Ember Sword: What we know so far

Ember Sword is an upcoming free-to-play, massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) on the blockchain that's set to release within the next year. You can own land, find valuable NFTs, level up your character, join a guild, beat up monsters and other players — and earn.

The terms MMO and RPG are tossed around a lot with crypto blockchain games, many lacking in the role-playing department, but it looks like Ember Sword might nail what it means to be a classic MMORPG.

This may be because the company behind Ember Sword, Bright Star Studios, is chock-full of pro gamers and experienced game makers.

What is Ember Sword?

Ember Sword is a blockchain crypto game that's still in testing. Developed by Bright Star Studios, it's got hype behind it, with more than 70,000 members on the game's Discord server and 87,000 followers on Twitter already.

The game is set on the dystopian moon Thanabus, with four nations planned: Solarwood, Duskerton, Sevrend and Ediseau. Alpha testing will take place in Solarwood, with the opening of the other nations planned for 2023 and beyond. Once the game is complete, players choose one of the four nations to call home upon character creation.

Ember Sword is in pre-alpha, with plans to open up alpha testing in the first quarter of 2022. Land sale applications are now closed, and the lucky early-access landowners can participate in alpha testing.

It's built on the Ethereum blockchain to power collectible NFTs and land ownership. Ember is the in-game currency, an ERC-20 token that you can purchase in-game (if it has the supply) and used to buy land and collectible in-game NFTs.

Playing Ember Sword

When the game releases, you'll have a few options for gameplay. You can team up with your guild for quests to find NFT items to sell at the marketplace, defend land and level up your character. You can also own plots of land for extra perks. Or be a solo player – brave the wilds and keep the spoils for yourself.

The developers want the game to be completely free to play and skill-based. In fact, they've said, "We hate Pay to Win, and we'll keep Ember Sword skill-based and competitive by not implementing any Pay to Win mechanics."

The game is played in your browser, and we're unsure of the actual character creation procedure or if a digital wallet is required to play. However, a digital wallet is required to buy land through EmberSword.com when land sales are available.

Combat

Active combat is key to earning valuable NFTs and leveling up your character. There's player versus player (PvP) and player versus environment (PvE) combat.

Combat can take place in three zones: Outlaw, Wilderness and Kinship.

Leveling up your character by beating monsters and other players allows you to craft better weapons, earn more loot and become more powerful in-game.

There are three types of weapons: melee, ranged and energy. There are no hero classes, so you're not bound to any one weapon type.

For armor, there are three types: Heavy (plate), Medium (leather) and Light (cloth). You can mix and match the armor you wear, so you're not tied to sets. Eventually, gear will come with special bonuses, but there's no information on the types of bonuses yet.

There are no plans to have character classes in this game. The devs want players to be able to change their gameplay at the drop of a hat. However, using the same weapon type increases your skill with that weapon, so players can specialize despite the lack of classes.

Character skills

Leveling up your character means climbing levels from 0 to 100. There are 16 skill sets to be released:

Landowning

Players can buy plots of land to earn passive income – and you get a fancy title. Build campsites, NPC houses and more on these plots. Work yourself up to owning a city to construct buildings, portals, trading posts and even guild houses.

There are set to be 160,000 plots. When land sales are available, you can purchase them at EmberSword.com. There aren't any land sales open at the time of writing, but developers say future sales will be announced on social media outlets. Prices for plots vary, and you need to have a digital wallet to buy land. Eventually, players can split up their land into smaller pieces and sell it to other players.

Owning land doesn't give you any in-game advantages or access to exclusive content. The devs don't want landowners to have a pay-to-play advantage over non-paying users – but there are perks to owning land, including actual revenue.

Some of the revenue that Ember Sword generates in the area around your owned property is distributed to you. How this will work isn't totally solidified, but we expect more details on this revenue distribution once the game is complete.

The more collectibles found near your land and the more players that interact with your land can mean more revenue – so having guild houses and portals has real value.

What is Ember Sword's token?

"Ember" is going to be the native token, an ERC-20 token. You'll be able to use it to buy land and collectibles, as a reward through gameplay and other in-game uses.

How to buy Ember Sword's token

You will be able to buy Ember on cryptocurrency exchanges, but the token has not had its initial coin offering (ICO) at the time of writing.

It looks like NULL may not be available to purchase on an exchange in the US.

You can still purchase NULL by using a decentralized exchange (DEX) instead. Decentralized exchanges are web applications that run on blockchains like Ethereum and allow users to trade any asset directly with one another.

How to purchase NULL using a decentralized exchange.

1. Find NULL on a decentralized exchange and make sure NULL can be traded for ETH which is the native asset of Ethereum. Popular DEXs include Uniswap, SushiSwap and 1INCH.
2. Buy ETH to trade for NULL using an exchange like Gemini. You will need to purchase enough ETH to swap for NULL as well as ETH to pay for transaction fees on the Ethereum network (known as gas). You can use a service like Etherscan to get an idea of how much gas fees currently cost.
3. Transfer the ETH into a web 3.0 wallet like MetaMask to connect to the DEX.
4. Trade ETH for NULL on the DEX of your choice, following the instructions on screen. Make sure to leave enough ETH in your wallet to pay for gas.
5. Wait for the transaction to finalize and the NULL tokens will arrive in your wallet.
6. You may now keep the tokens in your web 3.0 wallet or transfer them somewhere more secure like a hardware wallet.

You can follow the same process when you want to sell your tokens, or come back to this page to see if they can now be traded on an exchange in the US.

How does play-to-earn work with Ember Sword?

You can choose the free-to-play option of earning by fighting players or monsters in the three zones. By exploring the zones and fighting monsters, you can find collectible NFT items that can be sold in the in-game marketplace or on secondary marketplaces.

The more play-to-earn option is owning land so you can earn passive revenue largely based on how much players interact with your owned land.

If you're an artist, you'll be able to submit collectible designs through the Artists Workshop. Every month, artists can submit work (skins, emotes, wearables, etc.) to the Workshop, where players vote on the best ones. The winning submissions will be implemented into the game. Through smart contracts, the artist will earn whenever that NFT is sold.

What are the Ember Sword NFTs?

The plots of land are NFTs that can be bought and sold in-game and through Ember Sword's marketplace. Land sales are set to be held as the game is being developed and nations are created. And once the game is complete, players can buy and sell to each other.

There are also NFT "collectibles." These can include avatars, pets, mounts, wearables and more. These items are meant to be collected and sold and won't come with character buffs.

How to buy NFTs on Ember Sword

Each month, new collectibles are introduced to players via PvE and PvP quests or sold in themed sales on the proprietary marketplace. After a month, these collectibles stop being flooded in the game and are never reproduced again, creating scarcity. These collectibles can be sold in-game to other players or on secondary marketplaces.

Ember Sword also mentions that, eventually, they want players to be able to buy plots of land and collectibles with a credit card.

Other crypto games and NFT projects

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Name	Product	Categories	Blockchains	Payment methods	Platform	Genre
Gala Entertainment		Gaming	Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain, GALA	Cryptocurrency	Browser	Blockchain games	Blockchain gaming platforms where you can earn Gala and NFTs through playing.	Go to site View details	Compare	loading Fetching your data...
Splinterlands		Collectibles, Gaming, Trading cards	Hive	Cryptocurrency, PayPal	Browser, mobile	Trading card game (TCG)	Splinterlands is a digital, play-to-earn, collectible card game built on hive blockchain technology.	Go to site View details	Compare	loading Fetching your data...
Pegaxy		Gaming	Polygon	Cryptocurrency	Browser, mobile	Racing, collectibles	A blockchain-based horse racing game featuring NFT horses, breeding and earning opportunities.	Go to site View details	Compare	loading Fetching your data...
SoRare		Sports, Collectibles, Gaming, Trading cards	Ethereum	Credit card, Debit card, Cryptocurrency, Bank transfer	Browser	Trading card and fantasy sports app	A fantasy football game with collectible NFT cards, officially supported by the biggest soccer leagues in the world.	Go to site View details	Compare	loading Fetching your data...
Binance NFT Marketplace		Sports, Collectibles, Art, Gaming, Music, Trading cards, Domain names, Metaverse (Virtual Worlds), Memes, DeFi, Mixed	Ethereum	Credit card, Debit card, Cryptocurrency, Bank transfer	Browser	NFT marketplace	A peer-to-peer marketplace supported by one of the worlds largest cryptocurrency exchange, Binance. Not currently available to U.S. residents.	Go to site View details	Compare	loading Fetching your data...

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How to sell Ember Sword NFTs

Ember Sword partnered with OpenSea so players can sell official Ember Sword NFTs with less risk of buying or selling counterfeit NFTs. Ember Sword is working on adding more exchanges to their safelist of marketplaces.

About Ember Sword developers

The company behind Ember Sword is Bright Star Studios, founded in 2018. The company states they are "building the next generation Free to Play MMORPG experience — a re-thinking of what an MMORPG can be."

If you go to EmberSword.com, you can select MEET THE TEAM and see the CEO, founders, CTO, executive producer, creative director and more. Most of the team has placed their Twitter accounts on there as well.

The founders of Ember Sword are Mark Laursen, Joris Huijbregts and Loren Roosendaal.

Laursen — founder and CEO — is a former Counter-Strike Pro-Player and MMORPG World Champion; love to see it. His team at Bright Star Studios is a combination of other pro-players and experienced game developers across platforms.

Even though Ember Sword isn't out just yet, this team is promising and star-studded. Bright Star Studios contains real gamers, and not just run-of-the-mill ones, but pro gamers, so we're hopeful about this project.

Ember Sword roadmap and release date

Since the game is still in early testing, we're waiting for the actual release. However, alpha-testing by early access landowners is expected in the first quarter of 2022, and the second round of testing is set for Q2. We may not see all nations released until 2023 or later.

The studio is transparent about where it is in development and eager to include players and create a community. You can find updates on Reddit, Discord, Twitter and its blog. There's a "Work in Progress Wednesday" showing creatures, land plots and character designs in the works.

For the latest updates, follow its social media channels, and be on the lookout for land sales if you want a piece of the action.

Bottom line

There's so much planned for Ember Sword, and it's easily become one of the most anticipated blockchain games out there. And since it doesn't require players to pay to begin playing and earning, it's got an advantage over games like Axie Infinity and CryptoBlades that require the purchase of NFTs to do anything.

However, we're hesitant to say the game is entirely free to play. Getting your hands on land isn't free, and the perks with landowning look to be very substantial. There may be a clear distinction in earning potential between landowners and regular citizens. However, Ember Sword assures players that they don't need to pay anything to start earning.