To say 2023 has been a remarkable year, would be an understatement. With the introduction of Beam, our very own gaming ecosystem, the entire Merit Circle DAO has changed. We’ve had a year full of glorious partnerships, technological breakthroughs, and most importantly, product launches.

Let’s take a moment to reflect on everything that has brought us to this place in the past year, and the learning lessons of the fine year 2023.

Calm before the storm

In calm waters, the ship that we’ve built set sail for another year in the realms of the gaming industry. With an incredible year behind us, where previously renowned parties had fallen, and all regulatory uncertainties floating around, the year started off smooth. It was in these waters that we were able to continue building the foundation of where we are today.

Throughout the remainder of 2022 and continuously in 2023, we slowed down our investments to align better with the market conditions and increased our due diligence processes. We grew closer to the games that we forged bonds with, and learned more about their ambitions, the issues they’re facing and what they believe is necessary to succeed.

In the meantime, the DAO contributors grew more closely together and found each other in a burning desire to succeed. Throughout the endless conversations about possibilities for the DAO among contributors, game developers, investors and infrastructure partners, one idea was born that would turn out to become the sole focus in the months to follow.

A maturing autonomous organization

At the start of the year, in moments of relative calm, you have the ability to reflect and stand still for a while. Learn from everything that happened in the past and dream about the possible solutions. In collaboration with hundreds, if not thousands, of passionate DAO contributors, we were able to grow on the front of decentralization, transparency and governance.

In May 2023, the constitution of the Merit Circle DAO was unanimously accepted by the DAO creating a framework for the DAO’s governance in the future. The goal here was to set a precedent for other DAOs, protect our practices and allow for further decentralization. All proposals that followed thereafter had to adhere to the newly accepted rules.

Thereafter a handful of proposals followed that would change the DAO forever. Ending the staking pools felt like an historic move, but stood no chance for the proposals that followed. Throughout September, MIP-28 and 29 introduced the idea to migrate from the Merit Circle ($MC) token to a new, $BEAM token. Accepted by the majority of the DAO contributors, the migration officially commenced on the 26th of October. The start of a new era.

The birth of a new era

It’s hard to imagine, but in the beginning of the year 2023, the word Beam was nothing more than something that came out of a laser. Where the idea has been brewing for quite some time in the realms of the DAO, it wasn’t until April until we formally introduced Beam to the world.

Proudly, we launched our gaming ecosystem to kick off as a subnet on the Avalanche blockchain alongside some of the most promising games out there such as TrialXtreme, Walker World and a variety of others. With this new dot on the horizon, the entire DAO’s shifted into second, third and fourth gear and accelerated like never before.

Steadily but surely, we attracted a ton of development talent across the globe to assist in bringing our ambitions to live. Endless lines of code, sleepless nights and hours and hours of testing followed to deliver the Beam mainnet on the 18th of August. This, however, would prove to be merely a glimpse of what Beam would turn out to be

We dreamt of a blockchain for our games, but realized soon enough that we were onto something bigger than that. The gaming industry’s future will include blockchain technology, and we will allow games to integrate that technology into their games seamlessly. To realize this however, we needed more than a blockchain to house our games.

Action speak louder than words

It’s one thing to announce things, but actually shipping and delivering products is something else. On the 24th of October, marking the official launch of the Beam network to the general public, we released a keynote presentation to present our ambitions, but more importantly, our products that were released on that very same day.

Opening up the network as a permissionless mainnet, we also released the following products:

While the list is long, we are far from done realizing our mission. Every single product on this list requires refinement, improvement and further development. Moreover, we’re continuously exploring new ideas to make integrating blockchain into games easier and more efficient.

A thriving network

When we zoom into the Beam subnet on Avalanche, there’s a lot of traction and daily activity. With hundreds of thousands of blocks and transactions that passed, a lot has happened since the network went live in October. Let’s have a look at some of the numbers;

You may not have seen the announcements of all the games go out just yet, these will be announced in due course. However, to give you a glimpse of the announcements so far and what they’ve been doing on the Subnet so far, here’s a list:

This makes for a long-list, but it’s far from all the games that are building on the network. The upcoming year will be one of many releases, and we simply can’t wait. We’re speaking with new partners daily that might make their way onto the Beam subnet. However, the subnet is one feature of Beam, but with a recent expansion to Immutable’s zkEVM, there’s more to Beam than you may think.

“The Beam ecosystem is aiming to become the go-to place for any game developer that wishes to integrate blockchain technology, and any gamer that wishes to embrace the possibilities of web3. Acknowledging the expertise of other parties in the underlying technology, this community and ecosystem is able to deliver high quality user-facing products that leverage the best tech out there.” — Read the full article here.

Surround yourself with greatness

Beam changed the Merit Circle DAO for good. Where we previously dreamt big, these previous dreams suddenly grew tiny in comparison to our latest ambitions. Striving to achieve our mission of offering products and services to as many gamers and game developers as possible, and working towards a decentralized future for the gaming industry, our paths crossed with some of the industry giants: Immutable and Polygon.

With this collaboration, we’re expanding Beam that’s available in more places to more people that will become the go-to place for any game developer that wants to integrate blockchain technology. Additionally, Beam allows any gamer to embrace the possibilities of web3. Thrilled to work with such renowned parties, we feel like it’s a match made in heaven.

Kicking off this collaboration, we’re launching Sphere on the Immutable zkEVM to become the native place for all 200+ games building on Immutable. Moreover, we will be integrating with the Immutable Passport, and enhancing our SDK to make its functionality more robust. We’re in this together, and that simply feels great.

Creative fluids flowing around

Eager and enthusiastic as we were, the studio arm of the Merit Circle DAO started as a place to house our creative spirits. As we initially focused more on investing in other games, and our scope of products that we were building was relatively limited, we felt like we could take on another couple of projects. This was true, to a certain extent.

What we realized throughout the past year however, is that real success lies in collaboration, and acknowledging the strengths of others. We managed to find some great teams to work with, and now have a clear overview of products that we want to release as a flagship product of the DAO.

Edenhorde

Starting off with Edenhorde, our very first Flagship project, that we released as an NFT project to reward those who contributed during the initial Balancer Liquidity Bootstrapping Pool. In the process of its initial release, expectations grew far from our ambitions, causing frustration around the board. Therefore, in early February, we released an update about the future we see for Edenhorde. With a clear path ahead, we went on to build.

In the second half of 2023, we officially released Eclipse of Edenhorde. This card game is easy to understand, yet addictive and engaging. The very first release looked simple and didn’t feature too much of the rich lore of Edenhorde. That’s why, in October, we released a new version of the game with new cards, and an all-new style.

Eclipse of Edenhorde is currently being played daily by our lovely community. This game is expected to eventually become a self-sustaining game that can be played both single- and multiplayer. Elements of the game will also make their way onto the Beam subnet.

Moreover, Edenhorde will be releasing a new narrative arc in the first quarter of 2024.

Forgotten Payland

In collaboration with Duckland Games, we’ve created a new game studio — Vermillion Studios. This studio is bringing you Forgotten Playland, a free-to-play online party game set to arrive in the first quarter of 2024. We’ve only recently begun releasing snippets and sneak peaks, but the responses so far have been great.

With the DAO taking responsibility for matters such as in-game economics, smart contract design, token and NFT details, there’s an entire squad of experienced game developers working around the clock to build new minigames. The goal here is not to get trapped in an endless loop of development. Rather to ship quickly, and indulge players in fun experiences.

Looking forward into the next year

We can’t conclude this year without praising our lovely community. Through thick and thin, we’ve had hundreds of contributors spending time daily finding ways to improve the DAO. Seeing this work, which often goes under the radar, come to fruition and getting recognition from industry veterans, is nothing but motivating.

Lastly, when looking back at the previous year, we had another run-down of all the goals we’ve set for ourselves in 2023, and how they came to fruition. In no particular order, here’s what we set out to accomplish in our looking forward series for 2023.

We’re ready for another year full of spectacle, delivery and nothing but greatness. Expect an article that delves into everything that’s coming up for the Merit Circle DAO in 2024 in early January.