbitrum.
Freely sharing our novel calldata compression tool to cut L2 fees by 50%, which is deployed on Arbitrum-ecosystem chains.

We want to discuss a few points for clarification on the proposal:

Distinction and overlap between the Infrastructure Bounties fund vs. the Builder Onboarding & Growth fund.
- From our perspective, there is overlap in that publishers or games will build infrastructure. Can games and publishers apply for both the Builder Onboarding & Growth Fund and the Infrastructure Bounties Fund OR do proposals for the Builder Onboarding & Growth Fund include infrastructure development as a cost? We believe that infrastructure should be a part of the overall request from the Builder Onboarding & Growth fund.
Significant historical contributions should be taken into account when considering requests for funds.
- Building high-quality and seamless infrastructure for web3 games is a high-skill, laborious, and time-consuming effort. It takes years to deliver properly. We recommend that infrastructure providers’ track records and contributions to the Arbitrum ecosystem are considered when allocating Infrastructure Bounties. We needn’t wait to accelerate the Arbitrum ecosystem. Many of the tools required to build, launch, and scale the biggest games are available today, and ARB allocation can be used to accelerate and enhance existing tools to better support game developers, and ultimately solidify Arbitrum’s position in web3 gaming.

aepac

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from thedereksmart

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Quoted from thedereksmart

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I appreciate your optimism and share your confidence in ARB's direction. It's encouraging to note that several small gaming teams are already exploring development on Arbitrum.

The sooner Arbitrum can get started, the better.

aepac

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from thedereksmart

Can you explain how you see the potential for growth and traction being significant under the GCP?

Quoted from thedereksmart

Can you explain how you see the potential for growth and traction being significant under the GCP?

jump to post →

Quoted from thedereksmart

jump to post →

Quoted from thedereksmart

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Quoted from thedereksmart

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Quoted from thedereksmart

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What is it?

Quoted from thedereksmart

I will say this again, just throwing money at the challenge in a bid to see what sticks, will not yield the expected results.

jump to post →

I understand your concerns about the effectiveness of financial investment alone. However, I wonder, what outcomes do you envision for the Catalyst Program to consider it a success?

Quoted from thedereksmart

that even games currently in production aren’t likely to deploy inside of 12 months, finding ways to reach those devs in the interim, is probably a good idea.

jump to post →

With all due respect, it might be worth taking a closer look at who's actually building on Arbitrum, past and present.

Quoted from thedereksmart

jump to post →

I must disagree with your figures regarding the migration costs. From my experience and current discussions, the notion that it requires $200k to migrate a game to Arbitrum is not accurate.

However, starting from incorrect assumptions can lead us down a problematic path, shaping a flawed rationale for the future.

What concerns me more are the expectations set for these teams by Arbitrum and the criteria for defining a game's success as perceived by the DAO.

OfficialAbenger

posted 2 years ago

I'm the founder of BattleFly, one of the first games to launch on Arbitrum in the Treasure ecosystem (we started building in November 2021 and launched in March 2022). We are regularly in the top ten games on Arbitrum with 1,500+ DAUs. We support this proposal (and also are very grateful to the folks who have brought this proposal to life).

BattleFly wasn't created with the intention of being a AAA game; our ambition was to explore whether a game that was more data-driven, strategic and financialized would be interesting to players. We have done a lot of experimentation over the past 2+ years across multiple game modes, and only with the release of Colosseum do we now feel like we have a version of the game that is fun, sustainable and "built for a web3 audience".

Games take time, and game developers need the space to "learn new things" as they go. The traditional model for funding games is largely broken imho, because it has over-rotated towards investing in "sure bets" rather than "good teams and interesting ideas". I don't think we want to replicate the same problems that have led to large publishers becoming stale and predictable.

With all the layoffs that have happened in gaming over the past 18 months, there are some really talented people looking for their next move. I think if part of the grant program could be geared towards giving small (but experienced) teams with interesting ideas the space to build their first playable prototype, we could create a lot of buzz.

Yes, we want some big names to join Arbitrum and make big waves. But I hope we also attract a bunch of builders who want to use Arbitrum to reinvent gaming, not just copy existing ideas.

Thanks again to everyone who has helped stand up this proposal.

OfficialAbenger

posted 2 years ago

Yes, we want some big names to join Arbitrum and make big waves. But I hope we also attract a bunch of builders who want to use Arbitrum to reinvent gaming, not just copy existing ideas.

Thanks again to everyone who has helped stand up this proposal.

CU-ManicUnicorn

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Hello,

Great spaces! Firstly, thank you for presenting this proposal. I'm relatively new to the Arbitrum DAO community, and this marks my first participation in any discussion. Exciting moment for a first post. By way of introduction, I'm currently involved with Crypto Unicorns, a gaming ecosystem and DAO on Polygon. We're gearing up for a migration to XAI by the second quarter of this year. Given this timing, this proposal couldn't be more relevant to us!

Hello,

From Arbitrum's standpoint, this proposal is exceptionally promising. It offers a strategic opportunity for Arbitrum to forge a strong connection with the gaming space, repositioning itself as a gaming-focused blockchain network. This strategic branding, beyond the grant itself, has the potential to draw significant interest from a wide array of stakeholders, including developers, builders, and users.

Looking at it from the lens of a project on the cusp of migrating to XAI, the benefits are equally substantial. Throughout our migration discussions, we've witnessed remarkable synergy between teams and experienced firsthand the robust support network that both Arbitrum and XAI extend to builders and developers.

Encouraging Developer and Builder Engagement

The proposal acts as a catalyst for attracting new talent. It lays down a welcoming groundwork for developers and builders, signaling that Arbitrum is ready and eager for innovation.

Fostering Grassroots Initiatives

This proposal's commitment to providing financial support, mentorship, and additional resources is pivotal. It ensures that nascent ideas are nurtured into high-quality projects. Mentorship, in particular, is crucial for those transitioning from traditional web2 gaming development, offering them the essential knowledge and technological aid they require. The financial aspect also plays a significant role, enabling developers to focus on their projects without the immediate pressure of securing additional funding.

Bridging the Web2 and Web3 Divide

The emphasis on welcoming web2 developers into the web3 fold is commendable. This initiative not only immediately gives them access to the technologies but also imparts the necessary knowledge for web3 game development, which is pivotal for the web3 gaming space’s growth.

One aspect that piques my curiosity is the relationship between the GCP Council and the Catalyst Team mentioned above. At Crypto Unicorns, where I'm involved, we also operate under a DAO structure with a community-elected Council. In our setup, the Council's responsibilities include ensuring that the DAO receives a comprehensive breakdown of implementation steps before anything progresses to Snapshot voting. This process enables the DAO to hold any author accountable should there be any deviation from the agreed-upon steps. Given this context, I’m interested in comparing the designs, especially with the mention that the Council's role for GCP includes maintaining the Catalyst Team's accountability. How will the Council members be decided and what would be the nature of actions the Council can take if there's disagreement with how things are being implemented?

Overall, this proposal, in essence, represents a significant leap forward for both the Arbitrum ecosystem and the broader web3 gaming space, promising to pave the way for innovative developments and higher quality projects and I’m excited to see its implementation.

CU-ManicUnicorn

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Hello,

Encouraging Developer and Builder Engagement

The proposal acts as a catalyst for attracting new talent. It lays down a welcoming groundwork for developers and builders, signaling that Arbitrum is ready and eager for innovation.

Fostering Grassroots Initiatives

Bridging the Web2 and Web3 Divide

HDeNutte

posted 2 years ago

Title: Xai Games: Revolutionizing Gaming with Web3 Technology on Arbitrum

Introduction: The gaming industry is on the brink of a revolutionary transformation with the integration of Web3 technology and blockchain solutions. Among the key players driving this evolution is Xai, a layer-3 scaling network developed on top of Arbitrum, designed to empower gamers and developers alike. With its innovative approach, Xai aims to streamline in-game asset trading, enhance user experiences, and broaden accessibility to blockchain gaming for traditional gamers. This article delves into the significance of Xai Games (layer 3 - Arbitrum) and its native token XAI in reshaping the gaming landscape and why this intersection of gaming and blockchain technology is poised to make a profound impact.

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Title: Xai Games: Revolutionizing Gaming with Web3 Technology on Arbitrum

Empowering Traditional Gamers: Xai opens the door for potentially billions of traditional gamers to participate in open trade within their favorite games without the complexities associated with crypto-wallets. By leveraging Offchain Labs' expertise in developing Arbitrum technology, Xai ensures scalability, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness, essential for mass adoption among gamers accustomed to seamless experiences. This democratization of in-game asset trading not only enhances user engagement but also fosters a sense of ownership and value within gaming communities.

Revolutionizing In-Game Transactions: Traditional gaming ecosystems often struggle with scalability and cost inefficiencies, hindering the seamless exchange of in-game assets. Xai addresses these challenges by offering a dedicated layer-3 network built on top of Arbitrum, optimizing transactions for speed and affordability. Through AnyTrust technology, Xai can handle a high volume of transactions at minimal costs, making it an ideal solution for both game developers and players. Moreover, Xai's commitment to security ensures the protection of valuable in-game assets, instilling trust and confidence among users.

Customized Solutions for Web3 Games: Xai's integration with Arbitrum's layer-2 solution enhances scalability and efficiency, while its layer-3 architecture allows for customizable optimizations tailored to the unique needs of web3 games. Game developers can fine-tune parameters to optimize network performance, ensuring seamless gameplay experiences for users worldwide. With the support of Ex Populus, an experienced game development studio, Xai is set to introduce groundbreaking games like Final Form and LAMOverse, showcasing the potential of blockchain technology to revolutionize gaming experiences.

The Future of Gaming with Xai: As Xai prepares to launch later this year, it promises to usher in a new era of web3 gaming, characterized by scalability, interoperability, and immersive experiences. By leveraging Arbitrum's technology and Ex Populus' expertise, Xai is poised to redefine the gaming industry's landscape, attracting both early adopters and traditional gamers alike. With a focus on user-centric design and seamless integration, Xai paves the way for the widespread adoption of blockchain gaming, unlocking new opportunities for developers and players worldwide.

Conclusion: In conclusion, Xai Games represents a pivotal advancement in the convergence of gaming and blockchain technology. By leveraging layer-3 scaling solutions on Arbitrum, Xai empowers traditional gamers with seamless access to decentralized trading within their favorite games. With its focus on scalability, efficiency, and user experience, Xai is poised to revolutionize the gaming industry, offering a glimpse into the future of web3 gaming. As Xai prepares to launch, the possibilities for innovation and growth within the gaming ecosystem are limitless, marking a significant milestone in the evolution of gaming technology.

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HDeNutte

posted 2 years ago

Title: Xai Games: Revolutionizing Gaming with Web3 Technology on Arbitrum

114

Title: Xai Games: Revolutionizing Gaming with Web3 Technology on Arbitrum

114

aepac

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from thedereksmart

they’re sitting on a library of underperforming games - that nobody is playing. If Treasure needed funds to expand or to curate games and promote them, they could very well have put up a proposal to do just that.

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Quoted from thedereksmart

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The essence of this proposal is really to encourage involvement from groups like Treasure, as well as other developers and builders, in the Arbitrum ecosystem.

Saying "nobody" is playing Treasure's games is a bit harsh. They’ve been champions for Arbitrum from the start and have seen genuine engagement with some of their titles. For instance, take a look at The Beacon—it’s still in Alpha but has shown promising traction.

The lively discussion and differing viewpoints underscore Treasure’s influence in the space. The intention behind the 200MM ARB is to significantly enhance efforts like these. Whether it’s Treasure, Xai, or any other game publisher or developer, the goal is the same.

For a clear picture of what Treasure has contributed so far, checking out Karel's tweet might be enlightening.

Quoted from thedereksmart

it’s not my fight and I currently have no plans to build anything on ARB.

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Given your statement about not planning to build on ARB, it's understandable where you're coming from. Your passion's great, but we're really trying to get everyone on the same track and make things happen. As Soby pointed out on Telegram, aligning stakeholders, ensuring proper economics, and pushing forward with actionable steps is key.

As long as the DAO is receiving proper economics from these deals we'll be able to push forward

imo best mental model is to think of the DAO as a sovereign wealth fund that works closely with key stakeholders to fund verticals that increase arb usage / adoption

Discussions are valuable, but moving from talk to action is what will truly drives progress, and this is what Arbitrum needs, now.

As I mentioned on Telegram;

Nuances and definitions discussions won't get the ball rolling nor attract more game developers. Honestly what I'm mostly worried about is getting stuck into semantics and "analysis paralysis" whilst others are busy building and attracting both talent and players.

aepac

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from thedereksmart

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125

Quoted from thedereksmart

jump to post →

The essence of this proposal is really to encourage involvement from groups like Treasure, as well as other developers and builders, in the Arbitrum ecosystem.

For a clear picture of what Treasure has contributed so far, checking out Karel's tweet might be enlightening.

Quoted from thedereksmart

it’s not my fight and I currently have no plans to build anything on ARB.

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As long as the DAO is receiving proper economics from these deals we'll be able to push forward

imo best mental model is to think of the DAO as a sovereign wealth fund that works closely with key stakeholders to fund verticals that increase arb usage / adoption

Discussions are valuable, but moving from talk to action is what will truly drives progress, and this is what Arbitrum needs, now.

As I mentioned on Telegram;

Nuances and definitions discussions won't get the ball rolling nor attract more game developers. Honestly what I'm mostly worried about is getting stuck into semantics and "analysis paralysis" whilst others are busy building and attracting both talent and players.

conrad

posted 2 years ago

As someone who's been with Treasure since its inception, I've witnessed firsthand how it has not only been a catalyst for my journey into Arbitrum but also for many others. Treasure stands out as more than just a platform; it's a vibrant ecosystem that encapsulates the true essence of innovation and community engagement in the blockchain gaming world.

The impact of Treasure and its suite of games on the Arbitrum network is profound. It has been instrumental in attracting a diverse player base, fostering a community of builders, and channeling liquidity into the network. This isn't just about a single game or platform; it's about supporting an entire segment of the industry that has the potential to redefine gaming within the web3 space.

188

Granting support to Treasure, and by extension the gaming sector, aligns perfectly with the vision of fostering a rich, diversified, and thriving ecosystem on Arbitrum. It's not just about the financial backing but also about recognizing and encouraging the innovation and community-building efforts that have been a hallmark of Treasure's journey.

I strongly advocate for the allocation of grants to Treasure and the broader gaming community. This isn't merely an investment in a platform; it's a strategic move to nurture a segment that has consistently demonstrated its potential to bring in new users, create engaging experiences, and build lasting value in the blockchain space.

By supporting this initiative, we're not just fueling growth; we're actively participating in shaping the future of gaming on the blockchain. The stories of engagement, community, and innovation that come from Treasure are testaments to its impact on the network. It's these stories and experiences that highlight the importance of passing this proposal and reinforcing the belief that the future of gaming on Arbitrum, driven by communities like Treasure, is bright and full of potential.

188

nighttalker

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Gaming is sticky and will be the largest catalyst in bringing new attention, excitement, and users to crypto. While I was already involved in defi on Solana and ETH Mainnet, it was the attention Treasure brought to Arbitrum that led me to take the plunge and bridge over. Since dipping my toes in Treasure's ecosystem back in late 2021, I've found myself moving almost all of my liquidity to Arbitrum and utilizing exclusively Arbitrum-based defi protocols from GMX to VELA to Hyperliquid to Dopex and on and on. Imagine the increased liquidity compelling games will bring to Arbitrum if they're given the opportunity and funds to flourish.

Gaming has the strongest community, and Treasure's impressive community played a significant role in making Arbitrum my preferred chain. It wasn't a conscious decision to conduct most of my crypto transactions on this L2, and that hints at the power of what a strong investment in gaming can contribute to Arbitrum. Most people don't want to be spread out across 20 chains and various L2s. They, like me, will first be drawn to compelling games and the communal conversation around them, and they will undoubtedly explore other protocols and products on their favorite games' native chain.

175

Gaming is the flash to defi's smash, and strong games will reduce the friction present in onboarding new DAUs. If Arbitrum chooses not to put some portion of its considerable war chest into developing gaming on its chain, it is in essence choosing not to market to consumers of the highest grossing entertainment industry, and it will do so at its own peril. Every other chain has made gaming a priority, so why would Arbitrum cede this ground to everyone else without a fight, especially when it already has Treasure, Hytopia, XAI, and many others who have put in the work and are primed to succeed?

While this proposal might benefit from some improvements, we shouldn't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Remember that while 200m $ARB sounds like and frankly is a lot to the average person, a typical AAA game can cost $80-$100M. I've read other comments suggesting that this proposal is not without its flaws, but it doesn't need to be. It's only the beginning. Does it make sense to quibble over the minor details of an ambitious and well-thought out proposal designed to attract top-tier talent when the race to be the premiere gaming chain has already begun?

Tino.eth

posted 2 years ago

Allocating 200M $ARB to gaming is undoubtedly a correct bet. As a supporter and user of TreasureDAO, I hope Arbitrum will allocate enough resources to gaming-focused projects, especially TreasureDAO, for the following reasons:

TreasureDAO as a Web3 Gaming Launchpad: It acts as a gateway for diverse web3 gaming projects, hosting several notable games already.
The Importance of Sustainable Gaming Ecosystems: Given that games typically have shorter lifecycles than DeFi protocols, without a vision for long-term infrastructure, it's easy to fall into a cycle of game launch → token launch → hype → death. Through its meta-game, Bridgeworld, it encourages inter-game resource competition, enabling the ecosystem to naturally select the strongest games. This approach promises a sustainable web3 gaming platform in the long term.
Efficient Allocation of Resources: Therefore, this 200M $ARB investment by Arbitrum must be carefully considered and allocated to the most efficient projects. In my view, TreasureDAO stands out as the prime candidate.

163

TreasureDAO as a Web3 Gaming Launchpad: It acts as a gateway for diverse web3 gaming projects, hosting several notable games already.
The Importance of Sustainable Gaming Ecosystems: Given that games typically have shorter lifecycles than DeFi protocols, without a vision for long-term infrastructure, it's easy to fall into a cycle of game launch → token launch → hype → death. Through its meta-game, Bridgeworld, it encourages inter-game resource competition, enabling the ecosystem to naturally select the strongest games. This approach promises a sustainable web3 gaming platform in the long term.
Efficient Allocation of Resources: Therefore, this 200M $ARB investment by Arbitrum must be carefully considered and allocated to the most efficient projects. In my view, TreasureDAO stands out as the prime candidate.

I strongly recommend that the Arbitrum foundation invest resources into TreasureDAO to maximize the efficiency of these resources, focusing on teams with the right culture, community, and potential.

163

conrad

posted 2 years ago

188

nighttalker

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

175

Tino.eth

posted 2 years ago

TreasureDAO as a Web3 Gaming Launchpad: It acts as a gateway for diverse web3 gaming projects, hosting several notable games already.
The Importance of Sustainable Gaming Ecosystems: Given that games typically have shorter lifecycles than DeFi protocols, without a vision for long-term infrastructure, it's easy to fall into a cycle of game launch → token launch → hype → death. Through its meta-game, Bridgeworld, it encourages inter-game resource competition, enabling the ecosystem to naturally select the strongest games. This approach promises a sustainable web3 gaming platform in the long term.
Efficient Allocation of Resources: Therefore, this 200M $ARB investment by Arbitrum must be carefully considered and allocated to the most efficient projects. In my view, TreasureDAO stands out as the prime candidate.

163

TreasureDAO as a Web3 Gaming Launchpad: It acts as a gateway for diverse web3 gaming projects, hosting several notable games already.
The Importance of Sustainable Gaming Ecosystems: Given that games typically have shorter lifecycles than DeFi protocols, without a vision for long-term infrastructure, it's easy to fall into a cycle of game launch → token launch → hype → death. Through its meta-game, Bridgeworld, it encourages inter-game resource competition, enabling the ecosystem to naturally select the strongest games. This approach promises a sustainable web3 gaming platform in the long term.
Efficient Allocation of Resources: Therefore, this 200M $ARB investment by Arbitrum must be carefully considered and allocated to the most efficient projects. In my view, TreasureDAO stands out as the prime candidate.

I strongly recommend that the Arbitrum foundation invest resources into TreasureDAO to maximize the efficiency of these resources, focusing on teams with the right culture, community, and potential.

163

0xgb.eth

posted 2 years ago

Firstly, thanks to everyone involved in crafting, contributing, and critiquing this proposal. The discussions at ETH Denver and in the Arbitrum Gaming telegram group over the last few weeks have been invaluable.

Here are my key points regarding this proposal from the perspective of a Gaming Studio on Arbitrum (we have been building Footium, a multiplayer football management game, for the last 2 years):

250

Here are my key points regarding this proposal from the perspective of a Gaming Studio on Arbitrum (we have been building Footium, a multiplayer football management game, for the last 2 years):

Efficient Runway Extension : Startups often face runway concerns. The GCP offers a streamlined way to access capital, removing the need for extensive fundraising efforts which really can be entirely consuming for months at a time for studios which receive funding through the GCP. This frees up founders to focus on shipping good games and marketing them, which is what they really should be doing.

Accelerating Game Development : Additional capital can expedite game development and improve its quality. The team building Footium is currently 7 people, and we are all stretched across multiple roles. Hiring more developers, a game economist, and marketing personnel would enable us to deliver a better game faster, as well as grow more rapidly, all of which bring benefits for the wider Arbitrum ecosystem.

Onboarding web2 Users: Gaming presents an effective pathway for introducing web2 users to web3 due to the familiarity of gaming. The proposal's focus on infrastructure + seamless onboarding is crucial for facilitating this transition and it is great to see it included here. User acquisition through gaming is more efficient than through other channels such as financial apps, and will allow the entire Arbitrum ecosystem to grow and benefit from the effects of that growth.

While the proposal could be refined, speed is essential given market dynamics and competition. Acting decisively is crucial to ensure timely access to funding for game studios.

Competitors are actively seeking to attract games to their platforms, and we receive at least one message each week currently from an Arbitrum competitor who are trying to attract games to their chain via lucrative grants + .

We are committed to building on Arbitrum, but I can absolutely see how these offers could be enticing for those studios in need of capital right now. This further highlights the need for swift action to maintain Arbitrum's position as the market leading L2. Maximising network effects within Arbitrum gaming and the broader ecosystem is vital, and the GCP can significantly contribute to this goal.

250

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

I recall that back in Mar you were to vote ABSTAIN. So, something very important to you must have caused you to switch to AGAINST. Gaming is important to me, and as you and I had previously exchanged thoughts on this program, I wanted to expand on some of those discussions because, sadly, most people appear to have moved on or they don't feel that anything further needs to be added.

You cited "meaningful changes to address the concerns" but I fear that's a bit too ambiguous; especially in light of the [valid] concerns that you previously articulated, and which, to me at least, aren't that easily addressed or reconciled.

e.g.

[quote] Instead of creating the GCP from scratch, couldn’t the Arbitrum community work on refining the Questbook gaming grant program by: [/quote]

This - I thought - was impractical because the scope of the GCP eclipses anything that Questbook could feasibly morph into. That aside from the fact that the Questbook grants program, to put it bluntly, is completely inadequate. To the extent that the $25K-$50K grant requiring oversight by two allocators who may or may not have the experience to adequately vet gaming projects, means that the issue isn't just about extending the Questbook amounts, but also a complete overhaul of the program - including replacing the current domain allocators. As someone who has spent a lifetime in this one field, I can tell you that this description of the gaming program is wholly devoid of anything that would remotely pass for due diligence smell test in a game pitch.

And so, extending the Questbook gaming program would require a completely new program, while possibly retiring the pre-existing one as-is.

I want to also add that if you take a look at the current grant requests, it's easy to see that those applicants coming to the GCP would present a huge barrier of entry and too much friction that comes with the due diligence befitting an ask via the GCP.

In short, another Questbook proposal will just end up being a version of GCP anyway. Aside from the fact that the pre-existing Questbook doesn't actually have the stringent controls that GCP has.

[quote] Firstly, as highlighted by many detailed comments above, the success of a gaming ecosystem depends on factors beyond just financial investment. Allocating a large budget, such as the proposed $400 million, does not guarantee the creation of games that will be embraced by the community or attract a sustainable player base. The intrinsic quality of the games, the engagement of the community, and the ability to attract players from outside the existing Arbitrum ecosystem are all critical factors that need to be considered. [/quote]

Agreed. And these were already addressed in some fashion here in the discussions as well as in the proposal updates.

Fact is that, budgets aren't a guarantee of anything. You could have a $1M budget or a $265M budget and still yield the same net results. The only difference is that a larger budget allows larger and better curation of games and game devs, which in turn enable the spreading of risk over time.

While Arbitrum has lagged behind other chains in terms of gaming, I believe that, at the very least, if done correctly, GCP will curate enough quality games so that a few of them break out. If you look at how game publishing portals such as Steam, EGS, GoG, GMG got started, it's easy to see how they grew over the years. Now, they're all platforms that host/sell games of all types, even if only a few of them are successful enough to recoup costs. In the short-term, gaming on ARB is going to continue to flounder because making quality games takes a long time and costs a lot.

And ofc, we have ApeChain - built on Arbitrum - coming online this Summer; and they too are looking to curate games as a primary funnel. To me, that's another fly in the [ARB gaming] ointment, and I remain puzzled as to why the foundation decided to fund that, rather than put those funds towards a gaming on ARB initiative. The end result is that we're going to end up with Treasure, XAI, ApeChain, all of which, though built on ARB, just lead to fragmentation of the gaming on ARB ecosystem. But maybe that's just me looking at it the wrong way.

[quote] Secondly, the timeline proposed in the GCP may not align with the realities of game development. As noted in the comment, the program may not be able to move quickly enough to attract games that are already in the pipeline for deployment within the next 12-18 months. This suggests that the impact of the program on the immediate gaming landscape within the Arbitrum ecosystem may be limited. [/quote]

All of this is true - and most of us have harped on these points. However, tbf, that's why @Djinn increased the time span from 2 to 3 years; which in turn, increased the costs.

As to games coming online within 12-18 months, the reality is that most quality games befitting funding from GCP, likely already have their chain/investor partners lined up. And so, it's going to be games currently in dev or entering dev for the 25-28 that will be looking for funding.

But the reality of that too is the other chains aren't sleeping just because there's a $265M gaming fund floating around. In the end, the GCP may not even be able to curate any games any time soon. Especially since, in my estimation, with all the voting, hiring, entity setups, ops etc that need to be done, it's likely to take a good 6+ months before everything is in place for the GCP to start curating games. Which means we probably won't hear about any GCP funded games before H1/25.

[quote] Furthermore, the comment raises valid concerns about the potential misalignment of incentives between the goals of the Web3 community and the realities of game development. The focus on financial incentives and “filling bags” in the Web3 gaming space may not be conducive to the creation of truly engaging and sustainable games. [/quote]

Agreed. And there's not getting around this salient point. We all know that Web3 gamers don't play games for the fun factor. They play them if they can make money from them. If a game is fun, then it's just a bonus. But once the ability to make money ends up being a lot of work than they are willing to put in, they tend to go grind in the next best thing. There are literally no games in Web3 that you can't already find in trad gaming - and better. Not a single one. And so, that means if you're making a game for Web3, you need both the fun as well as the money funnel to keep players engaged.

This isn't a problem for the GCP to solve. It's there to curate games that have the appearance of longevity. It's why I believe that the GCP should focus on investments instead of grants because the former has a better chance of yielding tangible financial results.

That's all that I have to say. I don't profess to have all the answers, but as a legacy gamer and game dev who wants to see gaming thrive everywhere, I am just doing my best to get people to keep their eyes on the prize rather than on the nuances involved in the possibilities of failure.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

As someone who opined on this proposal since it first went up, and later ended up in this new thread, I just want to expand on a few thoughts. While I would have loved to excerpt and respond to some specific comments, alas I don't have enough time. And so, I will respond in a collated manner.

To be clear, I have no skin in the GCP game. And so, I neither want to be in the council nor in the team itself. I'm just an old school legacy gamer and game dev who remains a champion of an art form that has shaped my life and career while helping me to make a decent living by doing what I love the most. Also, my foray into Web3 has given me enough reason to want to see it succeed, seeing as I have seen and experienced every single gaming trend since the first ever video game was made.

First, the eloquence of the dissenting opinions expressed as per the Tally vote, cannot be understated. It shows that a lot of thought went into such a difficult decision to vote against or to abstain on such a pivotal and ambitious initiative. It beats the alternative "Yeah, hello nah! No way I'm not voting for that!"

Even I, who have been in the gaming business for 40+ years (I literally spent my life doing this one thing), couldn't help but agree with some of the expressed concerns for why this probably Tally vote needed to cook some more and for all other bases to be covered.

Game dev is hard - and risky. This is something that cannot be ignored nor the risk of failure underestimated. The bigger the investment, the harder the fall if/when it all goes south. Entire companies - even legacy studios - have fallen through the failure of a single project. In my latest missive regarding this program, I said:

There's no telling how this is going to turn out; and seeing as this is gaming whereby well over 90% of games will fail (in terms of recouping dev costs) - more so in the fledgling (gee, I guess us legacy game devs should've told them that making games was hard - and risky?) Web3 gaming ecosystem, my hope is that the hired/voted GCP team actually frontloads the plausible bets first so that all get to shout out the wins before the reality of the failures (there will be many) settles in.

I agree with @Bob-Rossi in his missive regarding the size of the funds solely for gaming being a huge risk. He's right. But we all knew this going in. Regardless, ARB is way behind the Web3 gaming curve, and in order to play catch-up, without leaving the likes of Treasure and XAI to do the heavy lifting, an initiative like this is needed. Arguably - and I did have this discussion with some parties - either Treasure or XAI could very well have written up a proposal such as this, only to see it fail spectacularly. Why? Because voters would clearly deduce that the benefits wouldn't flow to the DAO in the same way that they would be were it a DAO initiative.

The entire Web3 space is littered with games - most of them were either DOA or failed along the way. This has been the trend since 2019. Even the aggregate publishing websites are sitting on a catalog of underperforming games that nobody is playing. The reason isn't just about whether or not a Web3 game is good or bad, but more about whether or not money can be made from the games. Web3 gaming is a completely different mindset. Web3 games already have a lot going against them in this regard because unless you're playing a game because it's fun, once the money funnel dries up, people will move on. I've written about this, and similar traps since 2021. In this case, the incentives for playing a Web3 game are what tend to determine the game's success or failure - not if said game is fun or not. And so, the success or failure of a Web3 game has very little to do with whether or not the game is fun. And that's what we're up against.

That said, the question boils down to whether or not the DAO is going to pursue games and teams which have a good chance or success or continue the trend like those other guys who throw around $50K grants and hope for the best? Talented and experienced teams cost a lot of money - and ALL of them can afford to be picky. I would know because I am one of those guys. A team that has a $2M game budget has no interest in a $50K grant to go deploy their game on a lesser known "gaming chain". As an indie, I've personally never made a game that cost less than $5M to make; even by 1900s standards when my first game, took 7 yrs to make. And so, a grant that doesn't move the needle in terms of what a team is doing, ends up being of little or no interest. In fact, most of the upcoming Web3 games of the AA ilk now cost north of $8M (avg) to make because it's already become clear that in order to succeed in Web3 gaming, you have to fallback to the trad rules of engagement. And that, my friends, costs a lot of money.

While I agree that [material] changes such as the program time line and increased costs should have remained constant between temp check Snapshot and Tally votes, I am satisfied with the reasons given by @Djinn as to why those changes were necessary. Also, looking at the voting metrics between both votes, tells me that even if there was another Snapshot with the these changes before Tally, such a move wouldn't have made much difference to the Tally vote. In other words, what does spending another 3-4 wks updating, discussing etc. an update ahead of a second Snapshop vote, do?

As to paying the author for writing a proposal, one has to remember that most proposals which require funding almost always see some funds going to the authors because that's why they wrote them. For example, if I wrote up a proposal for a grant to make a game, as a member of the team, I would most certainly reap financial benefits from such a grant. With regards to this GCP, Dan made it clear that he wasn't a part of the GCP proper (neither council nor team). And so, one could regard him as an advisor/author of a program that took countless hours to put together, and with a lot of background moving parts. To that end, I have no concerns that the author - who has no part to play in the GCP ops - be compensated for this comprehensive and time-consuming effort. Plus, he started this in Feb; which means he had to have been discussing and thinking about it prior. And, from my calculations based on what they're hoping to build, it's going to take a good 6+ months before GCP even gets off the ground to the point whereby they start acting on proposals. So, it's not $100K to "write a proposal". It's about all the work that had to be done from start to finish. Heck, on any given day, you could hire an advisor to help you raise funding - and they all want 10% of whatever they help raise. It's all relative. But if you ask me, he did it for cheap because if this was me, I'd be asking for 10% of the entire haul, much to the chagrin of the voting whales who wouldn't be amused by such an affront. lol

I do want to voice my agreement that the GCP funds should probably remain in the DAO treasury. It wasn't entirely clear to me that the amount would be moved out of the treasury entirely and into the coffers of the GCP sans DAO (or Arb Foundation) oversight. I just assumed that whatever the GCP funds amounted to, would be a multi-sig with pre-existing oversight and guard rails managed by pre-existing foundation oversight. That said, I have to believe that a multi-sig of any kind inherently has a level of trust. To the extent that it's highly unlikely that a group of [known] people would rug the funds. To that end, if one argues that it's not about anyone rugging, then what is it about, and what difference does it make either way? If the funds are to be spent - and a multi-sig group has the auth to spend them - then that's what is going to happen regardless of where the funds are being held. Unless the concern is more about the market pressure that such a huge egress of funds would have on the token price. In which case, I think taking a look at the value of the voting wallets is a clear indication that large bag holders don't see that as much of a concern.

All said and done, a good 90+% of games coming through the GCP will fail to yield the expected results. But in gaming, the math is always about hoping that 1 or 2 games make enough money to cover the costs of the others that fail to make it. Yet still, that doesn't mean that the GCP stands to lose 90+% of its value by virtue of games that don't make it.

I remain hopeful and confident that a team of experienced people will be hired to lead this, and that they will use best practices - and not favoritism or tribalism - to curate the best teams who have the best chance of making this work. It is unfortunate that I can't be a part of that because, with three Web3 projects (dePIN + 2 games) in my 24-27 portfolio, the timing isn't right. Regardless, I wish them all the best with it, and I will continue to follow it closely because I am very much vested in seeing it succeed for the good of Web3 gaming everywhere.

0xgb.eth

posted 2 years ago

Here are my key points regarding this proposal from the perspective of a Gaming Studio on Arbitrum (we have been building Footium, a multiplayer football management game, for the last 2 years):

250

Here are my key points regarding this proposal from the perspective of a Gaming Studio on Arbitrum (we have been building Footium, a multiplayer football management game, for the last 2 years):

While the proposal could be refined, speed is essential given market dynamics and competition. Acting decisively is crucial to ensure timely access to funding for game studios.

250

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

e.g.

[quote] Instead of creating the GCP from scratch, couldn’t the Arbitrum community work on refining the Questbook gaming grant program by: [/quote]

And so, extending the Questbook gaming program would require a completely new program, while possibly retiring the pre-existing one as-is.

In short, another Questbook proposal will just end up being a version of GCP anyway. Aside from the fact that the pre-existing Questbook doesn't actually have the stringent controls that GCP has.

Agreed. And these were already addressed in some fashion here in the discussions as well as in the proposal updates.

All of this is true - and most of us have harped on these points. However, tbf, that's why @Djinn increased the time span from 2 to 3 years; which in turn, increased the costs.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from aepac

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Quoted from aepac

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Ah yes, that's been the case for some time now due to the crypto down-turn. Even though things appear to be picking up, lessons learned from back in 2020 when investors threw copious amounts of money at teams that didn't know the first thing about making games, have served as a wake-up call whereby it's a lot harder now to raise funds for making games because investors are looking a lot more closer than they otherwise would.

That said, while I now understand your sentiments regarding growth and traction under GCP, that doesn't change the inherent risks that will still be there because GCP isn't going to mitigate those risks outside of normal process. At least to any meaningful degree because teams looking for money and/or guidance isn't a measure of failure nor success.

Quoted from aepac

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I see. I don't recall seeing any of that mentioned in the education thread or the proposal itself. It's possible that you know more behind-the-scenes stuff than I do. Nevertheless, the inference above is just as I have indicated repeatedly; in that - as designed and proposed - the GCP is seeking to operated like a publisher/distributor. And that's no mean feat.

Quoted from aepac

Indeed, the current state of ARB’s gaming ecosystem may not yet be cohesive in the traditional sense, with many games and their communities gravitating towards platforms like Treasure and potentially XAI in the future. This reality underlines the importance of the GCP’s main objective: to attract top-tier builders capable of creating compelling, high-quality games. These games are essential not just for their entertainment value but for their ability to draw in and retain new users within the Arbitrum ecosystem, thereby nurturing a vibrant and diverse gaming community. If they leverage Treasure or XAI (honestly it’s not a fair comparison right now), it’s beyond the core scope of GCP.

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Absolutely agreed. I have repeatedly said that Treasure and XAI cannot be relied upon to carry the burden of curation and growth on Arbitrum because, centralization aside, the GCP needs to be able to curate a diverse and eclectic suite of games such that their growth makes Arbitrum the focal point.

Quoted from aepac

My experience includes collaborating with Upptic on projects we’ve either published or played a significant financial role in (i.e; we acquired the studio). The real potential of a $400M investment lies in strategic management and execution. The difference between speculating about what might be achieved and actively working towards making those achievements a reality is crucial. Our focus should be on leveraging this funding effectively to create impactful results.

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Agreed. I actually mentioned Upptic, Windwalk etc. as part of some of my missives in a bid to illustrate that the success of a game is a lot more than just doling out money.

I should note that Helika just announced a $50MM accelerator fund to enhance metrics such as:

User acquisition
Engagement
Retention
Growth

Quoted from aepac

Indeed, the figures from Fortnite’s creator payouts are astonishing, showcasing the incredible potential of successful game ecosystems. However, expecting Arbitrum or this program to mirror Epic Games’ success or launch the next “Fortnite” may not align with our immediate goals or realities.

Given your extensive experience as an indie developer, I’m sure you appreciate that our focus is on fostering a diverse and vibrant gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum. The aim is to attract developers and gamers with the promise of innovative and engaging gaming experiences, rather than replicating the blockbuster success of established giants overnight. “We want to develop the next Fortinite or AAA game” is simply the wrong goal.

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Ah yes, my point was not to say that GCP should aspire to that. I was attempting to point out that those impressive metrics are indicators of trad gamer engagement, and the impact that such games can have on an ecosystem - that being Fortnite. In turn, curating engaging games for Arbtirum lies in the ability to attract and retain games which would be a growth and retention funnel within its ecosystem proper.

Quoted from aepac

What is it?

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I have been formulating some ideas, but nothing yet that I am comfortable sharing publicly. We can discuss further on Telegram if you so choose. Do feel free to ping me there: thedereksmart

That said, yesterday, Steven posted something that resonated with me as an indie dev.

"Some are repeating the same mistakes again this cycle. If a chain’s sales pitch is “build here because we’ll pay you” that’s not sustainable, lacks character and should be a :exclamation: :exclamation: :exclamation: for devs. These chains may be up for an inning or two but they’ll lose the game. You can’t buy soul."

Seeing as you've responded to several of my posts, I can conclude that you've seen me echoing some of these very same sentiments. He's absolutely correct; and this is something that I hope the GCP doesn't engage in whereby games get funded as a way to get them over, rather than based on merit and prospects of success.

Quoted from aepac

I understand your concerns about the effectiveness of financial investment alone. However, I wonder, what outcomes do you envision for the Catalyst Program to consider it a success?

Nevertheless, I believe it’s critical to start with a presumption of efficacy and the selection of a competent team. I maintain an optimistic perspective, viewing challenges as opportunities for growth. It’s an ambitious endeavor, and maintaining a positive outlook is essential for navigating the journey ahead.

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From my perspective as an entrepreneur, investor, and indie dev, I would be more inclined to refer to the standards and metrics from trad gaming - then assume the worst case scenario due to the Web3 stigma. And so, if every GCP funded game makes it to release, that's a win of sorts because most games don't even get that far. It's why, in the education thread, I had outlined some suggestions for various game stages which then determines the funding cap for same. It's specifically why other chains can tout their list of games, despite the fact that most of them are underperforming and haven't yield the [financial] metrics which would be worthy of being deemed a success. Recall that I had pointed out that financial success is the only metrics worth focusing on.

So, to me:

If a GCP funded game actually makes it to release, that's a win
If they end up making money, to the extent that they are paying for their monthly operational costs, that's a bonus
If they make enough to give back to the GCP so that money can be recycled to on-board other aspiring games, then we can all pack and get ready for the [hype] train to Valhalla.

Incidentally, Sam (Horizon/Sequence) posted his GDC recap which included his usual brand of truth telling. This gem stands out:

2024-03-28_16-30-44|492x500

Quoted from aepac

With all due respect, it might be worth taking a closer look at who’s actually building on Arbitrum, past and present.

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Perhaps you misunderstood the point that I was making. Let me quote the entire thing again for context:

"While I had already pointed out that the GCP wasn’t going to be a thing for several months, and that even games currently in production aren’t likely to deploy inside of 12 months, finding ways to reach those devs in the interim, is probably a good idea."

The point that I was making there has nothing to do with games currently building on Arbitrum. I was making a broad statement about games in dev, and which don't even have Arbitrum on their radar. And so, given how long it would take for GCP to get up and running - a point that I already made, and for which Karel had his MVC idea - it's worth finding a way to reach out to those devs in the interim, instead of waiting for the GCP to be up an running before those efforts (by way of application filings) get underway. If not, those games would likely build elsewhere, thus reducing the pool of [worthy] games to curate from in the short term. Games take a long time to make; and not all teams are making 6-12 month "throwaway" games which are usually devoid of any intrinsic value.

Quoted from aepac

The idea that it’s okay for games to take over 12 months just to see the light of day doesn’t sit right. If that’s what we’re seeing after the first year, then it’s clear – the Catalyst Venture Team and the Council aren’t cutting it and should probably be shown the door. Quick development and getting games out there is key; we can’t afford to drag our feet.

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But that's not up to the GCP. And games - good games - take some time to make. Attempting to setup the GCP to only consider games which don't span 12 months is a recipe for disaster. It also says more about the quality of games, than it does about their ability to succeed.

Again, I should point out this is specifically why I provided these suggested guidelines based on decades of experience in the biz. I would expect that the Catalyst Venture Team would adopt best practices along these lines in their selection/curation of games.

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There is a measure of risk mitigation based on this industry standard guidance criteria. e.g. a game in year 2 of a 5 year term, at a cost of $5MM, can't be compared to one that's 5 months into a 12 month term, at a cost of $250K. But there's absolutely no way to gauge the success or failure of those two games; except to say that the former likely represents a much larger and well-designed scope, than the latter.

Quoted from aepac

I must disagree with your figures regarding the migration costs. From my experience and current discussions, the notion that it requires $200k to migrate a game to Arbitrum is not accurate.

Many teams I’ve been in talks with are operating or planning to operate on Arbitrum with budgets starting at around $5k/month (let’s x2, that’s $10k a month…). These are developers deeply passionate about gaming, eager to explore or continue their journey on Arbitrum.

However, starting from incorrect assumptions can lead us down a problematic path, shaping a flawed rationale for the future.

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While that may be accurate based the game devs and games that you're looking at, I can safely say that is absolutely not the norm. What you're implying there not only doesn't take into account important factors such as game type, game scope, team size, team expenses etc but it also ignores the fact that all chains aren't equal, tools and languages different, smart contracts - even those which may need to be migrated - all take time, the latter costs money, and testing isn't something you can do overnight.

That said, it is highly unlikely that games looking deploy on Arbitrum are OK with a $10K per month spend to assist in deployment costs, let alone migration costs - both of which are different things.

If someone asked me - today - to migrate either of my games to Arbitrum, and I tell them it would cost me up to $250K, and they asked me why I can't do it for $10K per month, that would be a very short conversation. And yes, I've had those very same conversations before; and so, I am speaking from experience.

This whole "we can/should do it cheaper and quicker" narrative is precisely why - today - gaming in Web3 is in dire straights. Deploying a game on a chain isn't just a matter of "put it on da blockchain", and cheap doesn't always mean better.

I invite you to ask the Crypto Unicorns team what it's costing them to migrate from Polygon to XAI. I can all but guarantee that it's not "2 x $5K a month".

Quoted from aepac

What concerns me more are the expectations set for these teams by Arbitrum and the criteria for defining a game’s success as perceived by the DAO.

If we’re using metrics like monthly transactions as the primary measure of a game’s success, then, in my opinion, we’re not laying the right foundation. This approach is what I’ve gleaned from conversations that developers have had with Offchain Labs, and it worries me.

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Absolutely agree; and I've said those very same things before because it's important to factor in. For my part, it's why I'm more concerned about the professional makeup of the Council and the Catalyst team, than I am about the games being curated. It all starts with the team - and even the best teams aren't infallible.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from aepac

While their success and player base may currently seem modest, especially when compared to traditional mobile gaming benchmarks, it’s important to remember that these efforts preceded the establishment of the Gaming Catalyst Program. The potential for growth and traction once the GCP is fully operational is significant.

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Can you explain how you see the potential for growth and traction being significant under the GCP?

From my perspective and experience, I have always found that access to money isn't a litmus test of success or failure. Most especially in gaming. The GCP is merely a funding vehicle which has no involvement in the viability, let alone the success or failure of a game project. I brought up this comparison before, in that a traditional publisher tends to do a lot more than just provide funding. It's why indies self-publishing on Steam or EGS tend to have to do all the things - including marketing - that publishers would otherwise do. And yet still, it's a hit or miss.

My view of the success of the GCP is transient to that of the games funded by it because at the end of the day, even those that don't have an ROI requirement, won't succeed by just their mere presence on ARB.

Quoted from aepac

The frequent mention of AAA games, while ambitious, shouldn’t overshadow the program’s immediate goals. Our focus should be on attracting, guiding, and nurturing builders and game developers. This approach will not only enhance the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum, but also introduce more players to our platform. While AAA titles may emerge in time, our initial aim should be to foster “fun games to play” that resonate with a broad audience.

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Indeed. But herein lies the rub. ARB doesn't [yet] have a [cohesive] gaming ecosystem. At least not in the traditional sense. And most of the games and their associated communities, are parked on Treasure; and soon others will do the same on XAI. And so, games being funded through the GCP aren't going to somehow automagically create a gaming presence other than be featured among a list of slew of games on something on like Arbitrum Arcade.

There are quite a few fun games (e.g. Pirate Nation comes to mind) already within the ARB gaming ecosystem; but most of them aren't being played. And as I said before, it's not because they aren't fun games, nor is it visibility a problem due to the small amount of games on the ecosystem. I believe that the primary issue is one of exposure, not discovery. Marketing and/or promoting a game to a bubble of degens isn't a plan that yields the expected results. Especially given that that [degen] bubble primarily cares more about making money than about the games themselves. And so, if you have a game that's not terribly fun and which doesn't have decent tokenomics, no degen is going to touch it. Similarly, a fun game without decent tokenomics will suffer the same fate - every time. And even the degens who do end up checking out such games, are likely to bail in search of the next thing. This is the reality of Web3 gaming - and which cannot be ignored. And it's specifically why the games with the larger budgets - not even AA or AAA - reach out beyond the degen bubble due to extensive marketing and promo activities. For example, games like Shrapnel, the aforementioned Off The Grid, and a few others.

My point being, the GCP can provide as much funding to a team as is required, but there are several factors that go into how that game performs, and whether or not it is a "win" for the ARB community proper.

What Treasure seems to have achieved on ARB, and which I believe XAI is also on track to do, is create an AIO (All-In-One) on-boarding solution. This is similar to the Steam and EGS model whereby you get all the tools that you need to deploy/publish on the platform; but when it comes to marketing and promo, you're [mostly] on your own. All that aside from the discovery problem because such an easy on-board system tends to also create a glut of games.

As I mentioned in the education thread, these are some of the things that the Catalyst Team needs to make a priority in funding grants or venture deals. A team needs to not only show how much of the funds are going toward dev, but also their marketing plans. And since some of these things have KPIs and similar activities which cannot be tracked - at least not without periodic reporting to the GCP team - there has to be a way to show that when you said 10% of funding when to marketing, that 10% of funding did in fact go to marketing. There are entire teams (Upptic, Windwalk etc) that do dedicated Web3 marketing activities as well as community building.

Anyone who believes that just throwing $400MM at this challenge is going to somehow yield expected results, really doesn't understand how any of this works. I know that I already sound like a broken record in this regard, but it's something that I am hoping sinks in as things move forward.

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Indeed. And that's the part of the challenge of expanding the [degen] bubble from the outside. But that's what everyone else is currently doing anyway; and honestly, ARB doesn't have an edge that I can see thus far. We're not talking about a Steam vs EGS vs Green Man Gaming vs Everyone Else. We're talking about ARB competing with other "game-centric" chains which already have a major lead, even in the face of Treasure and the growth of XAI. And the end result is going to be that without [gamer] eyeballs being on the GCP funded games, it's an insurmountable challenge.

Today, I saw David Taylor's analysis of the revenue paid out to Fortnite creators. It's all kinds of crazy. A total of $320MM (!) paid out - in the past 12 (!) months. Most of those gamers are neither making nor playing Web3 games. And you're not going to attract them without a compelling game and a reason to even take a look, let alone play it.

In my view, besides a $400MM play, ARB needs something else that gives it the edge that other game centric chains don't have; and which, much like the noise of the GCP funding, makes gamers and builders take notice.

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I couldn't agree more. But the challenge is going to be in not only identifying and reaching out to those builders like me who see the vision, but also to convince them that coming to ARB is a win-win. I will say this again, just throwing money at the challenge in a bid to see what sticks, will not yield the expected results.

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The sooner Arbitrum can get started, the better.

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Related to this, I was recently pondering something that @karelvuong pointed out in his missive in his Minimum Viable Catalyst suggestion due to the time it's going to take for GCP to get up an running. While I had already pointed out that the GCP wasn't going to be a thing for several months, and that even games currently in production aren't likely to deploy inside of 12 months, finding ways to reach those devs in the interim, is probably a good idea. But here's the thing:

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The ARB grant appears to only go up to $150K; and that's if you apply directly and within a specific funding cycle.

That hasn't - thus far - yielded the expected results because only one game, Into The Dungeons, went that route for 180K ARB. And it failed to pass.

One. Single. Game.

When you consider that the budgets of large teams tends to eclipse that of the average indie, offers of $150K to "large teams" isn't the sort of thing that those teams even consider; regardless of the fact that grants aren't designed to fund games to any meaningful degree. So, what would such a team do with $150K that's worth going through the trouble of deploying on ARB? e.g. If I were to migrate my in-progress Web3 game to ARB from the chain we're currently on, it would cost me in excess of $200K to do it. And so, of what use is even a $200K grant to me if that's just going to go towards my migration/deployment costs? What else is there in the ARB ecosystem that warrants the migration? That is a personal example of why I keep saying that this is a lot more than just money. And these are some of the questions and metrics that any builder who knows what he's doing, and who isn't just looking for money without any guarantee of performance, is going to be asking themselves.

That said, any builder that decides to go through the MVC via the voting process, is not only more likely to fail - even based on the merits of the game - but once that happens, they're not coming back.

And so, to me, despite the best intentions there, I believe that to try and "jump start" GCP via such an MVC, aside from adding another layer of work and a risky barrier of entry, will also - in one fell swoop - yield results which GCP naysayers will be quick to highlight at some point because the process would be seen as being rushed (something that I have advocated against).

And speaking of GDC, the announcement of King of Destiny, a preexisting game, and XAI's announcements (e.g. Crypto Unicorns), were the only notable ARB gaming news. And speaking of migration costs, the CU teams also pointed out how major it is for them to migrate from Polygon to XAI.

It's clear from the recent proposal vote that the voting population realizes the need to on-board gaming to ARB - in a big, albeit expensive, way. However, it's up to the foundation itself to start making moves now, ahead of the GCP, or we're all just going to be having this very same discussion +6 months from now. I remain confident that the GCP is a blue ocean opportunity, and so, I will try to help in whatever way that I can.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

Difficult to argue with these sentiments because they highlight the fallacies of Web3 gaming - such as it is.

That said, I would argue that there are quite a few commercially successful Web3 games currently in operation. However, in my experience, the definition of gaming success depends a lot on the value proposition. For e.g. a game that cost $1M to make, and which recoups its costs, but subsequently fails down the road, doesn't make it a failure. Yes - as I have repeatedly pointed out, a vast majority of games will fail. This problem isn't restricted to Web3, though it's a lot more pronounced given the added challenges of gaming.

Difficult to argue with these sentiments because they highlight the fallacies of Web3 gaming - such as it is.

If the GCP forks out $400MM to secure games, the reality is that it is unlikely to see an ROI of any kind, let alone even 30%. But once again, I have to point out that taking such a view is shortsighted because this proposal is more about getting more game devs to adopt the chain and for gamers to play those games. You have to ask how then does ARB benefit in that equation? It does in many ways but only - and only - if you look at it as a marketing expense and a growth vector. Does anyone here, and who is actually paying attention, see any DeFi growth in ARB, even without comparing to others? What is the purpose of the treasury. And please don't say anything about staking because that's as tangential as leaving money in a savings account without once being concerned about pesky things like yield, inflation etc.

Since the very beginning, gaming has always been the best way to gain adoption of any enterprise related to social engagement. If Blockchain was merely for DefI and similar, who do you think would be attracted to all these chains? You can only have so many banks - and most of them going on to fail or be bought out.

I would agree that gaming is "fundamentally incompatible with Web3" because I have said this for many years now. In fact, these past 48hrs, I've writing similarly in my X feed. But the flipside to this argument is that it's more about the games themselves than it is about trying to shoehorn gaming into Web3. As an engineer, I admit that there's no innovation in Web3 that warrants gaming of any kind being parked on it. All that talk about "owning" stuff is just a way to justify one thing over another; while P2E is precisely how we got to this very moment in time. Gamers, real gamers, don't actually care about such things. But the promise of Web3 games as an alternate revenue source for everyone involved, can't be understated. It's a new frontier that's basically a case of the emperor's new clothes.

In my estimation, if good controls are put into place, experienced people hired, decent games curated, and the GCP doesn't end up being a piggy bank for besties to loot via backdoor (these are more prevalent in Web3 than most think) deals, it can and will make an impact to the ARB ecosystem as a whole because growth is not just about gaming. And all this starts with who the voters put into Council positions, which then flows into who those people end up hiring. As I've said before, this initiative is basically a publishing/distribution/venture BD team. And that should be handled in much the same way that you would expect it to be handled if a VC gave $400MM to a startup. And that - all of that - is what everyone needs to pay attention to if/when this proposal passes Tally as most now expect that it will.

As I've said before, though I am unable to put my Web3 games through GCP because 1) I am already embedded in a chain, and as an indie studio, unexpected costs such as migration and associated expenses are a clear burden 2) it's going to take a lot longer to get GCP up and running than most realize; I still maintain that this is a blue ocean opportunity for everyone involved, and so, experienced and aspiring devs can seize on this opportunity to not only try something new, but also to reach a whole new audience which would otherwise not know about their game. But rest assured, if I could, I would most certainly deploy on ARB - if only to prove the points that I have made thus far in terms of this being a blue ocean growth vector - if you have a good game and an experienced gaming team attached to it.

Even if I say so myself (do freel free to ask my peers), I have an exceptionally good track record when it comes to gaming insights and trends; and so, despite the greater than zero chances of GCP being an unmitigated disaster and a waste of $400MM, I believe that this is a remarkable opportunity to kickstart growth on ARB. The alternative is to just ride the wave to 0 because, and this is coming from a numbers guy btw, that's precisely where every single Web3 platform is eventually headed. Grow or die. That's how that usually works.

At the risk of ruffling feathers, I will say this again. ARB giving ApeCoin DAO $3MM to build ApeChain is the type of thing to raise concerns about; not GCP. But the thing is - and rightfully so - the AF doesn't see $3MM grant as a risk or waste of funds - even when you consider the fact that the ApeCoin DAO, Yuga, and all their partners can very well afford to have built ApeChain if they wanted to. Why didn't they? It's not as if they didn't have the funds to do it. I would guess that AF decided to do it because they saw it as a growth vector and/or a marketing play. The latter failed spectacularly btw - if you actually looked up the trending metrics surrounding that. It landed with a resounding thud. And we won't know the results of the former (growth) unless and until ApeChain becomes a reality in the coming months. That's when devs will start asking wtf they should build on ApeChain instead of, oh I dunno, rolling an Orbit chain, or even going to Treasure or XAI, neither of which would guide them toward ApeChain. My guess is that Horizen (responsible for growth on ApeChain) is likely to throw funds (out of the meager $1M per year the grant accounts for) at such devs. And that brings us right back here; except the GCP has $400MM to do the same with, and also, with funding of that magnitude, a much better shot at attracting worthy devs and games.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

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Agreed. I actually mentioned Upptic, Windwalk etc. as part of some of my missives in a bid to illustrate that the success of a game is a lot more than just doling out money.

I should note that Helika just announced a $50MM accelerator fund to enhance metrics such as:

User acquisition
Engagement
Retention
Growth

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What is it?

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I have been formulating some ideas, but nothing yet that I am comfortable sharing publicly. We can discuss further on Telegram if you so choose. Do feel free to ping me there: thedereksmart

That said, yesterday, Steven posted something that resonated with me as an indie dev.

Quoted from aepac

I understand your concerns about the effectiveness of financial investment alone. However, I wonder, what outcomes do you envision for the Catalyst Program to consider it a success?

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So, to me:

If a GCP funded game actually makes it to release, that's a win
If they end up making money, to the extent that they are paying for their monthly operational costs, that's a bonus
If they make enough to give back to the GCP so that money can be recycled to on-board other aspiring games, then we can all pack and get ready for the [hype] train to Valhalla.

Incidentally, Sam (Horizon/Sequence) posted his GDC recap which included his usual brand of truth telling. This gem stands out:

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Quoted from aepac

With all due respect, it might be worth taking a closer look at who’s actually building on Arbitrum, past and present.

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Perhaps you misunderstood the point that I was making. Let me quote the entire thing again for context:

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Quoted from aepac

I must disagree with your figures regarding the migration costs. From my experience and current discussions, the notion that it requires $200k to migrate a game to Arbitrum is not accurate.

However, starting from incorrect assumptions can lead us down a problematic path, shaping a flawed rationale for the future.

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I invite you to ask the Crypto Unicorns team what it's costing them to migrate from Polygon to XAI. I can all but guarantee that it's not "2 x $5K a month".

Quoted from aepac

What concerns me more are the expectations set for these teams by Arbitrum and the criteria for defining a game’s success as perceived by the DAO.

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thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

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Can you explain how you see the potential for growth and traction being significant under the GCP?

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The sooner Arbitrum can get started, the better.

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The ARB grant appears to only go up to $150K; and that's if you apply directly and within a specific funding cycle.

That hasn't - thus far - yielded the expected results because only one game, Into The Dungeons, went that route for 180K ARB. And it failed to pass.

One. Single. Game.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

Difficult to argue with these sentiments because they highlight the fallacies of Web3 gaming - such as it is.

Quoted from AbdullahUmar

That being said, we’re not in favor of eliminating gaming in its entirety. There should still be programs to support game devs and attract publishers–but to a smaller account. Game development is very much an all or nothing task. Either we go all in or keep it light.

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Indeed. However, I think the proposal is setting aside $400MM to curate games; not that it's going to be spent all at once or on a few games with massive budgets. In fact, over in the educational post, I specifically highlighted the proposed budgets as being inadequate if the goal is to attract quality teams and their games.

[quote] The goal of this proposal is to play catch up, it seems. Hence, the focus should be on a handful of strong indie games. This budget could address that market, but we still feel that a smaller budget can be more prudently allocated to serve that purpose. [/quote]

Agreed. But this is specifically what the proposal is seeking to do. Except, it's not targeted at just indies, as that's an even greater risk.

[quote] We would encourage this proposal to go forward with a much smaller ask and collaborate with the grant groups, like the gaming domain allocator, to come up with a way to grow gaming. That way, some data points are present to help guide the funding initiative. [/quote]

All of this can be done within the GCP as it's just marketing, metrics, and process. Adding another layer (gaming domain allocator?) - or a glorified focus group - isn't going to achieve the expected results. I mean, the GCP could very well hire Helika or even Upptic, Windwalk, Naavik etc. and come up with sufficient metrics for guidance and pulse checking in any gaming areas they want.

[quote] We need follow-on investments to support the groups who are the most promising, and the best way to do so is track and monitor continual performance relative to given KPIs. As soon as KPIs are met, those teams attain more funding. This would elongate the timeline here from 2 years to many more. It would also reduce the ask of $400M to something smaller due to the tranched setup. This way, we are thinking more long-term and in an organized manner. Currently, it seems things are being rushed, which sounds like a recipe for disaster. [/quote]

I believe that's all part of the GCP process. I don't believe that just because something isn't mentioned in the - already detailed proposal - means that it's not part of the process. For example, I don't think that the GCP is going to dole out entire grant sums without milestone based tranches. However, at the same time, unless you're doing something different from what others are doing, and which is more attractive to game devs, there's little to no incentive to deploy on ARB. And so, adding what some would see as adequate safeguards which work in other industries outside gaming, may only serve to not only hamper the process but to also deter devs who already have a large pool of chains to deploy on.

[quote] The other aspect that we feel is unclear is how tangibly the reward will circle back to the DAO. There are two aspects this proposal can optimize for: increasing Arbitrum’s gaming presence and returning value to the DAO. Of course, both can theoretically be achieved, but there’s a very real likelihood that only one or none will be accomplished. If we are competing with groups like Immutable, who’ve spent the past several years throwing money at game studios, gaming partnerships, and tooling like their SDKs and custom APIs, it’s hard to justify spending this much capital to potentially see little return when a direct competitor is miles ahead and thinks about nothing else but gaming. [/quote]

Very true. And it's why the key to success has to be orchestrated via a fine balancing act by the GCP in how grant deals are structured.

Most of the chain deals that I have come across are either flat-out grants with no expectations of performance or venture deals with some ROI down the road. The GCP has to determine which route to take; but my guess is that even if it took the latter [ROI] route, structured properly and in a fair win-win manner, it would go a long way because game devs are already aware that in all cases they have to split their winnings.

The intrinsic issue here is that there are several factors that play into a win-win type ROI deal. For example, deploying on Steam means 30% of revenue, while deploying on EGS means 12% revenue. Right there, you've given up a sizeable portion of your revenue to be on a platform.

And you don't even have to deploy a game on either platform, although even with the saturation and discovery challenges on both, it's still better to deploy on either than to not. And so, when taking ROI splits into account, one should be mindful of the fact that a dev isn't likely to agree to any deal which doesn't have a win-win concept. By nature, a vast majority of VC and publishing deals are highly exploitative. As a lifetime member of the IGDA, and a one-time president of a local chapter for many years, I have come across a vast number of deals which game devs ask my advisory (always free) on. You wouldn't believe some of the deals that I have seen. In fact, I was once in that boat myself back when I first started out. And after my last deal concluded, I opted to self-publish. That was over two decades ago.

So, lets assume that games getting funding from the GCP plan to deploy on EGS (which, unlike Steam, allows Web3 games) . Right off the bat, that's 12% of rev. When you factor in the game costs as well as the on-going (little known fact: most, if not all, Web3 games have on-going costs) operating costs, it's easy to see that the financial pool shrinks - usually by a lot. So, a game seeking $250K funding, isn't going to have the same expenses and constraints as one that seeks $1.5M. And this is why I outlined some grant budget thresholds and guidance over in this post because those are some of the things that a competent and experienced games BD team would be looking on a per deal basis.

Resources:

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/the-hidden-costs-of-indie-game-development

https://www.guru.com/blog/what-is-the-average-cost-of-game-development/

https://pinglestudio.com/blog/game-development-business/how-much-does-game-production-cost

[quote] What we could focus on instead is a chain agnostic approach, where the DAO truly runs a VC gaming arm for the sake of profit, and of course, has a bias towards developing on Arbitrum. That way, at least we can more reasonably forecast ROI. [/quote]

What would a VC arm at a chain do differently from actual VC firms, BD teams at chains - or the Catalyst venture team that would be hired by the Council for this proposal? I would say, nothing different. Other than to adhere to less restrictive rules which guide profitability.

It should be noted that, the $400MM aside, this is also a marketing spend of sorts because if/when this passes Tally, at best, it will spark inquiries. Prior to that, my guess is that serious devs haven't exactly been pounding on the Arb Foundation doors for gaming grants - substantial or otherwise. Also, take a look at quest book. The dearth of games on ARB is due to the fact that game devs already know that, outside of Treasure - and now XAI, gaming isn't happening on ARB to any meaningful extent. This proposal, as I see it, is key to changing that.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

@Bob-Rossi

Very good points above btw. Not sure if you noticed them, but I previously made most of those points as well so that the community would have a better insight as to what this play is and what's at stake in both the short and long term.

@Bob-Rossi

Quoted from Bob-Rossi

As for a vote, still deciding at the moment. It’s been made clear the gaming is a huge space and Arbitrum is falling behind, I’m also worried though we too far behind the curve at this point (it looks like a lot of other chains pushed hard in 2022 and are really well aligned for this resurgence of the market). So while the spend is large I’m seeing the reason why, given we are behind and probably need to spend a little more to catch up.

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While Arbitrum has already fallen behind, when we look at gaming, they are always long-term plays. There's nothing short-term about it. And so, even though ARB has some catching up to do, I personally believe that it's in a unique position to capture the better crop of upcoming games, instead of having to curate from the pre-existing churn pool of games - most of which are likely to underform anyway. In the coming months, the new crop of Web3 games will have learned all what not do, as evidenced by the landscape of underperforming games parked on other chains. And so, my bet is that, as long as the Catalyst Group (which doesn't actually need to be a group of C Suite experts) is capable of curating and funding decent and engaging games which not only put the gaming first - and not just the game token, all will be OK.

In fact, and this is probably going to be rather unpopular, but I'm just going to say it. It would be of tremendous benefit to the ecosystem and community if the prerequisite for getting a GCP grant means that you cannot deploy a game token - of any kind. At least not without some restrictions. Instead, the game would use a game's internal economy to create a points reward system - just like MMO and similar games. And then tie that to $ARB. Not only does this create an initiative to build an engaging game, it also - to some extent - discourages farmers, while boosting the token itself. Usually, rolling game tokens is a means to raise funds from the community, investors etc. The Catalyst group should get rid of that. Sure, it would mean certain games won't come here, but so what?

This is the part where the community then gets to decide if they want enjoyable games or if they want games that they can make money from - even if they are otherwise enjoyable games.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from mcfly

Really appreciate your insights here. Considering the challenges you’ve outlined, do you believe there is a realistic path forward for the Arbitrum community to foster a thriving gaming ecosystem in the near to medium term with an alternative to the current GCP?

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Quoted from mcfly

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Thanks! Always happy to share knowledge and experience - even if they don't always paint a rosy picture.

To answer your question, there's nothing "short-term" about gaming. Even if a completed game was to deploy on ARB today, there's nothing to guarantee its success other than the game itself and the community around it.

Also bear in mind that unlike trad gaming, Web3 gaming is a completely different paradigm shift and one that gravitates more towards making money and filling bags than about playing a game. That's just the sad reality of it. Earlier this year, I wrote an article about this salient issue. And it's why, after the farmers have farmed the token, tanked the economy, then left the game, if the game doesn't or can't stand on its own, it will eventually die.

While I am not yet very familiar with the ARB gaming ecosystem, outside of Treasure that is, I don't think that the community should look from within to promote gaming adoption. As I have written before, in gaming you can't grow a bubble from within. Think about this. Say the ARB community is 10K (DAU) gamers strong, and they fund the game to the tune of $10K per day, $300K per month. Is that enough to sustain the game devs to keep the game going? That depends on the game. Live service games such as MMOs cost a fortune (trust me on this) to maintain. Even if there's no additional work remaining, you need to not only be on top of cheaters, scammers, abuse, bugs (no game is perfect and you would be surprised the kind of bugs that can crop once your game makes contact with gamers) etc. 24-7. And not only that, you need community management people as well as support staff.

What all this says is that the ability for a game to thrive here - or anywhere - depends on not just the pre-existing community, but also on how it attracts gamers outside the community, how the game is attractive to both parties etc. If gamers outside the community come here to play ARB games and the community isn't welcoming, unless the game can stand on its own, they will leave. And in some cases, even if the games don't hold their attention, it is the community itself - and how it treats new people - that will determine how it grows and how they impact games.

While the likes of WAX, IMX, AVAX et al all have large gaming communities and lots of games, most of those games, like those on Treasure, aren't being played for whatever reason. In fact, the last time I looked at the analysis from Naavik and others, most of those games are neither growing nor making money. So, the number of games on a platform isn't a metric of how well they are doing, let alone how the community reacts to them. As I have written before, again, it's the same problem with Steam, EGS and other platforms which, even with massive install bases in the millions, most of the games on them do not grow and thus don't make money.

You know why games like EQ, WoW, Runescape et al are still being played and literally printing money every month? The community which grew with them over the years. They are fun games, word gets around, people join, frens made etc. Web3 doesn't have that - and I very much doubt that it ever will because the current crop of games put priority in making money, not making a fun game that can cultivate gamers.

I am notable for my penchant for clarity and honesty, so, let me share something with you.

My MMORPG game which I am bringing to Web3 (IMX/AVAX) wasn't exactly lighting up the charts when it was live. It didn't have millions of gamers and it certainly wasn't making millions of Dollars per month. But, as a good (it wasn't great, and most games aren't that anyway), well designed, indie game with low maintenance costs, a passionate and engaged community, no grind type gameplay, the community more than paid for the game. And it kept growing. And so, I bought it from the investors because I figured that like its competitors, whether I later sold it or not, it would be around for another 10+ years even if we only extended it with expansion packs (of which we've since done two, now integrated into the main game itself), improved on the visuals - just like its competitors which did the same over the years. The community kept it going - and only because the game was engaging enough for them to do that, and to stick around. The pleasantly surprising aspect of that is when it got on Steam back in 2015, and we had to use the SteamWorks api for new user sign-ups, those accounts quickly surpassed the legacy accounts (which could still login to the game even on Steam because we had support for Steam and legacy login) from our website. And even with that [user] fragmentation, the end result was a cohesive community whereby even those who didn't actually like the game for whatever reason, still stuck around. I would know this because we can see their unflattering comments and their account play data.

And so, it's not just about what a community can do for a game - it's a two-way street. There's no benefit to a community embracing a bad game just because they want to support it. That actually never - ever - works out well in gaming. Ever. And this is part of why, in my foray into this GCP discussion, I have always provided insight and caution as to the expectations from the community. Just because there's $400MM to deploy for gaming doesn't make one bit of difference if the games aren't engaging enough for the community. And so, when outsiders hear about those games, then come here to engage and play them, only to find that they're not up to par, the end result just ends up with the community bubble not growing. Does the community want $400MM worth of games that even they, let alone outsiders, want to play?

The flipside of that is, when devs decide which chain to deploy their games on, a lot comes into play. Most of which is about money, how to make it, and how quickly to do so. You can easily tell this if you spend more time reading the game's tokenomics paper if public, or just by playing it. And so, a game being deployed to small community relies, on that community and outside farmers, to spark the money train. And that is how they fail.

Like I once tried with my Ape community who are deeply unserious about games not Yuga branded or the like, I would love to one day deploy a game to an engaging Web3 community, if only to help it grow as symbiotic relationships tend to co-exist. But it's just a different type of engagement metrics. e.g. when you make an RPG game, you're catering to fans of those types of games. When you make an FPS game, similar dynamics. But when you make a Web3 game - of any kind or genre - the odds are stacked because not only do you now have to cater to a horde that cares more about making money than about the enjoyment of a game, you also don't know what genre is even attractive to that community. And may the farce be with you if you try to deploy a Web3 FPS game into a Web3 community that mostly enjoys RPG games.

In closing, while I do believe that there's a realistic path forward for the ARB community, I would urge you the vocal gamers in the community, to come to grips with the fact that $400MM isn't going to guarantee anything. Not in the long term, and certainly not in the short term. And my guess is that more than one game signed by the Catalyst Group is likely to create a stir in the community who may not even like the game, let alone the spend to get it. And that's going to be as distracting as ever. Just like most everything in gaming. All you can hope for is that the Catalyst group hired by the Council, come up with criteria for the types and genres of games curated and funded in order to build an eclectic catalog of games. And even so, that's not a guarantee of anything because a game is only successful if people are actually playing because it's fun and not because they can fill and grow their [token] bags. If you can still play a game even if it doesn't have an associated token or that whole P2E thing, then you already have the answer as to what type of game is going to be successful for the community. Pick your poison.

Quoted from AbdullahUmar

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Agreed. But this is specifically what the proposal is seeking to do. Except, it's not targeted at just indies, as that's an even greater risk.

Very true. And it's why the key to success has to be orchestrated via a fine balancing act by the GCP in how grant deals are structured.

Resources:

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/the-hidden-costs-of-indie-game-development

https://www.guru.com/blog/what-is-the-average-cost-of-game-development/

https://pinglestudio.com/blog/game-development-business/how-much-does-game-production-cost

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

@Bob-Rossi

Quoted from Bob-Rossi

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This is the part where the community then gets to decide if they want enjoyable games or if they want games that they can make money from - even if they are otherwise enjoyable games.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from mcfly

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Quoted from mcfly

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Thanks! Always happy to share knowledge and experience - even if they don't always paint a rosy picture.

I am notable for my penchant for clarity and honesty, so, let me share something with you.

Quoted from mcfly

After carefully considering the Gaming Catalyst Program (GCP) proposal and the insights provided by OG in the gaming industry, such as @thedereksmart (thank you ser for following up on my prev comment), I have decided to vote “Abstain” on this proposal.

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You're welcome. Always happy to share.

Valid concerns there. However, I should point out that even $1B doesn't guarantee anything. That's the sad reality of the games dev business, unfortunately.

All the factors that you outline there, are all absolutely critical to the success of any game initiative. However, I should say that those metrics that you point out, are only available after the fact. In other words, you won't "know" unless you "try". And this proposal, such as it is, seeks to get to the try part sooner rather than later. To wit, despite their best efforts, there are many Web3 games portals sitting on underperforming games - games which I am all but certain those teams thought would make it. I keep coming back to Treasure because, until Xai came along, they were the gold standard for curating Web3 games on ARB. So, same story there. Go look at other portals such as Kap Games or any of the chains or portals that host Web3 games - they're ALL down bad. It's actually depressing tbh. But that's precisely how trad gaming started.

Take a look at this chart. It's an insight to why Web3 games - across all genres - are struggling for adoption.

blockchain_games|514x500

And as I've written before, it's not that they are bad games. It's mostly that, as I've found, the mindset of Web3 gamers isn't like that of trad gamers. The former care more about bags than about the game. This is a huge insurmountable problem that I don't see a fix for because the Web3 gaming culture, even with a cross-over with trad gaming, is all about "ownership", which in turn is about "profit".

Web3 games, already facing headwinds, have already hit the "Steam Wall" whereby there are so many games - mostly bad ones - that separating the wheat from the chaff is an exercise in futility.

All of this is me saying that it doesn't matter how it's done - and no matter the costs involved - there's always going to be [research] factors that are bad enough to kill any idea such as this proposal. And throughout history, it's known that you have no way to win if you don't try first.

Yup. As you are already aware, I have repeatedly stressed these very same points.

However, the flipside of this is that there are in fact Web3 games currently in dev, and which are the targets of initiatives from various chains. I would know this because, like myself, I have several friends in both indie and AA space who are working on transitioning their in-dev games to Web3 - if they could. IMX just put together another $100MM initiative to fund games because they, like most of us in the industry, know what's going on out there. And all the chains remotely interested in games have similar initiatives - even if they're not announced.

The risk there is not only the Web3 gaming stigma (which I believe is slowly subsiding as more and more good games sans cash grab tokenomics are released) , but also the fact that throwing everything at the [gaming] wall to see what sticks, means spending a lot of money.

In fact, at the on-going GDC, XAI just inked a deal with The MIX to bring some present and upcoming games to Web3. That's a big deal. However, it doesn't matter how many of those actually making the transition; what matters is how many are done properly and succeed. To me, that's the console/pc game port fiasco all over again. Trad gamers will rebel, but bringing those games to Web3 is crucial to growth; and not all of them have to succeed.

An initiative like this - which as anyone who bothers to read my missives knows I was first to highlight all the pitfalls - if handled correctly, has the potential to bring gamers to the ARB ecosystem; regardless of the quality of the games. The issue is, are there enough gamers in the ARB ecosystem to support the games? I mention this because since I came here, I have had several discussions with a few people within the ecosystem about my doubts in that regard. For example, what's the impetus for coming to ARB, as opposed to IMX, AVAX, WAX etc - all of which have large gaming communities who are all-in on their [gaming] engagement? That's the sad reality of the situation. It's the same thing over at my ApeCoin DAO where they're not remotely serious about games - unless ofc it's Yuga or Animoca or their partners - and those games fail. I would know that too because I tried - and failed, alongside other experienced teams. So, we all just went elsewhere.

If you don't have a community that is serious about games, it doesn't matter how much money you throw at gaming, it will all be for naught. But you still have to try.

I always put my money where my mouth is because I am notorious for not beating around the bush or saying/writing things that people want to hear. So, let me say this. Some in this community know that I have two Web3 games in dev - both currently targeted for a competing chain; and both on track for YE24 and H1/25 deployment, respectively. Now, you tell me, what's the incentive for deploying on ARB? From the perspective of a smart person, it should be obvious that this GCP proposal presents a blue ocean opportunity for any games team taking the risk of actually deploying on ARB as opposed to the other chains already saturated with games (most of which are underperforming). But that strategy will only succeed if the community believes in and supports the initiative. Yet still, what's the benefit of leaving a 10K strong gaming community to deploy at one with 2K? This is the battle ahead that eclipses the financial concerns of this proposal. As I've said before, throwing money at game devs is neither a sustainable strategy nor does it provide an edge in an industry where all of the chains serious about games are already throwing money around. Some devs will transition because they need the funds, while others will stay or transition depending on the community support at those chains.

I have to mention that, as of this morning when I checked, the proposal has already exceeded 95MM votes (98.92%) - with all the whales and large delegates carrying it. What that shows is that, despite some concerns about this proposal, the voters recognize that something has to be done. But at the same time, my guess is that they trust that the Council and Catalyst teams will self-govern while ensuring that the funds are put to good use, and as per best efforts and practices. Just like any venture.

Yup. Also, something that I have written tomes about. In fact, I just posted on X about a blog which I wrote in Nov 2021 highlighting this specific concern.

chrome_2024-03-21_11-29-45|597x490

The issue here is that most see Web3 gaming as a money making venture. I mean, what did anyone expect when the whole culture was born on the wings of Play-To-Earn (P2E)? I've said over and over that it was going to be the very one thing that will stifle Web3 gaming adoption. And so it came to pass.

However, the flipside here is that if you make good, fun and engaging games - even with tokenomics - they will stand out. I mean, games which are glorious cash-grabs, don't exactly hide it. And the reasons that they are no longer being played is because the LP has been drained, and so, there are no longer incentives for farmers and the like to play them. They just move on.

This is where the Catalyst group, in funding games, has to know every single detail about the game, the mechanics, tokenomics etc. And as I said in the education thread, this is why this whole proposal is basically a massive $400MM BD venture which is akin to an investor/publisher/distributor setup. And for that, it absolutely requires a team with that level of experience. And even then, that's not a guarantee of success.

[quote] Given these concerns, I believe that the Arbitrum community would benefit from further discussion and refinement of the proposal. By abstaining from the current proposal, we can signal our commitment to building a thriving gaming ecosystem while acknowledging the need for a more nuanced approach that takes into account the unique challenges and opportunities presented by the intersection of gaming and Web3.

I encourage the proponents of the GCP to engage more with the ARB community to refine the proposal and sets realistic expectations for the timeline and resources required to achieve these goals.

By taking the time to carefully consider and address these concerns, we can lay the foundation for a gaming ecosystem that is sustainable, rewarding, and truly reflective of the values and aspirations of the Arbitrum community. [/quote]

All very good points; particularly about the need for further dialog other than just rushing into this proposal. I pointed out the same things; and Karel's response was enough to satisfy my concerns.

Whether or not the Council or the Catalyst group adheres to them, is another story. But I am confident that the community will hold those teams accountable as things progress. What I am personally going to pay attention to, isn't actually the process, but rather the choice of hires as well as the criteria set for the curating games.

From all my experience in the games industry, one thing is certain and has always been the case, all it takes is that one game to make a difference. It's why publishers, distributors, console manufacturers etc. go to great pains - and at great cost - to pick out games they can make bets on. You win some, you lose some; but in every case, all it takes is that one bet. And so, the GCP has to find that one game, and the community needs to rally around it because if they don't, you end up in a situation whereby the game dev gets funding for their game, then the community abandons it - for whatever reason. And that's precisely why I have been calling for the criteria to be one in which the games build and stay on ARB - at least for a term - and, depending on the funding amount, no tokens designed as ICO be allowed.

Quoted from Bob-Rossi

This does indirectly hit at one of the fears with a program like this… are we going to end up funding a true gaming ecosystem or are we going to be providing a temporary capital boost to a bunch of Gacha ‘games’ that will jump ship 2 years from now when funds dry up? Because I’m not going to pretend to know the viability of not having a game token / NFT to the game, but you make a fair point about what some of these games really are.

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Indeed. But here's the thing, Web3 games need tokens for only 2 plausible and specific reasons. This being a well-informed Web3 community, I need not go into all the details, but I mention this only to illustrate my pov:

Funding. This can be from community or investors; and usually come with lockup periods etc.
Rewards. To the community for playing the game, and which they can then use in-game to buy or do stuff.

Depending on the stage at which a game requires funding, imo, it would be prudent for the GCP to put in safeguards to ensure that it's not just providing funding to a team that just needs liquidity other than what is needed to bring their game to ARB and to make it a success. As you said, once the liquidity dries up, those games will just get abandoned. The Web3 gaming landscape is littered with games like that, as you already know.

That said, we can't penalize a team for wanting to issue a token in order to raise additional funds for their game. But, like all investment deals, that team has to make a choice on what route they want to take. Take me for example, while my games are typically expensive - with the upcoming Web3 MMORPG being the single most expensive one for me, and by a wide margin - I have no reason to deploy a token other than as reward system for gamers. Issuing tokens for raising money basically provides additional funding for incidentals (e.g. marketing, server deployment, team growth etc). MMO games have traditionally had built-in economies in which their currency have no value outside of the game's ecosystem. In Web3, this presents an incredible opportunity for both the devs and the gamers if the tokenomics are done correctly.

Jan over at Outlier Ventures wrote a good article last year about the pros and cons of doing a token. And Yosh over at Revelator, and who designs tokenomics, also had a really article about that particular subject as well.

Even if $ARB is required to be used, the game can still issue a game-specific token but which is only used in the game as a utility. e.g. in my MMORPG game, you get free tokens for completing quests, finding secret stuff, engagement etc. And you can use those tokens to buy stuff in the game. And not just stuff that you own, but also consumables.

By requiring games use $ARB, not only does it help combat inflation in the game, but it also completely removes the issue of teams abandoning the game after their game token tanks (for whatever reason). Again, this isn't for all games because after all making games is a "for profit" enterprise and the goal is to make enough money to keep the game funded - especially if it's a live game and not just a one-off game.

I also want to mention that with Treasure's own $MAGIC token which has different utility and USDT paired, the concept of using a token native to a game's ecosystem is a solid one. However, that is only successful if the games using the token are fun to play and have a decent economics/tokenomics model to begin with. Short of that, if the game isn't successful in this regard, then the use of the token - even if it was unique to the game - is of no consequence.

That said, for a $400MM play, it's essential that a cohesive gaming ecosystem (not just Treasure) be built for ARB. To me, there's no reason to just do what others are doing when you have a war chest which can be put to so much better use than to just "fund games". Something along the lines of Arbitrum Gaming System (AGS) which is a portal for all funded GCP games - similar to Steam, EGS etc. would be an exceptional coup in the space because it would be much more than just a portal of disconnected games. The ARB community could build that. It's not rocket science. If the AF can give $3M to fund ApeChain - which the ApeCoin DAO could very well have funded themselves if they wanted to - I think that it can put up $2M to build AGS while the GCP is getting its act in gear to curate games. Something to think about as the community moves along this game-changing process.

Quoted from cp0x

I understand your reasoning. But Arbitrum tried only one option - giving money to startups to develop games. Only this option. Why not consider another with AAA or AA, because this is a normal approach to diversification. In addition, my second idea is to try to use existing and successful games to implement them into web3.

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Giving money to startups isn't the only option, though. As I understand the proposal, any team can decide to apply for a grant regardless of what stage their project is in. Then it's up to the Catalyst Team to accept it or not.

And in the above, whether it's indie, AA or AAA doesn't matter because whatever team(s) decide to apply for a grant, they can present their game pitch. Also, your exact query is why I had constructed my suggestions the way I did over here in the education thread, and which took into account games of different stages.

As to "use existing and successful games to implement them into web3" that's easier said than done. If a game is already pre-existing and successful, why would it want to migrate over to ARB from wherever they are currently deployed?

I will give you an example.

Remember that MMORPG game which I had bought, and foolishly tried to run through my ApeCoin DAO in order to get those guys on board with gaming, and which I referenced over here in the education thread?

That's a $26MM (base game, improvements, two expansion packs etc) MMO game since it was first developed some years back (btw Everquest just turned 25 yrs old). A 100% completed Web2 game with almost 400K unique accounts, large community, on Steam etc. when it was running.

Implementing Web3 features (blockchain, wallet, tokenomics etc) and 100% visual reskin, has been in dev since 2022 when I created a startup for that Web3 project. That entire exercise - start to finish - is over $3MM+ for which the visual improvements alone are about 75% of the costs.

That game's closest competitors (Domi, Avalon, MIR4, Mirandus, WorldShards, and possible Nine Chronicles) aren't even close in terms of gameplay, feature set etc. And some of these are still many years away from release. You know the main thing about those RPG games? They're all on different chains. NONE of them are on ARB.

I haven't taken any funding from chains because, metrics aside, money won't get you an "organic Web3 community". In the case of my MMORPG game which I am talking about, most especially as the game is likely to lose a large portion of its Web2 install base due to gaming's general resistance to Web3 games, there has to be a good reason to migrate over to ARB. And the cautionary tale is that when you've front-loaded all the risk, you get to call the shots. That's different from a team with a smaller game looking for funds to complete the game; or a team looking for funds to start a game.

Now for my point.

A lot of people don't really understand how much games cost to make, how long they take - and the inherent risks of that investment. I have dedicated over 40 yrs of my life to this industry and there is absolutely nothing about gaming or game dev that I am not familiar with. To me, Web3 gaming will continue to decline because [Web3] gamers are treating gaming the say way that they treat the next cash-grab airdrop; in that they want it now, they want to fill bags - and nobody really cares about the game.

Most people in this thread don't even realize that by the time GCP is even up and running, and even finds the first good game to fund, won't happen until YE24. And depending on the viability of the game, more likely nothing will deploy on ARB before H2/25.

And so, setting GCP aside for a moment, the reason nobody much cares about gaming on ARB isn't because of the community (most of them are parked on Treasure - and for good reason), it's because there hasn't been a reason to come here for that. A dev like me - and others like me - have zero interest in micro-grants (sub $50K) when we're talking about millions and larger games by experienced teams.

Right now, I see votes of 45MM ARB in favor of @Djinn GCP. The numbers don't lie, the interest is there. But that's just one iota of the battle ahead. Any decent game - such as mine - that's currently on track to deploy within the next 12 months isn't going to wait around for the GCP to get formed, get up and running, put up grant apps, wait for submissions, run through them, approve them, fund them etc. That's a long - long - process akin to a standard game funding/distribution/publishing process. So, those games would already have their deployment track ready and rolling, including maybe taking funding from the chains they are going on etc. and so, they can't exactly migrate even if they wanted to.

For a game - of any kind - of good quality and gameplay mechanics (including good tokenomics) to deploy on ARB - assuming they don't go on Treasure which already has a large built-in gaming community - by YE24, needs to already be in the process and ready to deploy right now.

As I said before, I don't have any immediate plans to deploy either of my two Web3 games on ARB because, [eager + excited] community aside, migration has associated planning, costs, refactoring etc. That's going to be the same boat that any game that's ready to deploy within 12-18 months is going to be in. Guaranteed. And those teams absolutely do not have the time to be messing around with DAO grants and the like because they already know the associated risks as well as the ramifications of running through a DAO gauntlet, wasting all that time, effort, and energy only to probably see it ultimately fail because at the end of the day, no matter how much the community likes the game, it's up to the voting wallets to make the financial decision.

I wish things were different, but this is the warning that I was giving over in the education thread that what GCP is building is basically a full-blown op that's not going to be as fast as most would like; and is likely to fund games the community likes and those it doesn't like because that decision is down to the Catalyst group because it's faster, more efficient - and is basically how it's done in the industry whereby it's just a handful of people at an investor/publisher/distributor group who get to green light games.

ps. Any ARB whale who understands all of this and is interested in talking to me (or my friends) about our games for deployment on ARB, feel free to msg me on Telegram (thedereksmart).

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

It's much higher risk bet to focus on AAA games because not only are they exceptionally expensive to make, but they also take a LOT of time and talent to build.

And they too can fail. Look no further than recently released Skull & Bones and Kill The Suicide Squad, both of which have failed - and from large AAA studios. Compare to Helldivers2 and PalWorld, neither of which is a AAA game, and cost under $10M to make.

It's much higher risk bet to focus on AAA games because not only are they exceptionally expensive to make, but they also take a LOT of time and talent to build.

There are quite a few quality AA games coming to Web3, and in various genres. e.g. Shrapnel, Domi Online etc. Thing is that all of the noteworthy games coming to Web3 and of AAA or AA quality ilk, are made by experienced and well-funded teams who can already afford to fund them. And most of them don't need these immaterial pocket change grants from chains. And so, they have no incentive to switch chains because not even the tech & gas are USPs now. I mentioned this in my earlier posts above.

This is why I cautioned about how to approach this GCP in terms of incentives for game devs. Bribing game devs to migrate over from another chain, isn't a sustainable plan in the long term. And so, what's left is to 1) identify the games already in the ARB ecosystem, and finds ways to grow them. That's where I believe Treasure and others come in 2) curate worthy games already building or about to, with a 2 yr span to release, and fund what it takes to not only get them done sooner, but also within the realms of the ARB ecosystem.

Since becoming involved in this GCP discussion, I have taken a closer look at the games in the ARB ecosystem; as well as ARB proper (no Treasure affiliation); and what I see, besides the underperforming games, is that these games tend not to pass the "why should I play this?" smell test. Tokenomics (another issue) aside, when you remove P2E and farming from the equation, if the game isn't fun, there's no reason to play. Also, if you remove tokens from the equation, why would a Web3 degen play it?

Yes, this is probably my thesis on why I believe that making several smaller ($250K - $10M) bets (indie & AA) is better than making larger bets due to the failure rate of games in general.

Let me give you an example. Since 2022, when I created a Web3 startup, separate from my primary studio, we have been working to release an MMORPG for Web3. That's a game that, since inception many years ago to today, has cost almost $30M to make. It didn't cost me that to make because I had bought it. But my investment is already hovering over $10M, and with another 12-14 months left to deploy, with a token listing coming later this year, it will cost another $2M for GTM, and approx $1M+ per month post-release to operate because, as an MMO, it's a live service game - the most expensive games to operate.

Those aren't small numbers. And they certainly aren't the type of numbers that you would expect a chain to give in grants - though I do know of grants (they are actually investments) of up to $15M by some chains.

So, of what use is a micro grant to a game dev like me or my friends, just to switch to a chain - or even to build on a chain that I normally wouldn't? It's all about perspective. To date, I haven't taken a single penny from any chain because I wanted the flexibility of building on a chain that not only has use case tech (and low gas) for my games; but also which comes with a built-in community because I know that I will most certainly lose a good percentage of my core Web2 gamers when I release a Web3 or Web 2.5 game.

And so, when you start thinking about playing in the realm of curating games, you have to decide if you're going big or just going for the low hanging fruit. The latter is why there are so many subpar cash grab games in Web3, even as better Web2 games are languishing on Steam and EGS because nobody is playing them due to the glut of games on those platforms.

GCP has some challenges ahead, we know this. As I have said before, people need to look past the amount of money and realize that this proposal is basically setting up and parking a BD + venture team - on ARB. That's no small thing; and the DAO is basically looking at building Treasure 2.0 in order to boost gaming adoption of the chain.

That said, I still wonder why all this is even needed when the foundation could simply have put up a gaming fund, and hire external BD people to curate and fund games - just like what other chains have done. Then again, those chains are run by people who see games as a serious enterprise. But it is what it is, and this is where we are now. And so, forward and onward. The only easy day was yesterday.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Quoted from Moonboi

You loose competitive edge as time goes by. Have you heard of first movers advantage?

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Quoted from Moonboi

You loose competitive edge as time goes by. Have you heard of first movers advantage?

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There is no first movers advantage in this regard. ARB is already playing catch-up in the gaming sector. Hence this impactful proposal. And given how long it takes to make games, coupled with the fact that financial incentives are no longer the edge that they once were in attracting good games, my guess is that GCP already has serious challenges ahead. But I am confident that, depending on who they hire, and how the plan shakes out, that it will - if nothing else - have some positive impact in the long term.

To be clear, there are many ways to look at this, and there's no point in making light of raised concerns, but we could spend the next six months discussing minutia when what really needs to be the focus are the core and key foundations of the proposal. Without a solid foundation, nothing built on top will survive because it's usually all about the best laid plans of mice and men.

Quoted from Moonboi

Other ecosystems like Immutable started funding teams long time ago with 500 million or so. I have no idea how many of their games are ready and how many are going to be released in next 6-12 months.

If Arbitrum starts funding 3-4 months from now, all this would start only then. Now, add the game development time on top of it.

Do you think other ecosystems will not be ahead of Arbitrum and hence, by definition, have advantage over it?

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Immutable thus far has 270+ games. And I am aware of several more because most of the guys with currently deployed games, as well as some games about to deploy, are friends of mine who work on them.

What most people don't realize is that a lot of trad [Web2] game devs are making the migration to Web3 in the background. Unless you're a notable (e.g. my friends over at Neon/Shrapnel) founder or team, that's not the sort of thing that makes the news. And that transition is growing now more than ever due to all the layoffs in the game dev sector because nothing says "Go find something challenging and build a bridge while you're at it" than being laid off; because it gives you an opportunity to explore new avenues.

Other ecosystems got this far in simple ways. I know this because for the past few years I have been engaged with all the key players.

Investors funded games, and those portfolio games ended up building on chains that are already part of an investor group portfolio.
The [sensible] chains put together BD teams to curate games from builders; mostly regardless of experience because, shockingly, very few trad [Web2] game devs cared about Web3 due to the resistance by gamers as well as the blight from all the crypto shenanigans and get-rich-quick [games].
The [sensible] chains specifically created toolsets which would be attractive to game devs because without a solid foundation, who would want to build on your [zombie] chain? And in doing that, even the game devs who didn't need grant funding, were able to on-board to a chain and ecosystem where they could thrive if they had a good game.

This was the core of my earlier dissent that if the ARB Foundation (herewith AF) actually cared [enough] about gaming, they would have engaged in similar activities by now, and so, the community wouldn't have required such a proposal from @Djinn and others. Especially not to the tune of $400MM. But here we are.

If you take Steam v Epic Games Store for example, the former had such a lead that it's unlikely that any other storefront will ever beat, let alone match its success. At least not in our lifetime. And they're a private company. EGS, on the other hand, even with gobs of money thrown around, didn't even make a dent in Steam's chokehold. And they threw a LOT of money at it. Scroll up to one of my posts for the links to some stories that I shared about this phenom. So, ARB isn't likely to make a dent in Web3 gaming just because it somehow allocated $400MM to the effort. The best that the community can hope for is that the money is deployed wisely by those in control of it, and for what it's worth, we don't end up in a situation whereby the onus and priority are placed on Treasure and others just because they are the de facto "faces" of the ARB gaming scene. That would be a patently unfair - and risky - proposition, as I've stated before. You're absolutely not going to grow a balloon without pumping more oxygen into it. The decision then is, are you pumping in oxygen (legacy) or helium (next gen) into the balloon?

Going forward, and given what's at risk here, I expect that the people who get voted into the Council will be mindful of the fact they need to come up with different plans to curate game builders because just because they have $400MM to play with doesn't mean there's going to be a successful deployment in the short-term, let alone the long-term. Why? Those other chains already have momentum - and they're not sleeping.

Added to that, bureaucracy, unfairness, short-sightedness and all the attributes that lead to failure, will absolutely kill this initiative before it even gets off the ground. And it's why I was initially opposed to the council + venture structure; until @karelvuong recognized the concern, and subsequently explained the reasoning while changing the name to fit a more broader narrative and understanding. Suddenly, it was all very clear (at least to me).

Quoted from ArbitrumLTCapital

However, its also clear that Treasure’s track record has not been great. If we evaluate how much they’ve spent using any reasonable metric for performance, Treasure has definitively proven to be ineffective at deploying large sums of capital.

For these reasons, The TreasureDAO team should NOT be directly involved in any decision making related to the use of funds resulting from this proposal. I believe this will produce the best outcome for all stakeholders, including Treasure.

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I think that's a patently unfair assessment. Things break. We fail. Game over. We try again.

Just because Treasure has the appearance of failure in some areas (e.g. arguably, game curation), doesn't mean that they don't deserve a seat at the table. These arguments (one of which I vehemently opposed on TG) are counter-productive because it means that people don't deserve a chance to either grow or to learn from mistakes made. I mean, if we're talking about scammers, yeah, who would want them at the table - or any table for that matter?

I need to stress this again: This proposal is not about Treasure. And it never was. At least that's not what I took away when I first read it. However, the appearances are there simply due to Treasure's exposure and notability within the ARB gaming ecosystem. And so, when some people read a proposal like this, they see all the glowing adulation from some people (all with new accounts on the same first day of posting), it's easy to see how one would think that Treasure is front-running this effort.

That Treasure - though Karel has explicitly stated that his opinions/suggestions are his alone (note: he is the face and name attached to Treasure, so we can all just disregard - out of hand - that disclaimer) is a huge supporter of this proposal should be a plus in terms of gaming. Why? Well, they are already the goto platform for games on ARB. To disregard that would be to say that Fortnite being a hit on EGS is due to the game, and not a combination of the game + the community that play and build on it.

And Treasure isn't responsible for allocating or deploying funds. And I certainly don't expect that anyone in Treasure would be in the Council, let alone in the Catalyst team. I believe that outfits like Treasure, XAI et al are better off on the outside, and being filters to help curate the games likely to be successful on the platform. How they get compensated (nothing comes for free, nor should their involvement) is a different issue. So, hopefully your concerns in this regard are premature.

Quoted from Moonboi

In fact, they are capable enough of launching their own chain and attract even more games using their capital.

The funding will allow them to do all of the above, at scale, which will benefit Arbitrum the most. They have every bit of right to get everything they deserve. Unlike many others.

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Launching your own chain isn't a measure of success or ability. I could send you a list of [ghost] chains if you'd like. And they too had great aspirations.

As I've stated previously, I certainly believe that Treasure's involvement would be a bonus; especially given that a large swathe of the ecosystem already know who they are, have experience with them etc. However, I don't see how deploying on their chain is more beneficial than just deploying directly on ARB. At least not without incentives for doing so. But that's a decision for the builders. If a term were deploying a game on ARB, for reasons of community exposure, I would most certainly suggest that they consider deploying within the Treasure ecosystem. It's not only free marketing, but it's also how you can curate an immediate community to your game.

Quoted from Rahuliojones

Treasure and their studios will and should be eligible for this grant just like any other applicant.

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I agree.

Quoted from Rahuliojones

As an early supporter of Arbitrum, they will and should be involved in the decision-making process. The $ARB allocation received has been used for Arbitrum governance, not filling their own coffers.

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I disagree. That's the job of the Council and Catalyst teams - not Treasure.

Quoted from Rahuliojones

The token? Fairly launched and bootstrapped from $30k liquidity. Mis-use of capital?

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Irrelevant to this discussion, and inconsequential to anything related to this proposal.

Quoted from Rahuliojones

No one would question nVidia on mis-use of capital when they were investing in chip technology and talent to reap rewards later.

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Their board and investors certainly would. And they have. I would know, I am a legacy nVidia investor.

Quoted from tungle3010

If XAI applied and approved for 50M fund, how the fund flow-in into XAI system, I mean, budget in $ARB, so you have to sell $ARB on the market and send the money in term of $USDT to XAI team, to pay for expenses, or XAI team will be paid in $ARB, and if so, is there a lock duration? cc @karelvuong

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Valid concern. But the fact is, why would there be a lock when the money needs to be spent? None of the things needed to build or promote a game, can be paid for in $ARB.

Quoted from readyplayerrich

I am FOR this proposal with the caveat that we need to be very thoughtful and selective over who sits on the council overseeing this venture. Although, the guidelines set for the council can be determined after this is voted as to not further postpone on this proposal - just that we keep these challenges in mind during the next step.

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Absolutely agreed. It's why I was also asking how the curation of the team would be done ahead of them being put up for vote. I mean, they're certainly not going to send up 100 applications in a bid to send them up to vote in order to pick the team.

Quoted from cp0x

Tell me where this information comes from? I look at the official Optimism data and don’t see 800M OP allocated for games

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Yeah, I was wondering about that myself, as I would certainly have heard about it.

Quoted from mcfly

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You're welcome. Always happy to share.

Valid concerns there. However, I should point out that even $1B doesn't guarantee anything. That's the sad reality of the games dev business, unfortunately.

Take a look at this chart. It's an insight to why Web3 games - across all genres - are struggling for adoption.

blockchain_games|514x500

Web3 games, already facing headwinds, have already hit the "Steam Wall" whereby there are so many games - mostly bad ones - that separating the wheat from the chaff is an exercise in futility.

Yup. As you are already aware, I have repeatedly stressed these very same points.

If you don't have a community that is serious about games, it doesn't matter how much money you throw at gaming, it will all be for naught. But you still have to try.

Yup. Also, something that I have written tomes about. In fact, I just posted on X about a blog which I wrote in Nov 2021 highlighting this specific concern.

chrome_2024-03-21_11-29-45|597x490

I encourage the proponents of the GCP to engage more with the ARB community to refine the proposal and sets realistic expectations for the timeline and resources required to achieve these goals.

All very good points; particularly about the need for further dialog other than just rushing into this proposal. I pointed out the same things; and Karel's response was enough to satisfy my concerns.

Quoted from Bob-Rossi

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Funding. This can be from community or investors; and usually come with lockup periods etc.
Rewards. To the community for playing the game, and which they can then use in-game to buy or do stuff.

Quoted from cp0x

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I will give you an example.

Now for my point.

ps. Any ARB whale who understands all of this and is interested in talking to me (or my friends) about our games for deployment on ARB, feel free to msg me on Telegram (thedereksmart).

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

It's much higher risk bet to focus on AAA games because not only are they exceptionally expensive to make, but they also take a LOT of time and talent to build.

Yes, this is probably my thesis on why I believe that making several smaller ($250K - $10M) bets (indie & AA) is better than making larger bets due to the failure rate of games in general.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Quoted from Moonboi

You loose competitive edge as time goes by. Have you heard of first movers advantage?

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Quoted from Moonboi

You loose competitive edge as time goes by. Have you heard of first movers advantage?

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Quoted from Moonboi

Other ecosystems like Immutable started funding teams long time ago with 500 million or so. I have no idea how many of their games are ready and how many are going to be released in next 6-12 months.

If Arbitrum starts funding 3-4 months from now, all this would start only then. Now, add the game development time on top of it.

Do you think other ecosystems will not be ahead of Arbitrum and hence, by definition, have advantage over it?

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Immutable thus far has 270+ games. And I am aware of several more because most of the guys with currently deployed games, as well as some games about to deploy, are friends of mine who work on them.

Other ecosystems got this far in simple ways. I know this because for the past few years I have been engaged with all the key players.

Investors funded games, and those portfolio games ended up building on chains that are already part of an investor group portfolio.
The [sensible] chains put together BD teams to curate games from builders; mostly regardless of experience because, shockingly, very few trad [Web2] game devs cared about Web3 due to the resistance by gamers as well as the blight from all the crypto shenanigans and get-rich-quick [games].
The [sensible] chains specifically created toolsets which would be attractive to game devs because without a solid foundation, who would want to build on your [zombie] chain? And in doing that, even the game devs who didn't need grant funding, were able to on-board to a chain and ecosystem where they could thrive if they had a good game.

Quoted from ArbitrumLTCapital

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I think that's a patently unfair assessment. Things break. We fail. Game over. We try again.

Quoted from Moonboi

In fact, they are capable enough of launching their own chain and attract even more games using their capital.

The funding will allow them to do all of the above, at scale, which will benefit Arbitrum the most. They have every bit of right to get everything they deserve. Unlike many others.

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Launching your own chain isn't a measure of success or ability. I could send you a list of [ghost] chains if you'd like. And they too had great aspirations.

Quoted from Rahuliojones

Treasure and their studios will and should be eligible for this grant just like any other applicant.

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I agree.

Quoted from Rahuliojones

As an early supporter of Arbitrum, they will and should be involved in the decision-making process. The $ARB allocation received has been used for Arbitrum governance, not filling their own coffers.

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I disagree. That's the job of the Council and Catalyst teams - not Treasure.

Quoted from Rahuliojones

The token? Fairly launched and bootstrapped from $30k liquidity. Mis-use of capital?

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Irrelevant to this discussion, and inconsequential to anything related to this proposal.

Quoted from Rahuliojones

No one would question nVidia on mis-use of capital when they were investing in chip technology and talent to reap rewards later.

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Their board and investors certainly would. And they have. I would know, I am a legacy nVidia investor.

Quoted from tungle3010

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Valid concern. But the fact is, why would there be a lock when the money needs to be spent? None of the things needed to build or promote a game, can be paid for in $ARB.

Quoted from readyplayerrich

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Quoted from cp0x

Tell me where this information comes from? I look at the official Optimism data and don’t see 800M OP allocated for games

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Yeah, I was wondering about that myself, as I would certainly have heard about it.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

I read the whole thing, though this excerpt - right off the bat - sold it (at least to me) because it means that you guys are in fact reading and taking concerns into account, and that I wasn't actually just being overly critical.

"However, changes/improvements should be made to launch a program that can truly catalyze gaming on Arbitrum. We’ve got a massive opportunity to do things right and do things well. This needs to move quickly while at the same time help stand up a long-term, sustainable structure that can continue to grow gaming on Arbitrum for many years to come — after we’ve had major gaming hits start to emerge from the early seeds we are sowing through the GCP."

And so, as someone without "skin in the game", I am pleased to continue my support of Dan for his effort to make this happen amid the largely insurmountable challenges ahead, and to Karel whose missive clearly proves that at least someone besides my mom and my friends, read the massive tomes that I wrote about this proposal.

I have no idea if this, as a $400MM ask will pass as-is, but I believe that at this point, it's "gud enough".

ps. I also want to add that this missive brought much-needed clarity to why a 2-tier structure was needed - amid all the challenges of what lies ahead. And the name change for the venture (to Catalyst) team, made it make even more sense that as was originally written.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

@aepac [quote="aepac, post:46, topic:2236] The essence of this proposal is really to encourage involvement from groups like Treasure, as well as other developers and builders, in the Arbitrum ecosystem. [/quote]

Yes, agreed - and that's the point that I was making; and that it's not about Treasure - and shouldn't be.

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Yes, agreed - and that's the point that I was making; and that it's not about Treasure - and shouldn't be.

[quote] Saying “nobody” is playing Treasure’s games is a bit harsh. They’ve been champions for Arbitrum from the start and have seen genuine engagement with some of their titles. For instance, take a look at The Beacon—it’s still in Alpha but has shown promising traction. [/quote]

I wasn't using that in the "collective" sense. There are games that nobody is playing; not that nobody is playing all games on Treasure. Hyperbole aside, I never intended for it to come across that way.

[quote]The lively discussion and differing viewpoints underscore Treasure’s influence in the space. The intention behind the 200MM ARB is to significantly enhance efforts like these. Whether it’s Treasure, Xai, or any other game publisher or developer, the goal is the same.[/quote]

I believe that we all agree on this?

[quote] For a clear picture of what Treasure has contributed so far, checking out Karel’s tweet might be enlightening. [/quote]

I am not - have never commented on their contribution or lack thereof. In fact, as my posts clearly state, part of my advocacy is indeed for the barrier of entry not to be higher for contributors like Treasure and others who have been here since day one; and that there shouldn't be a barrier of entry - at all.

Quoted from aepac

Given your statement about not planning to build on ARB, it’s understandable where you’re coming from. Your passion’s great, but we’re really trying to get everyone on the same track and make things happen. As Soby pointed out on Telegram, aligning stakeholders, ensuring proper economics, and pushing forward with actionable steps is key.

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I am a gamer and a game dev, I have designed, funded, released over a dozen games, and worked with a myriad of industry teams. I have been doing precisely that for 40+ years. For my foray into Web3, I created a startup back in 2021 specifically for Web3 games, separate from my primary studio of 30+ yrs. It was a bet that I made - with my own money and products - because I love gaming and all the communities around it. Though it took some convincing, I saw an opportunity to try and to do something new - in Web3 gaming. And so, I believe that it's safe to say that just because I don't have the opportunity to build on ARB at this moment in time doesn't mean that I wouldn't do so in the future. Even though I am 60 now, I still have a few games left in me. lol. Plus, multi-chain, if it came to that, is totally a thing.

Trying to get everyone on the same track is all well and good; but what's wrong with pointing out a dislodged track? After all, isn't it of benefit to all that we ensure a smooth rail track or is the plan to just run the train through anyway, then deal with the consequences down the track? That's not a good plan, is it?

And if getting 200MM to deploy based on just those elements alone was easy as stated, then investors would be lining up to give all of us who have those contacts, money. It's not happening. Getting funding for games is super hard - especially in this moment in Web3 gaming phase. The crazy money has all but dried up amid a swath of bad bets and failed games. And it's precisely why such an impactful proposal such as this from Dan needs to be solid.

While it's evident that most of Web3 is littered with the failures of many a dreamer and even the most successful planners and builders, the fact remains that if the goal is to BE impactful with such a proposal, you absolutely MUST get it right FIRST time. Unless of course the focus is in lining the pockets of friends and contacts and not really on the success of the games and hardworking builders who would come here. We have seen what happened when the investors gave funny money to a slew of people who never built a game in their life, and who envisioned that they totally could do it just because they happened to be sitting next to a game dev once. In college. Five years prior.

At the end of the day, we all want the same thing, and perhaps in different ways. e.g. most of you passionate and dedicated ARB folks want to move into gaming in a big way. Believe me, I feel your pain because I have fought this very same fight at my ApeCoin DAO - without success. And all my posts are still there. Out of decorum, I won't link them here; but anyone is free to DM me on TG and I will provide the links to those and my social media posts and articles about this specific issue. For the longest time I pushed and pushed and pushed for the DAO to embrace gaming because without it, adoption and growth for our community is nigh on impossible. Myself and other experienced devs and publishers (the links are in one of my missives in Dan's education thread) did our best. Then we all just gave up and moved on because, aside from having a voting system controlled by a few whales, without a concerted effort and concensus by the population, your vote is patently meaningless and inconsequential. As the saying goes, you can force a donkey to the river, but you can't force it to drink.

In comparison, other chains which today are leading the Web3 gaming wave, all figured out earlier on that gaming was - and has always been - the gateway to community building. And so, they created their own funds, and even outside of those funds, investors aligned with those chains, funded projects that build on those chains. I know this how? Because I have spoken to ALL of them, have contacts and friends at all of the key chains and groups. It's neither magic nor happenstance that those chains planned it this way.

Arbitrum is trailing in a genre that one would think should have been a priority given that they came along after those other guys. So, what changed? At which point did you guys all figure out that your ecosystem was trailing behind, and that Treasure wasn't going to be able to save everyone?

Let me be blunt here. Treasure can't do this alone. Ever. You're not going to somehow throw good money after bad then expect to reap rewards that aren't commensurate with the efforts that came before. They're neither publishers nor do they have anyone - not a single person that I know of - on the team who has the all encompassing experience required to pull off something as massive as what this proposal is suggesting. And it's precisely why I believe that the slant in this proposal is short-sighted - and even if this proposal passes as written - we'd be having a different discussion in two years when everyone starts asking where it all went wrong back in 2024.

Not that I need to stress - again - that I believe that Dan has done a remarkable job with this proposal. But the fact remains that there are other [external] forces at play here and who are looking, listening, and watching - while not saying anything publicly. I personally have no less 9 conversions going on right now about this proposal; and not just from people I know, but from others I don't know but who reached out to me after reading some of my posts about GCP. In fact, some of my industry friends who I sent the TG link to, have since joined that channel. So, to sit around and think that delegates are just going to vote in a 200MM proposal, regardless just because a group of frens are chanting "This is gud!! LFG!!!!" is short-sighted and irresponsible.

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thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

This reads well, but still needs some more work. I am particularly pleased that Dan took some of the suggestions in the education thread and incorporated them here. That said, here are my thoughts.

This GCP / Venture Team structure adds nothing tangible - other than [unnecessary] pay checks for additional people, with added bureaucracy.

A single GCP/Venture Team (5 people is more than sufficient for this) voted in by the community based on merit, experience etc. is a better path. There's literally nothing that a combined team can't do. So, why split it and create more red tape and friction? That's not conducive to expediency. And it doesn't need a "board". This team could focus specifically on all the tasks mentioned herein, while hiring third-parties for external activities such as legal, compliance, taxes, marketing etc. Just because you have 200MM doesn't mean you get to spend 1MM when 500K would work just as well.
Why must publishers be white listed? For one thing, that basically excludes a swath of publishers who aren't even involved in Web3 - yet. e.g. what purpose would it serve to have e.g. TreasureDAO be whitelisted? This is just friction.
Why does a publisher have to put up 10% matching funds? What problem is that initiative trying to solve? So, a publisher asking for a $1M grant to "build up the Arbitrum gaming ecosystem" has to put up $100K. Why? If it's about having skin in the game, that goes against the very concept being sold in this initiative. And that's not how grants of this type are designed to work. You want to attract gamers and publishers. And that means "little or no friction".

Not only that, why should the barrier of entry be higher for publishers? I foreseen the end result of this being: Studio A wants to get a GCP grant. So it approaches Publisher A who then explains that they (Studio A) have to put up the matching 10% in order for their grant to be submitted. So, all this does is create a pass-through event for the studio.
There is no need for a separate carved out 40M ARB. I don't see any reason for this. Especially since the process for getting a grant for those very same initiatives isn't any different than a game studio or dev looking for a grant. And so, why not go through GCP/VT rather than - again - going through an RFP voting gauntlet? This - again - is friction and red tape.
There is no need to have a carved out 20M ARB for "grants under $500K". That again serves no purpose other than to create more unnecessary work. In the education thread, I provided industry best practices which could be adopted in a manner that caters to various types of grants with a min and max. No need for carve outs because what that inevitably does is create a situation whereby once the $500K is fully deployed - the end. Then what? There's absolutely no reason - none whatsoever - to create a carve out that's just going to create a two-tier system. You have 200MM to spend. Go spend it. All welcome. That's it.
Outlining considered terms without the DAO having the benefit of those disclosures means that voters don't have insight into what exactly those terms are. So, GCP/VT gets $200M - then goes and makes up any rules it wants after the fact. That leaves voters with this: "wait! I didn't vote to that!". That's not goodwill. So, what needs to happen is spell out exactly the range of funding that are commensurate with the venture benefits. Again, I created an entire industry standard structure which can be adopted as-needed, and understood by all. e.g. we give you $2M, we [GCP/VT] get a 30% share of the revenue for 2 yrs.

This doesn't tell the voters anything as it lacks clarity: "Revenue capture up to the total size of grant will be split more favorably towards the DAO - this is a general rule, but each specific deal may see different percentages and deal structure" erm, wot?

Neither does this: "After the initial cost of the grant is covered, revenue share will be split according to agreed upon milestones dependent on time, total revenue, and other unique aspects - on a per deal basis" That entire sentence is rife with pre-requisite KPIs. So, spell them out for clarity so that, at least, there's a template understanding of what it is voters are in for. Then nobody can't say they were in the dark about what the proposal was pitching and what it is they voted for. Spell. It. Out.
This is absolutely anti-competitive (and dare I say a lawsuit waiting to happen) and narrows the playing field. It serves no purpose in a grant such as this, and it shouldn't be the role of GCP/VT to police external events related to BD: "Publishers will be free to approach any game builder but cannot poach from other Publishers within the Arbitrum Network"
And this is too ambiguous: "More detailed deal structure guidelines will be created by the Venture Team upon its formation". A proposal such as this needs to have all its ducks in a row and every single data point and KPI laid out so that the voters know what precisely is involved in doling out 200MM ARB to such an entity. I mean, nobody could go to any DAO and ask for $10K and there's an ambiguous line like that in there. It will ultimately fail at vote due to unanswered questions. Again, it just ends up with controversy down the road whereby something happens that wasn't previously disclosed or understood in the proposal, then has some voters up in arms about it because they never voted for "that" one thing that's now being outlined after the fact. Why risk this? You're asking voters (and delegates) for a significant sum of money. Just like investment decks, publisher pitches etc. you need to have every single detail outlined and clear.
"By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO". erm, why? Despite what most seem to think, 200MM isn't a lot of money for an initiative like this. There will always be deal flow for which money needs to be spent. Adding this just creates unnecessary angst and expectations. To wit: end of yr 2 the GCP/VT published reports come out and, whoa! we have 25MM left; yet we blew through 175MM and have nothing to show for it. But great, at least we didn't spend the last 25MM. Don't do that. GCP/VT gets the grant, that's where it ends. Whatever funds remain can certainly continue to be deployed as per this proposal's mandate.
I am not all that familiar with the Arb Foundation (AF) structure, but I don't think having the GCP/VT as a subsidiary of the AF is a good idea. All that does is create added risk and complexity to an otherwise insulated structure. It's specifically why, in the education thread, I had suggested a completely separate entity with zero ties to the AF. You could spend 15 mins with a good [Web3] attorney who will - right off the bat - explain why this is a terrible idea.

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

I have no idea if this, as a $400MM ask will pass as-is, but I believe that at this point, it's "gud enough".

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Yes, agreed - and that's the point that I was making; and that it's not about Treasure - and shouldn't be.

125

Yes, agreed - and that's the point that I was making; and that it's not about Treasure - and shouldn't be.

I believe that we all agree on this?

[quote] For a clear picture of what Treasure has contributed so far, checking out Karel’s tweet might be enlightening. [/quote]

Quoted from aepac

jump to post →

125

thedereksmart

posted 2 years ago

This reads well, but still needs some more work. I am particularly pleased that Dan took some of the suggestions in the education thread and incorporated them here. That said, here are my thoughts.

This GCP / Venture Team structure adds nothing tangible - other than [unnecessary] pay checks for additional people, with added bureaucracy.

A single GCP/Venture Team (5 people is more than sufficient for this) voted in by the community based on merit, experience etc. is a better path. There's literally nothing that a combined team can't do. So, why split it and create more red tape and friction? That's not conducive to expediency. And it doesn't need a "board". This team could focus specifically on all the tasks mentioned herein, while hiring third-parties for external activities such as legal, compliance, taxes, marketing etc. Just because you have 200MM doesn't mean you get to spend 1MM when 500K would work just as well.
Why must publishers be white listed? For one thing, that basically excludes a swath of publishers who aren't even involved in Web3 - yet. e.g. what purpose would it serve to have e.g. TreasureDAO be whitelisted? This is just friction.
Why does a publisher have to put up 10% matching funds? What problem is that initiative trying to solve? So, a publisher asking for a $1M grant to "build up the Arbitrum gaming ecosystem" has to put up $100K. Why? If it's about having skin in the game, that goes against the very concept being sold in this initiative. And that's not how grants of this type are designed to work. You want to attract gamers and publishers. And that means "little or no friction".

Not only that, why should the barrier of entry be higher for publishers? I foreseen the end result of this being: Studio A wants to get a GCP grant. So it approaches Publisher A who then explains that they (Studio A) have to put up the matching 10% in order for their grant to be submitted. So, all this does is create a pass-through event for the studio.
There is no need for a separate carved out 40M ARB. I don't see any reason for this. Especially since the process for getting a grant for those very same initiatives isn't any different than a game studio or dev looking for a grant. And so, why not go through GCP/VT rather than - again - going through an RFP voting gauntlet? This - again - is friction and red tape.
There is no need to have a carved out 20M ARB for "grants under $500K". That again serves no purpose other than to create more unnecessary work. In the education thread, I provided industry best practices which could be adopted in a manner that caters to various types of grants with a min and max. No need for carve outs because what that inevitably does is create a situation whereby once the $500K is fully deployed - the end. Then what? There's absolutely no reason - none whatsoever - to create a carve out that's just going to create a two-tier system. You have 200MM to spend. Go spend it. All welcome. That's it.
Outlining considered terms without the DAO having the benefit of those disclosures means that voters don't have insight into what exactly those terms are. So, GCP/VT gets $200M - then goes and makes up any rules it wants after the fact. That leaves voters with this: "wait! I didn't vote to that!". That's not goodwill. So, what needs to happen is spell out exactly the range of funding that are commensurate with the venture benefits. Again, I created an entire industry standard structure which can be adopted as-needed, and understood by all. e.g. we give you $2M, we [GCP/VT] get a 30% share of the revenue for 2 yrs.

This doesn't tell the voters anything as it lacks clarity: "Revenue capture up to the total size of grant will be split more favorably towards the DAO - this is a general rule, but each specific deal may see different percentages and deal structure" erm, wot?

Neither does this: "After the initial cost of the grant is covered, revenue share will be split according to agreed upon milestones dependent on time, total revenue, and other unique aspects - on a per deal basis" That entire sentence is rife with pre-requisite KPIs. So, spell them out for clarity so that, at least, there's a template understanding of what it is voters are in for. Then nobody can't say they were in the dark about what the proposal was pitching and what it is they voted for. Spell. It. Out.
This is absolutely anti-competitive (and dare I say a lawsuit waiting to happen) and narrows the playing field. It serves no purpose in a grant such as this, and it shouldn't be the role of GCP/VT to police external events related to BD: "Publishers will be free to approach any game builder but cannot poach from other Publishers within the Arbitrum Network"
And this is too ambiguous: "More detailed deal structure guidelines will be created by the Venture Team upon its formation". A proposal such as this needs to have all its ducks in a row and every single data point and KPI laid out so that the voters know what precisely is involved in doling out 200MM ARB to such an entity. I mean, nobody could go to any DAO and ask for $10K and there's an ambiguous line like that in there. It will ultimately fail at vote due to unanswered questions. Again, it just ends up with controversy down the road whereby something happens that wasn't previously disclosed or understood in the proposal, then has some voters up in arms about it because they never voted for "that" one thing that's now being outlined after the fact. Why risk this? You're asking voters (and delegates) for a significant sum of money. Just like investment decks, publisher pitches etc. you need to have every single detail outlined and clear.
"By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO". erm, why? Despite what most seem to think, 200MM isn't a lot of money for an initiative like this. There will always be deal flow for which money needs to be spent. Adding this just creates unnecessary angst and expectations. To wit: end of yr 2 the GCP/VT published reports come out and, whoa! we have 25MM left; yet we blew through 175MM and have nothing to show for it. But great, at least we didn't spend the last 25MM. Don't do that. GCP/VT gets the grant, that's where it ends. Whatever funds remain can certainly continue to be deployed as per this proposal's mandate.
I am not all that familiar with the Arb Foundation (AF) structure, but I don't think having the GCP/VT as a subsidiary of the AF is a good idea. All that does is create added risk and complexity to an otherwise insulated structure. It's specifically why, in the education thread, I had suggested a completely separate entity with zero ties to the AF. You could spend 15 mins with a good [Web3] attorney who will - right off the bat - explain why this is a terrible idea.

I think some of these guys think that this is a bailout of sorts for Treasure, and that these funds are somehow going to help them by way of Treasure. While I have no experience with Treasure, what I do know is that - as I have mentioned, and as seen in the metrics - they're sitting on a library of underperforming games - that nobody is playing. If Treasure needed funds to expand or to curate games and promote them, they could very well have put up a proposal to do just that. This proposal isn't that. And they certainly didn't need a 200MM play to do it.

So, that it was written in a manner that leads some to believe that, somehow Treasure - which for some reason has pivoted from developer to publisher (or portal depending on who you ask) - is going to be at the head of this effort, is why we're seeing all these posts about Treasure. That, to me, is an issue in and of itself that speaks to the fact that the proposal wasn't written in a manner befitting a wide array of external builders. In fact, in Dan's original education thread which was the precursor to this, it clearly stated that this effort was geared towards builders and publishers already in the ARB ecosystem. As I pointed out, that's a terrible idea because you want outsiders to come here, because clearly those who are already here, are in the minority and aren't likely to make any meaningful impact, let alone spark growth in gaming on ARB ecosystem.

I believe that this misconception is a terrible disservice to both Dan and Treasure because it unwittingly gives a rather skewed perspective on this proposal and its intent.

As my analysis above points out, certainly, everyone needs a seat at the ARB table, but it has to be equitable and fair to all; and all must be treated equally without fair or favor, backroom deals or any of that because otherwise the end result is that it will end up being the same people in the same churn - achieving very little, if anything.

I need to stress this, it's not relevant how many voting delegates spoken to at eth Denver because anyone with enough clout or trust to be a delegate bag holder knows the responsibilities and risks of being part of an effort to pass a vote for 200MM ARB which isn't likely to yield the expected results in the long-term. It's no small amount, and it's precisely why I am advocating for this proposal to be revised and all the concerns outlined and discussed, rather than rushing it to vote. Then again, this could all be a waste of time and the powers that be already figured out a way to get 200MM ARB regardless of merit.

Getting 200MM ARB in a hurry due to some imaginary sense of urgency, then going to try and figure out what to do with it, isn't a solid plan. It just isn't.

As I've said several times, including earlier today, it's not my fight and I currently have no plans to build anything on ARB. I just want to see Web3 gaming succeed everywhere - including here on ARB - and not just on AVAX, IMX etc because competition is good for everyone involved - even token farmers. lol

For the record, and as someone just asked me on Telegram DM, below is my reason for engaging and to help this succeed.

[quote] Primarily, a lot of the games and game devs are gravitating toward a small subset of chains - and that's bad for many reasons. We don't want consolidation like that because it's not good for long-term growth. It's why I believe that Dan's proposal - if written and executed properly so that it passes, stands a very good chance of changing the Web3 gaming landscape by providing another choice for gamers and game devs. [/quote]

132

This reads well, but still needs some more work. I am particularly pleased that Dan took some of the suggestions in the education thread and incorporated them here. That said, here are my thoughts.

This GCP / Venture Team structure adds nothing tangible - other than [unnecessary] pay checks for additional people, with added bureaucracy.

A single GCP/Venture Team (5 people is more than sufficient for this) voted in by the community based on merit, experience etc. is a better path. There's literally nothing that a combined team can't do. So, why split it and create more red tape and friction? That's not conducive to expediency. And it doesn't need a "board". This team could focus specifically on all the tasks mentioned herein, while hiring third-parties for external activities such as legal, compliance, taxes, marketing etc. Just because you have 200MM doesn't mean you get to spend 1MM when 500K would work just as well.
Why must publishers be white listed? For one thing, that basically excludes a swath of publishers who aren't even involved in Web3 - yet. e.g. what purpose would it serve to have e.g. TreasureDAO be whitelisted? This is just friction.
Why does a publisher have to put up 10% matching funds? What problem is that initiative trying to solve? So, a publisher asking for a $1M grant to "build up the Arbitrum gaming ecosystem" has to put up $100K. Why? If it's about having skin in the game, that goes against the very concept being sold in this initiative. And that's not how grants of this type are designed to work. You want to attract gamers and publishers. And that means "little or no friction".

Not only that, why should the barrier of entry be higher for publishers? I foreseen the end result of this being: Studio A wants to get a GCP grant. So it approaches Publisher A who then explains that they (Studio A) have to put up the matching 10% in order for their grant to be submitted. So, all this does is create a pass-through event for the studio.
There is no need for a separate carved out 40M ARB. I don't see any reason for this. Especially since the process for getting a grant for those very same initiatives isn't any different than a game studio or dev looking for a grant. And so, why not go through GCP/VT rather than - again - going through an RFP voting gauntlet? This - again - is friction and red tape.
There is no need to have a carved out 20M ARB for "grants under $500K". That again serves no purpose other than to create more unnecessary work. In the education thread, I provided industry best practices which could be adopted in a manner that caters to various types of grants with a min and max. No need for carve outs because what that inevitably does is create a situation whereby once the $500K is fully deployed - the end. Then what? There's absolutely no reason - none whatsoever - to create a carve out that's just going to create a two-tier system. You have 200MM to spend. Go spend it. All welcome. That's it.
Outlining considered terms without the DAO having the benefit of those disclosures means that voters don't have insight into what exactly those terms are. So, GCP/VT gets $200M - then goes and makes up any rules it wants after the fact. That leaves voters with this: "wait! I didn't vote to that!". That's not goodwill. So, what needs to happen is spell out exactly the range of funding that are commensurate with the venture benefits. Again, I created an entire industry standard structure which can be adopted as-needed, and understood by all. e.g. we give you $2M, we [GCP/VT] get a 30% share of the revenue for 2 yrs.

This doesn't tell the voters anything as it lacks clarity: "Revenue capture up to the total size of grant will be split more favorably towards the DAO - this is a general rule, but each specific deal may see different percentages and deal structure" erm, wot?

Neither does this: "After the initial cost of the grant is covered, revenue share will be split according to agreed upon milestones dependent on time, total revenue, and other unique aspects - on a per deal basis" That entire sentence is rife with pre-requisite KPIs. So, spell them out for clarity so that, at least, there's a template understanding of what it is voters are in for. Then nobody can't say they were in the dark about what the proposal was pitching and what it is they voted for. Spell. It. Out.
This is absolutely anti-competitive (and dare I say a lawsuit waiting to happen) and narrows the playing field. It serves no purpose in a grant such as this, and it shouldn't be the role of GCP/VT to police external events related to BD: "Publishers will be free to approach any game builder but cannot poach from other Publishers within the Arbitrum Network"
And this is too ambiguous: "More detailed deal structure guidelines will be created by the Venture Team upon its formation". A proposal such as this needs to have all its ducks in a row and every single data point and KPI laid out so that the voters know what precisely is involved in doling out 200MM ARB to such an entity. I mean, nobody could go to any DAO and ask for $10K and there's an ambiguous line like that in there. It will ultimately fail at vote due to unanswered questions. Again, it just ends up with controversy down the road whereby something happens that wasn't previously disclosed or understood in the proposal, then has some voters up in arms about it because they never voted for "that" one thing that's now being outlined after the fact. Why risk this? You're asking voters (and delegates) for a significant sum of money. Just like investment decks, publisher pitches etc. you need to have every single detail outlined and clear.
"By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO". erm, why? Despite what most seem to think, 200MM isn't a lot of money for an initiative like this. There will always be deal flow for which money needs to be spent. Adding this just creates unnecessary angst and expectations. To wit: end of yr 2 the GCP/VT published reports come out and, whoa! we have 25MM left; yet we blew through 175MM and have nothing to show for it. But great, at least we didn't spend the last 25MM. Don't do that. GCP/VT gets the grant, that's where it ends. Whatever funds remain can certainly continue to be deployed as per this proposal's mandate.
I am not all that familiar with the Arb Foundation (AF) structure, but I don't think having the GCP/VT as a subsidiary of the AF is a good idea. All that does is create added risk and complexity to an otherwise insulated structure. It's specifically why, in the education thread, I had suggested a completely separate entity with zero ties to the AF. You could spend 15 mins with a good [Web3] attorney who will - right off the bat - explain why this is a terrible idea.

There's so much more, but I decided to just stop at 10.

As an investor, gamer and game dev, this is an essential proposal. But it's clear - at least to me - that it was done in a hurry (to meet what deadline?). Which probably explains a vote in 2 days even after an almost month-long education thread yielded minimal interest and metrics. There's no need to rush through this. So, I highly recommend that you work through this some more, add needed clarity etc. The more info/data presented, the better the understanding of the voters (esp. the delegates). I can't imagine any investor forking out $1M for a proposal in this form, let alone $200M. Then you have DAO voters - who, as diverse as they are, usually stay silent and unengaged until it's time to vote. Then boom! Fail. The End.

227

I believe that this misconception is a terrible disservice to both Dan and Treasure because it unwittingly gives a rather skewed perspective on this proposal and its intent.

Getting 200MM ARB in a hurry due to some imaginary sense of urgency, then going to try and figure out what to do with it, isn't a solid plan. It just isn't.

For the record, and as someone just asked me on Telegram DM, below is my reason for engaging and to help this succeed.

132

This reads well, but still needs some more work. I am particularly pleased that Dan took some of the suggestions in the education thread and incorporated them here. That said, here are my thoughts.

This GCP / Venture Team structure adds nothing tangible - other than [unnecessary] pay checks for additional people, with added bureaucracy.

A single GCP/Venture Team (5 people is more than sufficient for this) voted in by the community based on merit, experience etc. is a better path. There's literally nothing that a combined team can't do. So, why split it and create more red tape and friction? That's not conducive to expediency. And it doesn't need a "board". This team could focus specifically on all the tasks mentioned herein, while hiring third-parties for external activities such as legal, compliance, taxes, marketing etc. Just because you have 200MM doesn't mean you get to spend 1MM when 500K would work just as well.
Why must publishers be white listed? For one thing, that basically excludes a swath of publishers who aren't even involved in Web3 - yet. e.g. what purpose would it serve to have e.g. TreasureDAO be whitelisted? This is just friction.
Why does a publisher have to put up 10% matching funds? What problem is that initiative trying to solve? So, a publisher asking for a $1M grant to "build up the Arbitrum gaming ecosystem" has to put up $100K. Why? If it's about having skin in the game, that goes against the very concept being sold in this initiative. And that's not how grants of this type are designed to work. You want to attract gamers and publishers. And that means "little or no friction".

Not only that, why should the barrier of entry be higher for publishers? I foreseen the end result of this being: Studio A wants to get a GCP grant. So it approaches Publisher A who then explains that they (Studio A) have to put up the matching 10% in order for their grant to be submitted. So, all this does is create a pass-through event for the studio.
There is no need for a separate carved out 40M ARB. I don't see any reason for this. Especially since the process for getting a grant for those very same initiatives isn't any different than a game studio or dev looking for a grant. And so, why not go through GCP/VT rather than - again - going through an RFP voting gauntlet? This - again - is friction and red tape.
There is no need to have a carved out 20M ARB for "grants under $500K". That again serves no purpose other than to create more unnecessary work. In the education thread, I provided industry best practices which could be adopted in a manner that caters to various types of grants with a min and max. No need for carve outs because what that inevitably does is create a situation whereby once the $500K is fully deployed - the end. Then what? There's absolutely no reason - none whatsoever - to create a carve out that's just going to create a two-tier system. You have 200MM to spend. Go spend it. All welcome. That's it.
Outlining considered terms without the DAO having the benefit of those disclosures means that voters don't have insight into what exactly those terms are. So, GCP/VT gets $200M - then goes and makes up any rules it wants after the fact. That leaves voters with this: "wait! I didn't vote to that!". That's not goodwill. So, what needs to happen is spell out exactly the range of funding that are commensurate with the venture benefits. Again, I created an entire industry standard structure which can be adopted as-needed, and understood by all. e.g. we give you $2M, we [GCP/VT] get a 30% share of the revenue for 2 yrs.

This doesn't tell the voters anything as it lacks clarity: "Revenue capture up to the total size of grant will be split more favorably towards the DAO - this is a general rule, but each specific deal may see different percentages and deal structure" erm, wot?

Neither does this: "After the initial cost of the grant is covered, revenue share will be split according to agreed upon milestones dependent on time, total revenue, and other unique aspects - on a per deal basis" That entire sentence is rife with pre-requisite KPIs. So, spell them out for clarity so that, at least, there's a template understanding of what it is voters are in for. Then nobody can't say they were in the dark about what the proposal was pitching and what it is they voted for. Spell. It. Out.
This is absolutely anti-competitive (and dare I say a lawsuit waiting to happen) and narrows the playing field. It serves no purpose in a grant such as this, and it shouldn't be the role of GCP/VT to police external events related to BD: "Publishers will be free to approach any game builder but cannot poach from other Publishers within the Arbitrum Network"
And this is too ambiguous: "More detailed deal structure guidelines will be created by the Venture Team upon its formation". A proposal such as this needs to have all its ducks in a row and every single data point and KPI laid out so that the voters know what precisely is involved in doling out 200MM ARB to such an entity. I mean, nobody could go to any DAO and ask for $10K and there's an ambiguous line like that in there. It will ultimately fail at vote due to unanswered questions. Again, it just ends up with controversy down the road whereby something happens that wasn't previously disclosed or understood in the proposal, then has some voters up in arms about it because they never voted for "that" one thing that's now being outlined after the fact. Why risk this? You're asking voters (and delegates) for a significant sum of money. Just like investment decks, publisher pitches etc. you need to have every single detail outlined and clear.
"By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO". erm, why? Despite what most seem to think, 200MM isn't a lot of money for an initiative like this. There will always be deal flow for which money needs to be spent. Adding this just creates unnecessary angst and expectations. To wit: end of yr 2 the GCP/VT published reports come out and, whoa! we have 25MM left; yet we blew through 175MM and have nothing to show for it. But great, at least we didn't spend the last 25MM. Don't do that. GCP/VT gets the grant, that's where it ends. Whatever funds remain can certainly continue to be deployed as per this proposal's mandate.
I am not all that familiar with the Arb Foundation (AF) structure, but I don't think having the GCP/VT as a subsidiary of the AF is a good idea. All that does is create added risk and complexity to an otherwise insulated structure. It's specifically why, in the education thread, I had suggested a completely separate entity with zero ties to the AF. You could spend 15 mins with a good [Web3] attorney who will - right off the bat - explain why this is a terrible idea.

There's so much more, but I decided to just stop at 10.

227

Djinn

47.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

We Did It!

A Huge THANK YOU to everyone in the Arbitrum Community, the GCP working group, and all the delegates who participated in the voting process! We're thrilled to announce that the Gaming Catalyst Program proposal has officially passed.

We Did It!

This is a major milestone for the Arbitrum community, and it wouldn't have been possible without your support, valuable feedback, and willingness to shape such an important initiative.

What happens now?

We're excited to dive into the program execution and keep you informed throughout the process.

There is a lot of work to do, and we will be doing our best to keep the DAO informed on the progress of infrastructure setup and next steps in the near term.

A few major items for us to tackle and share:

Council Formation: We'll soon be announcing the council process including dates, nominations for both the initial cohort and elections, and key details on council responsibilities and requirements.
Program Details & Strategy: Stay tuned for more information in the coming months! We'll be sharing details about our overall program vision, investment thesis and strategy, and most importantly, how you can get involved in this exciting journey.
Oversight and Treasury Management Process Improvements: We heard the concerns of some DAO participants around both items. There is active due diligence to better communicate and construct robust controls to ensure that fund usage is sustainable, and that the DAO has pathways to ensure oversight.

We believe the GCP has the potential to make Arbitrum the go-to platform for Web3 gaming. With your continued support and the dedication of the GCP team, we're confident we can achieve our ambitious goals.

In the meantime, feel free to share this achievement with your network! Please reach out to us if you have any questions.

Dialogue is extremely important with an ambitious program like the GCP. The process has been informed by hundreds of conversations with delegates, DAO participants, and other stakeholders -> we intend on continuing this culture of collaboration :heart:

jwindawi

31.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

Coming to this as a relatively new delegate, I want to first say how impressive the proposal’s authors have been in their willingness to adapt and refine the proposal in dialogue with the DAO. I was especially glad to see @Djinn and others on the team participate in this week’s governance call and share the latest developments. It has also been great to see members of the broader web3 gaming ecosystem get involved.

I’m voting abstain since I wasn’t around for the Snapshot vote for this important proposal.

While I think the GCP has transformative potential for Abritrum, and I have growing confidence in the team putting it together, there are a few aspects that would have led me to vote against had I participated in Snapshot. I detail these below in the spirit of suggesting areas for improvement as the program moves forward because we all have a vested interest in its success.

1. Information asymmetries. From their comments, it’s clear that the proposal team has been doing a lot of hard work behind the scenes to determine how best to structure the GCP. However, the results of that work - and especially the insights gained from groups like Delphi - has only filtered to the DAO in pieces, and it strikes me that we’d be more comfortable with taking the big swing here if more of those findings were shared with the DAO while in flight. I gather that may be happening in the tg channel and in conversations with involved delegates, which is a great step. Would love to see that taken further so that we can all be more conversant with the insights that are driving the decisions being made.

2. The f word. Establishing a legal entity is crucial for the investment component of this program but raises significant concerns, particularly regarding fiduciary duty. If there is a legal entity, then there will need to be some form of duty to someone. But if the DAO can’t be a legal signatory, then who is the entity legally bound to benefit? If things go south, how can the DAO ensure that its interests are protected if it’s not an LP, investor, board member, or whatever the counterpart is for the chosen structure? The ability to vote a single Council member out is necessary but not sufficient protection here.

We need to avoid a situation where the DAO is taking the most economic (and, as the deep pockets, potentially legal) risk while getting the least protections in whatever deals are struck. If the Foundation isn’t willing or able to act as the DAO’s proxy, then it will be extremely important for the DAO to have more clarity and voice at some stage in the legal setup, up to and including potentially hiring its own counsel to advise the DAO directly on whatever structure is adopted.

The f-word also matters because of the lack of clarity on how the investment decision process - which is typically geared to producing some hurdle rate of return - can instead be mapped to the broad and more qualitative goals of the program. This lack of clarity is a concern in terms of both return of funds (which is not a base case goal here but could be in the worst case) as well as the returns on funds. I think it makes a lot of sense to wait to initiate the investment part of the program until the mechanisms and structure of returns to the DAO are clarified in greater level of detail.

3. Scale mismatch. The lack of clarity around the above indicates a mismatch between the scale of the ask and the benefits to/protections for the DAO and its treasury. I buy the importance of the vertical, and I get the need for urgency. But given the amount of other potential claims on the treasury for other worthy projects, I do think this ask is too large in the absence of clear metrics and accountability to the DAO.

The best of all worlds would be to get to the fully requested amount, but that should be the outcome of successful execution over time rather than a binary decision. I agree with others above and on Tally that the best way to fix this is to move forward in stages following a very public and clearly documented pilot, with progress from one stage to the next subject to some form of DAO oversight given the amount of money involved. I’ve been impressed by other projects that propose some variation on this kind of structure even though they are much smaller. There’s no reason the GCP couldn’t be slightly modified to make this possible.

Congratulations to the team for taking the proposal this far - there’s a lot to be excited about here, and I hope we can all come out ahead as the project develops.

Djinn

47.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

We Did It!

This is a major milestone for the Arbitrum community, and it wouldn't have been possible without your support, valuable feedback, and willingness to shape such an important initiative.

What happens now?

We're excited to dive into the program execution and keep you informed throughout the process.

There is a lot of work to do, and we will be doing our best to keep the DAO informed on the progress of infrastructure setup and next steps in the near term.

A few major items for us to tackle and share:

Council Formation: We'll soon be announcing the council process including dates, nominations for both the initial cohort and elections, and key details on council responsibilities and requirements.
Program Details & Strategy: Stay tuned for more information in the coming months! We'll be sharing details about our overall program vision, investment thesis and strategy, and most importantly, how you can get involved in this exciting journey.
Oversight and Treasury Management Process Improvements: We heard the concerns of some DAO participants around both items. There is active due diligence to better communicate and construct robust controls to ensure that fund usage is sustainable, and that the DAO has pathways to ensure oversight.

In the meantime, feel free to share this achievement with your network! Please reach out to us if you have any questions.

jwindawi

31.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

I’m voting abstain since I wasn’t around for the Snapshot vote for this important proposal.

Congratulations to the team for taking the proposal this far - there’s a lot to be excited about here, and I hope we can all come out ahead as the project develops.

Camelot will vote “against” the Tally proposal, despite having voted “for” in Snapshot.

Although the proposal will pass due to quorum being reached and support shown by other delegates, we believe it requires a signal of disapproval. The problem does not lie in supporting games, both in crypto in general and in Arbitrum in particular: we are quite favourable towards pushing for a sector that can potentially create asymmetric returns for our ecosystem as a whole and drive growth. This is the main reason why we voted in favour during the temp check in Snapshot, despite the proposal being imperfect and incomplete in our view. However, we do not think this motivation is sufficient to give the proposal a free pass.

Specifically, we are against such dramatic changes between Snapshot and Tally: while understanding that the scope has changed from 2 to 3 years, moving from $10M to $25M in costs is something that should have been better highlighted and explained during the interim period, assuming it was even necessary. This huge compensation package, updated between the two votes, is something that should not happen, in general, for proposals in our DAO, especially for important and sizeable ones like this.

Among other things, we are not favourable to the lack of tranches and the performance bench-marking (accountability) that would be expected when discussing one of the largest gaming-specific funds in the industry, such as the explanation of the legal model or how the DAO is going to effectively manage assets from companies in which it invests. We believe that for a proposal of this size, $250m, it’s imperative to have in-depth structures and clarity laid out before a tally vote. We believe that a proposal of this type should provide more flexibility, proving execution and performance before unlocking further funds.

While we realistically know that this proposal will pass despite our vote, we want to signal that a proposal of this scale should have further oversight and not have such significant gaps between its initial snapshot vote and the tally vote. In addition to the lack of legal, overall structure, and accountability details, we believe this does not give us enough certainty to vote FOR. This proposal is for a significant amount over a long period of time in an area that is new for the DAO, and therefore we believe it needs to be broken down into much more flexible periods and funding that is more closely aligned to clearly defined performance metrics. Instead, we hope that despite the positive vote, this proposal will be addressed with either a re-vote, or specific sub proposals to fix the issues highlighted above by us and other delegates who are raising questions and have reserves.

Despite voting "Yes" on Snapshot, I will be voting "Against" on Tally. My Snapshot vote was made in favor of seeing where changes would lead, however upon additional reflection and review of the changes to the proposal I don't believe the proposal should move forward as stands.

I previously expressed hesitancy towards the size of the grant, mainly as a % of the DAO budget, but also the size in relation to the potential benefits funding specifically gaming could provide. The extension of the program from 2 to 3 years is appreciated, however I think ultimately this is too large of a grant to focus specifically on gaming. I don't really believe the gaming ecosystem is worth pursuing with this type of funding and given how far behind Arbitrum already is in the gaming space I fear we will just be throwing funding at hopelessly catching up. Additionally, people I represent as a delegate have shown either apathy or opposition to this type of spend. I am all for 'spend it if you got it', but I think this is too narrow of a focus over too short of a timeframe to be spending this large of a budget on.

I will note that I see value in the Infrastructure Bounties portion of this proposal, and as such on the off chance this does not pan out I'd be for further discussion / funding of something like that.

I also must echo concern expressed about the administrative costs. This is a hefty cost, both in terms of straight ARB as well as a percentage of the total ask. In fairness to the proposal, there has been some expanded explanations of the costs, but I still think they aren't fully substantiated and a little underwhelming given the time this proposal has been worked on. For example, an independent analysis of staffing costs was done, but then it was doubled without much explanation beyond "our estimates were higher". I will caveat all this with this - if the analysis is accurate and this is just the cost of business in the gaming space... then fair enough. However, I think then the discussion circles back to my main point - I'm not sure the cost to run this is worth the potential benefits.

Also, as a more general point --- I'm not a fan of the precedent being set to just start paying people to draft proposals. I understand a lot of effort goes into these things (100s of hours as noted above), but this wasn't part of the Snapshot vote and to throw it in as part of the Tally vote makes it feel pork barrel-ish (for a lack of a better word). In that obviously no one is going to reject a 225m ARB tally vote solely over a $100k spend... so it puts a voter in a difficult position where even if said voter is against that specific spend they are forced to stomach it to get a proposal through they would otherwise support.

BlockworksResearch from blockworksresearch.eth

2.00 TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

After much internal deliberation, and striving to stay in line with our general philosophy of refraining from establishing a precedent wherein votes are cast on onchain proposals that lack finalization and absolute clarity, Blockworks Research has decided to vote AGAINST this proposal on Tally.

While we at Blockworks Research believe Arbitrum should make a strong attempt at becoming the gaming ecosystem in the space, and think the high-level direction of the proposal is sound, there is some ambiguity related to the operational structure of the program, the size of the potential market opportunity, as well as risks associated with such a large upfront investment in this initiative that we cannot ignore.

First, we would like to point out the things we are in favor of with respect to this proposal:

The co-fund mandate imposed on the Game Publishers
The anti-poaching clause to ensure we see net new growth in the ecosystem
Multi-year KPIs (the studio deal KPIs in particular) with the flexibility to refine the 3rd year KPIs
The high-level structure between the Council, Core team, and IC

Generally, Blockworks Research is not against earmarking notable capital on catalyzing the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum, but we are unsure if the market opportunity for deploying 200M ARB is there today.

While we are in favor of an “optimistic governance” approach, we think giving all 200M ARB upfront is not a best practice and is not a good precedent to set. We believe giving a sizable amount upfront to give the program contributors latitude in making operational decisions is warranted and propose giving 50% of the total ask in advance, with the ability for the GCP Council/Core team to come to the DAO at a later date to unlock the remaining 50%. Even if the multisig has clawback functionality, having to use that clawback is much more politically and socially difficult than putting the onus on the GCP Council/Core to prove that the remaining 50% of funds are needed. We think this is a compromise and having 100M ARB upfront at the team’s disposal should give certainty to the eventual GCP team that Arbitrum is serious about this initiative while creating an incentive for core contributors to perform at a high level.

Additionally, there is currently no Conflict of Interest clause for the Core team members, only the Council members. Seeing as the Core team is the one predominantly handling the capital allocation on behalf of the DAO (majority of the seats on the Investment Committee), we believe this is a gap in the proposal that needs correcting before we would feel comfortable voting in favor. Moreover, there are no details in the proposal around the hiring process of the Core team, which feels like a gap we’d like to have more insight into.

Lastly, we’d like to see more detail on the revenue-sharing agreements between the game developers and the DAO. Our understanding is that these will be outlined in the quarterly transparency reports given to the DAO, but ideally, the DAO is given more transparency on what these deal structures could look like.

After a conversation with the GCP contributors, our understanding is some of our concerns highlighted above will be resolved and brought forward to the DAO post-approval (primarily around Conflict of Interest/hiring policies for the Core Team members). We appreciate the time all proposal contributors have taken over the past 6mo to move this initiative forward and look forward to hopefully seeing these as well as other community members’ concerns addressed in the future.

karpatkey

153.8K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

While the gaming industry is an interesting vertical, the significant budget required for this initiative and the various unsolved issues raised, albeit late in the proposal cycle, are concerns for us. Specifically, the GCP’s main focus and budget are dedicated towards investments (135m ARB) and grants and bounties (65m ARB). Despite this, there is no clarity on the legal structure to be used for these investments and the legal liabilities are unclear even though they are critical elements to the foundation of the program. Operational expenses are also considerable ($25m) and various delegates have raised concerns around this point. The specifics around the obtained funding are also vague. The funds' management appears to be delegated to the Arbitrum Foundation with no ringfencing of assets or separation of risk and the clawback mechanism appears missing.

Additionally, we prefer to see an organic strategy aimed at the sustainable growth of the Arbitrum ecosystem rather than standalone allocations of funds. This proposal represents a large disbursement for the Arbitrum DAO to be added to the already high annual spending impacting the Treasury.

Although we are not opposed to opening Arbitrum to the gaming ecosystem, it’s difficult to endorse such a large ask without clarity on the issues identified above. We believe it is critical to address the legal, funds management and treasury considerations before supporting this proposal.

For these reasons, we have voted against it.

GFXlabs from gfxlabs.eth

8.4M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Thank you for the response. GFX and its allies are appreciative of how open the proposal's proponents have been to seeking a middle ground we can all be comfortable with. As you know, at the moment we're still at an impasse around governance oversight.

Let's summarize our objections.

Quoted from Djinn

#2. Why the increase from $10m to $25m in operational costs between Snapshot and Tally?

jump to post →

11% expense ratio is just very high. If this is what is required to administer this program, then it shouldn't happen. Full stop. There are other opportunities that have more certain yield for lower cost. The cost structure needs significant improvement.

There is no legitimate reason why 225,000,000 ARB needs to be transferred to a multisig. That prevents any governance oversight. In theory governance can claw it back, but the history of DAOs is littered with such promises. Cayman and other offshore jurisdictions do not provide easy environments for DAO governance to exert its rights. It is better to keep control unambiguously with governance -- which means the funds should stay in the treasury.
This is an enormous amount of money for an industry vertical with no visible winners. This is highly speculative and looks like a YOLO.
This is intensely dilutive. Messages we have gotten the last few days about ARB from current and past ARB holders, which has underperformed ETH and OP, are intensely negative.

Ethereum and Optimism are positive over the last year. Arbitrum is down. The Arbitrum fundamentals are strong and this weak price performance is a reflection on the constant dilution that Arbitrum's spendthrift programs have inflicted upon the token. Arbitrum has a spending problem, and putting 8% of the chain's entire TVL into a highly speculative venture is bad financial stewardship. ARB in the treasury effectively does not yet exist. It's like shares authorized but not yet issued. 225,000,000 new ARB issuance is very dilutive and will affect your bags. Dilution isn't evil, but it needs to be thoughtful, efficient, and compared to alternative uses of the funds.

Our recommendations:

Lower operating cost. This is an uneconomical administrative cost. If expense ratios cannot come down, the entire thing should be cast aside. 8% is already expensive, but would at least be in the realm of realistic vs other alternative uses for the funds.
Implement actual oversight. Once the tokens leave the treasury, they are gone. They will be spent. There will not be any practical oversight by governance. Promises will be made, legalese will be trotted forth, but there will be little real-life ability to get the money back. A 5-person multisig should never have a quarter billion dollars of the DAO's money. There is no legitimate reason why the program cannot accept 6 months of funding and come back to the DAO for a top-up regularly. This keeps the program accountable to the DAO.

It's incredibly strange that this would be structured to provide three years of funding at a quarter billion dollars entirely upfront. This reflects a lack of experience and expertise. We have lived through too many island foundations, trusts, and SPVs to have faith the DAO will actually retain control of these funds. Once this vote passes, the funds are gone. They will never come back if recalled a year or two years later.

Between the high certainty of dilution by minting 225,000,000 ARB, the low certainty of returns on investment, and the high operating costs, this proposal should fail on its merits. If it passes by some stroke of good luck or inertia, we and other stakeholders will consider moving to repeal it immediately if left as is.

Griff from griff.eth

9.5M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Quoted from GFXlabs

There is no legitimate reason why 225,000,000 ARB needs to be transferred to a multisig. That prevents any governance oversight. In theory governance can claw it back, but the history of DAOs is littered with such promises. Cayman and other offshore jurisdictions do not provide easy environments for DAO governance to exert its rights. It is better to keep control unambiguously with governance – which means the funds should stay in the treasury.

jump to post →

I have to agree. But if this was completely the case I would be voting no on this proposal.

Quoted from GFXlabs

jump to post →

I have to agree. But if this was completely the case I would be voting no on this proposal.

However

Quoted from Djinn

Since the multisig will be receiving the ARB in lump sum to fund both the program and operations, we added a section to specify how we approach underfunding or overfunding of the operational cost.

The funding for operations will be calculated at the USD value of ARB at the time of the Tally vote setup (5/21/24). In the case of overfunding, the program will return any funds to the DAO treasury.

In the case of underfunding, the GCP team will have two options to continue operations:

Utilize any earmarked amounts for investments or grants to close the gap on funding up to the total allocated amount for operations

Stand up a vote to add additional operational funding to continue running the program

jump to post →

I am in full support of this proposal, I believe it can help Arbitrum dominate the gaming market, and I believe in the future of on-chain gaming. However, if ARB's price escalates greatly, we should consider clawing back the funds for other verticals.

I'm voting to support this proposal on Tally

Djinn

47.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

Thanks for all the feedback guys. I just wanted to share some thoughts in response to the questions around the overall budget as well as a timeline of the GCP communications.

Feedback is always welcome so please feel free to reach out to me or any other working group member if you have any additional concerns or want to deep dive into any of the GCP topics.

Thanks for all the feedback guys. I just wanted to share some thoughts in response to the questions around the overall budget as well as a timeline of the GCP communications.

Feedback is always welcome so please feel free to reach out to me or any other working group member if you have any additional concerns or want to deep dive into any of the GCP topics.

The working group has been super transparent about collaborating with delegates, the Foundation, and DAO members across many AMAs, open offices, and smaller discussions - so dialogue is extremely important to us.

I also don’t want to downplay the size or challenges that this program will face.

Just like any trailblazing effort, there is risk associated with this effort. But we added many checks to make sure the DAO has insight into performance and has a voice in the future of this program. These include but are not limited to an oversight council, transparency reports, and of course the ability to clawback funds.

The multi-sig that would hold funds (should the vote pass) currently consists of five trusted Offchain and Foundation signers. If we need to increase the total count of signers, let’s do it.

This is our chance to make a big difference for the Arbitrum gaming community, and the strong signals that propagated the crypto space after the successful Snapshot vote tells me people are resonating with the potential the GCP brings to what I believe could be the best gaming network in the small, but rapidly growing web3 gaming ecosystem.

#1 Why did the operational budget change from $0m on Snapshot to $25m on Tally?

The operating budget for the GCP was never set at $0M.

$10M for operating expenses was clearly noted in the proposal draft.

See the original post here.

The $10M figure was not included in the headline number for Snapshot, but was in the details of the budget breakdown. We recognize that more consistency should observed in terms of adding opex in Snapshot votes (proposals including the STIP for example also did not include the operational costs in the temp check proposals https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/arbitrums-short-term-incentive-program-arbitrum-improvement-proposal/16131/102). Honestly even the naming and details included within the Snapshot text itself were debated between myself and @coinflip in terms of what made the most sense.

#2. Why the increase from $10m to $25m in operational costs between Snapshot and Tally?

After the successful Snapshot vote concluding on Mar 22nd, the working group consisting of Dan Peng, @Soby from Xai Games, @karelvuong from Treasure, Helika, and the Arbitrum Foundation (as facilitators) continued to harden the existing proposal, which included a hard look at the timeline and budget needed to execute on an ambitious 200m ARB multi-use program.

We also started to bring in potential candidates for the GCP team to get feedback. These extremely experienced operators who came from top venture and gaming firms worked closely with us to battle test the operational setup and bring theory to reality.

What we found after speaking to these potential team members and a variety of industry advisors:

2 years was not enough time to thoughtfully deploy capital and see significant results in an industry with multi-year development cycles - especially if we are targeting serious games and developers. The decision was made to increase the program to 3 years.
The $10m allocated to opex in the Snapshot vote was not adequate for several reasons:
- Timelines were updated to 3 years
- Salaries + bonus structures would need to be adjusted due to the lack of carry as compensation for GCP investment team members (carry typically starts to come into play 5+ years after the start of a fund).
- The program includes a mixture of investments, grants, and RFP creation / management and would need a more diverse staff than a typical fund
- Immutable X, Ronin, and other competitors in the space provide extensive Developer Relations and Support to drive success in development, live ops, community activation, etc.. ,The GCP does not need to match Ronin or Immutable but it does need to support its builders
- Legal costs were better scoped after several calls with Foundation legal partners

The timeline of updates and public communications are detailed below.

Timeline

Gaming Research Forum Post (Feb 15th)

Link: https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/arbitrum-and-the-future-of-web3-gaming/21270

Other communications:

Arbitrum Gaming AMA (Feb 12th): https://twitter.com/arbitrum/status/1756796652835295330?s=46&t=vKyyxar9_lQrb6e-UhUMcQ

Eth Denver Working Group Onsite (Feb 26th - Feb 28th)

Initial Forum Post (March 12th)

Link: https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/catalyze-gaming-ecosystem-growth-on-arbitrum/22368

Details:

200m ARB
$10m opex budget
2 year program

Snapshot Vote (Mar 5th - Mar 22nd)

Link: https://snapshot.org/#/arbitrumfoundation.eth/proposal/0x1a9f2097b0b5a0021628e9edb0e7c9bffae4fdbb104f9996463e40a3129c7718

Details:

200m ARB
$10m opex budget
2 year program

Other communications:

Treasure GCP AMA (3/15): https://x.com/i/spaces/1RDGllYMYvOGL/peek

L2Beat Gaming Interview (3/21): https://twitter.com/Sinkas_/status/1770818902408282124

Updated Draft for Tally v1 (Apr 18th)

Link: https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/catalyze-gaming-ecosystem-growth-on-arbitrum/22368/173 Details:

200m ARB
$20m opex budget (+$10m)
3 year program (+1 year)
Updated with additional advisory from former / current publisher and studio executives, former / current venture partners, potential GCP team members

Other communications:

Arbitrum AMA (May 8th) : https://twitter.com/i/spaces/1eaKbgvBaEBGX

Updated Draft for Tally v2 (May 10)

Link: https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/catalyze-gaming-ecosystem-growth-on-arbitrum/22368/176

Details:

200m ARB
$25m opex budget (+$5m)
3 year program
Updated with additional advisory from former / current publisher and studio executives, former / current venture partners, potential GCP team members

Tally Vote (May 24 - Jun 7)

Link: https://www.tally.xyz/gov/arbitrum/proposal/53472400873981607449547539050199074000442490831067826984987297151333310022877

Details

$25m opex budget
3 year program

Last note:

This is one of the first (if not the first) DAO programs that will stand up a professional, full time team ready to deliver grants and invest in game developers within Web3.

I believe that transparency is going to be key to maintaining trust, and as delegates like @krst @thedevanshmehta @Frisson @gauntlet and many more who voted FOR have mentioned, there are going to be lots of diligent folks ready to hold us accountable. This program cannot succeed without an open line of communication and results driven execution.

The potential GCP team members and working group embraces this call for transparency and I believe it has the potential to pave the way for future DAO incentives and programming if done correctly. Thank you again everyone for the support!

Camelot will vote “against” the Tally proposal, despite having voted “for” in Snapshot.

BlockworksResearch from blockworksresearch.eth

2.00 TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

First, we would like to point out the things we are in favor of with respect to this proposal:

The co-fund mandate imposed on the Game Publishers
The anti-poaching clause to ensure we see net new growth in the ecosystem
Multi-year KPIs (the studio deal KPIs in particular) with the flexibility to refine the 3rd year KPIs
The high-level structure between the Council, Core team, and IC

karpatkey

153.8K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

For these reasons, we have voted against it.

GFXlabs from gfxlabs.eth

8.4M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Let's summarize our objections.

Quoted from Djinn

#2. Why the increase from $10m to $25m in operational costs between Snapshot and Tally?

jump to post →

There is no legitimate reason why 225,000,000 ARB needs to be transferred to a multisig. That prevents any governance oversight. In theory governance can claw it back, but the history of DAOs is littered with such promises. Cayman and other offshore jurisdictions do not provide easy environments for DAO governance to exert its rights. It is better to keep control unambiguously with governance -- which means the funds should stay in the treasury.
This is an enormous amount of money for an industry vertical with no visible winners. This is highly speculative and looks like a YOLO.
This is intensely dilutive. Messages we have gotten the last few days about ARB from current and past ARB holders, which has underperformed ETH and OP, are intensely negative.

Our recommendations:

Lower operating cost. This is an uneconomical administrative cost. If expense ratios cannot come down, the entire thing should be cast aside. 8% is already expensive, but would at least be in the realm of realistic vs other alternative uses for the funds.
Implement actual oversight. Once the tokens leave the treasury, they are gone. They will be spent. There will not be any practical oversight by governance. Promises will be made, legalese will be trotted forth, but there will be little real-life ability to get the money back. A 5-person multisig should never have a quarter billion dollars of the DAO's money. There is no legitimate reason why the program cannot accept 6 months of funding and come back to the DAO for a top-up regularly. This keeps the program accountable to the DAO.

Griff from griff.eth

9.5M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Quoted from GFXlabs

jump to post →

I have to agree. But if this was completely the case I would be voting no on this proposal.

Quoted from GFXlabs

jump to post →

I have to agree. But if this was completely the case I would be voting no on this proposal.

However

Quoted from Djinn

Since the multisig will be receiving the ARB in lump sum to fund both the program and operations, we added a section to specify how we approach underfunding or overfunding of the operational cost.

The funding for operations will be calculated at the USD value of ARB at the time of the Tally vote setup (5/21/24). In the case of overfunding, the program will return any funds to the DAO treasury.

In the case of underfunding, the GCP team will have two options to continue operations:

Utilize any earmarked amounts for investments or grants to close the gap on funding up to the total allocated amount for operations

Stand up a vote to add additional operational funding to continue running the program

jump to post →

I'm voting to support this proposal on Tally

Djinn

47.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

Thanks for all the feedback guys. I just wanted to share some thoughts in response to the questions around the overall budget as well as a timeline of the GCP communications.

Feedback is always welcome so please feel free to reach out to me or any other working group member if you have any additional concerns or want to deep dive into any of the GCP topics.

Thanks for all the feedback guys. I just wanted to share some thoughts in response to the questions around the overall budget as well as a timeline of the GCP communications.

Feedback is always welcome so please feel free to reach out to me or any other working group member if you have any additional concerns or want to deep dive into any of the GCP topics.

I also don’t want to downplay the size or challenges that this program will face.

The multi-sig that would hold funds (should the vote pass) currently consists of five trusted Offchain and Foundation signers. If we need to increase the total count of signers, let’s do it.

#1 Why did the operational budget change from $0m on Snapshot to $25m on Tally?

The operating budget for the GCP was never set at $0M.

$10M for operating expenses was clearly noted in the proposal draft.

See the original post here.

#2. Why the increase from $10m to $25m in operational costs between Snapshot and Tally?

What we found after speaking to these potential team members and a variety of industry advisors:

2 years was not enough time to thoughtfully deploy capital and see significant results in an industry with multi-year development cycles - especially if we are targeting serious games and developers. The decision was made to increase the program to 3 years.
The $10m allocated to opex in the Snapshot vote was not adequate for several reasons:
- Timelines were updated to 3 years
- Salaries + bonus structures would need to be adjusted due to the lack of carry as compensation for GCP investment team members (carry typically starts to come into play 5+ years after the start of a fund).
- The program includes a mixture of investments, grants, and RFP creation / management and would need a more diverse staff than a typical fund
- Immutable X, Ronin, and other competitors in the space provide extensive Developer Relations and Support to drive success in development, live ops, community activation, etc.. ,The GCP does not need to match Ronin or Immutable but it does need to support its builders
- Legal costs were better scoped after several calls with Foundation legal partners

The timeline of updates and public communications are detailed below.

Timeline

Gaming Research Forum Post (Feb 15th)

Link: https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/arbitrum-and-the-future-of-web3-gaming/21270

Other communications:

Arbitrum Gaming AMA (Feb 12th): https://twitter.com/arbitrum/status/1756796652835295330?s=46&t=vKyyxar9_lQrb6e-UhUMcQ

Eth Denver Working Group Onsite (Feb 26th - Feb 28th)

Initial Forum Post (March 12th)

Link: https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/catalyze-gaming-ecosystem-growth-on-arbitrum/22368

Details:

200m ARB
$10m opex budget
2 year program

Snapshot Vote (Mar 5th - Mar 22nd)

Link: https://snapshot.org/#/arbitrumfoundation.eth/proposal/0x1a9f2097b0b5a0021628e9edb0e7c9bffae4fdbb104f9996463e40a3129c7718

Details:

200m ARB
$10m opex budget
2 year program

Other communications:

Treasure GCP AMA (3/15): https://x.com/i/spaces/1RDGllYMYvOGL/peek

L2Beat Gaming Interview (3/21): https://twitter.com/Sinkas_/status/1770818902408282124

Updated Draft for Tally v1 (Apr 18th)

Link: https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/catalyze-gaming-ecosystem-growth-on-arbitrum/22368/173 Details:

200m ARB
$20m opex budget (+$10m)
3 year program (+1 year)
Updated with additional advisory from former / current publisher and studio executives, former / current venture partners, potential GCP team members

Other communications:

Arbitrum AMA (May 8th) : https://twitter.com/i/spaces/1eaKbgvBaEBGX

Updated Draft for Tally v2 (May 10)

Link: https://forum.arbitrum.foundation/t/catalyze-gaming-ecosystem-growth-on-arbitrum/22368/176

Details:

200m ARB
$25m opex budget (+$5m)
3 year program
Updated with additional advisory from former / current publisher and studio executives, former / current venture partners, potential GCP team members

Tally Vote (May 24 - Jun 7)

Link: https://www.tally.xyz/gov/arbitrum/proposal/53472400873981607449547539050199074000442490831067826984987297151333310022877

Details

$25m opex budget
3 year program

Last note:

This is one of the first (if not the first) DAO programs that will stand up a professional, full time team ready to deliver grants and invest in game developers within Web3.

This program is a huge bet on the onchain gaming industry.

we believe that games can become a big component of the onchain economy, and we believe Arbitrum can be one of the poles of this industry, and we believe the best way to attract professional builders (gaming studios) is with incentives,

THEN

the only way to compete with other ecosystems is to set up the right arm chest (funds), culture, tooling, and find ways to attract those builders. It is the DAO's task to enable these factors.

Yes the plan is still lacking some structure, and looks quite costly, however I believe it can be refined and improved once kickstarted. I understand this amount requested is unheard of at Arbitrum and raises some red flags (but where was everyone in the last 3 months??), but it seems to be aligned with what other chains are doing.

This is a vote of confidence that the Council, the Foundation and the elected teams can execute for Arbitrum to compete in the space.

The extreme scenarios are:

Worst case: onchain gaming never takes off. We waste a big part of that money which wakens the price of $ARB (and so reduces our resources). However, it could result in: better tooling that can be used for more performant apps, and a new wave of builders that are connected with the Arbitrum ecosystem.

Quoted from GFXlabs

Once this vote passes, the funds are gone. They will never come back if recalled a year or two years later.

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I also disagree with this take - As the multisig is controlled by Foundation and Offchain Labs members, which I am sure will promptly return the funds if the DAO decided so.

Best case: onchain gaming becomes massive; new types of experiences, dynamics and game-players relationships are created. Arbitrum manages to invest in a few successful projects, which are tied to Arbitrum, the Orbit chains, and the DAO. These become invaluable assets that can generate revenue for the DAO, and repay the investment.

Attracting builders and new use cases should be our #1 priority, and both cases can potentially cover that. I am buying the optimistic vision.

Voting FOR.

Djinn

47.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Hey Axlvaz - thanks for the in-depth questions and feedback.

A lot of the changes had to do with further discovery and feedback from both potential team members and industry professionals that come from venture / gaming / legal after the Snapshot vote.

Hey Axlvaz - thanks for the in-depth questions and feedback.

A lot of the changes had to do with further discovery and feedback from both potential team members and industry professionals that come from venture / gaming / legal after the Snapshot vote.

Another major change was the extension from 2 years to 3 years after discussing heavily with investors in the gaming space and DAO stakeholders. Their concern was that gaming is so long tail for quality titles that 2 years would be a little too short of a time period to see the best results - which makes sense given how resource heavy game development is.

A Marketing Infrastructure budget of 2M is created.

We realized that we had 0 budget to attend conferences for BD, sponsor events, digital efforts etc.

This program comes with high expectations, and we have to put our best foot forward to get in front of the best studios and compete with other networks for top of funnel attention.

There will be professionals handling the marketing efforts, and we want to make sure they are well equipped with resources from day 1, without having to constantly come back to the DAO for funding requests.

The legal budget is tripled, from 1M to 3M.

This budget changed as a result of more due diligence with legal professionals and venture folks who have spent time navigating through compliance / legal.

Legal setup is included, and some estimates showed a range of 100k-500k for setup depending on the structure.

If we put a thesis of 50-100 games funded by the GCP, with a typical compliance/legal fee of 10k-20k per, the dollar amount would already start to bump up against the 3m number over 3 years.

A 100K compensation for drafting the proposal is proposed.

It's been a 6+ month effort with 100s of hours between different DAO members to get this passed. Given the amount of time, we thought it was fair to ask for the 100k ARB. A program of this size takes time and resources to create - happy to ask folks for notes on time etc if really needed.

I think this is a broader question too of how we incentivize proposal authors to create great proposals for the DAO and there have been many ideas thrown around to create a better system so happy to chat on this.

GPC Team budget went from 10M to 18M

Some of the increase came from the change to a 3 year program, but scoping was overall was done with the help of potential venture and operational candidates from top firms that we are trying to recruit.

A single venture partner in the gaming space that has a great network / experience can easily command a base salary in the high 6 figures - this is without incentives for performance.

Delphi Digital had an independent analysis of staffing costs based on the known needs for the program that came to about $3-4.5m per year.

image|690x273

This is not including a compliance officer (300-500k a year potentially) and other team needs that are not known as of now such as additional marketing, bd, other roles. We want to be smart and give ourselves buffer room to equip the GCP team with the largest change of success.

Our estimates were higher than Delphi's, specifically on producer and CTO roles, with totals ranging from $4m - $6m per year for staffing costs.

Regarding programs like STIP - remember that those programs do not have a full time staff and is not considered an investment entity, both which substantially increase the cost.

For the investment committee members, there is not additional pay to anyone on the committee that is a GCP team member.

We assumed one member of the DAO would be an investment committee member out of five members.

80k * 3 = 240k 30 * 4 * 3 = 360k 240k + 360k = 600k

It might have been a little confusing how the cost breakdown for council members was structured, will see if we can tidy that section up a bit.

All really good questions, I will reach out to you to schedule time to review any additional feedback!

axlvaz_SEEDLATAM.eth from cattin.seedlatam.eth

7.8M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Hello everyone!

SEEDGov would like to thank the whole community for their efforts in drafting this proposal. We know it has not been easy and we really like the result, we see a generally well-structured proposal that could boost the development of games within the Arbitrum ecosystem and that is why we initially gave our support in the Snapshot voting instance.

102

Hello everyone!

However, there have been a few changes since the Snapshot approval (especially of a budgetary nature) that have given us some doubts.

On March 22 of this year, when the proposal was approved on Snapshot, the budget was as follows:

Quoted from Djinn

[The current Program Administration & Operations budget is being verified by working group team members and will be adjusted prior to the Tally vote.]

Total Incentives: 200m ARB
- Builder Onboarding and Growth: 160m ARB
- Infrastructure, Tooling & Stylus Development: 40m ARB
Program Administration & Operations - $10m in ARB
- Council Members (5): $25,000 per year ($250k total)
- Initial Legal Structuring: $250k
- General Legal / Compliance: $2m
- Fund Manager / Venture Lead: Up to $2m per year ($200k base + bonuses)
- Analysts (3): $125-$200k per year
- Proposal Authors and Key Collaborators: Retrofunded from administration flex fund, determined by council
- Program Insights and Analysis: TBD
- Multisig Signers (5): TBD
- Flex Spend - Remaining amount earmarked for any additional staffing needs, vendors, ops, retro funding, and research

Despite the proposal mentioning that it was a:

Quoted from Djinn

The GCP is meant to serve as a catalyst, not a comprehensive program, with a focus around onboarding and supporting high quality builders.

200M ARB + 10M was requested for Administration and Operations, making it the largest funding request ever approved by the DAO.

The initial goal for the 2-year period was as follows:

Quoted from Djinn

Within the initial time frame of the program, establish Arbitrum as a de facto leader for on-chain gaming:

200-300 applications
20%+ of all web3 games selecting Arbitrum as their network
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
25+ new Orbit launches

It appears that since its approval on Snapshot, both the design and the budget of the proposal have changed significantly, as published on Tally. On April 18, the proposal's timeframe was extended from 2 years to 3 years “to ensure the proposal has more time to show results” (question: does it continue to be a catalyst?). The proposal does not set KPIs for this third year. We believe that, despite possible variations, it is important to establish a minimum threshold.

Regarding the KPIs, the targets have been significantly expanded. The goals for applications and Orbit Launches have been doubled:

Quoted from Djinn

Within the initial time frame of the program (3 years), the goal is to establish Arbitrum as a de facto leader for on-chain gaming. Specifically:

400-600 applications
100-200 net funded games
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
50+ new Orbit launches

jump to post →

On this date (April 18), the description of the GCP team and their roles (7 members) was also included, along with the Investment Committee (3 members).

In an initial iteration of the description of these teams, it was mentioned that

“GCP team members may receive incentives every 6 months based on performance. These incentives will be established with the approval of the Council and KPIs will be set for each team member.”

However, this same iteration, between April 18 and May 6 (last edit), expanded the operational budget by 100%:

Quoted from Djinn

Total Incentives: 200m ARB
Builder Onboarding and Growth: 160m ARB
Infrastructure, Tooling & Stylus Development: 40m ARB
Program Administration & Operations - $20m
Council Members (5): $630k
30k each member per year
60k for investment committee representative
MultiSig Signers (5): $180k
Team Salaries: $18m
Legal / Compliance: $1m
Expecting usage for vendors, entity setup, adjustments for fast evolving regulatory environment
Proposal Authors and Contributors: 100k ARB

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Council Member compensation increased from 25K to 30K per year.

Initial Legal structuring was removed.

Legal Compliance was reduced by 50%.

The Fund Manager / Venture Lead budget of "up to 2M" (which was important because it was 200K per year + bonus) is no longer included but is replaced with "Team Salaries of 18M" without any justification of how it would be spent.

Multisig signers (5) are added for 180K.

This was the proposal as of May 4.

Now, on May 10, six days later, the final version is published. The operational budget is 25M, which is 5M (25%) more than the last edited proposal and 15M (150%) more than the amount approved on Snapshot.

Quoted from Djinn

Program Administration & Operations - $25m
- Council Members (5): $600k
  - 30k each member per year
  - 80k for investment committee representative
- MultiSig Signers (5): $180k (the multi-sig holding the total sum will have signers from the Arbitrum Foundation and Offchain labs - these individuals will not be paid)
- Team Salaries: $18m
- Marketing and Infrastructure: $2m
  - Includes website standup, conference spend, travel expenditure, and other costs
- Legal / Compliance: $3m
  - Expecting usage for vendors, entity setup, adjustments for fast evolving regulatory environment
- Proposal Authors and Contributors: 100k ARB

The funding for operations will be calculated at the USD value of ARB at the time of the Tally vote setup (5/21/24). In the case of overfunding, the program will return any funds to the DAO treasury.

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The difference between what was proposed in April/May and this latest version lies mainly in four points:

A Marketing Infrastructure budget of 2M is created.
The legal budget is tripled, from 1M to 3M.
A 100K compensation for drafting the proposal is proposed.
GPC Team budget went from 10M to 18M

We believe that some figures are not correct. Correct us if there are any errors on our part.

The proposal mentions 600K for the Council and breaks it down into 30K per member per year (5 members) and 80K for the Committee Representative.

30 * 5 * 3 = 450

80 * 3 = 240

450 + 240 = 690

The other option is that the budget for the Committee Representative is for the 3 years, which would be 450 + 80 = 530.

In neither case does it amount to 600K.

As I mentioned above, the overall cost is claimed to increase by 5 million, but the added expenses for the April/May issue amount to 4.1 million.

Calculations show that 23.8 or 23.9 million is requested (depending on the Committee representative's budget) instead of the stated 25 million. What is the reason for this discrepancy?

25M ARB represents 12.5% of the program's cost, which we believe is somewhat high compared to other large programs due to administrative fees. For example:

The STIP had a cost of 94K ARB on an expenditure of 50M, a cost of less than 1%.
The LTIPP had a cost of 435K ARB on an expenditure of 45M, a cost of less than 1%.
The STEP estimates a cost of 300K ARB on an expenditure/investment of 35M, a cost of less than 1%.

Note: We understand that these incentive programs are also of different durations, the administration lasted approximately 6 months. In addition, the number of administrators varies between proposals.

Of the total cost, several aspects are unjustified.

The budget for the GPC TEAM has been added and is estimated at 18M ARB. This is more than 100% of the originally requested and approved amount on Snapshot for the total cost, . considering that the GPC team consists of 7 people, we are talking about more than $70,000 per month average per member (18,000,000/36 months/7 members). However, it does not explain how much will be paid to each of these roles. Moreover, both the responsibilities and KPIs are very generic and difficult to monitor.

An investment committee was also created, which was not in the original proposal. Why is there an additional budget for the members of this Investment Committee when they are part of the GPC team, which already has a budget of 18M ARB or the Council which are paid positions?

Why is there 180K allocated for the multisig when: 1- the foundation provided a multisig, and 2- there is a proposal to control the multisig and avoid adding such unnecessary costs?

You are proposing 2M for Marketing. This was also not in the original proposal and has not been justified within the proposal. This proposal asks for 10% of what you are requesting but has received a lot of criticism and questions.

Why did the legal compliance budget go from 2M originally, then to 1M, and now to 3M?

Finally, the explanations given about how the DAO can "hold accountable" the GCP team are crucial but definitely insufficient. You are requesting an 18M ARB budget for salaries. It is mentioned in a generic manner that "regular transparency reports" should be submitted.

This should be much more detailed, explaining precisely what the DAO should expect to see in these reports. Additionally, this commitment to transparency should be included in the proposal.

In conclusion, we have followed the proposal since its inception and agree that gaming is important for Arbitrum to take the lead in this market. But the changes in the proposal have been significant. We also know that there have been people working on this proposal for quite some time so it is possible that we have missed some information, if so do not hesitate to tell us if there has been an error or if there is any information that has already been published.

Djinn

47.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

After a review with key delegates, the Arbitrum foundation, and other key stakeholders, we present our final (really this time) draft before we go live on Tally.

Thank you everyone for your contributions, feedback, and invaluable support throughout this process!

Arbitrum DAO Gaming Catalyst Program: Final Tally Draft - 5/10

145

After a review with key delegates, the Arbitrum foundation, and other key stakeholders, we present our final (really this time) draft before we go live on Tally.

Thank you everyone for your contributions, feedback, and invaluable support throughout this process!

Arbitrum DAO Gaming Catalyst Program: Final Tally Draft - 5/10

This draft was completed after a successful Snapshot temp check for the Arbitrum DAO to empower gaming with a three year, 200m ARB with the goal of powering the Arbitrum gaming ecosystem with the best studios and games in the web3 industry.

The temp check showcased the enthusiasm to support web3 gaming, but also revealed important questions to answer when launching an ambitious, multi-year plan requiring not only a strong team to run the program, but transparent, flexible collaboration between many stakeholders.

Introduction - Gaming Catalyst Program

What changed: No changes

The Gaming Catalyst Program (GCP) is designed to immediately expand awareness and adoption of Arbitrum/Orbit/Stylus by builders and players in the Gaming community.

Arbitrum has emerged as a leader in the competitive network race through a dynamic formula of innovation, robust technology, organic builders, and a variety of short and long-term incentives.

The proliferation of DeFi on Arbitrum showcases how quickly a snowball effect can onboard builders, users, and ultimately value for the Arbitrum DAO and other stakeholders (i.e. Offchain Labs, Ethereum, etc.). The TAM for DEFI has surged to $50B and is projected to surge to over $120B by 2030 and Arbitrum is leading the way.

We believe that the same opportunity exists to attract the best builders that will in turn create sticky high quality games that bring and retain new users within Arbitrum. The gaming vertical has a $250B TAM today that is projected to grow to $500B+ by 2030. Though the “web 3 + games” segment of today’s game TAM is relatively small, it is poised to grow exponentially this decade.

Several L1s and L2s see this opportunity (most notably Solana, Cardano, Opstack, Immutable, Optimism, to name a few) and are moving to claim the builders with grants and investments.

GCP Hypothesis

What changed: Minor language updates

Arbitrum has had immense success in the decentralized finance vertical, but the branding of Arbitrum as a home for gamers and game builders is nascent. As a network, Arbitrum falls behind major competitors (Immutable X, Ronin, Solana, etc) across total games migrated, games launched, and total gamers.

This educational post shares some of the pain points and metrics within the gaming ecosystem in regards to Arbitrum.

Through the Gaming Catalyst Program, we aim to establish a dedicated team and fund to provide technical and strategic support to the game industry. This dedicated team is key to attracting and retaining the best established and independent developers.

We will know we are succeeding when we achieve the following:

Rapidly Increase the number of Game Developers using Arbitrum/Orbit/Stylus

The GCP aims to provide support and resources to developers interested in building on the Arbitrum network. This includes access to funding, mentorship by vetted experts, and other forms of assistance to expedite the development process and contribute to success in the market post-launch.

Strategic Allocation of Resources via Grants and Investments

By allocating resources strategically, the program can maximize its impact by focusing on proven publishers and developers as well as promising independent projects within gaming. This ensures that resources are used efficiently and effectively to foster the growth of high-quality games on Arbitrum.

Attracting and retaining Top Talent

Just as DeFi projects have flocked to Arbitrum due to its innovative technology and incentives, the GCP aims to attract the best game developers in the industry. By offering support,incentives and game industry specific tools, Arbitrum can position itself as an attractive platform for game development, leading to a surge in high-quality gaming experiences on the network.

Expanding the Use Cases of Arbitrum

While DeFi has been a major focus of Arbitrum’s success so far, expanding into the gaming vertical opens up new opportunities and use cases for the network. By supporting game and gaming infrastructure development, Arbitrum can diversify its ecosystem and appeal to a broader range of users and developers, with results that include but are not limited to Orbit chain and Stylus adoption.

Facilitating the Development of Sticky, Quality Games

The ultimate goal of the GCP is to encourage the development of sticky, high-quality games that not only attract users but also retain them over the long term. A dedicated GCP Team and Council representing the interests of the DAO will serve as quality control mechanisms to make sure the best applicants receive the full support of the GCP.

Proposal Summary

What changed: No changes

We are asking the DAO to earmark 200m ARB over a three year period to expand the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum and establish the network as the top choice for game builders across the landscape.

The GCP is meant to serve as a catalyst, not a comprehensive program, with a focus around onboarding and supporting high quality builders. After the roll out of the GCP, the aim is to use its learnings to mature the organization into a longer-term gaming program with a comprehensive approach to game ecosystem growth.

Strategically, we believe that attracting, retaining, and supporting builders with a dedicated team and an ongoing investment in game developers and the technical solutions they need will be a key differentiating factor vs other competitive networks. This commitment to gaming will lead to high quality game launches that will in turn attract large numbers of engaged gamers.

Part of the fund will be utilized to co-invest into promising studios and games along with approved, Arbitrum-aligned publishers, with the belief that the business model, industry expertise, and track record of publishers will streamline the outreach, vetting, negotiation, onboarding, and support process for builders. The fund will also be available for all other game builders seeking to create games on Arbitrum.

Controls

Publishers and developers will be subject to a robust set of checks and balances to ensure alignment with this proposal’s goals and Arbitrum DAO’s values:

A GCP Council of 5 individuals with deep gaming, venture experience, analytics / reporting, and/or DAO governance skills will be elected by the DAO and will be responsible for holding the Catalyst GCP Team accountable - with influence including general oversight, visibility of performance reviews for GCP team members, offering a channel for constructive feedback.**
A GCP Team will be created with the support of the Arbitrum Foundation, and will collaborate with the GCP Council (which will serve as oversight):
- An investment committee of 3 individuals including 1 Council member will approve investments
- Funding for projects will be contingent on achieving milestones
- A quarterly transparency report will be created with summary data on GCP performance
- Funding of projects will include terms that are market competitive

Program Outcomes and KPIs

What changed: Adjusted KPIs for year 1 and year 2 to account for infrastructure setup time

The Gaming Catalyst program has an overarching goal to bring in talented builders, and help the builders accelerate their games through the lifecycle stages.

The highest level metric we will be tracking is studio / builder onboarding into the Arbitrum ecosystem. However, there will be a variance in the realized outcome due to publisher applications, types of builders targeted, and variables from network competition.

Primary expected outcome:

Within the initial time frame of the program (3 years), the goal is to establish Arbitrum as a de facto leader for on-chain gaming. Specifically:

400-600 applications
100-200 net funded games
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
50+ new Orbit launches

The GCP will take time to reach its full potential, and setting milestones vs maturity of the program is prudent:

KPI	Year 1	Year 2	Year 3
Daily Active Users	20,000	50,000	To be set by GCP Team
Orbit Launches	5	20	To be set by GCP Team
Studio Deals	10	20	To be set by GCP Team

Most games will be in dev and not (yet) live in 2024

The GCP team will set appropriate OKRs and KPIs internally to align with the goals and milestones listed above.

An additional outcome that the program aims to achieve is incremental movement through the gaming lifecycles illustrated by the Helika presentation on 2/2/24 here (slide 15) during our open office hours.

Initiatives & Budgeting

What changed: Formatting changes, combined sections for readability

We are asking the DAO for 200m ARB to develop the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum and establish the network as the top choice for game builders across the landscape.

The funding will be allocated towards the following initiatives over the span of a three year period:

1. Builder Onboarding & Growth (160m ARB)

Focused on attracting and supporting the best game builders into Arbitrum - open to publishers, established studios, and independent builders.

Use of Funds: This funding is proposed to be reserved for established publishers, game studios and independent builders on Arbitrum to help scale the DAO’s ability to attract, secure, and accelerate talented teams on Arbitrum.

Thesis / Experiment: We are allocating a large majority of the budget to empower growth of publishers and studios on Arbitrum.

Build Grants (25m)

Grants will primarily be used to empower teams that are aiming to accelerate early stage development on Arbitrum, or to incentivize user onboarding. Other grant uses may be reviewed on a case-by-case basis.

Guidelines & Details:

Teams may apply via the GCP Grants form
Grants have a maximum size of 500k ARB
Preference for user onboarding incentives or early stage development
The grants manager has final approval on grants
- Scorecards and details must be shared with the GCP Council
Proposed: early grants period until legal entity is formed for GCP
- Onboard interim grants allocator
- Interim council of 5 members votes on individual grants
- Maximum allocation of 10m ARB prior to GCP entity formation
Each grant must have specific milestones agreed upon before funding

Investments (135m)

Teams seeking more than 500k ARB or additional funding for development beyond initial development must work with the GCP investment team to align on deal terms.

Publishers may submit multi-game deals to the GCP for consideration - allowing them to be more efficient and create more strategic plans for their ecosystem. As a packaged proposal, publishers and the GCP team may collaborate to set milestones, funding, kpis, etc in aggregate form or by each game, allowing for more flexible launch, development, and operational capabilities.

Guidelines & Details:

Builders or publishers must agree on a commercial agreement value share through tokens, equity, revenue share (post recoupment), or other pathways.
- Other considerations include active use of Orbit chains with significant sequencer revenue share as part of the default licensing structure
More detailed deal structure guidelines will be created by the GCP Team upon its formation
By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO

2. Infrastructure Bounties (40m ARB)

Focused on creating game specific tech needed to make Arbitrum the best choice for game builders. Deals will follow grant or investment classifications based on the same sizing requirements as the Builder Onboarding and Growth program.

Allocated by RFP or decided by the Council on a per proposal basis for any tooling and infrastructure needed to support gaming within Arbitrum (i.e. account abstraction solutions and gasless transactions for games, payment rails, web and game engine SDKs, data analytics and attribution, etc.)
Promote Orbit, Stylus, and other development and infrastructure growth on top of new Arbitrum technology releases

Use of Funds: This will be allocated by RFP or per proposal for any tooling and infrastructure needed to further support gaming within Arbitrum (i.e. onboarding documentation, gaming-centric boilerplates for Arbitrum Orbit, game contract libraries built via Stylus, account abstraction and gasless transactions solutions, payment rails for games, web and game engine SDKs (Unity, Unreal, Godot), etc.)

Thesis / Experiment: Web3 gaming is still nascent and there exists key gaps for game builders to build games and bring them to market. By incentivizing development for such infrastructure projects and tools, or accelerating development of Stylus as an Arbitrum native framework, this will help set Arbitrum further ahead in the competitive network landscape.

Current Gaps: A non-exhaustive list of gaps that currently exist within the Arbitrum ecosystem:

Custom gaming-centric implementations of Orbit chains
Mobile App Infrastructure with wallet that is optimized for games and asset management (See Ronin Wallet on mobile as an example)
Web and game engine SDKs (Unity, Unreal, Godot) that allow for in-game contract calls
Desktop launcher and distribution solutions
Game analytics, optimization, and related tooling (tying together on-chain, off-chain, social, and player activity)

Funding Guidelines:

The GCP Team will establish initial RFPs and funding guidelines
An infrastructure specific rubric will be established by the Council to assess proposals
Independent proposals that do not fit within RFP guidelines are welcome to apply separately for GCP Team consideration
Any approved applicants for RFPs may be selected for vendor whitelisting, which allows vendors to be marketed to GCP participants
By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO

GCP Org Structure

What changed: No changes

When designing the organizational structure of the GCP, two major dynamics were considered:

Enabling autonomy of the GCP team while setting safeguards for program success
Empowering the DAO to have transparency and representation without impacting compliance, disclosure, and other necessities for a grants program with commercial ties within the gaming industry

Decision making process

Decision is made by GCP team
- Investment committee decision, staffing, etc
Council meetings every two weeks to discuss / veto any decisions
Decision is ‘ratified’ and activated
Every half year, aggregate summary of data as applicable shared in a report to DAO

GCP Team

What changed: Added roles / responsibilities, section on entity setup, team incentives, and overall costing estimates.

The GCP Team will be the primary operator of the GCP program.

Team members may join the program through a few pathways:

Nomination through the proposal process (to help accelerate standup of the program)
Hiring by the GCP team, with veto capabilities held by the Council

The below team roles and responsibilities are illustrative of an initial proposed structure, but may change based on industry / program demands.

GCP Team Roles & Responsibilities

These roles are understood to be the MVP in order to stand up successful programming. The roles and titles may adjust based on needs. Any adjustment of budget will be reviewed with the council and put forth for the DAO to vote if needed.

Fund General Manager / Venture Lead

Responsibilities:

Presents deals to the investment committee
Responsible for strategic planning and the overall success of the program
Managing and staffing the GCP Venture team
Providing leadership and oversight to the Venture team
Driving deals, partnerships and being the public face of the GCP program
Compliance

KPIs:

Overall investment milestones
Deal flow
Venture team performance

Program Director

Responsibilities:

Member of investment committee
Ensuring overall program success and sustainability
Managing and staffing the overall GCP program (in collaboration with the Venture Lead)
Leading marketing / program development efforts
Establishing internal metrics for OKRs & KPIs with the Venture and Grants programs
Align with Arbitrum DAO and other key stakeholders on strategic direction

KPIs:

Overall program milestones

Venture Partner

Responsibilities:

Member of the investment committee
Providing support for the GM
Negotiating with publishers and studios on deal terms
Working with General Counsel to ensure compliance
Overseeing portfolio management and providing strategic guidance to portcos
Preparing deal memos for the GCP Board

KPIs:

Funded deals
Successful game launches
Venture milestones
Compliance

General Counsel

Responsibilities:

Ensuring legal compliance/diligence
Managing legal operations
Managing documentation for investment deals
Serving as the liaison between the GCP and VCDAO

KPIs:

Average time to complete deals
Operating within budget for Legal

VP Finance

Responsibilities:

Managing all GCP council required reporting and tax requirements
Modeling of potential deals
Ensure budget compliance
AR/AP, payroll, vendor management
Maintain token calendar

KPIs:

Budget compliance
Program sustainability

Analyst x 2

Responsibilities:

Sourcing top deals in the market
Providing in-depth market research
Running due diligence for deals
Geographical focus:
- 1-2 - Asia-focused
- 1-2 - US/Europe-focused

KPIs:

Venture partner satisfaction
Number of fundable deals

Producer

Responsibilities:

Establishes milestones
Providers additional DD support for GM / Investor
Tracks performance for games
Collaboration with Program Director and Director of Technology to create infrastructure RFPs

KPIs:

Games shipping at quality
Game progress through development funnel

Director of Technology

Responsibilities:

Speed and ease of onboarding for builders
Documentation for tech onboarding of game projects
Connect the dots with vendors and gaming teams
Helps frame infrastructure RFPs for bounty program
Shortlists preferred vendors

KPIs:

Implementation throughput, onboarding pace
Builder advancement across development phases

Grants Manager

Responsibilities:

Due diligence for submitted grants
Presentation of grants to the council in written form
Contribution to transparency reports

KPIs:

Performance of projects receiving grants
Efficient distribution of grant funds

Investment Committee (separate from Council!)

The investment committee’s role is to provide extra perspective on deals brought forth by the Investment Lead and other team members, and make a final decision on investments.

The proposed investment committee structure consists of two GCP Team Members and council members - however the size and composition may change based on needs.

Our current proposed committee has 3 seats:

Program Director
Venture Partner
1 GCP Council Member (extra pay for this position)

Team Incentives

GCP team members may receive incentives every 6 months based on performance.

These incentives will be established with the approval of the Council and KPIs will be set for each team member.

The council must approve the bonus / incentives after each 6 month period (this time period may evolve over time).

GCP & Legal Compliance

The GCP will retain qualified counsel and coordinate with the Arbitrum DAO to ensure that it operates in a legally compliant manner at all times.

Team and GCP Board Costs

The GCP’s operating budget is capped at $25m USD (excluding additional set-up, legal and financial expenses specifically required to ensure compliance with DAO/Foundation requirements). Any expenditures above the $25m cap must be approved by the GCP council and may either be deducted from grant budgeting or increased through a DAO vote.

Performance against budget will be reviewed by GCP Council as part of the regular transparency reports.

ARB will be converted to USD or USDC by the Foundation before each quarter and sent to the GCP program account or multi-sig for disbursement.

Entity Setup and Model

The GCP working group and Arbitrum Foundation are actively exploring entity setup to ensure DAO transparency while following the rigorous compliance guidelines that surround any entity focused on investments.

This effort also involves DAO members from the M&A, Ops Co, VCDAO, and other initiatives.

GCP Council

What changed: Additional requirements added

The GCP Council will be a DAO elected group of trusted professionals with backgrounds ranging across gaming, venture, grant allocation, web3 technology, and DAO relations. The group functions as a braintrust that offers their accumulated knowledge to empower the GCP Core Team.

Primary responsibilities of the GCP Council:

Collaborate with the GM and IC on deal proposals by providing insights and identifying potential risks (can challenge based on deals not meeting very clear requirements).
Offer recommendations on proposed deals after reviewing relevant data and analysis (this analysis would be a standard for all deal memos).
Escalate concerns regarding deals to designated oversight bodies if necessary.
Review and provide feedback on GCP team member nominations submitted by the GM and Program Director.
Advise the GM and Program Director on long-term strategic plans for GCP.

Requirements:

Council members must not be from publishers or studios intending to apply to GCP programs
Council members may not represent network competitors or have significant conflicts of interest due to investments, advisory, etc with competitors (Solana, Polygon, etc)
Council members must align with the values within the Arbitrum constitution
Council members with advisory, investor, or other relationships to applicants must disclose any conflicts of interest
Council members will go through mandatory yearly elections
The DAO may call a snapshot vote to remove / replace council members
Must sign NDAs and respect confidentiality agreements

Kickstarting the Team and Program

What changed: New section

To facilitate the stand up of the overall GCP programming and start funding talented teams within a reasonable time frame, we propose the following phases.

Phase 1: Early Activation (1-2 months)

Focus/Goal: Establish core operational framework.
Activities:
- Finalize entity setup for legal compliance.
- Working Group selects two interim council members with relevant expertise (gaming, industry influence, venture capital, DAO governance).
- Working Group, in collaboration with the interim council, selects initial team members for critical roles (Program Director, Analyst).
- Develop and present a clear timeline for council elections and full team buildout.

Phase 2: Program Development (2-4 months)

Focus/Goal: Build operational infrastructure and initiate program activities & tactics.
Activities:
- DAO elects remaining three council members & votes to confirm/reject interim council members.
- Establish key program infrastructure: website, grant application process, communication channels.
- Issue first RFP for infrastructure development.
- Open grant applications for game developers and studios.
- Develop initial marketing, brand, and outreach strategy (this includes identifying agency partners if needed).
- Finalize onboarding process for funded projects (includes research and team/project leader interviews).
- Begin recruiting for additional team members based on a prioritized hiring plan (which will be clarified early phase two).

Phase 3: Program Acceleration (4-6 months)

Focus/Goal: Achieve momentum, establish presence, and scale funding activities.
Activities:
- Full GCP team is operational, with all key roles filled (may be additional roles to consider based on learnings from prior months).
- Grant applications reviewed, and first grants awarded to qualified projects.
- Infrastructure RFPs reviewed, and contracts awarded to selected vendors.
- Implement marketing and outreach strategy.
- First program transparency report issued outlining performance against KPIs to DAO, Council, etc. Adjust strategies as needed.

Next Steps

What changed: Adjusted based on current estimates on timeline.

[Done] Post Open Draft (Shared on 2/15/24, link within Arbitrum Gaming Education Post [Arbitrum and the Future of Web3 Gaming 89]
[Done] Post GCP proposal to forum (3/11/24)
[Done] Snapshot vote (3/15/24) for general delegate agreement on GCP commitment, start entity setups, and to receive detailed feedback: Snapshot 304
Tally vote / ratification (May 2024)
In parallel with Tally vote and /or post-ratification, GCP working group and authors will work with the Arbitrum Foundation for entity setup
- Collaborate with Arbitrum Foundation resources and vendors for due diligence
- Stand up legal framework and entity to support GCP
- Initiate on elections, team recruitment, and other procedures after completion of entity setup
GCP Council Elections (June 2024)
GCP GCP Team formation (Starting in May/June 2024)
Grant applications and RFPs open (June/July 2024)

Total Cost

What changed: Adjusted total cost breakdown, added more details to Program Admin and Operations.

We estimate the total cost to equal 200m ARB + operations costs detailed below under Program Administration & Operations.

This is a three-year program and forecasted amounts may change / require amendment(s) as the program evolves. Any unutilized ARB at the end of the program duration will be returned to the DAO treasury.

Total Incentives: 200m ARB
- Builder Onboarding and Growth: 160m ARB
- Infrastructure, Tooling & Stylus Development: 40m ARB
Program Administration & Operations - $25m
- Council Members (5): $600k
  - 30k each member per year
  - 80k for investment committee representative
- MultiSig Signers (5): $180k (the multi-sig holding the total sum will have signers from the Arbitrum Foundation and Offchain labs - these individuals will not be paid)
- Team Salaries: $18m
- Marketing and Infrastructure: $2m
  - Includes website standup, conference spend, travel expenditure, and other costs
- Legal / Compliance: $3m
  - Expecting usage for vendors, entity setup, adjustments for fast evolving regulatory environment
- Proposal Authors and Contributors: 100k ARB

The funding for operations will be calculated at the USD value of ARB at the time of the Tally vote setup (5/21/24). In the case of overfunding, the program will return any funds to the DAO treasury.

In the case of underfunding, the GCP team will have two options to continue operations:

Utilize any earmarked amounts for investments or grants to close the gap on funding up to the total allocated amount for operations
Stand up a vote to add additional operational funding to continue running the program

Proposal Contributors

What changed: Added new contributors, working group

Working group:

Dan Peng (PM / Author)
Karel Vuong (Author)
Marcus Segal
Rick Johanson

Djinn (Dan Peng) - PM / Author

Karel Vuong - Author (Co-Founder, Treasure)

Marcus Segal - Contributor

Rick Johanson - Contributor

Xai Games - Advisor / Contributor

L2Beats - Delegate Feedback

Helika - Advisor / Contributor

Jason Lee - Advisor / Contributor (ExPolygon Games, current web3 gaming founder)

Resources & Content

What changed: -

GCP AMA / Open Office 3/15/24 - https://twitter.com/i/spaces/1RDGllYMYvOGL?s=20 26

GCP AMA 5/8/24 - https://twitter.com/arbitrum/status/1788281797081456938?s=46

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Djinn

47.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

Additional clarification of Council, Investment Committee, and GCP Core Team roles and responsibilities (thanks to Rick Johanson)

GCP Ecosystem Working Norms and Mechanics:

TL;DR: This collaborative structure aims to achieve program objectives while maintaining DAO oversight and transparency.

1. Funding and Oversight

138

Additional clarification of Council, Investment Committee, and GCP Core Team roles and responsibilities (thanks to Rick Johanson)

GCP Ecosystem Working Norms and Mechanics:

TL;DR: This collaborative structure aims to achieve program objectives while maintaining DAO oversight and transparency.

1. Funding and Oversight

Arbitrum DAO: Allocates xxx million ARB tokens over xxx years to fund the GCP.
GCP Council: Elected by the DAO, the council provides oversight and collaboration for the GCP team. They review proposals, offer insights, and can challenge a deal by majority vote and through a collaborative process of escalation with GCP Core Team.

2. Program Execution

GCP Core Team: Executes the program's day-to-day operations. This team identifies deals, negotiates terms, manages grants, and tracks progress.
Investment Committee (IC): A small group with representation from all entities within the GCP ecosystem. They make final decisions on investment deals brought forth by the GCP Core team.

3. Collaboration and Decision Making

GCP Core Team & Council: Collaborate on program strategy, deal evaluation, and identifying potential risks. The council provides expert advice and can challenge deals that don't meet clear requirements or are not aligned to established program objectives..
Investment Committee: Reviews investment proposals from the GCP team and makes final funding decisions. Additionally, they help resolve issues or concerns surfaced by the GCP Council related to deals.

4. Transparency and Accountability

GCP Core Team: Provides regular reports to the DAO on program performance, including metrics, risk response, and progress reports.
GCP Council: Ensures transparency by reviewing and providing feedback on team performance, nominations and decisions. The Arbitrum DAO can also call for council member removal.

Simple flow of responsibilities:

Arbitrum DAO allocates funds and elects the GCP Council.
The GCP Core Team identifies deals and negotiates terms.
The Investment Committee makes final decisions on investments.
The GCP Council provides oversight and collaborates with the team.
The GCP Core Team reports program performance to the DAO.

Key areas of ownership:

The DAO maintains ultimate control through funding and council elections.
The GCP Council provides expert guidance, escalates deal concerns and ensures transparency.
The GCP Core Team defines strategy, executes the program, and makes funding recommendations.
The Investment Committee has final say on investment decisions.

GCP Ecosystem Accountability Methodology:

TL;DR: A structure to ensure each entity is held accountable to the other to serve the best interests of the Arbitrum DAO and the overall success of the program.

Accountability is achieved through a multi-layered system that provides transparency but maintains collaborative work relationships.

Arbitrum DAO holds accountable:

GCP Council: Through yearly elections and the ability to call a snapshot vote for removal/replacement of council members.
- Elections and Removal: The DAO and council can remove members who underperform or violate trust/terms of agreements (NDA, PIIA, etc).
GCP Core Team: By receiving regular reports on program performance and having the ability to influence program strategy through the council.
- Transparency Reports: Regular reports from the GCP Core Team to the DAO showcase program performance and resource allocation, allowing the DAO to assess effectiveness.

GCP Council holds accountable:

GCP Core Team: By observing team member nominations and performance, providing feedback on decisions, and having the ability to challenge deals through collaborative escalation.
Themselves: By maintaining transparency through disclosure, NDAs, and facing potential removal via Arbitrum DAO, etc.
- NDAs and Disclosure: These ensure confidentiality and prevent conflicts of interest within the council and team.

GCP Core Team holds accountable:

Themselves: By meeting program goals like attracting builders, achieving milestones, and delivering results outlined in the proposal.
- Performance-based Incentives: The GCP Core Team's incentives are tied to performance, further aligning their goals with program success.
- Performance Metrics: Program success is measured against KPIs, holding the core team accountable for results.
Investment Committee: By providing justification and data for investment proposals.
GCP Council: By requesting clear, consistent, and actionable rationale when deals are challenged.

Investment Committee holds accountable:

Themselves: By making funding decisions based on sound analysis and alignment with program goals.
GCP Core Team: By potentially requesting additional information or revisions to investment proposals when needed.

138

maxlomu from maxlomu.eth

4.4M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

gm all, I have voted in favor of this proposal at temperature check.

I think it's worth trying to push the Arbitrum ecosystem into a vertical that will be important for Web3, and further boost the effort that Treasure, XAI, and other ecosystems have put in the last months and years.

gm all, I have voted in favor of this proposal at temperature check.

I love that we are adopting a mindset of a venture studio, this can go a long way. However the chances of succeeding here are low, and we should expect a vast majority of the projects funded to actually not perform well. Genuine thanks to @thedereksmart for bringing some sound skepticism and counterpoints to the proposal.

This is a vote of confidence. Electing the right council will be key as they will have much greater power than other committees we created.

More details that would help to facilitate the final onchain vote:

Quoted from Djinn

200-300 applications
20%+ of all web3 games selecting Arbitrum as their network
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
25+ new Orbit launches

Great to see some KPIs - I would encourage further details around them and expected milestones for the program.

I'd like to highlight to the DAO, that while other programs like the LTIP distribute incentives to users/partners who may not necessarily sell their tokens, this is a huge program that will apply considerable sell pressure to $ARB - All parties will sell tokens to pay for salaries and progress.

I want to hope that 2 years will be enough to demonstrate any ROI so we can then assess the overall impact of the program.

Let the Games begin!

This program is a huge bet on the onchain gaming industry.

THEN

the only way to compete with other ecosystems is to set up the right arm chest (funds), culture, tooling, and find ways to attract those builders. It is the DAO's task to enable these factors.

This is a vote of confidence that the Council, the Foundation and the elected teams can execute for Arbitrum to compete in the space.

The extreme scenarios are:

Worst case: onchain gaming never takes off. We waste a big part of that money which wakens the price of $ARB (and so reduces our resources). However, it could result in: better tooling that can be used for more performant apps, and a new wave of builders that are connected with the Arbitrum ecosystem.

Quoted from GFXlabs

Once this vote passes, the funds are gone. They will never come back if recalled a year or two years later.

jump to post →

I also disagree with this take - As the multisig is controlled by Foundation and Offchain Labs members, which I am sure will promptly return the funds if the DAO decided so.

Best case: onchain gaming becomes massive; new types of experiences, dynamics and game-players relationships are created. Arbitrum manages to invest in a few successful projects, which are tied to Arbitrum, the Orbit chains, and the DAO. These become invaluable assets that can generate revenue for the DAO, and repay the investment.

Attracting builders and new use cases should be our #1 priority, and both cases can potentially cover that. I am buying the optimistic vision.

Voting FOR.

Djinn

47.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Hey Axlvaz - thanks for the in-depth questions and feedback.

A lot of the changes had to do with further discovery and feedback from both potential team members and industry professionals that come from venture / gaming / legal after the Snapshot vote.

Hey Axlvaz - thanks for the in-depth questions and feedback.

A lot of the changes had to do with further discovery and feedback from both potential team members and industry professionals that come from venture / gaming / legal after the Snapshot vote.

A Marketing Infrastructure budget of 2M is created.

We realized that we had 0 budget to attend conferences for BD, sponsor events, digital efforts etc.

This program comes with high expectations, and we have to put our best foot forward to get in front of the best studios and compete with other networks for top of funnel attention.

The legal budget is tripled, from 1M to 3M.

This budget changed as a result of more due diligence with legal professionals and venture folks who have spent time navigating through compliance / legal.

Legal setup is included, and some estimates showed a range of 100k-500k for setup depending on the structure.

If we put a thesis of 50-100 games funded by the GCP, with a typical compliance/legal fee of 10k-20k per, the dollar amount would already start to bump up against the 3m number over 3 years.

A 100K compensation for drafting the proposal is proposed.

GPC Team budget went from 10M to 18M

A single venture partner in the gaming space that has a great network / experience can easily command a base salary in the high 6 figures - this is without incentives for performance.

Delphi Digital had an independent analysis of staffing costs based on the known needs for the program that came to about $3-4.5m per year.

image|690x273

Our estimates were higher than Delphi's, specifically on producer and CTO roles, with totals ranging from $4m - $6m per year for staffing costs.

Regarding programs like STIP - remember that those programs do not have a full time staff and is not considered an investment entity, both which substantially increase the cost.

For the investment committee members, there is not additional pay to anyone on the committee that is a GCP team member.

We assumed one member of the DAO would be an investment committee member out of five members.

80k * 3 = 240k 30 * 4 * 3 = 360k 240k + 360k = 600k

It might have been a little confusing how the cost breakdown for council members was structured, will see if we can tidy that section up a bit.

All really good questions, I will reach out to you to schedule time to review any additional feedback!

axlvaz_SEEDLATAM.eth from cattin.seedlatam.eth

7.8M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Hello everyone!

102

Hello everyone!

However, there have been a few changes since the Snapshot approval (especially of a budgetary nature) that have given us some doubts.

On March 22 of this year, when the proposal was approved on Snapshot, the budget was as follows:

Quoted from Djinn

[The current Program Administration & Operations budget is being verified by working group team members and will be adjusted prior to the Tally vote.]

Total Incentives: 200m ARB
- Builder Onboarding and Growth: 160m ARB
- Infrastructure, Tooling & Stylus Development: 40m ARB
Program Administration & Operations - $10m in ARB
- Council Members (5): $25,000 per year ($250k total)
- Initial Legal Structuring: $250k
- General Legal / Compliance: $2m
- Fund Manager / Venture Lead: Up to $2m per year ($200k base + bonuses)
- Analysts (3): $125-$200k per year
- Proposal Authors and Key Collaborators: Retrofunded from administration flex fund, determined by council
- Program Insights and Analysis: TBD
- Multisig Signers (5): TBD
- Flex Spend - Remaining amount earmarked for any additional staffing needs, vendors, ops, retro funding, and research

Despite the proposal mentioning that it was a:

Quoted from Djinn

The GCP is meant to serve as a catalyst, not a comprehensive program, with a focus around onboarding and supporting high quality builders.

200M ARB + 10M was requested for Administration and Operations, making it the largest funding request ever approved by the DAO.

The initial goal for the 2-year period was as follows:

Quoted from Djinn

Within the initial time frame of the program, establish Arbitrum as a de facto leader for on-chain gaming:

200-300 applications
20%+ of all web3 games selecting Arbitrum as their network
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
25+ new Orbit launches

Regarding the KPIs, the targets have been significantly expanded. The goals for applications and Orbit Launches have been doubled:

Quoted from Djinn

Within the initial time frame of the program (3 years), the goal is to establish Arbitrum as a de facto leader for on-chain gaming. Specifically:

400-600 applications
100-200 net funded games
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
50+ new Orbit launches

jump to post →

On this date (April 18), the description of the GCP team and their roles (7 members) was also included, along with the Investment Committee (3 members).

In an initial iteration of the description of these teams, it was mentioned that

“GCP team members may receive incentives every 6 months based on performance. These incentives will be established with the approval of the Council and KPIs will be set for each team member.”

However, this same iteration, between April 18 and May 6 (last edit), expanded the operational budget by 100%:

Quoted from Djinn

Total Incentives: 200m ARB
Builder Onboarding and Growth: 160m ARB
Infrastructure, Tooling & Stylus Development: 40m ARB
Program Administration & Operations - $20m
Council Members (5): $630k
30k each member per year
60k for investment committee representative
MultiSig Signers (5): $180k
Team Salaries: $18m
Legal / Compliance: $1m
Expecting usage for vendors, entity setup, adjustments for fast evolving regulatory environment
Proposal Authors and Contributors: 100k ARB

jump to post →

Council Member compensation increased from 25K to 30K per year.

Initial Legal structuring was removed.

Legal Compliance was reduced by 50%.

Multisig signers (5) are added for 180K.

This was the proposal as of May 4.

Quoted from Djinn

Program Administration & Operations - $25m
- Council Members (5): $600k
  - 30k each member per year
  - 80k for investment committee representative
- MultiSig Signers (5): $180k (the multi-sig holding the total sum will have signers from the Arbitrum Foundation and Offchain labs - these individuals will not be paid)
- Team Salaries: $18m
- Marketing and Infrastructure: $2m
  - Includes website standup, conference spend, travel expenditure, and other costs
- Legal / Compliance: $3m
  - Expecting usage for vendors, entity setup, adjustments for fast evolving regulatory environment
- Proposal Authors and Contributors: 100k ARB

The funding for operations will be calculated at the USD value of ARB at the time of the Tally vote setup (5/21/24). In the case of overfunding, the program will return any funds to the DAO treasury.

jump to post →

The difference between what was proposed in April/May and this latest version lies mainly in four points:

A Marketing Infrastructure budget of 2M is created.
The legal budget is tripled, from 1M to 3M.
A 100K compensation for drafting the proposal is proposed.
GPC Team budget went from 10M to 18M

We believe that some figures are not correct. Correct us if there are any errors on our part.

The proposal mentions 600K for the Council and breaks it down into 30K per member per year (5 members) and 80K for the Committee Representative.

30 * 5 * 3 = 450

80 * 3 = 240

450 + 240 = 690

The other option is that the budget for the Committee Representative is for the 3 years, which would be 450 + 80 = 530.

In neither case does it amount to 600K.

As I mentioned above, the overall cost is claimed to increase by 5 million, but the added expenses for the April/May issue amount to 4.1 million.

Calculations show that 23.8 or 23.9 million is requested (depending on the Committee representative's budget) instead of the stated 25 million. What is the reason for this discrepancy?

25M ARB represents 12.5% of the program's cost, which we believe is somewhat high compared to other large programs due to administrative fees. For example:

The STIP had a cost of 94K ARB on an expenditure of 50M, a cost of less than 1%.
The LTIPP had a cost of 435K ARB on an expenditure of 45M, a cost of less than 1%.
The STEP estimates a cost of 300K ARB on an expenditure/investment of 35M, a cost of less than 1%.

Of the total cost, several aspects are unjustified.

Why is there 180K allocated for the multisig when: 1- the foundation provided a multisig, and 2- there is a proposal to control the multisig and avoid adding such unnecessary costs?

Why did the legal compliance budget go from 2M originally, then to 1M, and now to 3M?

This should be much more detailed, explaining precisely what the DAO should expect to see in these reports. Additionally, this commitment to transparency should be included in the proposal.

Djinn

47.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

After a review with key delegates, the Arbitrum foundation, and other key stakeholders, we present our final (really this time) draft before we go live on Tally.

Thank you everyone for your contributions, feedback, and invaluable support throughout this process!

Arbitrum DAO Gaming Catalyst Program: Final Tally Draft - 5/10

145

After a review with key delegates, the Arbitrum foundation, and other key stakeholders, we present our final (really this time) draft before we go live on Tally.

Thank you everyone for your contributions, feedback, and invaluable support throughout this process!

Arbitrum DAO Gaming Catalyst Program: Final Tally Draft - 5/10

Introduction - Gaming Catalyst Program

What changed: No changes

The Gaming Catalyst Program (GCP) is designed to immediately expand awareness and adoption of Arbitrum/Orbit/Stylus by builders and players in the Gaming community.

Arbitrum has emerged as a leader in the competitive network race through a dynamic formula of innovation, robust technology, organic builders, and a variety of short and long-term incentives.

Several L1s and L2s see this opportunity (most notably Solana, Cardano, Opstack, Immutable, Optimism, to name a few) and are moving to claim the builders with grants and investments.

GCP Hypothesis

What changed: Minor language updates

This educational post shares some of the pain points and metrics within the gaming ecosystem in regards to Arbitrum.

We will know we are succeeding when we achieve the following:

Rapidly Increase the number of Game Developers using Arbitrum/Orbit/Stylus

Strategic Allocation of Resources via Grants and Investments

Attracting and retaining Top Talent

Expanding the Use Cases of Arbitrum

Facilitating the Development of Sticky, Quality Games

Proposal Summary

What changed: No changes

We are asking the DAO to earmark 200m ARB over a three year period to expand the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum and establish the network as the top choice for game builders across the landscape.

Controls

Publishers and developers will be subject to a robust set of checks and balances to ensure alignment with this proposal’s goals and Arbitrum DAO’s values:

A GCP Council of 5 individuals with deep gaming, venture experience, analytics / reporting, and/or DAO governance skills will be elected by the DAO and will be responsible for holding the Catalyst GCP Team accountable - with influence including general oversight, visibility of performance reviews for GCP team members, offering a channel for constructive feedback.**
A GCP Team will be created with the support of the Arbitrum Foundation, and will collaborate with the GCP Council (which will serve as oversight):
- An investment committee of 3 individuals including 1 Council member will approve investments
- Funding for projects will be contingent on achieving milestones
- A quarterly transparency report will be created with summary data on GCP performance
- Funding of projects will include terms that are market competitive

Program Outcomes and KPIs

What changed: Adjusted KPIs for year 1 and year 2 to account for infrastructure setup time

The Gaming Catalyst program has an overarching goal to bring in talented builders, and help the builders accelerate their games through the lifecycle stages.

Primary expected outcome:

Within the initial time frame of the program (3 years), the goal is to establish Arbitrum as a de facto leader for on-chain gaming. Specifically:

400-600 applications
100-200 net funded games
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
50+ new Orbit launches

The GCP will take time to reach its full potential, and setting milestones vs maturity of the program is prudent:

KPI	Year 1	Year 2	Year 3
Daily Active Users	20,000	50,000	To be set by GCP Team
Orbit Launches	5	20	To be set by GCP Team
Studio Deals	10	20	To be set by GCP Team

Most games will be in dev and not (yet) live in 2024

The GCP team will set appropriate OKRs and KPIs internally to align with the goals and milestones listed above.

Initiatives & Budgeting

What changed: Formatting changes, combined sections for readability

We are asking the DAO for 200m ARB to develop the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum and establish the network as the top choice for game builders across the landscape.

The funding will be allocated towards the following initiatives over the span of a three year period:

1. Builder Onboarding & Growth (160m ARB)

Focused on attracting and supporting the best game builders into Arbitrum - open to publishers, established studios, and independent builders.

Thesis / Experiment: We are allocating a large majority of the budget to empower growth of publishers and studios on Arbitrum.

Build Grants (25m)

Guidelines & Details:

Teams may apply via the GCP Grants form
Grants have a maximum size of 500k ARB
Preference for user onboarding incentives or early stage development
The grants manager has final approval on grants
- Scorecards and details must be shared with the GCP Council
Proposed: early grants period until legal entity is formed for GCP
- Onboard interim grants allocator
- Interim council of 5 members votes on individual grants
- Maximum allocation of 10m ARB prior to GCP entity formation
Each grant must have specific milestones agreed upon before funding

Investments (135m)

Teams seeking more than 500k ARB or additional funding for development beyond initial development must work with the GCP investment team to align on deal terms.

Guidelines & Details:

Builders or publishers must agree on a commercial agreement value share through tokens, equity, revenue share (post recoupment), or other pathways.
- Other considerations include active use of Orbit chains with significant sequencer revenue share as part of the default licensing structure
More detailed deal structure guidelines will be created by the GCP Team upon its formation
By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO

2. Infrastructure Bounties (40m ARB)

Allocated by RFP or decided by the Council on a per proposal basis for any tooling and infrastructure needed to support gaming within Arbitrum (i.e. account abstraction solutions and gasless transactions for games, payment rails, web and game engine SDKs, data analytics and attribution, etc.)
Promote Orbit, Stylus, and other development and infrastructure growth on top of new Arbitrum technology releases

Current Gaps: A non-exhaustive list of gaps that currently exist within the Arbitrum ecosystem:

Custom gaming-centric implementations of Orbit chains
Mobile App Infrastructure with wallet that is optimized for games and asset management (See Ronin Wallet on mobile as an example)
Web and game engine SDKs (Unity, Unreal, Godot) that allow for in-game contract calls
Desktop launcher and distribution solutions
Game analytics, optimization, and related tooling (tying together on-chain, off-chain, social, and player activity)

Funding Guidelines:

The GCP Team will establish initial RFPs and funding guidelines
An infrastructure specific rubric will be established by the Council to assess proposals
Independent proposals that do not fit within RFP guidelines are welcome to apply separately for GCP Team consideration
Any approved applicants for RFPs may be selected for vendor whitelisting, which allows vendors to be marketed to GCP participants
By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO

GCP Org Structure

What changed: No changes

When designing the organizational structure of the GCP, two major dynamics were considered:

Enabling autonomy of the GCP team while setting safeguards for program success
Empowering the DAO to have transparency and representation without impacting compliance, disclosure, and other necessities for a grants program with commercial ties within the gaming industry

Decision making process

Decision is made by GCP team
- Investment committee decision, staffing, etc
Council meetings every two weeks to discuss / veto any decisions
Decision is ‘ratified’ and activated
Every half year, aggregate summary of data as applicable shared in a report to DAO

GCP Team

What changed: Added roles / responsibilities, section on entity setup, team incentives, and overall costing estimates.

The GCP Team will be the primary operator of the GCP program.

Team members may join the program through a few pathways:

Nomination through the proposal process (to help accelerate standup of the program)
Hiring by the GCP team, with veto capabilities held by the Council

The below team roles and responsibilities are illustrative of an initial proposed structure, but may change based on industry / program demands.

GCP Team Roles & Responsibilities

Fund General Manager / Venture Lead

Responsibilities:

Presents deals to the investment committee
Responsible for strategic planning and the overall success of the program
Managing and staffing the GCP Venture team
Providing leadership and oversight to the Venture team
Driving deals, partnerships and being the public face of the GCP program
Compliance

KPIs:

Overall investment milestones
Deal flow
Venture team performance

Program Director

Responsibilities:

Member of investment committee
Ensuring overall program success and sustainability
Managing and staffing the overall GCP program (in collaboration with the Venture Lead)
Leading marketing / program development efforts
Establishing internal metrics for OKRs & KPIs with the Venture and Grants programs
Align with Arbitrum DAO and other key stakeholders on strategic direction

KPIs:

Overall program milestones

Venture Partner

Responsibilities:

Member of the investment committee
Providing support for the GM
Negotiating with publishers and studios on deal terms
Working with General Counsel to ensure compliance
Overseeing portfolio management and providing strategic guidance to portcos
Preparing deal memos for the GCP Board

KPIs:

Funded deals
Successful game launches
Venture milestones
Compliance

General Counsel

Responsibilities:

Ensuring legal compliance/diligence
Managing legal operations
Managing documentation for investment deals
Serving as the liaison between the GCP and VCDAO

KPIs:

Average time to complete deals
Operating within budget for Legal

VP Finance

Responsibilities:

Managing all GCP council required reporting and tax requirements
Modeling of potential deals
Ensure budget compliance
AR/AP, payroll, vendor management
Maintain token calendar

KPIs:

Budget compliance
Program sustainability

Analyst x 2

Responsibilities:

Sourcing top deals in the market
Providing in-depth market research
Running due diligence for deals
Geographical focus:
- 1-2 - Asia-focused
- 1-2 - US/Europe-focused

KPIs:

Venture partner satisfaction
Number of fundable deals

Producer

Responsibilities:

Establishes milestones
Providers additional DD support for GM / Investor
Tracks performance for games
Collaboration with Program Director and Director of Technology to create infrastructure RFPs

KPIs:

Games shipping at quality
Game progress through development funnel

Director of Technology

Responsibilities:

Speed and ease of onboarding for builders
Documentation for tech onboarding of game projects
Connect the dots with vendors and gaming teams
Helps frame infrastructure RFPs for bounty program
Shortlists preferred vendors

KPIs:

Implementation throughput, onboarding pace
Builder advancement across development phases

Grants Manager

Responsibilities:

Due diligence for submitted grants
Presentation of grants to the council in written form
Contribution to transparency reports

KPIs:

Performance of projects receiving grants
Efficient distribution of grant funds

Investment Committee (separate from Council!)

The investment committee’s role is to provide extra perspective on deals brought forth by the Investment Lead and other team members, and make a final decision on investments.

The proposed investment committee structure consists of two GCP Team Members and council members - however the size and composition may change based on needs.

Our current proposed committee has 3 seats:

Program Director
Venture Partner
1 GCP Council Member (extra pay for this position)

Team Incentives

GCP team members may receive incentives every 6 months based on performance.

These incentives will be established with the approval of the Council and KPIs will be set for each team member.

The council must approve the bonus / incentives after each 6 month period (this time period may evolve over time).

GCP & Legal Compliance

The GCP will retain qualified counsel and coordinate with the Arbitrum DAO to ensure that it operates in a legally compliant manner at all times.

Team and GCP Board Costs

Performance against budget will be reviewed by GCP Council as part of the regular transparency reports.

ARB will be converted to USD or USDC by the Foundation before each quarter and sent to the GCP program account or multi-sig for disbursement.

Entity Setup and Model

This effort also involves DAO members from the M&A, Ops Co, VCDAO, and other initiatives.

GCP Council

What changed: Additional requirements added

Primary responsibilities of the GCP Council:

Collaborate with the GM and IC on deal proposals by providing insights and identifying potential risks (can challenge based on deals not meeting very clear requirements).
Offer recommendations on proposed deals after reviewing relevant data and analysis (this analysis would be a standard for all deal memos).
Escalate concerns regarding deals to designated oversight bodies if necessary.
Review and provide feedback on GCP team member nominations submitted by the GM and Program Director.
Advise the GM and Program Director on long-term strategic plans for GCP.

Requirements:

Council members must not be from publishers or studios intending to apply to GCP programs
Council members may not represent network competitors or have significant conflicts of interest due to investments, advisory, etc with competitors (Solana, Polygon, etc)
Council members must align with the values within the Arbitrum constitution
Council members with advisory, investor, or other relationships to applicants must disclose any conflicts of interest
Council members will go through mandatory yearly elections
The DAO may call a snapshot vote to remove / replace council members
Must sign NDAs and respect confidentiality agreements

Kickstarting the Team and Program

What changed: New section

To facilitate the stand up of the overall GCP programming and start funding talented teams within a reasonable time frame, we propose the following phases.

Phase 1: Early Activation (1-2 months)

Focus/Goal: Establish core operational framework.
Activities:
- Finalize entity setup for legal compliance.
- Working Group selects two interim council members with relevant expertise (gaming, industry influence, venture capital, DAO governance).
- Working Group, in collaboration with the interim council, selects initial team members for critical roles (Program Director, Analyst).
- Develop and present a clear timeline for council elections and full team buildout.

Phase 2: Program Development (2-4 months)

Focus/Goal: Build operational infrastructure and initiate program activities & tactics.
Activities:
- DAO elects remaining three council members & votes to confirm/reject interim council members.
- Establish key program infrastructure: website, grant application process, communication channels.
- Issue first RFP for infrastructure development.
- Open grant applications for game developers and studios.
- Develop initial marketing, brand, and outreach strategy (this includes identifying agency partners if needed).
- Finalize onboarding process for funded projects (includes research and team/project leader interviews).
- Begin recruiting for additional team members based on a prioritized hiring plan (which will be clarified early phase two).

Phase 3: Program Acceleration (4-6 months)

Focus/Goal: Achieve momentum, establish presence, and scale funding activities.
Activities:
- Full GCP team is operational, with all key roles filled (may be additional roles to consider based on learnings from prior months).
- Grant applications reviewed, and first grants awarded to qualified projects.
- Infrastructure RFPs reviewed, and contracts awarded to selected vendors.
- Implement marketing and outreach strategy.
- First program transparency report issued outlining performance against KPIs to DAO, Council, etc. Adjust strategies as needed.

Next Steps

What changed: Adjusted based on current estimates on timeline.

[Done] Post Open Draft (Shared on 2/15/24, link within Arbitrum Gaming Education Post [Arbitrum and the Future of Web3 Gaming 89]
[Done] Post GCP proposal to forum (3/11/24)
[Done] Snapshot vote (3/15/24) for general delegate agreement on GCP commitment, start entity setups, and to receive detailed feedback: Snapshot 304
Tally vote / ratification (May 2024)
In parallel with Tally vote and /or post-ratification, GCP working group and authors will work with the Arbitrum Foundation for entity setup
- Collaborate with Arbitrum Foundation resources and vendors for due diligence
- Stand up legal framework and entity to support GCP
- Initiate on elections, team recruitment, and other procedures after completion of entity setup
GCP Council Elections (June 2024)
GCP GCP Team formation (Starting in May/June 2024)
Grant applications and RFPs open (June/July 2024)

Total Cost

What changed: Adjusted total cost breakdown, added more details to Program Admin and Operations.

We estimate the total cost to equal 200m ARB + operations costs detailed below under Program Administration & Operations.

Total Incentives: 200m ARB
- Builder Onboarding and Growth: 160m ARB
- Infrastructure, Tooling & Stylus Development: 40m ARB
Program Administration & Operations - $25m
- Council Members (5): $600k
  - 30k each member per year
  - 80k for investment committee representative
- MultiSig Signers (5): $180k (the multi-sig holding the total sum will have signers from the Arbitrum Foundation and Offchain labs - these individuals will not be paid)
- Team Salaries: $18m
- Marketing and Infrastructure: $2m
  - Includes website standup, conference spend, travel expenditure, and other costs
- Legal / Compliance: $3m
  - Expecting usage for vendors, entity setup, adjustments for fast evolving regulatory environment
- Proposal Authors and Contributors: 100k ARB

The funding for operations will be calculated at the USD value of ARB at the time of the Tally vote setup (5/21/24). In the case of overfunding, the program will return any funds to the DAO treasury.

In the case of underfunding, the GCP team will have two options to continue operations:

Utilize any earmarked amounts for investments or grants to close the gap on funding up to the total allocated amount for operations
Stand up a vote to add additional operational funding to continue running the program

Proposal Contributors

What changed: Added new contributors, working group

Working group:

Dan Peng (PM / Author)
Karel Vuong (Author)
Marcus Segal
Rick Johanson

Djinn (Dan Peng) - PM / Author

Karel Vuong - Author (Co-Founder, Treasure)

Marcus Segal - Contributor

Rick Johanson - Contributor

Xai Games - Advisor / Contributor

L2Beats - Delegate Feedback

Helika - Advisor / Contributor

Jason Lee - Advisor / Contributor (ExPolygon Games, current web3 gaming founder)

Resources & Content

What changed: -

GCP AMA / Open Office 3/15/24 - https://twitter.com/i/spaces/1RDGllYMYvOGL?s=20 26

GCP AMA 5/8/24 - https://twitter.com/arbitrum/status/1788281797081456938?s=46

145

Djinn

47.6K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

Additional clarification of Council, Investment Committee, and GCP Core Team roles and responsibilities (thanks to Rick Johanson)

GCP Ecosystem Working Norms and Mechanics:

TL;DR: This collaborative structure aims to achieve program objectives while maintaining DAO oversight and transparency.

1. Funding and Oversight

138

Additional clarification of Council, Investment Committee, and GCP Core Team roles and responsibilities (thanks to Rick Johanson)

GCP Ecosystem Working Norms and Mechanics:

TL;DR: This collaborative structure aims to achieve program objectives while maintaining DAO oversight and transparency.

1. Funding and Oversight

Arbitrum DAO: Allocates xxx million ARB tokens over xxx years to fund the GCP.
GCP Council: Elected by the DAO, the council provides oversight and collaboration for the GCP team. They review proposals, offer insights, and can challenge a deal by majority vote and through a collaborative process of escalation with GCP Core Team.

2. Program Execution

GCP Core Team: Executes the program's day-to-day operations. This team identifies deals, negotiates terms, manages grants, and tracks progress.
Investment Committee (IC): A small group with representation from all entities within the GCP ecosystem. They make final decisions on investment deals brought forth by the GCP Core team.

3. Collaboration and Decision Making

GCP Core Team & Council: Collaborate on program strategy, deal evaluation, and identifying potential risks. The council provides expert advice and can challenge deals that don't meet clear requirements or are not aligned to established program objectives..
Investment Committee: Reviews investment proposals from the GCP team and makes final funding decisions. Additionally, they help resolve issues or concerns surfaced by the GCP Council related to deals.

4. Transparency and Accountability

GCP Core Team: Provides regular reports to the DAO on program performance, including metrics, risk response, and progress reports.
GCP Council: Ensures transparency by reviewing and providing feedback on team performance, nominations and decisions. The Arbitrum DAO can also call for council member removal.

Simple flow of responsibilities:

Arbitrum DAO allocates funds and elects the GCP Council.
The GCP Core Team identifies deals and negotiates terms.
The Investment Committee makes final decisions on investments.
The GCP Council provides oversight and collaborates with the team.
The GCP Core Team reports program performance to the DAO.

Key areas of ownership:

The DAO maintains ultimate control through funding and council elections.
The GCP Council provides expert guidance, escalates deal concerns and ensures transparency.
The GCP Core Team defines strategy, executes the program, and makes funding recommendations.
The Investment Committee has final say on investment decisions.

GCP Ecosystem Accountability Methodology:

TL;DR: A structure to ensure each entity is held accountable to the other to serve the best interests of the Arbitrum DAO and the overall success of the program.

Accountability is achieved through a multi-layered system that provides transparency but maintains collaborative work relationships.

Arbitrum DAO holds accountable:

GCP Council: Through yearly elections and the ability to call a snapshot vote for removal/replacement of council members.
- Elections and Removal: The DAO and council can remove members who underperform or violate trust/terms of agreements (NDA, PIIA, etc).
GCP Core Team: By receiving regular reports on program performance and having the ability to influence program strategy through the council.
- Transparency Reports: Regular reports from the GCP Core Team to the DAO showcase program performance and resource allocation, allowing the DAO to assess effectiveness.

GCP Council holds accountable:

GCP Core Team: By observing team member nominations and performance, providing feedback on decisions, and having the ability to challenge deals through collaborative escalation.
Themselves: By maintaining transparency through disclosure, NDAs, and facing potential removal via Arbitrum DAO, etc.
- NDAs and Disclosure: These ensure confidentiality and prevent conflicts of interest within the council and team.

GCP Core Team holds accountable:

Themselves: By meeting program goals like attracting builders, achieving milestones, and delivering results outlined in the proposal.
- Performance-based Incentives: The GCP Core Team's incentives are tied to performance, further aligning their goals with program success.
- Performance Metrics: Program success is measured against KPIs, holding the core team accountable for results.
Investment Committee: By providing justification and data for investment proposals.
GCP Council: By requesting clear, consistent, and actionable rationale when deals are challenged.

Investment Committee holds accountable:

Themselves: By making funding decisions based on sound analysis and alignment with program goals.
GCP Core Team: By potentially requesting additional information or revisions to investment proposals when needed.

138

maxlomu from maxlomu.eth

4.4M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

gm all, I have voted in favor of this proposal at temperature check.

This is a vote of confidence. Electing the right council will be key as they will have much greater power than other committees we created.

More details that would help to facilitate the final onchain vote:

Quoted from Djinn

200-300 applications
20%+ of all web3 games selecting Arbitrum as their network
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
25+ new Orbit launches

Great to see some KPIs - I would encourage further details around them and expected milestones for the program.

I want to hope that 2 years will be enough to demonstrate any ROI so we can then assess the overall impact of the program.

Let the Games begin!

Quoted from Djinn

我们的快照投票正在进行中！非常感谢@coinflip帮助构建和发布它。

https://snapshot.org/#/arbitrumfoundation.eth/proposal/0x1a9f2097b0b5a0021628e9edb0e7c9bffae4fdbb104f9996463e40a3129c7718

简介 - Gaming Catalyst 计划

通过动态的创新模式、强大的技术、有机建设者以及各种短期和长期激励措施，Arbitrum 已成为竞争性网络竞赛的领导者。

Arbitrum 上 DeFi 的激增展示了滚雪球效应如何快速地吸引构建者、用户，并最终为 Arbitrum DAO 和其他利益相关者（即链下实验室、以太坊等）带来价值。

这种动态在 web3 游戏垂直领域中尚未发生，但我们相信存在同样的机会来吸引最好的开发者，他们反过来会创造出具有粘性的优质游戏，从而在 Arbitrum 中带来并留住新用户。

Gaming Catalyst 计划 (GCP) 是一种模型，可快速加速 Arbitrum 对游戏开发者的支持，并战略性地向经过审查的专家分配资源，以加速游戏行业最佳开发者的入职和进入市场。

GCP假说

Arbitrum 在去中心化金融领域取得了巨大成功，但 Arbitrum 作为游戏玩家和游戏开发者之家的品牌才刚刚起步。作为一个网络，Arbitrum 在迁移的游戏总数、发布的游戏总数和游戏玩家总数方面落后于几个主要竞争对手。

这个教育帖子分享了游戏生态系统中有关 Arbitrum 的一些痛点和指标。

通过游戏催化剂计划，我们相信拨出积极的预算来吸引开发者和留住人才将带来一些重大胜利：

游戏开发者的快速加速： GCP 旨在为有兴趣在 Arbitrum 网络上构建的游戏开发者提供支持和资源。这包括获得资金、指导和其他形式的援助，以加快开发进程。

资源的战略分配： 通过战略性地分配资源，该计划可以通过关注游戏行业内经过审查的专家和有前途的项目来最大限度地发挥其影响力。这确保了资源得到有效利用，促进 Arbitrum 上优质游戏的发展。

吸引顶尖人才： 就像 DeFi 项目因其创新技术和激励措施而纷纷涌向 Arbitrum 一样，GCP 的目标是吸引业内最优秀的游戏开发者。通过提供支持和激励，Arbitrum 可以将自己定位为一个有吸引力的游戏开发平台，从而有可能导致网络上高质量游戏体验的激增。

打造有粘性的优质游戏： GCP 的最终目标是鼓励开发有粘性的高质量游戏，不仅能吸引用户，还能长期留住用户。专门的风险投资团队和专家委员会将作为质量控制机制，以确保最好的申请者得到 GCP 的全力支持。

扩展 Arbitrum 的用例： 虽然 DeFi 迄今为止一直是 Arbitrum 成功的主要焦点，但扩展到游戏垂直领域为网络带来了新的机会和用例。通过支持游戏开发，Arbitrum 可以使其生态系统多样化，并吸引更广泛的用户和开发者，其结果包括但不限于 Orbit 链和 Stylus 的采用。

提案摘要

我们要求 DAO 在两年内拨出 2 亿 ARB，以支持 Arbitrum 上的游戏生态系统，并将该网络打造成整个领域游戏开发者的首选。

GCP 旨在充当催化剂，而不是一个综合计划，重点是吸引和支持高质量的构建者。

GCP 推出后，目标是发展成为一个长期的游戏计划，以更全面的方法促进游戏生态系统的发展。

从战略上讲，我们相信吸引、留住和支持开发者将是与其他竞争网络的关键差异化因素，并将带来最高概率的优质游戏发布，进而吸引大量活跃的游戏玩家。

该基金的一部分将用于与经批准的、符合 Arbitrum 的发行商共同投资有前途的工作室和游戏，相信发行商的商业模式、行业专业知识和业绩记录将简化外展、审查、谈判、构建者的入职和支持流程。该基金还将提供给所有其他寻求在 Arbitrum 上创建游戏的游戏开发者。

发行商和开发者将受到一套强有力的制衡，以确保符合该提案的目标和 Arbitrum DAO 的价值观：

要参与 GCP，发布商必须列入白名单并获得理事会批准
由 DAO 选出的由 5 名具有深厚游戏或/和风险投资经验的人组成的 GCP 委员会将负责让 Catalyst 风险投资团队承担责任 - 权力包括一般监督、雇用/解雇员工（将其视为董事会））
将使用 GCP 绩效的汇总数据创建季度透明度报告
将在基金会子公司下创建一个风险投资团队，并由 GCP 委员会监督，以促进交易结构、尽职调查、资金支付等
- 风险投资主管/总经理
- 项目经理/运营主管
- 分析师
- 合法合规
- 其他管理/操作
- 业务拓展/营销

预期成果和 KPI

Gaming Catalyst 计划的总体目标是引进有才华的开发者，并帮助开发者在整个生命周期阶段加速他们的游戏。

我们将举办一系列开放办公时间，以帮助将游戏行业标准与我们旨在通过该计划实现的最佳实践/成果联系起来。

我们将跟踪的最高级别指标是工作室/构建者加入 Arbitrum 生态系统。然而，由于发布者应用程序、目标构建者类型以及网络竞争的变量，实现的结果将会存在差异。

主要预期成果：

在该计划的初始时间范围内，将 Arbitrum 打造为链上游戏事实上的领导者：

200-300 个申请
超过 20% 的 web3 游戏选择 Arbitrum 作为其网络
与其他 L2 相比，赢得 Arbitrum 的净迁移
超过 25 个新 Orbit 发射

该计划旨在实现的另一个成果是通过2024 年 2 月 2 日的 Helika 演示展示的游戏生命周期中的渐进运动在我们的开放办公时间内。

举措

我们要求 DAO 指定 2 亿 ARB 来开发 Arbitrum 上的游戏生态系统，并将该网络打造成整个领域游戏开发者的首选。

资金将在两年内分配给以下举措：

1. 构建商入职和成长（160m ARB）

发行商通过寻找/收购开发者和扩大发行支持来加速 Arbitrum 游戏生态系统的发展
1. 出版商可以通过理事会投票（白名单流程）获得资格，并公开理事会成员的决定
2. 出版商必须至少匹配总拨款要求的 10%
独立游戏开发者为与发行商没有商业关系的开发者提供资助

2. 基础设施奖励（40m ARB）

由 RFP 分配或由理事会根据每个提案决定，用于支持 Arbitrum 内的游戏所需的任何工具和基础设施（即游戏的账户抽象解决方案和无 Gas 交易、支付轨道、网络和游戏引擎 SDK、数据分析和归因等） .)
在新 Arbitrum 技术发布的基础上，促进 Orbit、Stylus 和其他开发和基础设施的增长

提议的数字代表了可用于促进 Arbitrum 游戏的 ARB 上限。如果这三个计划中的任何一个在 GCP 结束时都存在未使用的 ARB，资金将被转回 DAO。

A. 构建商入职和成长

预算：1.6亿美元ARB

资金用途：这笔资金拟保留给 Arbitrum 上已建立的发行商生态系统和独立构建者，以帮助扩大 DAO 吸引、保护和加速 Arbitrum 人才团队的能力。

论文/实验：我们将大部分预算分配给 Arbitrum 上的发行商和工作室的发展。

这些发行商和工作室是 DAO 的主题专家，他们拥有现有的游戏专业知识和资源，能够有效地将新项目和用户引入网络。发行商生态系统通常集中有多个游戏，这些游戏属于一个保护伞，由共享社区、统一基础设施和社交结构连接，可以为游戏提供更大的成功机会。发行商需要提交一份提案以将其列入该计划的白名单，并向风险投资团队提交个别交易以供考虑。

资金还可以作为赠款分配给没有活跃发行商关系的开发者，以鼓励独立工作室和开发者的发展。每个提案将直接提交给创业团队审核和批准。

资助指南：

发布商需要根据发布商申请模板在论坛上发布公共提案，才能被列入白名单作为批准的发布商
- 出版商历史
- 团队背景及构成
- 成功案例和投资组合
- 仲裁贡献
- Arbitrum 网络增长计划
- 一旦列入白名单，出版商可以向风险投资团队提出交易以供考虑资助
（指定 2000 万 ARB）对于 50 万以下的赠款，建设者/发行商不需要签订商业协议，并且可以联系风险团队赠款分配者（与传统的风险团队交易分开），以更快地获得资金
- 基金会可能参与其中
（指定 1.4 亿 ARB）对于超过 50 万或由 GCP 委员会标记的赠款，开发者或发行商必须通过代币、收入或其他途径就商业协议价值份额达成一致
- 出版商必须为整个交易分配至少 10% 的出资
- 瀑布结构之后将进行以下高级突破（风险团队将添加必要的细节）：
  - 赠款总规模的收入将更优惠地分配给 DAO - 这是一般规则，但每笔具体交易可能会看到不同的百分比和交易结构
  - 在支付初始资助成本后，收入份额将根据商定的里程碑进行分配，具体取决于时间、总收入和其他独特方面 - 以每笔交易为基础
  - 根据交易的类型/结构，将考虑1-2年的时间因素
发行商可以自由地接触任何游戏开发商，但不能从 Arbitrum 网络内的其他发行商那里挖走
赠款分配没有大小限制
风险投资团队将在成立后制定更详细的交易结构指南
计划期限结束时，任何未使用的 ARB 将退还给 DAO

B. 游戏基础设施赏金

预算：4000万美元ARB

资金使用：这将由 RFP 或根据提案分配给进一步支持 Arbitrum 内游戏所需的任何工具和基础设施（即 Arbitrum Orbit 以游戏为中心的样板、通过 Stylus 构建的游戏合约库、帐户抽象和无气体交易解决方案、支付）用于游戏、Web 和游戏引擎 SDK（Unity、Unreal、Godot）等的 Rails

论文/实验：Web3 游戏仍处于萌芽阶段，游戏构建者在构建游戏并将其推向市场方面存在关键差距。通过激励此类基础设施项目和工具的开发，或加速 Stylus 作为 Arbitrum 原生框架的开发，这将有助于使 Arbitrum 在竞争性网络领域进一步领先。

当前差距：Arbitrum 生态系统中当前存在的差距的非详尽列表：

Orbit 链的以游戏为中心的自定义实施
带有针对游戏和资产管理进行优化的钱包的移动应用基础设施（请参阅移动设备上的 Ronin 钱包作为示例）
允许游戏内合约调用的 Web 和游戏引擎 SDK（Unity、Unreal、Godot）
桌面启动器和分发解决方案
游戏分析、优化和相关工具（将链上、链下、社交和玩家活动结合在一起）

资助指南：

理事会将制定初步征求建议书和融资指南
理事会将制定基础设施特定的标题来评估提案
欢迎不符合 RFP 指南的独立提案单独申请供理事会考虑
计划期限结束时，任何未使用的 ARB 将退还给 DAO

下一步

[已完成] 公开草案发布（于 2024 年 2 月 15 日共享，Arbitrum 游戏教育帖子中的链接 [ Arbitrum 和 Web3 Gaming 的未来）
[已完成] 将 GCP 提案发布到论坛 (3/11/24)
[已完成] 快照投票 (3/15/24)，以就 GCP 承诺达成一般代表协议、启动实体设置并接收详细反馈：快照
计票/批准（2024 年 4 月）
GCP 理事会选举（2024 年 4 月至 5 月）
GCP 风险团队组建（2024 年 4 月至 5 月）
赠款申请和 RFP 开放（2024 年 4 月至 5 月）

总成本

我们估计总成本等于 2 亿美元 ARB + 运营成本（详见下文“计划管理和运营”）。

这是一个为期两年的计划，随着计划的发展，预测金额可能会发生变化/需要修改。

[当前的计划管理和运营预算正在由工作组团队成员验证，并将在计票投票之前进行调整。]

总奖励：200m ARB
- 构建商入职和成长：160m ARB
- 基础设施、工具和手写笔开发：40m ARB
项目管理和运营 - ARB 1000 万美元
- 理事会成员 (5)：每年 25,000 美元（总计 25 万美元）
- 初始法律架构：25万美元
- 一般法律/合规：200 万美元
- 基金经理/风险投资主管：每年高达 200 万美元（基础金额 + 奖金 20 万美元）
- 分析师 (3)：每年 125-20 万美元
- 提案作者和主要合作者：由理事会决定，从管理弹性基金中返还资金
- 计划见解和分析：待定
- 多重签名者 (5)：待定
- 弹性支出 - 剩余金额指定用于任何额外的人员需求、供应商、运营、复古资金和研究

提案贡献者

Djinn (Dan) - 作者（Vela Exchange 联合创始人） Karel - 作者（Treasure 联合创始人） Xai Games - 顾问/贡献者 Helika - 顾问/贡献者 Jason Lee - 顾问/贡献者（ExPolygon Games，现任 web3 游戏创始人）

Great job on initiating the Gaming Catalyst Program! 👏 It's a pivotal step towards solidifying Arbitrum's position as a leader in competitive network gaming. Here's a suggestion: let's ensure that alongside attracting talented developers, we focus on fostering a vibrant gaming community on Arbitrum. Engaging users through interactive events, tournaments, and community-driven initiatives can amplify the program's impact and attract even more users. Keep up the fantastic work! 🚀

Arbitrum DAO Gaming Catalyst Program: Tally Draft

Introduction - Gaming Catalyst Program

What changed: Added additional data points and market sizing.

The Gaming Catalyst Program (GCP) is designed to immediately expand awareness and adoption of Arbitrum/Orbit/Stylus by builders and players in the Gaming community.

Arbitrum has emerged as a leader in the competitive network race through a dynamic formula of innovation, robust technology, organic builders, and a variety of short and long-term incentives.

Several L1s and L2s see this opportunity (most notably Solana, Cardano, Opstack, Optimism, to name a few) and are moving to claim the builders with grants and investments.

GCP Hypothesis

What changed: General content, enhanced GCP goals.

This educational post shares some of the pain points and metrics within the gaming ecosystem in regards to Arbitrum.

We will know we are succeeding when we achieve the following:

Rapidly Increase the number of Game Developers using Arbitrum/Orbit/Stylus

Strategic Allocation of Resources via Grants and Investments

Attracting and retaining Top Talent

Expanding the Use Cases of Arbitrum

Facilitating the Development of Sticky, Quality Games

Proposal Summary

What changed: Extended timeline to three years from two years to ensure program has room to show more results.

We are asking the DAO to earmark 200m ARB over a three year period to expand the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum and establish the network as the top choice for game builders across the landscape.

Controls

Publishers and developers will be subject to a robust set of checks and balances to ensure alignment with this proposal’s goals and Arbitrum DAO’s values:

A GCP Council of 5 individuals with deep gaming, venture experience, analytics / reporting, and/or DAO governance skills will be elected by the DAO and will be responsible for holding the Catalyst GCP Team accountable - with powers including general oversight, hiring / firing of staff (think of them as a Board )
A GCP Team will be created with the support of the Arbitrum Foundation, and will collaborate with the GCP Council (which will serve as oversight):
- An investment committee of 3 individuals including 1 Council member will approve investments
- Funding for projects will be contingent on achieving milestones
- A quarterly transparency report will be created with summary data on GCP performance
- Funding of projects will include terms that are market competitive

Program Outcomes and KPIs

What changed: Adjusted KPIs to account for a three year period and more aggressive goals, added Year 1 goals.

The Gaming Catalyst program has an overarching goal to bring in talented builders, and help the builders accelerate their games through the lifecycle stages.

Primary expected outcome:

Within the initial time frame of the program (3 years), the goal is to establish Arbitrum as a de facto leader for on-chain gaming. Specifically:

400-600 applications
100-200 net funded games
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
50+ new Orbit launches

The GCP will take time to reach its full potential, and setting milestones vs maturity of the program is prudent:

KPI	Year 1	Year 2
Daily Active Users	40,000 - 50,000 *	To be set by the GCP Team
Orbit Launches	15
Studio Deals	20

Most games will be in dev and not (yet) live in 2024

The GCP team will set appropriate OKRs and KPIs internally to align with the goals and milestones listed above.

Initiatives

What changed: Removed publisher earmark, split the Builder Onboarding & Growth section into grants and investments. RFP details adjusted.

We are asking the DAO to earmark 200m ARB to develop the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum and establish the network as the top choice for game builders across the landscape.

The funding will be allocated towards the following initiatives over the span of a three year period:

1. Builder Onboarding & Growth (160m ARB)

Focused on bringing the best game builders into Arbitrum - open to publishers, established studios, and independent builders.

Grants to accelerate ecosystem growth (25m)
- Generally for smaller asks and projects
- Commercial terms may not be required
- Reviewed by grants manager
Investments with commercial agreements (135m)
- Generally for larger deals
- Managed by an internal GCP venture team, via commercial terms (recoup + revenue share, equity, tokens, gas fees, etc..) with ROI as a main KPI
- Full funding of projects tied to achievement of milestones

2. Infrastructure Bounties (40m ARB)

Allocated by RFP or decided by the Council on a per proposal basis for any tooling and infrastructure needed to support gaming within Arbitrum (i.e. account abstraction solutions and gasless transactions for games, payment rails, web and game engine SDKs, data analytics and attribution, etc.)
Promote Orbit, Stylus, and other development and infrastructure growth on top of new Arbitrum technology releases

The numbers proposed represent an upper bound of ARB that could be deployed to catalyze gaming on Arbitrum. In the event there is unused ARB at the end of the GCP across any of the two initiatives, funds will be transferred back to the DAO.

A. Builder Onboarding and Growth

Total Budget: 160m ARB

Thesis / Experiment: We are allocating a large majority of the budget to empower growth of publishers and studios on Arbitrum.

Build Grants (25m)

Guidelines & Details:

Teams may apply via the GCP Grants form
Grants have a maximum size of 500k ARB
Preference for user onboarding incentives or early stage development
The grants manager has final approval on grants
- Scorecards and details must be shared with the GCP Council
Proposed: early grants period until legal entity is formed for GCP
- Onboard interim grants allocator
- Interim council of 5 members votes on individual grants
- Maximum allocation of 10m ARB prior to GCP entity formation
Each grant must have specific milestones agreed upon before funding

Investments (135m)

Teams seeking more than 500k ARB or additional funding for development beyond initial development must work with the GCP investment team to align on deal terms.

Guidelines & Details:

Builders or publishers must agree on a commercial agreement value share through tokens, equity, revenue share (post recoupment), or other pathways.
- Other considerations include active use of Orbit chains with significant sequencer revenue share as part of the default licensing structure
More detailed deal structure guidelines will be created by the GCP Team upon its formation
By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO

B. Game Infrastructure Bounties

Budget: 40m ARB

Use of Funds: This will be allocated by RFP or per proposal for any tooling and infrastructure needed to further support gaming within Arbitrum (i.e. gaming-centric boilerplates for Arbitrum Orbit, game contract libraries built via Stylus, account abstraction and gasless transactions solutions, payment rails for games, web and game engine SDKs (Unity, Unreal, Godot), etc.)

Current Gaps: A non-exhaustive list of gaps that currently exist within the Arbitrum ecosystem:

Custom gaming-centric implementations of Orbit chains
Mobile App Infrastructure with wallet that is optimized for games and asset management (See Ronin Wallet on mobile as an example)
Web and game engine SDKs (Unity, Unreal, Godot) that allow for in-game contract calls
Desktop launcher and distribution solutions
Game analytics, optimization, and related tooling (tying together on-chain, off-chain, social, and player activity)

Funding Guidelines:

The GCP Team will establish initial RFPs and funding guidelines
An infrastructure specific rubric will be established by the Council to assess proposals
Independent proposals that do not fit within RFP guidelines are welcome to apply separately for GCP Team consideration
Any approved applicants for RFPs may be selected for vendor whitelisting, which allows vendors to be marketed to GCP participants
By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO

GCP Org Structure

What changed: Added proposed org structure and relationship between each stakeholder / partie(s).

When designing the organizational structure of the GCP, two major dynamics were considered:

Enabling autonomy of the GCP team while setting safeguards for program success
Empowering the DAO to have transparency and representation without impacting compliance, disclosure, and other necessities for a grants program with commercial ties within the gaming industry

Decision making process

Decision is made by GCP team
- Investment committee decision, staffing, etc
Council meetings every two weeks to discuss / veto any decisions
Decision is ‘ratified’ and activated
Every half year, aggregate summary of data as applicable shared in a report to DAO

GCP Team

What changed: Added roles / responsibilities, section on entity setup, team incentives, and overall costing estimates.

The GCP Team will be the primary operator of the GCP program.

Team members may join the program through a few pathways:

Nomination through the proposal process (to help accelerate standup of the program)
Hiring by the GCP team, with veto capabilities held by the Council

The below team roles and responsibilities are illustrative of an initial proposed structure, but may change based on industry / program demands.

GCP Team Roles & Responsibilities

1. Fund General Manager / Venture Lead

Responsibilities:

Presents deals to the investment committee
Responsible for strategic planning and the overall success of the program
Managing and staffing the GCP Venture team
Providing leadership and oversight to the Venture team
Driving deals, partnerships and being the public face of the GCP program
Compliance

KPIs:

Overall investment milestones
Deal flow
Venture team performance

2. Program Director

Responsibilities:

Member of investment committee
Ensuring overall program success and sustainability
Managing and staffing the overall GCP program (in collaboration with the Venture Lead)
Leading marketing / program development efforts
Establishing internal metrics for OKRs & KPIs with the Venture and Grants programs
Align with Arbitrum DAO and other key stakeholders on strategic direction

KPIs:

Overall program milestones

3. Venture Partner

Responsibilities:

Member of the investment committee
Providing support for the GM
Negotiating with publishers and studios on deal terms
Working with General Counsel to ensure compliance
Overseeing portfolio management and providing strategic guidance to portcos
Preparing deal memos for the GCP Board

KPIs:

Funded deals
Successful game launches
Venture milestones
Compliance

4. General Counsel

Responsibilities:

Ensuring legal compliance/diligence
Managing legal operations
Managing documentation for investment deals
Serving as the liaison between the GCP and DAO

KPIs:

Average time to complete deals
Operating within budget for Legal

5. VP Finance

Responsibilities:

Managing all GCP council required reporting and tax requirements
Modeling of potential deals
Ensure budget compliance
AR/AP, payroll, vendor management
Maintain token calendar

KPIs:

Budget compliance
Program sustainability

6. Analyst x 2

Responsibilities:

Sourcing top deals in the market
Providing in-depth market research
Running due diligence for deals
Geographical focus:
- 1-2 - Asia-focused
- 1-2 - US/Europe-focused

KPIs:

Venture partner satisfaction
Number of fundable deals

7. Producer

Responsibilities:

Establishes milestones
Providers additional DD support for GM / Investor
Tracks performance for games
Collaboration with Program Director and Director of Technology to create infrastructure RFPs

KPIs:

Games shipping at quality
Game progress through development funnel

8. Director of Technology (implementation engineer)

Responsibilities:

Documentation for tech onboarding of game projects
Connect the dots with vendors and gaming teams
Helps frame infrastructure RFPs for bounty program
Shortlists preferred vendors

KPIs:

Implementation throughput, onboarding pace
Builder advancement across development phases

9. Grants Manager

Responsibilities:

Due diligence for submitted grants
Presentation of grants to the council in written form
Contribution to transparency reports

KPIs:

Performance of projects receiving grants
Efficient distribution of grant funds

Investment Committee (separate from Council!)

The investment committee’s role is to provide extra perspective on deals brought forth by the Investment Lead and other team members, and make a final decision on investments.

The proposed investment committee structure consists of two GCP Team Members and council members - however the size and composition may change based on needs.

Our current proposed committee has 3 seats:

Program Director
Venture Partner
1 GCP Council Member (extra pay for this position)

Team Incentives

GCP team members may receive incentives every 6 months based on performance.

These incentives will be established with the approval of the Council and KPIs will be set for each team member.

The council must approve the bonus / incentives after each 6 month period (this time period may evolve over time).

GCP & Legal Compliance

The GCP will retain qualified counsel and coordinate with the Arbitrum DAO to ensure that it operates in a legally compliant manner at all times.

Team and GCP Board Costs

The GCP’s operating budget will be capped at $20m USD (excluding additional legal and financial expenses specifically required to ensure compliance with DAO/Foundation requirements).

ARB will be converted to USD or USDC by the Foundation before each quarter and sent to the GCP program account or multi-sig for disbursement.

Entity Setup and Model

This effort also involves DAO members from the M&A, Ops Co, VCDAO, and other initiatives.

GCP Council

What changed: Revised descriptions of GCP Council’s role and responsibilities that portrays it more as a collaborative body vs a governing board.

Primary responsibilities of the GCP Council:

Collaborate with the GM and IC on deal proposals by providing insights and identifying potential risks (can challenge based on deals not meeting very clear requirements).
Offer recommendations on proposed deals after reviewing relevant data and analysis (this analysis would be a standard for all deal memos).
Escalate concerns regarding deals to designated oversight bodies if necessary.
Review and provide feedback on GCP team member nominations submitted by the GM and Program Director.
Advise the GM and Program Director on long-term strategic plans for GCP.

Requirements:

Council members must not be from publishers or studios intending to apply to GCP programs
Council members with advisory, investor, or other relationships to applicants must disclose these conflicts
Council members will go through mandatory yearly elections
The DAO may call a snapshot vote to remove / replace council members
Must sign NDAs and respect confidentiality agreements

Next Steps

What changed: Adjusted based on current estimates on timeline.

[Done] Post Open Draft (Shared on 2/15/24, link within Arbitrum Gaming Education Post [Arbitrum and the Future of Web3 Gaming 89]
[Done] Post GCP proposal to forum (3/11/24)
[Done] Snapshot vote (3/15/24) for general delegate agreement on GCP commitment, start entity setups, and to receive detailed feedback: Snapshot 304
Tally vote / ratification (May 2024)
In parallel with Tally vote and /or post-ratification, GCP working group and authors will work with the Arbitrum Foundation for entity setup
- Collaborate with Arbitrum Foundation resources and vendors for due diligence
- Stand up legal framework and entity to support GCP
- Initiate on elections, team recruitment, and other procedures after completion of entity setup
GCP Council Elections (May 2024)
GCP GCP Team formation (April - May 2024)
Grant applications and RFPs open (May - June 2024)

Total Cost

What changed: Adjusted total cost breakdown, added more details to Program Admin and Operations.

We estimate the total cost to equal 200m ARB + operations costs detailed below under Program Administration & Operations.

Total Incentives: 200m ARB
- Builder Onboarding and Growth: 160m ARB
- Infrastructure, Tooling & Stylus Development: 40m ARB
Program Administration & Operations - $20m
- Council Members (5): $630k
  - 30k each member per year
  - 60k for investment committee representative
- MultiSig Signers (5): $180k
- Team Salaries: $18m
- Legal / Compliance: $1m
  - Expecting usage for vendors, entity setup, adjustments for fast evolving regulatory environment
- Proposal Authors and Contributors: 100k ARB

Proposal Contributors

What changed: Added new contributors.

Djinn (Dan Peng) - PM / Author

Karel Vuong - Author (Co-Founder, Treasure)

Marcus Segal - Contributor

Rick Johanson - Contributor

Xai Games - Advisor / Contributor

Helika - Advisor / Contributor

Jason Lee - Advisor / Contributor (ExPolygon Games, current web3 gaming founder)

Resources & Content

What changed: -

GCP AMA / Open Office 3/15/24 - https://twitter.com/i/spaces/1RDGllYMYvOGL?s=20 26

132

Here are some thoughts on behalf of the UADP (voted against the Snapshot):

Although we are generally in support of initiatives to further strengthen Arbitrum’s gaming ecosystem, we simply believe that the ask of nearly $400M here is exorbitant. One thing we’ve been thinking about is L2s having more of a concrete identity. Naturally, Arbitrum’s identity has become DeFi-biased. And although there are strong gaming initiatives that have sprouted out of Arb, like Treasure, we feel that doubling down on what we’re good at is what we should focus more attention on. That being said, we’re not in favor of eliminating gaming in its entirety. There should still be programs to support game devs and attract publishers–but to a smaller account. Game development is very much an all or nothing task. Either we go all in or keep it light.

Everyone saying these sorts of funding programs will seed the next AAA game are simply incorrect. The entire $400M budget would easily be spent curating a AAA game and would take numerous years. The goal of this proposal is to play catch up, it seems. Hence, the focus should be on a handful of strong indie games. This budget could address that market, but we still feel that a smaller budget can be more prudently allocated to serve that purpose. We would encourage this proposal to go forward with a much smaller ask and collaborate with the grant groups, like the gaming domain allocator, to come up with a way to grow gaming. That way, some data points are present to help guide the funding initiative.

A good idea may be to switch the framing of this program to an incubator/accelerator that is paid out in tranches. A big issue with this proposal is that longevity is not addressed. We need follow-on investments to support the groups who are the most promising, and the best way to do so is track and monitor continual performance relative to given KPIs. As soon as KPIs are met, those teams attain more funding. This would elongate the timeline here from 2 years to many more. It would also reduce the ask of $400M to something smaller due to the tranched setup. This way, we are thinking more long-term and in an organized manner. Currently, it seems things are being rushed, which sounds like a recipe for disaster.

The other aspect that we feel is unclear is how tangibly the reward will circle back to the DAO. There are two aspects this proposal can optimize for: increasing Arbitrum’s gaming presence and returning value to the DAO. Of course, both can theoretically be achieved, but there’s a very real likelihood that only one or none will be accomplished. If we are competing with groups like Immutable, who’ve spent the past several years throwing money at game studios, gaming partnerships, and tooling like their SDKs and custom APIs, it’s hard to justify spending this much capital to potentially see little return when a direct competitor is miles ahead and thinks about nothing else but gaming. What we could focus on instead is a chain agnostic approach, where the DAO truly runs a VC gaming arm for the sake of profit, and of course, has a bias towards developing on Arbitrum. That way, at least we can more reasonably forecast ROI.

PrincetonBlockchain from princetonbc.eth

406.5K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

The Princeton Blockchain Club is (cautiously) voting FOR the Gaming Catalyst Program at the Snapshot stage.

The Arbitrum DAO should be concerned about how many other chains are deploying upwards of 9 figures towards gaming. Starknet's Gaming Committee was just given 50m STRK (~$110m USD), and Immutable, King River Capital, and Polygon Labs formed a $100m USD gaming fund. There's also a $3m USD gaming accelerator program for Optimism chains. Clearly other teams recognize that Web3 gaming could be a goldmine for adoption and revenue.

The Princeton Blockchain Club is (cautiously) voting FOR the Gaming Catalyst Program at the Snapshot stage.

200m ARB is a pretty large ask. It's interesting to think back to the STIP Backfund a while ago, which passed with significantly more friction over 1/10th of the current ask. We do acknowledge that the process of making a quality AAA title can get quite massive though - the speculated budget for the upcoming GTA VI is multiples higher than this whole proposal for example.

If we can launch a few games that appeal to the non-crypto crowd during this 2-year program, the increase in Arbitrum adoption will be more than worth it. Based on the way the Snapshot votes are going, it seems that other delegates think similiarly.

(I must admit, I am quite skeptical of crypto gaming. The gaming crowd is extremely hostile of crypto, and for good reason. If all I was exposed to was Logan Paul's CryptoZoo and BAYC's Dookey Dash, I'd write off the sector entirely. We also face pushback from marketplaces, such as Steam, which outright ban blockchain games. I don't think it's impossible to change this though, so I do have some hope. Having the next CS:GO or Genshin Impact on Arbitrum would be incredible.)

We will be doing further review before the onchain vote. Big thanks to everyone that contributed to this proposal though, as we're glad to see something like this!

mcfly from 0xmcfly.eth

101.8K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

While I appreciate the Arbitrum community's enthusiasm for fostering a thriving gaming ecosystem and recognize the potential value of dedicating significant resources to this effort, I believe there are several important concerns that need to be addressed before moving forward.

Firstly, as highlighted by many detailed comments above, the success of a gaming ecosystem depends on factors beyond just financial investment. Allocating a large budget, such as the proposed $400 million, does not guarantee the creation of games that will be embraced by the community or attract a sustainable player base. The intrinsic quality of the games, the engagement of the community, and the ability to attract players from outside the existing Arbitrum ecosystem are all critical factors that need to be considered.

Secondly, the timeline proposed in the GCP may not align with the realities of game development. As noted in the comment, the program may not be able to move quickly enough to attract games that are already in the pipeline for deployment within the next 12-18 months. This suggests that the impact of the program on the immediate gaming landscape within the Arbitrum ecosystem may be limited.

Furthermore, the comment raises valid concerns about the potential misalignment of incentives between the goals of the Web3 community and the realities of game development. The focus on financial incentives and "filling bags" in the Web3 gaming space may not be conducive to the creation of truly engaging and sustainable games.

Given these concerns, I believe that the Arbitrum community would benefit from further discussion and refinement of the proposal. By abstaining from the current proposal, we can signal our commitment to building a thriving gaming ecosystem while acknowledging the need for a more nuanced approach that takes into account the unique challenges and opportunities presented by the intersection of gaming and Web3.

I encourage the proponents of the GCP to engage more with the ARB community to refine the proposal and sets realistic expectations for the timeline and resources required to achieve these goals.

Quoted from Djinn

我们的快照投票正在进行中！非常感谢@coinflip帮助构建和发布它。

https://snapshot.org/#/arbitrumfoundation.eth/proposal/0x1a9f2097b0b5a0021628e9edb0e7c9bffae4fdbb104f9996463e40a3129c7718

简介 - Gaming Catalyst 计划

通过动态的创新模式、强大的技术、有机建设者以及各种短期和长期激励措施，Arbitrum 已成为竞争性网络竞赛的领导者。

Arbitrum 上 DeFi 的激增展示了滚雪球效应如何快速地吸引构建者、用户，并最终为 Arbitrum DAO 和其他利益相关者（即链下实验室、以太坊等）带来价值。

GCP假说

这个教育帖子分享了游戏生态系统中有关 Arbitrum 的一些痛点和指标。

通过游戏催化剂计划，我们相信拨出积极的预算来吸引开发者和留住人才将带来一些重大胜利：

提案摘要

我们要求 DAO 在两年内拨出 2 亿 ARB，以支持 Arbitrum 上的游戏生态系统，并将该网络打造成整个领域游戏开发者的首选。

GCP 旨在充当催化剂，而不是一个综合计划，重点是吸引和支持高质量的构建者。

GCP 推出后，目标是发展成为一个长期的游戏计划，以更全面的方法促进游戏生态系统的发展。

发行商和开发者将受到一套强有力的制衡，以确保符合该提案的目标和 Arbitrum DAO 的价值观：

要参与 GCP，发布商必须列入白名单并获得理事会批准
由 DAO 选出的由 5 名具有深厚游戏或/和风险投资经验的人组成的 GCP 委员会将负责让 Catalyst 风险投资团队承担责任 - 权力包括一般监督、雇用/解雇员工（将其视为董事会））
将使用 GCP 绩效的汇总数据创建季度透明度报告
将在基金会子公司下创建一个风险投资团队，并由 GCP 委员会监督，以促进交易结构、尽职调查、资金支付等
- 风险投资主管/总经理
- 项目经理/运营主管
- 分析师
- 合法合规
- 其他管理/操作
- 业务拓展/营销

预期成果和 KPI

Gaming Catalyst 计划的总体目标是引进有才华的开发者，并帮助开发者在整个生命周期阶段加速他们的游戏。

我们将举办一系列开放办公时间，以帮助将游戏行业标准与我们旨在通过该计划实现的最佳实践/成果联系起来。

主要预期成果：

在该计划的初始时间范围内，将 Arbitrum 打造为链上游戏事实上的领导者：

200-300 个申请
超过 20% 的 web3 游戏选择 Arbitrum 作为其网络
与其他 L2 相比，赢得 Arbitrum 的净迁移
超过 25 个新 Orbit 发射

该计划旨在实现的另一个成果是通过2024 年 2 月 2 日的 Helika 演示展示的游戏生命周期中的渐进运动在我们的开放办公时间内。

举措

我们要求 DAO 指定 2 亿 ARB 来开发 Arbitrum 上的游戏生态系统，并将该网络打造成整个领域游戏开发者的首选。

资金将在两年内分配给以下举措：

1. 构建商入职和成长（160m ARB）

发行商通过寻找/收购开发者和扩大发行支持来加速 Arbitrum 游戏生态系统的发展
1. 出版商可以通过理事会投票（白名单流程）获得资格，并公开理事会成员的决定
2. 出版商必须至少匹配总拨款要求的 10%
独立游戏开发者为与发行商没有商业关系的开发者提供资助

2. 基础设施奖励（40m ARB）

由 RFP 分配或由理事会根据每个提案决定，用于支持 Arbitrum 内的游戏所需的任何工具和基础设施（即游戏的账户抽象解决方案和无 Gas 交易、支付轨道、网络和游戏引擎 SDK、数据分析和归因等） .)
在新 Arbitrum 技术发布的基础上，促进 Orbit、Stylus 和其他开发和基础设施的增长

提议的数字代表了可用于促进 Arbitrum 游戏的 ARB 上限。如果这三个计划中的任何一个在 GCP 结束时都存在未使用的 ARB，资金将被转回 DAO。

A. 构建商入职和成长

预算：1.6亿美元ARB

资金用途：这笔资金拟保留给 Arbitrum 上已建立的发行商生态系统和独立构建者，以帮助扩大 DAO 吸引、保护和加速 Arbitrum 人才团队的能力。

论文/实验：我们将大部分预算分配给 Arbitrum 上的发行商和工作室的发展。

资金还可以作为赠款分配给没有活跃发行商关系的开发者，以鼓励独立工作室和开发者的发展。每个提案将直接提交给创业团队审核和批准。

资助指南：

发布商需要根据发布商申请模板在论坛上发布公共提案，才能被列入白名单作为批准的发布商
- 出版商历史
- 团队背景及构成
- 成功案例和投资组合
- 仲裁贡献
- Arbitrum 网络增长计划
- 一旦列入白名单，出版商可以向风险投资团队提出交易以供考虑资助
（指定 2000 万 ARB）对于 50 万以下的赠款，建设者/发行商不需要签订商业协议，并且可以联系风险团队赠款分配者（与传统的风险团队交易分开），以更快地获得资金
- 基金会可能参与其中
（指定 1.4 亿 ARB）对于超过 50 万或由 GCP 委员会标记的赠款，开发者或发行商必须通过代币、收入或其他途径就商业协议价值份额达成一致
- 出版商必须为整个交易分配至少 10% 的出资
- 瀑布结构之后将进行以下高级突破（风险团队将添加必要的细节）：
  - 赠款总规模的收入将更优惠地分配给 DAO - 这是一般规则，但每笔具体交易可能会看到不同的百分比和交易结构
  - 在支付初始资助成本后，收入份额将根据商定的里程碑进行分配，具体取决于时间、总收入和其他独特方面 - 以每笔交易为基础
  - 根据交易的类型/结构，将考虑1-2年的时间因素
发行商可以自由地接触任何游戏开发商，但不能从 Arbitrum 网络内的其他发行商那里挖走
赠款分配没有大小限制
风险投资团队将在成立后制定更详细的交易结构指南
计划期限结束时，任何未使用的 ARB 将退还给 DAO

B. 游戏基础设施赏金

预算：4000万美元ARB

当前差距：Arbitrum 生态系统中当前存在的差距的非详尽列表：

Orbit 链的以游戏为中心的自定义实施
带有针对游戏和资产管理进行优化的钱包的移动应用基础设施（请参阅移动设备上的 Ronin 钱包作为示例）
允许游戏内合约调用的 Web 和游戏引擎 SDK（Unity、Unreal、Godot）
桌面启动器和分发解决方案
游戏分析、优化和相关工具（将链上、链下、社交和玩家活动结合在一起）

资助指南：

理事会将制定初步征求建议书和融资指南
理事会将制定基础设施特定的标题来评估提案
欢迎不符合 RFP 指南的独立提案单独申请供理事会考虑
计划期限结束时，任何未使用的 ARB 将退还给 DAO

下一步

[已完成] 公开草案发布（于 2024 年 2 月 15 日共享，Arbitrum 游戏教育帖子中的链接 [ Arbitrum 和 Web3 Gaming 的未来）
[已完成] 将 GCP 提案发布到论坛 (3/11/24)
[已完成] 快照投票 (3/15/24)，以就 GCP 承诺达成一般代表协议、启动实体设置并接收详细反馈：快照
计票/批准（2024 年 4 月）
GCP 理事会选举（2024 年 4 月至 5 月）
GCP 风险团队组建（2024 年 4 月至 5 月）
赠款申请和 RFP 开放（2024 年 4 月至 5 月）

总成本

我们估计总成本等于 2 亿美元 ARB + 运营成本（详见下文“计划管理和运营”）。

这是一个为期两年的计划，随着计划的发展，预测金额可能会发生变化/需要修改。

[当前的计划管理和运营预算正在由工作组团队成员验证，并将在计票投票之前进行调整。]

总奖励：200m ARB
- 构建商入职和成长：160m ARB
- 基础设施、工具和手写笔开发：40m ARB
项目管理和运营 - ARB 1000 万美元
- 理事会成员 (5)：每年 25,000 美元（总计 25 万美元）
- 初始法律架构：25万美元
- 一般法律/合规：200 万美元
- 基金经理/风险投资主管：每年高达 200 万美元（基础金额 + 奖金 20 万美元）
- 分析师 (3)：每年 125-20 万美元
- 提案作者和主要合作者：由理事会决定，从管理弹性基金中返还资金
- 计划见解和分析：待定
- 多重签名者 (5)：待定
- 弹性支出 - 剩余金额指定用于任何额外的人员需求、供应商、运营、复古资金和研究

提案贡献者

Arbitrum DAO Gaming Catalyst Program: Tally Draft

Introduction - Gaming Catalyst Program

What changed: Added additional data points and market sizing.

The Gaming Catalyst Program (GCP) is designed to immediately expand awareness and adoption of Arbitrum/Orbit/Stylus by builders and players in the Gaming community.

Arbitrum has emerged as a leader in the competitive network race through a dynamic formula of innovation, robust technology, organic builders, and a variety of short and long-term incentives.

Several L1s and L2s see this opportunity (most notably Solana, Cardano, Opstack, Optimism, to name a few) and are moving to claim the builders with grants and investments.

GCP Hypothesis

What changed: General content, enhanced GCP goals.

This educational post shares some of the pain points and metrics within the gaming ecosystem in regards to Arbitrum.

We will know we are succeeding when we achieve the following:

Rapidly Increase the number of Game Developers using Arbitrum/Orbit/Stylus

Strategic Allocation of Resources via Grants and Investments

Attracting and retaining Top Talent

Expanding the Use Cases of Arbitrum

Facilitating the Development of Sticky, Quality Games

Proposal Summary

What changed: Extended timeline to three years from two years to ensure program has room to show more results.

We are asking the DAO to earmark 200m ARB over a three year period to expand the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum and establish the network as the top choice for game builders across the landscape.

Controls

Publishers and developers will be subject to a robust set of checks and balances to ensure alignment with this proposal’s goals and Arbitrum DAO’s values:

A GCP Council of 5 individuals with deep gaming, venture experience, analytics / reporting, and/or DAO governance skills will be elected by the DAO and will be responsible for holding the Catalyst GCP Team accountable - with powers including general oversight, hiring / firing of staff (think of them as a Board )
A GCP Team will be created with the support of the Arbitrum Foundation, and will collaborate with the GCP Council (which will serve as oversight):
- An investment committee of 3 individuals including 1 Council member will approve investments
- Funding for projects will be contingent on achieving milestones
- A quarterly transparency report will be created with summary data on GCP performance
- Funding of projects will include terms that are market competitive

Program Outcomes and KPIs

What changed: Adjusted KPIs to account for a three year period and more aggressive goals, added Year 1 goals.

The Gaming Catalyst program has an overarching goal to bring in talented builders, and help the builders accelerate their games through the lifecycle stages.

Primary expected outcome:

Within the initial time frame of the program (3 years), the goal is to establish Arbitrum as a de facto leader for on-chain gaming. Specifically:

400-600 applications
100-200 net funded games
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
50+ new Orbit launches

The GCP will take time to reach its full potential, and setting milestones vs maturity of the program is prudent:

KPI	Year 1	Year 2
Daily Active Users	40,000 - 50,000 *	To be set by the GCP Team
Orbit Launches	15
Studio Deals	20

Most games will be in dev and not (yet) live in 2024

The GCP team will set appropriate OKRs and KPIs internally to align with the goals and milestones listed above.

Initiatives

What changed: Removed publisher earmark, split the Builder Onboarding & Growth section into grants and investments. RFP details adjusted.

We are asking the DAO to earmark 200m ARB to develop the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum and establish the network as the top choice for game builders across the landscape.

The funding will be allocated towards the following initiatives over the span of a three year period:

1. Builder Onboarding & Growth (160m ARB)

Focused on bringing the best game builders into Arbitrum - open to publishers, established studios, and independent builders.

Grants to accelerate ecosystem growth (25m)
- Generally for smaller asks and projects
- Commercial terms may not be required
- Reviewed by grants manager
Investments with commercial agreements (135m)
- Generally for larger deals
- Managed by an internal GCP venture team, via commercial terms (recoup + revenue share, equity, tokens, gas fees, etc..) with ROI as a main KPI
- Full funding of projects tied to achievement of milestones

2. Infrastructure Bounties (40m ARB)

Allocated by RFP or decided by the Council on a per proposal basis for any tooling and infrastructure needed to support gaming within Arbitrum (i.e. account abstraction solutions and gasless transactions for games, payment rails, web and game engine SDKs, data analytics and attribution, etc.)
Promote Orbit, Stylus, and other development and infrastructure growth on top of new Arbitrum technology releases

A. Builder Onboarding and Growth

Total Budget: 160m ARB

Thesis / Experiment: We are allocating a large majority of the budget to empower growth of publishers and studios on Arbitrum.

Build Grants (25m)

Guidelines & Details:

Teams may apply via the GCP Grants form
Grants have a maximum size of 500k ARB
Preference for user onboarding incentives or early stage development
The grants manager has final approval on grants
- Scorecards and details must be shared with the GCP Council
Proposed: early grants period until legal entity is formed for GCP
- Onboard interim grants allocator
- Interim council of 5 members votes on individual grants
- Maximum allocation of 10m ARB prior to GCP entity formation
Each grant must have specific milestones agreed upon before funding

Investments (135m)

Teams seeking more than 500k ARB or additional funding for development beyond initial development must work with the GCP investment team to align on deal terms.

Guidelines & Details:

Builders or publishers must agree on a commercial agreement value share through tokens, equity, revenue share (post recoupment), or other pathways.
- Other considerations include active use of Orbit chains with significant sequencer revenue share as part of the default licensing structure
More detailed deal structure guidelines will be created by the GCP Team upon its formation
By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO

B. Game Infrastructure Bounties

Budget: 40m ARB

Current Gaps: A non-exhaustive list of gaps that currently exist within the Arbitrum ecosystem:

Custom gaming-centric implementations of Orbit chains
Mobile App Infrastructure with wallet that is optimized for games and asset management (See Ronin Wallet on mobile as an example)
Web and game engine SDKs (Unity, Unreal, Godot) that allow for in-game contract calls
Desktop launcher and distribution solutions
Game analytics, optimization, and related tooling (tying together on-chain, off-chain, social, and player activity)

Funding Guidelines:

The GCP Team will establish initial RFPs and funding guidelines
An infrastructure specific rubric will be established by the Council to assess proposals
Independent proposals that do not fit within RFP guidelines are welcome to apply separately for GCP Team consideration
Any approved applicants for RFPs may be selected for vendor whitelisting, which allows vendors to be marketed to GCP participants
By the end of the program term, any unused ARB will be returned to the DAO

GCP Org Structure

What changed: Added proposed org structure and relationship between each stakeholder / partie(s).

When designing the organizational structure of the GCP, two major dynamics were considered:

Enabling autonomy of the GCP team while setting safeguards for program success
Empowering the DAO to have transparency and representation without impacting compliance, disclosure, and other necessities for a grants program with commercial ties within the gaming industry

Decision making process

Decision is made by GCP team
- Investment committee decision, staffing, etc
Council meetings every two weeks to discuss / veto any decisions
Decision is ‘ratified’ and activated
Every half year, aggregate summary of data as applicable shared in a report to DAO

GCP Team

What changed: Added roles / responsibilities, section on entity setup, team incentives, and overall costing estimates.

The GCP Team will be the primary operator of the GCP program.

Team members may join the program through a few pathways:

Nomination through the proposal process (to help accelerate standup of the program)
Hiring by the GCP team, with veto capabilities held by the Council

The below team roles and responsibilities are illustrative of an initial proposed structure, but may change based on industry / program demands.

GCP Team Roles & Responsibilities

1. Fund General Manager / Venture Lead

Responsibilities:

Presents deals to the investment committee
Responsible for strategic planning and the overall success of the program
Managing and staffing the GCP Venture team
Providing leadership and oversight to the Venture team
Driving deals, partnerships and being the public face of the GCP program
Compliance

KPIs:

Overall investment milestones
Deal flow
Venture team performance

2. Program Director

Responsibilities:

Member of investment committee
Ensuring overall program success and sustainability
Managing and staffing the overall GCP program (in collaboration with the Venture Lead)
Leading marketing / program development efforts
Establishing internal metrics for OKRs & KPIs with the Venture and Grants programs
Align with Arbitrum DAO and other key stakeholders on strategic direction

KPIs:

Overall program milestones

3. Venture Partner

Responsibilities:

Member of the investment committee
Providing support for the GM
Negotiating with publishers and studios on deal terms
Working with General Counsel to ensure compliance
Overseeing portfolio management and providing strategic guidance to portcos
Preparing deal memos for the GCP Board

KPIs:

Funded deals
Successful game launches
Venture milestones
Compliance

4. General Counsel

Responsibilities:

Ensuring legal compliance/diligence
Managing legal operations
Managing documentation for investment deals
Serving as the liaison between the GCP and DAO

KPIs:

Average time to complete deals
Operating within budget for Legal

5. VP Finance

Responsibilities:

Managing all GCP council required reporting and tax requirements
Modeling of potential deals
Ensure budget compliance
AR/AP, payroll, vendor management
Maintain token calendar

KPIs:

Budget compliance
Program sustainability

6. Analyst x 2

Responsibilities:

Sourcing top deals in the market
Providing in-depth market research
Running due diligence for deals
Geographical focus:
- 1-2 - Asia-focused
- 1-2 - US/Europe-focused

KPIs:

Venture partner satisfaction
Number of fundable deals

7. Producer

Responsibilities:

Establishes milestones
Providers additional DD support for GM / Investor
Tracks performance for games
Collaboration with Program Director and Director of Technology to create infrastructure RFPs

KPIs:

Games shipping at quality
Game progress through development funnel

8. Director of Technology (implementation engineer)

Responsibilities:

Documentation for tech onboarding of game projects
Connect the dots with vendors and gaming teams
Helps frame infrastructure RFPs for bounty program
Shortlists preferred vendors

KPIs:

Implementation throughput, onboarding pace
Builder advancement across development phases

9. Grants Manager

Responsibilities:

Due diligence for submitted grants
Presentation of grants to the council in written form
Contribution to transparency reports

KPIs:

Performance of projects receiving grants
Efficient distribution of grant funds

Investment Committee (separate from Council!)

The investment committee’s role is to provide extra perspective on deals brought forth by the Investment Lead and other team members, and make a final decision on investments.

The proposed investment committee structure consists of two GCP Team Members and council members - however the size and composition may change based on needs.

Our current proposed committee has 3 seats:

Program Director
Venture Partner
1 GCP Council Member (extra pay for this position)

Team Incentives

GCP team members may receive incentives every 6 months based on performance.

These incentives will be established with the approval of the Council and KPIs will be set for each team member.

The council must approve the bonus / incentives after each 6 month period (this time period may evolve over time).

GCP & Legal Compliance

The GCP will retain qualified counsel and coordinate with the Arbitrum DAO to ensure that it operates in a legally compliant manner at all times.

Team and GCP Board Costs

The GCP’s operating budget will be capped at $20m USD (excluding additional legal and financial expenses specifically required to ensure compliance with DAO/Foundation requirements).

ARB will be converted to USD or USDC by the Foundation before each quarter and sent to the GCP program account or multi-sig for disbursement.

Entity Setup and Model

This effort also involves DAO members from the M&A, Ops Co, VCDAO, and other initiatives.

GCP Council

What changed: Revised descriptions of GCP Council’s role and responsibilities that portrays it more as a collaborative body vs a governing board.

Primary responsibilities of the GCP Council:

Collaborate with the GM and IC on deal proposals by providing insights and identifying potential risks (can challenge based on deals not meeting very clear requirements).
Offer recommendations on proposed deals after reviewing relevant data and analysis (this analysis would be a standard for all deal memos).
Escalate concerns regarding deals to designated oversight bodies if necessary.
Review and provide feedback on GCP team member nominations submitted by the GM and Program Director.
Advise the GM and Program Director on long-term strategic plans for GCP.

Requirements:

Council members must not be from publishers or studios intending to apply to GCP programs
Council members with advisory, investor, or other relationships to applicants must disclose these conflicts
Council members will go through mandatory yearly elections
The DAO may call a snapshot vote to remove / replace council members
Must sign NDAs and respect confidentiality agreements

Next Steps

What changed: Adjusted based on current estimates on timeline.

[Done] Post Open Draft (Shared on 2/15/24, link within Arbitrum Gaming Education Post [Arbitrum and the Future of Web3 Gaming 89]
[Done] Post GCP proposal to forum (3/11/24)
[Done] Snapshot vote (3/15/24) for general delegate agreement on GCP commitment, start entity setups, and to receive detailed feedback: Snapshot 304
Tally vote / ratification (May 2024)
In parallel with Tally vote and /or post-ratification, GCP working group and authors will work with the Arbitrum Foundation for entity setup
- Collaborate with Arbitrum Foundation resources and vendors for due diligence
- Stand up legal framework and entity to support GCP
- Initiate on elections, team recruitment, and other procedures after completion of entity setup
GCP Council Elections (May 2024)
GCP GCP Team formation (April - May 2024)
Grant applications and RFPs open (May - June 2024)

Total Cost

What changed: Adjusted total cost breakdown, added more details to Program Admin and Operations.

We estimate the total cost to equal 200m ARB + operations costs detailed below under Program Administration & Operations.

Total Incentives: 200m ARB
- Builder Onboarding and Growth: 160m ARB
- Infrastructure, Tooling & Stylus Development: 40m ARB
Program Administration & Operations - $20m
- Council Members (5): $630k
  - 30k each member per year
  - 60k for investment committee representative
- MultiSig Signers (5): $180k
- Team Salaries: $18m
- Legal / Compliance: $1m
  - Expecting usage for vendors, entity setup, adjustments for fast evolving regulatory environment
- Proposal Authors and Contributors: 100k ARB

Proposal Contributors

What changed: Added new contributors.

Djinn (Dan Peng) - PM / Author

Karel Vuong - Author (Co-Founder, Treasure)

Marcus Segal - Contributor

Rick Johanson - Contributor

Xai Games - Advisor / Contributor

Helika - Advisor / Contributor

Jason Lee - Advisor / Contributor (ExPolygon Games, current web3 gaming founder)

Resources & Content

What changed: -

GCP AMA / Open Office 3/15/24 - https://twitter.com/i/spaces/1RDGllYMYvOGL?s=20 26

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Here are some thoughts on behalf of the UADP (voted against the Snapshot):

PrincetonBlockchain from princetonbc.eth

406.5K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

The Princeton Blockchain Club is (cautiously) voting FOR the Gaming Catalyst Program at the Snapshot stage.

We will be doing further review before the onchain vote. Big thanks to everyone that contributed to this proposal though, as we're glad to see something like this!

mcfly from 0xmcfly.eth

101.8K TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

I encourage the proponents of the GCP to engage more with the ARB community to refine the proposal and sets realistic expectations for the timeline and resources required to achieve these goals.

As a broad response to the entire proposal, the elephant in the room has to be that this is a relatively large ask - 5.67% of the entire treasury and nearly double what we've already spent thus far. For a period of 2 years. That's not to say I'm immediately opposed to the idea, but with that kind of ask should come a lot of scrutiny.

image|690x113

I read through the gaming educational post and providing that is appreciated. As I must admit I'm having a 'head in the sand' moment with the gaming space. I was surprised to see such a robust community tbh, and it's put into perspective the fund ask. I'll also acknowledge to those who may have missed it since there are a lot of replies --- a great post by @karelvuong above. It brought a lot of good insight and suggestions to this conversation. Of which I'll highlight the budget discussion. I don't want to quote block half the post so just read it, but I'll say I think the proposed changes should be taken into consideration. Especially a few items we learned from the STIPP/LTIPP

Arbitrary division of capital based on over/under 500k grants I'm a little torn. I do like the thought in practice to make sure 'little guys' have funding, but it creates a situation where one group might be fully funded before the other. And it seems silly to stop funding one group even though funds are available (and arguably that is an indicator they need more funding!) I also think Questbook fills the 'small developer' niche already.
All that said about over/under 500k, I think the better solution is a cap on each proposal. This was a huge problem IMO with the STIPP round 1 - a few large projects sucked up a big percentage of the total grant amount.
Spreading out spend I think is important too. Not only do I think we need to limit spend amounts so there is an even distribution over the window, I also would feel more comfortable if this was a greater then 2 year project.
As a general concept, I really like the idea of finding ways to get profits back into the gaming ecosystem so it is self-sustaining. The spend is a lot easier to swallow if it's an expected one time, and not something that is being asked for again come 2026.

Other thoughts (@Djinn):

Is there a more detailed breakdown of why there is 2.250M ARB ask for legal costs?
Can we also get more details on the "Fund Manager / Venture Lead" role, as they are getting possibly 2m ARB tokens a year.
(Note: I'm not just dismissing this cost outright, but it seems like a big ask at face value so wanted to be more understanding of what this is and what I may be missing)
Apologies if I just missed it, but all the informational material gives a good sense of scope and scale of gaming in the space... but are there metrics on actual revenues of this space? i.e., what makes gaming specifically worth chasing after a piece of this pie with 5% of DAO Treasury funds?
And aligned with that, I saw where other projects have started their gaming ecosystem funding in 2022 - what have you seen with those projects as presumably they are well into their funding at this point? Just high level thoughts.

As for a vote, still deciding at the moment. It's been made clear the gaming is a huge space and Arbitrum is falling behind, I'm also worried though we too far behind the curve at this point (it looks like a lot of other chains pushed hard in 2022 and are really well aligned for this resurgence of the market). So while the spend is large I'm seeing the reason why, given we are behind and probably need to spend a little more to catch up.

karelvuong

3.9M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from thedevanshmehta

I don’t fully understand the mechanics of how revenue will come back to the DAO - who is going to make sure this actually happens?

On a related note, I wonder if deals can be executed as token swaps for the games that have launched a token. For example, if treasure or XAI were to apply to the GCP then it would be a simple swap of $ARB for $MAGIC or $XAI, and revenue share/capturing the upside for the DAO would be taken care of with minimal headache

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Quoted from thedevanshmehta

I don’t fully understand the mechanics of how revenue will come back to the DAO - who is going to make sure this actually happens?

jump to post →

Mechanism would be dependent on the grant or deal terms but could come in the form of: equity/tokens, treasury swap, revenue share (on microtransactions, marketplace revenue, sequencer revenue), etc.

On the enforcement, the "Catalyst Team" (Venture Team) to stood up would broker these deals and the associated commercial arrangements / terms with either the game developers or the publishers on behalf of the DAO with it being a beneficiary of the value capture. With the Catalyst Team being (potentially) structured an Arbitrum Foundation subsidiary (TBD following more fulsome entity structuring analysis), this group, like the Foundation, should operate for the benefit of the Arbitrum DAO.

—

On the token swap approach, this could work for some deals and feels cleaner but the majority will likely be too early to do this and prefer a long term lock or vesting structure. With tokens entering into the equation, the upside would need to be captured through a plan to divest those tokens at some point in time. The divestment strategy should likely be driven by the Catalyst Team as the folks being closest to the respective game teams and their progress but should work in concert with the DAO's treasury management council.

Quoted from thedevanshmehta

Breaking up into tranches of 50 million ARB makes sense. I wonder how it would be structured - would the entire 200 million be transferred from tally in one vote and then it gets streamed over time?

Or would there be 50 million ARB approved in the first batch and then a review by the DAO on continuation? I would personally be more comfortable with this approach, especially once @Immutablelawyer , @DisruptionJoe and others complete their optimistic governance module that would make it easier to get remaining tranches without a DAO wide vote.

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Both strategies could work. The latter depending on timing does also make sense and could fall in line well with the proposed quarterly transparency reports to evaluate progress. In either case, the DAO will always have the rights to shut things down if needed. What I like about the latter vs. it being streamed over time is that it could be deployed in a treasury management strategy to generate yield vs. remaining fully dormant (a wasted opportunity given the magnitude of the funds)!

thedevanshmehta from devansh.voicedeck.eth

13.85 TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

Appreciate the huge engagement the post is receiveing and the efforts of @karelvuong , @Djinn and team in getting this out. I have primarily 2 concerns with the proposal as it currently is

Quoted from karelvuong

Profits from the GCP should be reinvested back into the Arbitrum gaming ecosystem to sustain and extend future funding while also supporting public goods, infrastructure development, bounties, and other future opportunities yet to be identified.

Appreciate the huge engagement the post is receiveing and the efforts of @karelvuong , @Djinn and team in getting this out. I have primarily 2 concerns with the proposal as it currently is

Quoted from karelvuong

jump to post →

I don't fully understand the mechanics of how revenue will come back to the DAO - who is going to make sure this actually happens?

Quoted from karelvuong

We should consider committing to funding being unlocked and available within four 6-month timeframes (25% unlocking).

jump to post →

I like this idea a lot. Something @Frisson mentioned to me was how worried he gets when he has to vote on multi-million proposals that have not even had a pilot.

Breaking up into tranches of 50 million ARB makes sense. I wonder how it would be structured - would the entire 200 million be transferred from tally in one vote and then it gets streamed over time?

Overall very supportive, great to see we have now stood up a gaming vertical too!

karelvuong

3.9M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

First, it’s great to see the GCP formally published to the forum. Huge thanks to Dan (@Djinn) for his leadership and initiative here. Gaming is near and dear to our hearts at Treasure and I was excited to help co-author this proposal.

Having contributed to this proposal, I’m of course supportive of the overall direction and, on behalf of the Treasure ARC, we will be voting FOR it when it goes to Snapshot.

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Having contributed to this proposal, I’m of course supportive of the overall direction and, on behalf of the Treasure ARC, we will be voting FOR it when it goes to Snapshot.

We believe that a program like the GCP was sorely needed yesterday. Now is better than never and the GCP will help Arbitrum and all of the games, ecosystems, and projects that orbit it secure the lead across the web3 gaming landscape.

However, changes/improvements should be made to launch a program that can truly catalyze gaming on Arbitrum. We’ve got a massive opportunity to do things right and do things well. This needs to move quickly while at the same time help stand up a long-term, sustainable structure that can continue to grow gaming on Arbitrum for many years to come — after we’ve had major gaming hits start to emerge from the early seeds we are sowing through the GCP.

These comments are mostly my own with additional thoughts/perspectives collected from the Treasure core contributors as well as the Treasure DAO’s Arbitrum Council (ARC).

Background & Select Responses to Comments

The key goals for the GCP (in my opinion):

Quoted from Djinn

Primary expected outcome:

Within the initial time frame of the program, establish Arbitrum as a de facto leader for on-chain gaming:

200-300 applications
20%+ of all web3 games selecting Arbitrum as their network
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
25+ new Orbit launches

An additional outcome that the program aims to achieve is incremental movement through the gaming lifecycles illustrated by the Helika presentation on 2/2/24 during our open office hours.

On top of the primary KPIs outlined ^, we should also orient around these themes:
- Arbitrum should be the leader in gaming but we need to invest and move quickly so as to not risk losing the race (both a sprint and a marathon).
- We need to see more games, more builders, more gaming ecosystems, and greater adoption of Arbitrum technology (L3 and Stylus) come out the other side of the program. We should see hits emerge, games progress between stages within the development lifecycle, and we should double down on those showing signs of success and traction in an industry that is primarily hits-driven.
- The GCP should build and improve upon the STIP and LTIPP as a differentiated and gaming-centric program that can address earlier DAO-governance inefficiencies we’ve faced while also propel a flywheel that can reinvest in and further gaming on Arbitrum.
- There is a noteworthy gap in gaming expertise and focus within Arbitrum across the various grant/incentive programs that have been run since the DAO’s inception as well as within the delegate body. This is an opportunity to expand the network and grow the pie of developers, publishers and builders, while also providing additional ammunition to those who can start running right away and drive results. Just as DeFi on Arbitrum has had the opportunity to in late 2023.

About the market and competitive landscape

Speaking from Treasure’s perspective, we’ve been on the front lines in this “shadow war” that has been forged behind the scenes to acquire game developers and studios. This has spanned several years in close collaboration with both Offchain Labs and the Arbitrum Foundation both pre- and post-decentralization as we work to acquire builders to come not only to Treasure but also to Arbitrum.
This was detailed in the educational post but there are a number of competitive ecosystems and networks ranging from Polygon (Immutable), Optimism (Base), Ronin, Avalanche, Oasys, …, the list goes on. To-date, they have been better coordinated with generally more agency and capital that has been put into the hands of the associated foundations or labs entities. Arbitrum is lacking this due to its decentralized nature by design. Thus far, Arbitrum has relied on its clear technology and innovation lead along with its small (but mighty) partnerships team at Offchain Labs and the Arbitrum Foundation, as well as a number of gaming ecosystems to help scale and carry the business development effort (including Treasure).
The reality today is that many of these other ecosystems are going after games and gaming projects on Arbitrum. Aggressively. This recently happened via Treasure with Optimism, zkSync, and SKALE publishing public proposals to bring the Treasure Chain over to their ecosystems. This also happens behind the scenes with many of our games as well who we’ve spent time, capital, and energy to fund, develop, and grow over the past few years. A similar story is echoed by @0xgb.eth from Footium as well as @divdaurres from The Beacon.
As much as we would like to say that we’re primarily competing with the likes of the Blizzards, Nintendos, Epic Games, etc. of the world, Arbitrum and its associated ecosystems are competing mostly within the much smaller web3 space on top of the traditional games market while attempting to change the narrative and shift the negative stigma that traditional gamers have when it comes to crypto/web3/NFTs.

Why the Council and Catalyst Team structure

(I’ve renamed Venture Team to Catalyst Team which I expand upon below.)
This structure does not lead to unnecessary bureaucracy as others have suggested. If done well with the right team (and this is the important part), it has the power to greatly scale the DAO, reduce the load on delegates, and bring in experts into two symbiotic groups who have different, important roles to play within the GCP. Also introduces necessary entity/legal protections that are insufficient for a DAO-elected council (given the amount of capital being proposed).
- The Council represents the broader Arbitrum DAO to the Catalyst Team, lends credibility, advisory expertise, and network access (assuming they comprise a bench of gaming experts), determines the RFPs for necessary game infrastructure, and keeps the Catalyst Team accountable.
- The Catalyst Team handles the day-to-day of grant/deal assessment, due diligence, and fund disbursement. They should be deeply knowledgeable about game development, grants, and/or venture as the core team driving much of the grant and deal making process.
As a member of one of the largest Arbitrum DAO delegates and someone who had to assess over a hundred STIP applications while also sitting on the LTIPP council with ~170+ applications to review, these council/committee structures are a godsend that reduce the burden for the DAO’s delegates. As evidenced by the LTIPP and other subgroup / council programs that have emerged not only within Arbitrum but elsewhere, we should scale the DAO by placing responsibility onto those who have the experience and who have earned the trust to represent the DAO and its stakeholders (while maintaining measures in place to change the bench as needed).

Feedback on the Proposal

RE: General Structure

Extend Snapshot Timeline: Push to Friday, March 15th at 5pm PT

In order to elicit more feedback from the DAO community and continue educating and socializing the revised proposal with the delegate body, we should add a bit more time to discuss.
Treasure will be hosting an open community call on Friday, March 15th at 1pm ET to discuss the proposal with Karel Vuong (Treasure and co-author), Dan Peng (Vela and co-author), Soby (XAI), Lucas Fulks (Helika), Franklin Bi (Pantera), Andrew Green (Storygrounds and ex-a16z + gaming executive), and others who will share perspectives on the GCP as Arbitrum builders, gaming leaders, and VCs. We hope to see other delegates, game builders, and other stakeholders in attendance.

Rename the Venture Team to the "Catalyst Team" and be more explicit throughout that grants are part of the equation

As mentioned above, I don’t believe “venture” well captures the intended role and focus of the team. The GCP extends beyond venture to include developer grants and other incentive mechanisms focused on gaming.
Not all deals should be venture deals so early into the game (no pun intended!). Catalyzing growth of gaming on Arbitrum extends beyond making 10-100x deals to return the fund. Informed bets should be made via grants in the spirit of increasing the builder/developer/studio presence on Arbitrum, driving long-term alignment to ensure game/studio player growth leads to Arbitrum growth, strengthening Arbitrum’s brand as the defacto home for web3 / on-chain games, and proliferating the adoption of its leading technology.
My fear is if we over-index on venture-like deals and do not provide builders with an easy path to more agile/rapid grants that Arbitrum will lose out on deals. Many of the other ecosystems out there do not ask for explicit, financial return on investment and are more than willing to partner without requiring builders to give equity/tokens up and are happy with other alignment models (exclusivity/commitment period, subsidies based on traction, etc).
The Catalyst Team should comprise professionals who, at minimum, can drive (i) venture or commercial deals (equity/token, rev share, etc.); and (ii) fast-track grant funding. Other alternative types of incentivization and investment models should also be explored.

RE: Builder/Publisher - Funding Guidelines

Eliminate the division of capital (over/under 500k) for grants and leave it more open ended

While I agree there should be a faster track path to grant funding, the arbitrary < or > 500k mark creates restrictions that may raise or lower the barrier of approval (ie. could see 50 good projects requesting 499k vs. 3 mediocre projects requesting 501k)
The Catalyst Team should instead have the ability and flexibility to assess on a case-by-case basis to offer grants or strike commercial agreements with teams

Remove the Arbitrum Foundation’s formal role in the grants process above ^

Beyond playing a supporting role in the program (providing help via business development, partnerships, and deal flow or advising on legal structuring), the Catalyst Team being hired should handle this and maintain a degree of separation from the Foundation

There should be a size limit to grant distributions on a per deal basis for game dev grants

While it’s still early and hard to generalize without deal-specific context, we should set a [US$10m] size limit per deal (possibly even less than that)
More is not often better and this enters into the territory of late-stage investing / M&A and possibly overspending on deals which I do not believe aligns with the overall goals of this program (recall: to catalyze gaming as the first program of its kind within Arbitrum)

Minimum capital contribution by publishers in deals is positive and could be further expanded

Publishers should absolutely put skin in the game and not look for the DAO to fully fund deals.
Within this, there should be additional provisions to allow the Council or Catalyst Team to assess contributions on a facts/circumstances basis to provide greater flexibility.

Speaking of capital contribution, some of the comments seem to misunderstand the minimum capital contribution and difference between publishers vs. builders

Define “Publishers” and “Game Builders” (game developers, studios, and builders)
Make it clearer that independent Game Builders do not have to put up any minimum amount to access funds, this is specific only to publishers who, themselves, are looking to acquire and partner with Game Builders themselves.

Allowing publishers to request an allocation out of the infrastructure bucket

The lines are blurred between ecosystems/publishers who are also infrastructure/technology/protocol builders as the "job" goes well beyond simply finding and bringing in games as extensions to BD/partnerships for Arbitrum. It can also spans distribution, advisory, fundraising, game design, development, QA, localization, and much more.
In Treasure's case, we are building decentralized infrastructure for next-gen gaming through an end-to-end ecosystem of game development support spanning the full spectrum of infrastructure including a native chain (L2), Infinity Chains (L3s), marketplace, AMM, LiveOps, APIs/SDKs, analytics services, and more as outlined in our litepaper.
In XAI's case, they've innovated to create a new node primitive through their Sentry Nodes (which net them 12,897 ETH through their node sale).

RE: Next Steps & Timelines

The timeline for when capital will begin to flow should be spelled out

While the “Next Steps” section captures the program initialization and administrative steps well, it does not make it clear when builders or publishers can expect to access or tap into the allocated funds. With the added layers (Council, Catalyst Team, publishers), there should be a more explicit timeline and structure for how funds can begin to be unlocked and allocated
Take this example - the Council and Catalyst Team have been fully assembled and stood up, and grant applications and RFPs have started to be posted by May 2024. Past this, there is no stated timeline for when deals will begin to be made
The STIP, Backfund, and LTIPP made it clear for builders and applying projects as to when incentives would be granted, and the GCP would benefit from something similar.

The council composition is important, an election shouldn’t be rushed, and the council needs to reach beyond the Arbitrum DAO pool of candidates

The council needs to comprise a diverse panel of professionals who are knowledgeable about gaming (on both publishing-side and development), web3, and ideally also familiar with Arbitrum.
We should incorporate more flexibility in the timeline and election process that doesn’t leave Arbitrum and the GCP with a feeling of, “well, this is everybody who applied in the two weeks we had and we kinda have to pick five of them”.
There needs to be active recruitment by the DAO to convince highly qualified council members to apply because the people we will want are likely not here reading our forum posts or participating in these discussions (yet).

RE: Budget

200m ARB is proposed to be earmarked but probably shouldn’t be spent in 1 year

This figure was used to turn heads and be market competitive with other similar initiatives out there employed by other ecosystems. However, it’s unlikely that all of that will (or should be) spent in year 1 or even over the 2 year term that the GCP is contemplated.
We should consider committing to funding being unlocked and available within four 6-month timeframes (25% unlocking). Should the Catalyst Team need to unlock capital earlier, it should be presented to the Council (or the DAO).

Allow for greater flex in budget between builders (A) and infrastructure (B)

Incorporate flexibility into the buckets to allow for grant priorities/flow to evolve over time and not be limited by bucketed capacity constraints (or force spending that may be later deemed unnecessary) - ie. on a total 200m total budget, bake in a 15% overallocation:
- 160m games → target 160m but up to 184m
- 40m infrastructure → target 40m but up to 46m
- Total budget hard cap remains at 200m
Council to maintain the ability in managing the gaming budget and increase/decrease capacity across the different sleeves depending on how the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum evolves.

Profits to the DAO should be reinvested into gaming

Profits from the GCP should be reinvested back into the Arbitrum gaming ecosystem to sustain and extend future funding while also supporting public goods, infrastructure development, bounties, and other future opportunities yet to be identified.
There currently exist a multitude of revenue streams that Arbitrum is able to access across a more generalized treasury management strategy being contemplated, sequencer fees, the Arbiturm Orbit Expansion Program, etc.

Closing Note

While there are many other granular details that we as a team and council have to contribute to this proposal to help better define the program design, roles and responsibilities of the various groups, value capture mechanism (including a full waterfall model!), etc., this can all be followed up with in due course.

As mentioned, we support the general direction of the proposal and plan to vote FOR this proposal during the Snapshot temperature check.

A Catalyst to the Catalyst

In the current form, my feeling is the Gaming Catalyst Program is fated to have a slow start with timing being gated by: (1) having formed a Catalyst Team; and also (2) having elected a Council.

Based on the noted timeline, the first applications will come in April/May and grants will start flowing in May/June (assuming streamlined commercial discussions / negotiations). This all assumes everything goes as planned, which let’s face it, it rarely does. In actuality, and I hope to be proven wrong, with all of the moving parts around the Catalyst Team and Council recruitment (executive search level recruitment) I think we can reasonably expect at least a 1-2 month delay to get the house in order. And while we can potentially rush to fill seats with bodies, it doesn’t mean that we should.

This means that we’re looking at June/July to actually start catalyzing gaming (3-4 months from now). I think this is too late.

We should consider a “catalyst” to the “catalyst” to get the ball rolling through a publisher/ecosystem-led effort in close collaboration with the Arbitrum Foundation.

Here’s how this could play out:

While there is no stated restriction preventing project from making a grant proposal directly to the DAO (we applaud Into the Dungeons for being the first gaming project to do so), it’s clear that Arbitrum DAO likes its frameworks.
With this in mind, it may make sense to explore a “Minimum Viable Catalyst” (MVC) that aligns with this framework with the following modifications:
- For an interim period while everything is being stood up, substitute the Council and Catalyst Team with the Arbitrum Foundation
- Allow publishers/ecosystems to, through their public proposals posted on the Arbitrum governance forum, propose an interim structure to bring deals to the Arbitrum Foundation for grant consideration
- Allow the DAO to approve/ratify the publisher proposals (the interim measures only)
- Upon the hiring of the teams and entity formation, have all deals reassigned from the Arbitrum Foundation to the new Catalyst Team
- Publishers/ecosystems will resubmit public proposals to the forum to provide both a status report and to unlock access to further capital in line with the existing proposal

Ecosystems like Treasure are already at the ready and are putting in the work to grow gaming on Arbitrum regardless of the GCP passing or not (ideally it will). We have business development resources, we’ve driven several game migrations (from Polygon, Solana, etc.), we’ve allocated millions in capital and grants ($MAGIC via emissions and ecosystem fund, our treasury) to builders, and we have a deep network to access gaming deal flow which has allowed us to bring together our portfolio of games that has helped put Arbitrum gaming on the map.

eg. ~50% of the games in the Arbitrum Arcade event (the gaming edition of Arbitrum Odyssey) are associated with Treasure
Our games include: Smolbound, The Beacon, Realm, Zeeverse, Bitmates, Kuroro, Kaiju Cards, Tales of Elleria, Knights of the Ether, Mighty Action Heroes, and others.

Put us in, coach!

image|690x113

Arbitrary division of capital based on over/under 500k grants I'm a little torn. I do like the thought in practice to make sure 'little guys' have funding, but it creates a situation where one group might be fully funded before the other. And it seems silly to stop funding one group even though funds are available (and arguably that is an indicator they need more funding!) I also think Questbook fills the 'small developer' niche already.
All that said about over/under 500k, I think the better solution is a cap on each proposal. This was a huge problem IMO with the STIPP round 1 - a few large projects sucked up a big percentage of the total grant amount.
Spreading out spend I think is important too. Not only do I think we need to limit spend amounts so there is an even distribution over the window, I also would feel more comfortable if this was a greater then 2 year project.
As a general concept, I really like the idea of finding ways to get profits back into the gaming ecosystem so it is self-sustaining. The spend is a lot easier to swallow if it's an expected one time, and not something that is being asked for again come 2026.

Other thoughts (@Djinn):

Is there a more detailed breakdown of why there is 2.250M ARB ask for legal costs?
Can we also get more details on the "Fund Manager / Venture Lead" role, as they are getting possibly 2m ARB tokens a year.
(Note: I'm not just dismissing this cost outright, but it seems like a big ask at face value so wanted to be more understanding of what this is and what I may be missing)
Apologies if I just missed it, but all the informational material gives a good sense of scope and scale of gaming in the space... but are there metrics on actual revenues of this space? i.e., what makes gaming specifically worth chasing after a piece of this pie with 5% of DAO Treasury funds?
And aligned with that, I saw where other projects have started their gaming ecosystem funding in 2022 - what have you seen with those projects as presumably they are well into their funding at this point? Just high level thoughts.

karelvuong

3.9M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

Quoted from thedevanshmehta

I don’t fully understand the mechanics of how revenue will come back to the DAO - who is going to make sure this actually happens?

jump to post →

Quoted from thedevanshmehta

I don’t fully understand the mechanics of how revenue will come back to the DAO - who is going to make sure this actually happens?

jump to post →

Mechanism would be dependent on the grant or deal terms but could come in the form of: equity/tokens, treasury swap, revenue share (on microtransactions, marketplace revenue, sequencer revenue), etc.

—

Quoted from thedevanshmehta

Breaking up into tranches of 50 million ARB makes sense. I wonder how it would be structured - would the entire 200 million be transferred from tally in one vote and then it gets streamed over time?

jump to post →

thedevanshmehta from devansh.voicedeck.eth

13.85 TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

Appreciate the huge engagement the post is receiveing and the efforts of @karelvuong , @Djinn and team in getting this out. I have primarily 2 concerns with the proposal as it currently is

Quoted from karelvuong

Appreciate the huge engagement the post is receiveing and the efforts of @karelvuong , @Djinn and team in getting this out. I have primarily 2 concerns with the proposal as it currently is

Quoted from karelvuong

jump to post →

I don't fully understand the mechanics of how revenue will come back to the DAO - who is going to make sure this actually happens?

Quoted from karelvuong

We should consider committing to funding being unlocked and available within four 6-month timeframes (25% unlocking).

jump to post →

I like this idea a lot. Something @Frisson mentioned to me was how worried he gets when he has to vote on multi-million proposals that have not even had a pilot.

Breaking up into tranches of 50 million ARB makes sense. I wonder how it would be structured - would the entire 200 million be transferred from tally in one vote and then it gets streamed over time?

Overall very supportive, great to see we have now stood up a gaming vertical too!

karelvuong

3.9M TOKEN

posted 2 years ago

edited 2 years ago

Having contributed to this proposal, I’m of course supportive of the overall direction and, on behalf of the Treasure ARC, we will be voting FOR it when it goes to Snapshot.

123

Having contributed to this proposal, I’m of course supportive of the overall direction and, on behalf of the Treasure ARC, we will be voting FOR it when it goes to Snapshot.

These comments are mostly my own with additional thoughts/perspectives collected from the Treasure core contributors as well as the Treasure DAO’s Arbitrum Council (ARC).

Background & Select Responses to Comments

The key goals for the GCP (in my opinion):

Quoted from Djinn

Primary expected outcome:

Within the initial time frame of the program, establish Arbitrum as a de facto leader for on-chain gaming:

200-300 applications
20%+ of all web3 games selecting Arbitrum as their network
Win net migrations to Arbitrum vs other L2s
25+ new Orbit launches

An additional outcome that the program aims to achieve is incremental movement through the gaming lifecycles illustrated by the Helika presentation on 2/2/24 during our open office hours.

On top of the primary KPIs outlined ^, we should also orient around these themes:
- Arbitrum should be the leader in gaming but we need to invest and move quickly so as to not risk losing the race (both a sprint and a marathon).
- We need to see more games, more builders, more gaming ecosystems, and greater adoption of Arbitrum technology (L3 and Stylus) come out the other side of the program. We should see hits emerge, games progress between stages within the development lifecycle, and we should double down on those showing signs of success and traction in an industry that is primarily hits-driven.
- The GCP should build and improve upon the STIP and LTIPP as a differentiated and gaming-centric program that can address earlier DAO-governance inefficiencies we’ve faced while also propel a flywheel that can reinvest in and further gaming on Arbitrum.
- There is a noteworthy gap in gaming expertise and focus within Arbitrum across the various grant/incentive programs that have been run since the DAO’s inception as well as within the delegate body. This is an opportunity to expand the network and grow the pie of developers, publishers and builders, while also providing additional ammunition to those who can start running right away and drive results. Just as DeFi on Arbitrum has had the opportunity to in late 2023.

About the market and competitive landscape

Speaking from Treasure’s perspective, we’ve been on the front lines in this “shadow war” that has been forged behind the scenes to acquire game developers and studios. This has spanned several years in close collaboration with both Offchain Labs and the Arbitrum Foundation both pre- and post-decentralization as we work to acquire builders to come not only to Treasure but also to Arbitrum.
This was detailed in the educational post but there are a number of competitive ecosystems and networks ranging from Polygon (Immutable), Optimism (Base), Ronin, Avalanche, Oasys, …, the list goes on. To-date, they have been better coordinated with generally more agency and capital that has been put into the hands of the associated foundations or labs entities. Arbitrum is lacking this due to its decentralized nature by design. Thus far, Arbitrum has relied on its clear technology and innovation lead along with its small (but mighty) partnerships team at Offchain Labs and the Arbitrum Foundation, as well as a number of gaming ecosystems to help scale and carry the business development effort (including Treasure).
The reality today is that many of these other ecosystems are going after games and gaming projects on Arbitrum. Aggressively. This recently happened via Treasure with Optimism, zkSync, and SKALE publishing public proposals to bring the Treasure Chain over to their ecosystems. This also happens behind the scenes with many of our games as well who we’ve spent time, capital, and energy to fund, develop, and grow over the past few years. A similar story is echoed by @0xgb.eth from Footium as well as @divdaurres from The Beacon.
As much as we would like to say that we’re primarily competing with the likes of the Blizzards, Nintendos, Epic Games, etc. of the world, Arbitrum and its associated ecosystems are competing mostly within the much smaller web3 space on top of the traditional games market while attempting to change the narrative and shift the negative stigma that traditional gamers have when it comes to crypto/web3/NFTs.

Why the Council and Catalyst Team structure

(I’ve renamed Venture Team to Catalyst Team which I expand upon below.)
This structure does not lead to unnecessary bureaucracy as others have suggested. If done well with the right team (and this is the important part), it has the power to greatly scale the DAO, reduce the load on delegates, and bring in experts into two symbiotic groups who have different, important roles to play within the GCP. Also introduces necessary entity/legal protections that are insufficient for a DAO-elected council (given the amount of capital being proposed).
- The Council represents the broader Arbitrum DAO to the Catalyst Team, lends credibility, advisory expertise, and network access (assuming they comprise a bench of gaming experts), determines the RFPs for necessary game infrastructure, and keeps the Catalyst Team accountable.
- The Catalyst Team handles the day-to-day of grant/deal assessment, due diligence, and fund disbursement. They should be deeply knowledgeable about game development, grants, and/or venture as the core team driving much of the grant and deal making process.
As a member of one of the largest Arbitrum DAO delegates and someone who had to assess over a hundred STIP applications while also sitting on the LTIPP council with ~170+ applications to review, these council/committee structures are a godsend that reduce the burden for the DAO’s delegates. As evidenced by the LTIPP and other subgroup / council programs that have emerged not only within Arbitrum but elsewhere, we should scale the DAO by placing responsibility onto those who have the experience and who have earned the trust to represent the DAO and its stakeholders (while maintaining measures in place to change the bench as needed).

Feedback on the Proposal

RE: General Structure

Extend Snapshot Timeline: Push to Friday, March 15th at 5pm PT

In order to elicit more feedback from the DAO community and continue educating and socializing the revised proposal with the delegate body, we should add a bit more time to discuss.
Treasure will be hosting an open community call on Friday, March 15th at 1pm ET to discuss the proposal with Karel Vuong (Treasure and co-author), Dan Peng (Vela and co-author), Soby (XAI), Lucas Fulks (Helika), Franklin Bi (Pantera), Andrew Green (Storygrounds and ex-a16z + gaming executive), and others who will share perspectives on the GCP as Arbitrum builders, gaming leaders, and VCs. We hope to see other delegates, game builders, and other stakeholders in attendance.

Rename the Venture Team to the "Catalyst Team" and be more explicit throughout that grants are part of the equation

As mentioned above, I don’t believe “venture” well captures the intended role and focus of the team. The GCP extends beyond venture to include developer grants and other incentive mechanisms focused on gaming.
Not all deals should be venture deals so early into the game (no pun intended!). Catalyzing growth of gaming on Arbitrum extends beyond making 10-100x deals to return the fund. Informed bets should be made via grants in the spirit of increasing the builder/developer/studio presence on Arbitrum, driving long-term alignment to ensure game/studio player growth leads to Arbitrum growth, strengthening Arbitrum’s brand as the defacto home for web3 / on-chain games, and proliferating the adoption of its leading technology.
My fear is if we over-index on venture-like deals and do not provide builders with an easy path to more agile/rapid grants that Arbitrum will lose out on deals. Many of the other ecosystems out there do not ask for explicit, financial return on investment and are more than willing to partner without requiring builders to give equity/tokens up and are happy with other alignment models (exclusivity/commitment period, subsidies based on traction, etc).
The Catalyst Team should comprise professionals who, at minimum, can drive (i) venture or commercial deals (equity/token, rev share, etc.); and (ii) fast-track grant funding. Other alternative types of incentivization and investment models should also be explored.

RE: Builder/Publisher - Funding Guidelines

Eliminate the division of capital (over/under 500k) for grants and leave it more open ended

While I agree there should be a faster track path to grant funding, the arbitrary < or > 500k mark creates restrictions that may raise or lower the barrier of approval (ie. could see 50 good projects requesting 499k vs. 3 mediocre projects requesting 501k)
The Catalyst Team should instead have the ability and flexibility to assess on a case-by-case basis to offer grants or strike commercial agreements with teams

Remove the Arbitrum Foundation’s formal role in the grants process above ^

Beyond playing a supporting role in the program (providing help via business development, partnerships, and deal flow or advising on legal structuring), the Catalyst Team being hired should handle this and maintain a degree of separation from the Foundation

There should be a size limit to grant distributions on a per deal basis for game dev grants

While it’s still early and hard to generalize without deal-specific context, we should set a [US$10m] size limit per deal (possibly even less than that)
More is not often better and this enters into the territory of late-stage investing / M&A and possibly overspending on deals which I do not believe aligns with the overall goals of this program (recall: to catalyze gaming as the first program of its kind within Arbitrum)

Minimum capital contribution by publishers in deals is positive and could be further expanded

Publishers should absolutely put skin in the game and not look for the DAO to fully fund deals.
Within this, there should be additional provisions to allow the Council or Catalyst Team to assess contributions on a facts/circumstances basis to provide greater flexibility.

Speaking of capital contribution, some of the comments seem to misunderstand the minimum capital contribution and difference between publishers vs. builders

Define “Publishers” and “Game Builders” (game developers, studios, and builders)
Make it clearer that independent Game Builders do not have to put up any minimum amount to access funds, this is specific only to publishers who, themselves, are looking to acquire and partner with Game Builders themselves.

Allowing publishers to request an allocation out of the infrastructure bucket

The lines are blurred between ecosystems/publishers who are also infrastructure/technology/protocol builders as the "job" goes well beyond simply finding and bringing in games as extensions to BD/partnerships for Arbitrum. It can also spans distribution, advisory, fundraising, game design, development, QA, localization, and much more.
In Treasure's case, we are building decentralized infrastructure for next-gen gaming through an end-to-end ecosystem of game development support spanning the full spectrum of infrastructure including a native chain (L2), Infinity Chains (L3s), marketplace, AMM, LiveOps, APIs/SDKs, analytics services, and more as outlined in our litepaper.
In XAI's case, they've innovated to create a new node primitive through their Sentry Nodes (which net them 12,897 ETH through their node sale).

RE: Next Steps & Timelines

The timeline for when capital will begin to flow should be spelled out

While the “Next Steps” section captures the program initialization and administrative steps well, it does not make it clear when builders or publishers can expect to access or tap into the allocated funds. With the added layers (Council, Catalyst Team, publishers), there should be a more explicit timeline and structure for how funds can begin to be unlocked and allocated
Take this example - the Council and Catalyst Team have been fully assembled and stood up, and grant applications and RFPs have started to be posted by May 2024. Past this, there is no stated timeline for when deals will begin to be made
The STIP, Backfund, and LTIPP made it clear for builders and applying projects as to when incentives would be granted, and the GCP would benefit from something similar.

The council composition is important, an election shouldn’t be rushed, and the council needs to reach beyond the Arbitrum DAO pool of candidates

The council needs to comprise a diverse panel of professionals who are knowledgeable about gaming (on both publishing-side and development), web3, and ideally also familiar with Arbitrum.
We should incorporate more flexibility in the timeline and election process that doesn’t leave Arbitrum and the GCP with a feeling of, “well, this is everybody who applied in the two weeks we had and we kinda have to pick five of them”.
There needs to be active recruitment by the DAO to convince highly qualified council members to apply because the people we will want are likely not here reading our forum posts or participating in these discussions (yet).

RE: Budget

200m ARB is proposed to be earmarked but probably shouldn’t be spent in 1 year

This figure was used to turn heads and be market competitive with other similar initiatives out there employed by other ecosystems. However, it’s unlikely that all of that will (or should be) spent in year 1 or even over the 2 year term that the GCP is contemplated.
We should consider committing to funding being unlocked and available within four 6-month timeframes (25% unlocking). Should the Catalyst Team need to unlock capital earlier, it should be presented to the Council (or the DAO).

Allow for greater flex in budget between builders (A) and infrastructure (B)

Incorporate flexibility into the buckets to allow for grant priorities/flow to evolve over time and not be limited by bucketed capacity constraints (or force spending that may be later deemed unnecessary) - ie. on a total 200m total budget, bake in a 15% overallocation:
- 160m games → target 160m but up to 184m
- 40m infrastructure → target 40m but up to 46m
- Total budget hard cap remains at 200m
Council to maintain the ability in managing the gaming budget and increase/decrease capacity across the different sleeves depending on how the gaming ecosystem on Arbitrum evolves.

Profits to the DAO should be reinvested into gaming

Profits from the GCP should be reinvested back into the Arbitrum gaming ecosystem to sustain and extend future funding while also supporting public goods, infrastructure development, bounties, and other future opportunities yet to be identified.
There currently exist a multitude of revenue streams that Arbitrum is able to access across a more generalized treasury management strategy being contemplated, sequencer fees, the Arbiturm Orbit Expansion Program, etc.

Closing Note

As mentioned, we support the general direction of the proposal and plan to vote FOR this proposal during the Snapshot temperature check.

A Catalyst to the Catalyst

In the current form, my feeling is the Gaming Catalyst Program is fated to have a slow start with timing being gated by: (1) having formed a Catalyst Team; and also (2) having elected a Council.

This means that we’re looking at June/July to actually start catalyzing gaming (3-4 months from now). I think this is too late.

We should consider a “catalyst” to the “catalyst” to get the ball rolling through a publisher/ecosystem-led effort in close collaboration with the Arbitrum Foundation.

Here’s how this could play out:

While there is no stated restriction preventing project from making a grant proposal directly to the DAO (we applaud Into the Dungeons for being the first gaming project to do so), it’s clear that Arbitrum DAO likes its frameworks.
With this in mind, it may make sense to explore a “Minimum Viable Catalyst” (MVC) that aligns with this framework with the following modifications:
- For an interim period while everything is being stood up, substitute the Council and Catalyst Team with the Arbitrum Foundation
- Allow publishers/ecosystems to, through their public proposals posted on the Arbitrum governance forum, propose an interim structure to bring deals to the Arbitrum Foundation for grant consideration
- Allow the DAO to approve/ratify the publisher proposals (the interim measures only)
- Upon the hiring of the teams and entity formation, have all deals reassigned from the Arbitrum Foundation to the new Catalyst Team
- Publishers/ecosystems will resubmit public proposals to the forum to provide both a status report and to unlock access to further capital in line with the existing proposal

eg. ~50% of the games in the Arbitrum Arcade event (the gaming edition of Arbitrum Odyssey) are associated with Treasure
Our games include: Smolbound, The Beacon, Realm, Zeeverse, Bitmates, Kuroro, Kaiju Cards, Tales of Elleria, Knights of the Ether, Mighty Action Heroes, and others.

Put us in, coach!

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Introduction - Gaming Catalyst Program

GCP Hypothesis

Proposal Summary

Expected Outcomes and KPIs

Initiatives

A. Builder Onboarding and Growth

B. Game Infrastructure Bounties

Next Steps

Total Cost

Proposal Contributors

Resources & Content

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Introduction - Gaming Catalyst Program

GCP Hypothesis

Proposal Summary

Expected Outcomes and KPIs

Initiatives

A. Builder Onboarding and Growth

B. Game Infrastructure Bounties

Next Steps

Total Cost

Proposal Contributors

Resources & Content

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Catalyze Arbitrum Gaming: HADOUKEN!

Introduction - Gaming Catalyst Program

GCP Hypothesis

Proposal Summary

Expected Outcomes and KPIs

Initiatives

A. Builder Onboarding and Growth

B. Game Infrastructure Bounties

Next Steps

Total Cost

Proposal Contributors

Resources & Content

Introduction - Gaming Catalyst Program

GCP Hypothesis

Proposal Summary

Expected Outcomes and KPIs

Initiatives

A. Builder Onboarding and Growth

B. Game Infrastructure Bounties

Next Steps

Total Cost

Proposal Contributors

Resources & Content

Proposal Name:

Response:

Proposal Name:

Response:

Proposal Name:

Response:

Proposal Name:

Response:

Next Steps

Next Steps

Next Steps

Next Steps

I'm voting to support this proposal on Tally

#1 Why did the operational budget change from $0m on Snapshot to $25m on Tally?

#2. Why the increase from $10m to $25m in operational costs between Snapshot and Tally?

Timeline

Gaming Research Forum Post (Feb 15th)

Initial Forum Post (March 12th)

Snapshot Vote (Mar 5th - Mar 22nd)

Updated Draft for Tally v1 (Apr 18th)

Updated Draft for Tally v2 (May 10)

Tally Vote (May 24 - Jun 7)

I'm voting to support this proposal on Tally

#1 Why did the operational budget change from $0m on Snapshot to $25m on Tally?