Over the last six weeks, we have talked about various popular blockchain games. They were: Rarity, Axie Infinity, Gods Unchained, Illuvium, Light Nite, and Star Atlas.

These projects are inspired by mainstream online games such as Magic of the Gathering (Gods Unchained, Axie Infinity), DOTA 2 (Illuvium), Fortnite (Light Nite), and galactic war games such as Star Wars: The Old Republic (Star Atlas).

The novelty with blockchain is that it allows players to own almost every item (as NFTs) in the game. This feature sets the play-to-earn wheel in motion as owners can sell their NFTs to other interested players.

These games also have a native crypto token for in-game purchases on their respective marketplaces. And, some of these tokens power the game’s decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) that will allow the community to steer its development in the future.

Today, I am going to introduce a similar blockchain-gaming project, Aurory. This is one of the most anticipated games on Solana, planning for a launch early next year.

Aurory is Solana’s flagship gaming project that aims to become the next Axie Infinity of Solana, possibly bigger. The project is backed by crypto giants like Serum, Alameda Research, Animoca Brands, and CMS Holdings.

The Aurory game is a Pokemon-style game based on Japanese role-playing games (JPRG). JPRG has a characteristic retro-anime look and comes with expansive single-player storytelling gameplay along with multiplayer battles.

The characters of the game—Aurorians—need to complete single-player quests to level up, earn AURY tokens, and find in-game creatures—Nefties—the in-game creatures that fight battles in a multiplayer setting. Only an Aurorian can validate the existence of Netfies.

Although Aurorians are an integral part of the game, the game will be free-to-play, meaning you don’t need to purchase Aurorian NFTs to play. You can also start in the single-player mode, level up in them and mint your Aurorian to engage in multiplayer battles.

The multiplayer mode looks similar to Axie Infinity and Gods Unchained, a turn-based online battle with three Nefties on each side.

On Aug. 31, the team dropped the first 10,000 Aurorian NFTs. The minting process of the game was far from smooth.The congestion blocked several interested buyers and even the smart contract did not function as expected. It required only 1 SOL to mint, instead of 3 SOL as notified earlier on their site.

Despite the poor drop, the NFT pumped to astronomical levels, with a few rare ones selling for 2000 SOL (worth $440,000 at current prices.)

Aurory NFTs on Solanar. Source: solanart.com

Two months since, the project has continued to stay on top in trading volume and has a floor price of around 28 SOL ($6,200).

The Aurory NFT gives owners certain advantages such as a badge of uniqueness, early access to NFT drops and new gaming modes, and membership to Aurory’s decentralized organization, DAOrory.

The DAOrory will be composed of Aurory NFT holders, who will get to participate in the decision-making process of the DAO. The DAO is funded by part of the Aurory NFT sale.

The DAO will “allocate money to Solana-based NFT projects through a treasury”. It also plans to support NFT creators and collectors in the Solana NFT ecosystem.

The idea of the NFT-based DAO backed by Solana’s top stakeholders has attracted a lot of liquidity for the Aurorian NFTs.

On Oct. 21, the team also conducted IDO of Aurory’s native tokens, AURY. The AURY token will have in-game utility, facilitate trading on the Aurory marketplace, and earn from the marketplace’s revenue.

The IDO in October-end raised $108.8 million, selling 7% of the total supply for a price of $29.5 per AURY token.

Currently, the AURY token is trading at a loss of around 40% from its IDO price. The reason for the drop could be that the game is currently in production mode. Moreover, unlike Illuvium and Axie Infinity, it does not have a staking component yet.

The team plans to launch staking by mid-November. The actual game will be launched next year; they are planning an open beta launch in early 2022.

How to Participate?

Currently, with the game in production, you can only purchase the Aurory NFT and the native $AURY tokens. These will give access to the early release of the game and future NFT drops.

To purchase Aurory items, first, you need to have a Solana wallet like Phantom. You can download Phantom wallet here.

Make sure you top it with some SOL to pay for fees. The transaction fees on Solana are extremely low: $10 worth SOL should be enough for multiple transactions.

To buy the Aurory NFT, visit the Solanart NFT marketplace for Aurory and connect your Phantom wallet.

Connecting wallet on Solanart marketplace. Source: solanart.io

To check for the Rarity rank of respective NFTs, go to HowRare.is and enter the ID of the Aurory NFT you are interested in.

Checking rarity ranking of Aurory NFT. Source: howrare.is

Once you’re convinced about the price and ranking of your selected NFT, complete the purchase on Solanart by clicking on “Buy.”

Buying Aurory NFT on Solanart. Source: solanart.io

Confirm the transaction on your Phantom wallet extension to complete the purchase.

To purchase AURY tokens, you can access centralized exchanges like Kucoin or FTX. You can also use the Raydium decentralized exchange (DEX) on Solana.

To buy via Raydium, top up your Solana wallet with Solana or other tokens launched on Solana blockchain. Make sure you have SOL to pay for fees. Since Raydium is a DEX router it will automatically exchange tokens by connecting through liquidity pools itself. For e.g. SOL -> USDC -> AURY

Visit Raydium, and go to their Swap page. In the Swap section, choose to swap for AURY for the list of tokens you get in the “To” section.

Buying AURY token. Source: Raydium

Select a buy order of your choice and click on Setup. Approve the transaction and then click on the Swap button once it gets activated. Once again, sign the transaction on your Solana wallet to complete the purchase.

As mentioned earlier, the private beta will prioritize NFT and AURY token holders coming out early next year. Start preparing now to gain early access.

Good luck and have fun.