For more content, subscribe to our newsletter below! Now let’s get right into this in-depth view of the Ronin blockchain.
Focus
The purpose of this article is to provide an overview of the Ronin blockchain, starting with some history and notable events, followed by a thorough breakdown of the strengths and weaknesses of building on Ronin then concluding with some case studies of selected builders on Ronin. Our motivation is to educate web3 gaming builders by providing more color around the Ronin ecosystem. The intended audience of this piece is game developers exploring the web3 space as well as veteran crypto builders seeking to expand into a thriving ecosystem.
Origin
Initial Success
The Ronin blockchain is a product built out of necessity by Sky Mavis (SM), creators of renowned game Axie Infinity (Axie). While building Axie, the SM team quickly bumped into numerous challenges and limitations when building on Ethereum. The high fees stunted their growth. Undeterred, Sky Mavis continued its search for a solution, which manifested in the form of a project called Loom network but that also fell short of their expectations.
Thus after numerous attempts to build on Ethereum and atop Ethereum projects, the team decided to control their own destiny by building their own blockchain. After building and deploying Ronin, Axie Infinity experienced its hypergrowth in 2021, where Axies reached a peak of 2M+ DAUs, 2.2M Axie Holders, and 4M+ Ronin Wallet downloads. The success and learnings from Axie Infinity led SM to go back to the drawing board and envision what a proper L1 built for gaming would look like.
Ronin Launch
Ronin launched in April 2021 and much like many alternative L1s at the time, mercenary capital and speculators quickly flocked to the chain. Additionally, Ronin was running a highly lucrative liquidity incentivization plan to bootstrap its native decentralize exchange, Katana DEX. There were over $8B cumulative volume that transacted on Katana DEX. At one point, there were over $1B of TVL on the decentralized exchange. (SOURCE: DEFI LLAMA) This large sum of capital bridged over into Ronin, which inadvertently turned into a honey pot for bad actors.
Exploit
In March 2022, Ronin was hacked for over $600M through a series of social engineering attacks. (SOURCE: COIN TELEGRAPH) This is catastrophic not only because the amount lost is substantial but also because of the far-reaching impact on SM, RON token holders, Ronin users, Axie Infinity players, as well as builders in the Ronin ecosystem. Previously, Sky Mavis raised funds from the top venture capitalists in the industry such as a16z.
Although SM achieved great success with its Axie Infinity title, SM is far from a multinational conglomerate with an abundance of cash. Therefore the fact that the SM team was able to fully compensate the users is notable. This point should be acknowledged. However, it could be said that the hack shouldn’t have occurred in the first place if SM had better control systems. This is a fair criticism as the team could have done a better job preventing such attack vectors in the first place. The second best thing SM can do now is to improve its controls moving forward, which it has.
Enhancing Ronin’s Security
Sky Mavis has taken four key actions in greatly enhancing its security. First, SM doubled the number of validators to 18, one of whom is Google Cloud — though with the recent DPoS upgrade the validator count is 22 with SM occupying only 1 slot. Second, governance underwent an upgrade to requiring voting. (SOURCE: RONIN DOCUMENTATION) Third, alerts and circuit breakers are placed on bridges. Fourth, the internal security process improved by quadrupling the headcount for the security team.
Obviously, it is impossible to guarantee that a hack will not happen again but what is tangible are the measures SM took to prevent exploits from occurring. This is not to minimize the impact of the Ronin hack but more so to highlight the actions and efforts SM performed to do right by their past users as well as future ones.
Aside from just retail users, builders in the Ronin ecosystem have also been impacted by the hack, as the security breach has shaken confidence in the network's ability to provide a secure and reliable infrastructure for gaming and NFT projects. It is reasonable to expect builders to hold reservations about building on Ronin but that’s actually not the case as there are numerous game projects building in stealth.
Finally, Ronin blockchain users have also been affected by the hack, as some lost funds and confidence – but all in-game assets were secured. The attack has highlighted the need for increased security measures and more robust protocols to prevent similar incidents in the future. Though it’s important to note that the game client itself, the SLP token nor the Axie NFTs were compromised.
In conclusion, the Ronin blockchain hack has had far-reaching consequences for all stakeholders in the ecosystem. The Sky Mavis team responded swiftly and took measures to mitigate the impact of the attack. Now, Ronin has implemented security upgrades and thinks about securing the network proactively
Vision
Ronin Vision
Ronin has large ambitions. These ambitions aren’t empty as the Sky Mavis team believes Ronin is the place to build for web3 games.
“Find your first 1000 true fans within the leading web3 gaming community from Axie Infinity created by Sky Mavis. Ronin is a battle-tested scalable blockchain solution with a tightly integrated ecosystem of products that is hyper-optimized for gaming and best-in-class user experience.”
The initial step to manifesting this vision is to create an integrated ecosystem of products such as the NFT Marketplace and native Katana DEX with value accrual to RON.
RON Utility
Therefore, the native token on Ronin, RON, is going through massive updates. As aforementioned, the SM team doubled the validator count and with that comes increased security for the Ronin blockchain – as well as value accrual for RON. Ronin recently went through a consensus upgrade to Delegated Proof of Stake (DPoS). Delegated Proof of Stake (DPoS) is a consensus algorithm that allows token holders to vote for a limited number of block validators who are responsible for producing new blocks and securing the network.
The validators are incentivized to act in the best interest of the network via commission on block rewards and their token staked can be slashed or even removed from their position if they do not fulfill their duties. This means that tokenholders are able to stake RON to delegate their tokens to their validator of choice. There are 12 trusted and reputable Governing Validators and 10 Standard Validators, making up a total of 22 validators who perform critical roles in the ecosystem and thus earning a portion of the network transaction fees – RON stakers also get a slice of this fee. This is not all.
RON holders will likely also have control over the ecosystem’s treasury in the future. The potential growth of Ronin’s treasury should not be underestimated as 0.05% of every trade that occurs on the native Katana DEX is accrued to the treasury. As at 6th April 2023, the total volume traded on Katana Dex has been $8.29B (SOURCE: DEFILLAMA) and the average volumes have increased in Q1 2023 compared to prior quarter. Additionally, there are plans to use these fees to provide liquidity provision, so the compounding effect is not to be discounted. The value capture of the RON token is truly democratized as the token was launched with fairness as a core tenet.
The max supply cap for RON is 1,000,000,000 tokens. The distribution of RON is Ecosystem Fund 15%, Rewards 25%, Community Incentives 30%, and Sky Mavis 30%. It will take 108 months for the token to be fully diluted. (SOURCE: Ronin Documentation) Note that, unlocked tokens go through a program budget before being allotted to be added to circulation.
Currently SM stewards the different program budgets for RON incentives but that will progress into a system with more community oversight. Also, there are no VCs that got in private investment rounds at discount prices to “dump on retail.” Furthermore, Sky Mavis have not sold a single token – barring some token distributions to equity investors, though this amount is minimal.
It is not a far speculation to imagine that the Katana DEX would be paired with an NFT marketplace to facilitate both token and NFT liquidity. Now envision that a layer-one blockchain has natively designed and built liquidity into its architecture to enable the fluidity of assets. This could be envisioned as the combination as Ethereum’s top two innovations – Uniswap and OpenSea – then layer in the potential for identity primitives like Ronin Naming System (RNS).
With all these primitives, One could picture all them coalescing into a seamless user experience that empowers a project to use a “Ronin Naming Service” for whitelisting for the NFT Marketplace launchpad for their initial NFT sale then the proceeds is immediately used to provide liquidity into the Katana DEX with the project’s native token. All this integrated into the base blockchain reveals Ronin’s pursuit of becoming a true web3 gaming blockchain.
Decentralization
Ronin is a samurai without a master. Sky Mavis intends for the network to be progressively decentralized such that there would not be a centralized entity that would become a single point of failure. The plan for decentralization lies in the initial 12 governing validators – with SM only controlling 1 seat. The 10 additional validators are elected by the community through a token staking weight via delegation thus truly allowing the community, developers, and all key stakeholders to control their own destiny.
The Ronin Experience
Building on Ronin has many advantages. We’ll break down these advantages into three distinct categories: (1) Technical; (2) Business; (3) Ecosystem Growth.
Technical Advantage
Technology Philosophy
Ronin is architected for web3 gaming. Ronin’s philosophy is to adopt battle-tested technical solutions. In other words, the SM team focuses on maximizing user experience rather than maximizing innovative but experimental technologies.
One area to spend extra attention on is user onboarding. To improve the First-Time-User-Experience (FTUE), Ronin is looking into ways for creating gasless experiences for players or allowing the devs to front the onboarding costs – internally known as ‘Transaction Pass’. We believe this is the appropriate stance and the proper environment for game development.
This is particularly true in the crypto space as the majority of testing occurs in production so extra precaution is needed. Though that doesn’t mean that Sky Mavis aren't kept abreast of the latest research in the crypto space.
Currently, the SM team is looking into the different types of zero knowledge scaling technologies to improve transaction bandwidth and keep transaction costs affordable for both developers and players. Alongside this research, the team is actively improving their native primitives such as the Ronin Wallet, Mavis Hub, Katana DEX, and launching the Mavis Marketplace.
Primitives & Integrations
These primitives are integral building blocks for builders. The SM team makes it easy for developers to adopt these primitives into their games via APIs and SDKs. Not only are the tools available but there is also a dedicated engineering team to facilitate smooth integrations. All of these tools and support are accessible via the Sky Mavis developer portal. Other on-chain level of support includes liquidity and off/on-ramping needs.
The Katana DEX allows for native integration into any dapp. Additionally, a project can bootstrap their liquidity with RON, one of the strongest assets on chain. Liquidity is an integral part of any thriving ecosystem. Therefore, SM partners with Ramp.Network and Binance integration to enable Ronin builders to have access to a seamless off/on-ramping solution. The Sky Mavis team aims to provide a holistic 360-degree support so let’s discuss about the business advantages of building on Ronin.
Business Advantage
Selective & Focused
SM is taking an extremely curated approach in their partnerships – that’s why they’re only selecting a few studios (single digits) to maintain and sustain a high support level. This is a highly intentional approach to seed the ecosystem with high-quality projects with the highest chance of success. There are plans in the future to transition to more permissionless launches.
Currently, Ronin has a strong presence in Southeast Asia region and Latin America but remain steadfast in their global approach. Much like many game publishers, Ronin is targeting the central gaming hub of Asia: Japan and Korea. All of this effort is to broaden and enrich Ronin’s ecosystem.
Deep & Hands-On Support
This small cohort of initial partners enjoy end-to-end support from design, Go-To-Market, monetization, to community building. In other words, SM is able to fully support the full lifecycle of a game from planning to production then even live ops. There are dedicated teams for each stage. SM's selective choices align their interests with those of the partners.
Furthermore, these selected teams may have access to funding and hands-on advisory across all facets of building and growing a successful web3 game, as well as deep cross-game partnerships and promotions. This level of integral support stems from SM’s core tenet of prioritizing the needs of its partner studios. Therefore any partnership with SM is intentionally executed to ensure long-term sustainability for the partners.
Growth & Social
A key element that SM offers is access to their distribution channels. For PC games, there’s the Mavis Hub launcher with 40k MAUs. This will enable games to instantly have access to tens of thousands of users from day one. On the other hand, mobile games will get to work with SM’s growth team to get placement on mobile platforms. Recall that SM has these relationships because of their Ronin wallet mobile application, which received over 4 million installs.
Additionally, SM has 2.5k content creators to produce videos, blogs, art, and all forms of community-driven and user-generated content. SM will have a dedicated growth team to perform light-publisher role mainly focusing on Acquisition & Conversion while consulting on Retention.
Most recently, SM’s creators partnered with The Machines Arena (TMA) to expand the game’s awareness and activated large numbers of community members to the tune of 10k+ followers on Twitter with 6k+ beta access codes distributed. This success was largely driven by Ronin’s social following which amounted to 700k+ Discord members, 2.5M Twitter followers across all SM affiliated accounts, 400k Substack subscribers.
Ecosystem
SM approaches the ecosystem with a community-first mindset. This requires SM to think in terms of all the stakeholders – users, players, and builders. Firstly, the underlying thread that connects all three is the RON token. Therefore the demand for blockspace is key.
To drive demand, SM greatly improve the developer experience and supercharge these builders with the appropriate infrastructure tools and on-chain primitives. On the projects’ end, SM expects the teams to be honest, forthright, and mission-focused. Ronin will be the defacto hub for web3 games. In order to attain this title, the projects built on Ronin must meet the gold standard – that is to put the community first.
The very basic level is to not use the community as exit liquidity and to not sell a token just for pure fundraising purposes. Additionally, safety is a given. SM and the Ronin builders must conduct audits and technical reviews before apps are deployed on mainnet – no exceptions.
This arguably is not the most “decentralized” or “permissionless” but it does ensure a better user experience. Along this thread, Ronin primitives like the Mavis Marketplace, Katana DEX, and Mavis ID (soonTM) are natively integratable into the games so the user experience is seamless across all the apps in the ecosystem.
CONSIDERATIONS
Lack of Customization
The unison experience for the users mean that each game must utilize the native Katana DEX, the native NFT Marketplace, and the native wallet. This can be restricting from the developers’ perspective. However, there are economic benefits to using the native primitives such as the fee share system based on wallet referrals.
The “restriction” are offset by the economics for both the DEX and NFT Marketplace. Another area the team incentivize adopting their primitives is through the Katana DEX token emissions, which are decided quarterly. By using the native Ronin wallet, game developers also instantly on board the millions of users on both mobile wallet app and PC browser extension.
Although there are numerous advantages to using these primitives, the limited choice reduces the control that a developer has over the user experience. SM understands how games would want to own their user relationship and is working on ways to allow games to create their own NFT marketplace frontend easily while tapping into a global orderbook across Ronin. Speaking of control, Dapps on mainnet needs to be whitelisted by the SM team.
Lack of Permissionlessness
In order to offer the best users the best experiences, SM currently acts as a central curator. This takes the form of SM controlling who can deploy onto mainnet – though, anyone can experiment and build on the testnet. Recall Ronin’s core tenet of putting the community first and their philosophy on technology. To protect the users and maintain a certain standard, Ronin has to impose these controls on their chain.
Further, mainnet is not particularly used for experimentation. Mainnet is when products are ready for the masses. Ronin is a gaming chain. There are no games that would launch without being heavily QA’d and tested thoroughly. SM is simply enforcing that quality control over the games on their chain. The vehicle for control is done through commercial agreements with SM. But it is important to allow permissionlesss innovation and launching of games.
The delicate balance between openness and protection of the ecosystem needs to be considered under the overarching goal of maximizing the player’s joy and experience.
Business Expectations
Ronin is seeking good teams that are coachable and have conviction in Ronin for the long term – build stronger together. This partnership takes shape through a commercial agreement. Similar to how a publisher works with game studios, SM takes on the responsibility of the publisher, which also means there are expectations that the studios need to meet.
Ronin is seeking games with deep social layers with multiplayer functions targeted towards core audiences, so single-player games aren’t a top priority. Regardless of the game genre, SM expects the teams to ship fast, especially since there will be an abundance of support and frequent check-ins to ensure the builders have everything they need to succeed. Conversely, teams that do not have commercial agreements with SM will have more autonomy in their building journey – but also light touch from SM, limited to the blockchain integration and ecosystem product support.
Ronin is “Axie Chain”
SM is actively working with creators and developers to incentivize development of new IP. Hence the hands-on support and publisher-like responsibilities. To that end, SM focuses on both indie studios trying to start their own IP as well as larger studios with renowned IPs. There isn’t a quick and easy solution for Ronin to graduate from being “Axie Chain” but the team is focused and driven to make Ronin the premier tech platform for web3 games.
Though on the pursuit of this mission, SM may be susceptible to favoritism and king-makerism for certain game titles within the same genre. This is natural as witnessed in web2 publishers where there’s the flagship titles that receives all the support from the publisher. And with that, let’s dive into some case studies of the genesis launch partners. (SOURCE: RONIN TWITTER)
CASE STUDIES
Directive Games
Directive Games is developing a cross-platform, team-based shooter game called The Machines Arena. The team comprises of industry veterans from companies such as CCP Games, LucasArts, Square Enix, Ubisoft, and Tencent. The game is set in The Machines world and features multiple heroes with devastating weapons, rooted in augmented reality technology.
Why Ronin?
The studio chose to partner with the Ronin blockchain due to its understanding of game development and its community-led approach, which aligns with Directive Games' values. They aim to provide the Axie community with an exciting new universe of play. This wouldn’t have been possible without building on atop of Ronin.
Tribes Studio
Tribes Studio, founded by a former executive at King and Scopely, is building an open-world MMO game called Tribestars: Island of Solas. The team previously oversaw product and community for popular games such as Candy Crush, Walking Dead, and Star Trek. Prior to the game's launch, they will release a Community Engagement Platform that allows the community to contribute to the game's development and receive rewards. The studio shares Axie Infinity's community-led approach and plans to provide innovative gaming experiences.
Why Ronin?
They chose to build on the Ronin blockchain due to its gaming focus, scalability, and success with Sky Mavis, and will also offer their Community Engagement Platform to other games in the ecosystem.
Bowled.io
Bowled.io is a social gaming platform focused on sports, starting with cricket, and eventually expanding to other popular sports. The partnership with Sky Mavis will introduce India-based sports fans to the Ronin ecosystem.
Why Ronin?
Bowled.io chose Ronin because the platform is designed specifically for gaming, and its features include faster confirmation times, low latency, and seamless trading of NFTs and in-game assets. Ronin is built on Ethereum, providing access to the broader Ethereum ecosystem and allowing for collaborations with other projects in the blockchain gaming community.
Bali games
Bali Games, created by the developers of the popular Anipang series in Korea, plans to create Axie-inspired puzzle games, leveraging their extensive mobile game experience. The team has a track record of expanding major IPs such as Disney Pop, Snoopy Puzzle, and BT21. They aim to expand the Axie community in Korea through the expansion of Axie IP and lore through their games.
Why Ronin?
The CEO of Team Bali, Kim Yungwoo, explains that they chose to build on Ronin due to Axie Infinity's success as a pioneer of the Web3 game industry and its strong community and users on the Ronin Network.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Ronin is establishing itself as a premier gaming chain in the industry. The platform has proven its reliability, gained user trust, and continues to attract both new users and developers. With Sky Mavis' curated approach to project onboarding, they are able to provide comprehensive support to builders, ranging from technology to marketing assistance.
The Ronin community has a friendly, family-like atmosphere, which can be experienced by joining their Discord server. If you're a developer interested in building on Ronin, visit this link or contact the team directly.
Stay tuned for updates on Ronin's growth and evolution by bookmarking this publication, as it will be regularly updated with new information.
Also if you want to learn more here are a few good resources:
Ronin’s Official DPoS + Game Studio Announcement
Decentralised.Co’s The Birth of An Ecosystem
Jason Choi (Tangent/TheBlockCrunch Founder)’s Why Ronin