Dark City – A MMORPG on Bitcoin

The first MMORPG on the Bitcoin blockchain, Dark City is an open cybernetic world, built using the groundbreaking Tap protocol, Ordinals and Bitmap.

Players become part of a mysterious, dystopian cyberpunk scenario after the collapse of human civilization. The few survivors are isolated in artificial environments, keeping their bodies alive thanks to the services of a global corporation controlled by a sentient AI called OR1.

The only form of human interaction allowed is through the highly supervised Paradise Computer metaverse, created by OR1 itself, to which the bodies and minds of the remnants of humankind are permanently connected.

To escape the control of OR1's authoritarian theocracy, a group of elite hackers called the Moon Runners created Dark City, a place of outlaws ruled by clans of techno-rebels and cyber lone wolves. In the heavily encrypted, marginal network, known as Dnet, the codified rules of Paradise Computer do not apply.

The Dark City network allows players to compete or collaborate in a parallel simulation - surviving on the outskirts, amassing fortunes and mastering the underground world of black market foragers, drug cartels, hackers and organised outlaw enterprises.

Philosophy

Games should not have owners

For years we have witnessed corporations creeping up the world's command chain, with even less regard for humankind than governments. We see this happening with land, food, seeds, water, space, information, beliefs and consciousness. The same has happened with and games.

How many games and franchises once beloved by players have been killed, quartered and butchered by corporatist interest with no regard for what the players want? A person born into this new reality has little chance of experiencing the good old days when games were made by us gamers. We watch in dismay as day-by-day the gaming industry plunges into even deeper depths of abuse.

Games should be fun, challenging and foster free-thinking

The very same games are released year after year under different titles and skin. This endless chain of copy-pasting is mostly focused on making money with minimal effort. Games are published unfinished, and players must purchase extensions and DLCs, making buying AAA games feel like a scam. We see a downfall in value while prices rise.

In detriment to intellectual and creative challenges, but in the benefit of corporate greed, games have become boring, easy and predictable. Repetitive forms of game-play flood the market and often who pays more wins. Gamers do not want this, but their options are limited.

Vision

As an open world, Dark City is an experience. We are making a game and giving this newly created world the basic building blocks so players can inhabit and create with us. We want players to have agency and freedom while we provide the means for a community of shared creative effort.

Dark City's gameplay is inspired by Multi User Dungeons, cyberpunk games (Hacknet, Shadowrun, Technobabylon, Beneath a Steel Sky, Jazzpunk, Fallout 2), and traditional RPGs such as GURPs and Paranoia.

Players start as an apprentice hacker experiencing the Dark City for the first time; an activist fighting against or simply fleeing the rule of authoritarian AIs. Little information is given regarding what the outside world is like, and newcomers are encouraged to make sense of the little bits of information, encrypted and scattered around the Dnet, solving their own, personal puzzles.

Secrecy, double-entendres and paranoia are fundamental ingredients of the narrative. Most of the in-game items are to be found or crafted, and sold by players to players.

We offer freedom to understand and engage the game alone or collaboratively. Meaning making is encouraged, lore is shared and not much is set in stone. Nothing is easy or simple, every step is complex and requires careful thinking. Dark City is hostile, dangerous and no one - human or machine - is to be ultimately trusted.

We invite players to build the world they wanna play and live in.