Please describe your proposed solution

Genun has been building the foundation for a strong game with Ascent: Rivals over the last 3 years and is approved on Steam & Epic Games. With many hours of consultation and advisement, the studio aims to add the final touches of integrating account and wallet features that are compliant with the platforms terms and conditions. Custodial wallets are generated for users when signing in with Steam, and will be encouraged to connect their own wallets. By integrating wallet connection into “third party account linking features” on our accounts, users will be able to seamlessly be a steward of their own assets with no extra work.

Ascent will showcase Cardano integration in a manner that is compliant, and opt-in. This is important for also setting precedent of creating value for players where they are encouraged to take a look at what Cardano has to offer. While permissioned teams will be possible via passwords or more novel additions such as requiring subscribing on twitch, web3 users will be able to access these same features for their community by offering team access based on holding their projects NFT.

Showcasing automatic sign and approval of Steam can be seen here

Please define the positive impact your project will have on the wider Cardano community

1. Setting Example: With this open sourced work that enables connecting to Steam accounts (and other popular accounts such as PSN/Xbox/Discord/Twitch), it will pave the way for the other studios to follow suite
2. Increased Exposure: Integration into popular gaming platforms like Steam and Epic Games exposes Cardano to millions of active users, fostering greater awareness and adoption.
3. Compliance and Reputation: By ensuring compliance with platform terms and conditions, Cardano's reputation as a trustworthy blockchain for mainstream applications is enhanced.
4. Cardano Utility: Showcasing direct utility for collections and their holders into a Ascent: Rivals

What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability? How do you intend to validate if your approach is feasible?

Our alpha is currently approved and live on Steam with over 450 playtesters.

We showcased the game at PAX West (130k attendees) winning players choice award.

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAnnsbV9X7E>Showcasing at PDX

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHrqJwKJo_cThe team was just invited (booth fee waived!) to showcase game at Dreamhack Dallas.

We were also invited speakers at Google's Web3 Gaming Week and Dubai main panelists.

What are the key milestones you need to achieve in order to complete your project successfully?

Milestone 1: Approval on Steam

0% cost | completed! | 25% completion

Deliverables:

• Game is playable and ready for Steam process
• Approved by Steam’s official process

Acceptance criteria:

• Game is downloadable on Steam

Milestone 2: Account linking

33% cost | 1 month | 50% completion

Deliverables:

• Webclient for accessing account
• Blockchain and backend verification service

Acceptance criteria:

• Live webclient to connect wallet
• Demo of creating an account on steam and connecting wallet

Milestone 3: Team Gating Based on NFT holding

33% cost | 1 month | 75% completion

Deliverables:

• backend service for richer team permission and authorization
• UX/UI of creating team based permissions
• Service for check connected wallet for required permissions

Acceptance criteria:

• Team captain can set a requirement
• Player can join by connecting wallet

Final Milestone: Live Testing

33% cost | 2 weeks | 100% completion

Deliverables:

• Collect user feedback
• Verify stability and bug fixes

Acceptance criteria:

• 2 weeks of live data bug free

Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

Core Developers - and Previous Experience

Steven George - Lead Engineer; Level 11, DigiPen

Stan Hayes - Aesthetic Engineer; Epic Games, Nvidia, DigiPen

Michael Yagi - Creative Director; 2K Games, DigiPen

Ming Chi - Artist; NetEase

Scott Meyers - Audio Engineer; Respawn Entertainment, Riot Games

Jeff Uong - DevOps Engineer; Samsung, DigiPen

Clifford Garvis - Solutions Architect &amp; Smart Contract; Nintendo, Level 11, DigiPen

Advisors

Lowell Vaughn - Principal Strategist Epic Games

Shoutout! 1+ Year(s) Fulltime contribution

Alejandro Hitti - Technical Project Lead; Rockstar Games, DigiPen

Jason Dempsey - Senior Engineer; Microsoft, DigiPen

Zander Jensen - Gameplay Engineer; Treyarch, DigiPen

Hiago Desena - Senior Engineer; Firewalk, DigiPen

Ahn Do - Producer; 343, GEC, DigiPen

Mickey Cushing - Designer; 343, Blizzard, Wizards of the Coast, Rockstar Games

Brian Park - Designer; Riot Games

Anon Developer - Senior Engineer; Respawn Entertainment, DigiPen

Please provide a cost breakdown of the proposed work and resources

Milestone 1: Approval on Steam

• 1 developer, 1 month = $8,750 / ₳25,000

Milestone 2: Account linking

• 2 developers (sharing work), 1 month = $7,666.67 / ₳21,904.76

Milestone 3: Team Gating Based on NFT holding

• 2 developers (sharing work), 1 month = $7,666.66/ ₳21,904.76

Milestone 4: Live Testing

• 1 developer, 2 weeks = $7,666.66 / ₳21,904.76

Tooling &amp; Reserve: reserve for changes to business requirements resulting to technical pivots necessary to deliver a better product/outcome

• Tooling (aws) = $1,000 / ₳2,857.14
• Reserve = $1,000 / ₳2,857.14

TOTAL AMOUNT

• $25,000 / ₳71,428.57

We apply a 0.35 USD/ADA exchange rate, which is the average rate over the past few months conservatively adjusted downward to ensure that the project will remain viable despite moderate price shocks that may occur before or during the project timeline.

No dependencies.

How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?

Because the studio was able to build 3 years full time, we are able to keep this proposal to final touches of wallet integration and some supporting systems requiring limited engineering resources while offering value of a game approved on steam, account linking, and NFT gated features!