FishChain, an Ethereum-based blockchain game, has announced its intention to launch a NEO-based counterpart called NeoFish, alongside an airdrop of the NEP-5 version of its FISH token. FishChain combines a mining mechanism and fishing gameplay with a token model, with the goal of creating an interactive, player-driven marketplace and ecosystem.

The team behind FishChain previously found success with Bubble Fish, which it claims was the most popular social game on the Renren social network (often called the “Chinese Facebook”) during 2010-2012, with 3 million daily active users. Bubble Fish is noted as a predecessor of FishChain and NeoFish, as it also had an unlimited free market where fish could be bought or sold.

To access the current Ethereum version of the game, players need to register an account using a mobile number. There are other KYC steps in place with rewards available for completion, but these rewards may be waived to give access to the full game functionality without further KYC.

Assets and Mining

FishChain’s active currency is the FISH token, which can be acquired by mining, fishing or directly traded for ETH on the in-game exchange.

There are two categories of non-fungible token; fish and fishbowls. Fishbowls are required to mine FISH tokens and may be filled with fish owned by the player. Only 20,000 fishbowls are issued, available in various colors and capacities.

Fish are also unique, being made up of eight different genes. Different traits give fish different computing powers, with higher computing powers translating to greater mining returns when placed in a fishbowl. This mining process is designed to emulate Proof-of-Work consensus mechanisms, popularized by Bitcoin. More powerful hardware (or in this case, better fish and fishbowls) correspond to greater rewards.

Breeding

Fish may also be bred together to create new fish, which requires a fee paid in FISH tokens based on the parent’s computing power. This is the core method by which new fish are added to the game, with genetics from each fish being combined alongside random mutations to produce entirely new fish.

Different fish rarity results in a different probability of a mutation; 5% for common, 30% for rare, and 50% for epic fish. When breeding has completed, the parents will have their computing power permanently lowered by 5%.

Genes may mutate to lower, equal or higher level genes. Depending on the gene rarity, the ratio of mutation to lower, equal or higher level varies. These ratios are as follows; 0:4:1 for common genes, 25:4:1 for rare genes, and 45:4:1 for legendary genes.

Fishing

Interactive gameplay comes in the form of fishing, where the player may pay FISH to hook new fish. There are three pool types for fishing:

Official Fishing – Randomly caught fish, with a chance to catch fish with new genes or rare fish.

Normal Fishing – Players place their own fish in a pool, then set a price in FISH and specify the number of attempts other players have to catch them.

Celebrity Pool – Exclusively created by players with rare Golden fishbowls, catching fish in this mode requires a FISH buy-in to be paid, allowing players to attempt to catch a fish with a bounty attached to it.

NeoFish

Both FishChain and NeoFish share common gameplay, however the NEO release will also see the release of three unique fish designs; NEO fish, GAS fish and NNC fish (referring to the token used by NEO Name Service). NNC fish have already been launched in the Ethereum-based FishChain at the time of writing.

Both NeoFish and FishChain will use the same account system, and the 20,000 fishbowl limit is shared between both versions. These fishbowls, alongside the unique fish designs, will be released in gift packages and auctions. Players will then be able to breed new fish from these designs, aiming for rare genes and higher computing power to maximize mining returns.

NeoFish will initially launch with NEP-5 FISH tokens but non-fungible assets will be stored on centralized servers, pending migration to smart contracts. The FishChain team told NEO News Today that the migration is touted to take place in several months time.

NEP-5 Airdrop, Deposit Reward and Pre-Sale Details

A NEP-5 FISH airdrop will be available to members of the NeoFish Telegram channel. To register for the airdrop, the following form must be filled out with the user’s Telegram account name and NEO wallet address. Users must be members of the FishChain Telegram and hold more than 1 NEO in the provided address. The form may be found here.

The form submission deadline is May 1st (EST), and participants will receive up to 5000 NEP-5 FISH tokens, calculated by 2000 + (number of NEO held * 10). As an example, if 100 NEO are held in the address, 3000 NEP-5 FISH tokens would be airdropped.

The team will also distribute daily NEP-5 FISH token rewards between April 24th and April 28th which are calculated based on NEO deposits to the game wallet. The amount of NEO deposited, multiplied by 10, will be distributed in NEP-5 FISH tokens each day. The total amount distributed is capped at 100k, 200k, 300k, 400k, and 500k FISH tokens each day.

The game will be accessible through https://neofish.io/ on April 25th.

In addition to the airdrop and deposit rewards, the FishChain team will offer a limited number of NEO gift packages, containing limited edition mining bowls and fish with NEO genes for breeding. Purchasing these gift packages grants entry to special gameplay events:

FOMO – A NEO reward pool will be built from 5% of the funds raised from the gift packages. A 24-hour countdown timer will be set, and each package purchase will reset the timer. The last person to purchase a package receives the entire reward pool.

Lottery – Each 10 NEO spent to buy packages grants a lottery ticket, providing a chance to win up to 100 NEO.

Referral – Community partners (required to lock up 10 regular fishbowls, 2 white or black fishbowls or 1 gold bowl) receive a 10% reward from any users they refer. Non-partners receive 2% rewards from referrals.

The packages will be available from April 25th.