Splinterlands is a digital, collectible card game based on blockchain technology and inspired by games like Magic the Gathering and Hearthstone, where players build a collection of cards with different attributes and battle other players in skills-based matches. It is a game where players can buy, sell and trade their digital assets just as they would with physical trading cards games such as Magic the Gathering, Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh!

Splinterlands was created as players lost the ability to truly own their assets (or trading cards) once games went digital. With blockchain technology, it allows players to own and trade their digital assets freely once again. It also allows the game to have true scarcity and transparency, which means all cards on Splinterlands have a verifiable supply and historical record.

Players battle other players by choosing ranked or practice battles. With ranked battles, players can increase their rating. There is no downside to playing ranked battles as a beginner since players with a rating below 100 do not lose ranking points. Battles take place between players of similar strength. When matched up with an opponent, both players choose a set of six monster cards and one summoner card for the battle to destroy all their opponent’s monster cards and win the battle.

Although the game is free-to-play, players need to purchase the summoner’s spellbook for $10 if they want to unlock the game in full. With the summoner’s spellbook, players get access to their account keys and unlock the ability to earn Dark Energy Crystals, which can be redeemed for real currency.

Splinterlands started in May 2018 and launched Splintershards (SPS) – its governance token for the SPS decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) at the end of July 2021. It concluded a $3.6M private token sale for 6.6% of the SPS token supply. After reaching 100,000 players in its first three years, it added another 50,000 in just over a month from June 2021. Splinterland plans to build out its game in the latter half of 2021, with oracle integration planned for Q1 2022.


## Who Are the Founders of Splinterland?

Jesse Reich and Matthew Rosen, who go under “aggroed” and “yabapmatt” on the Splinterlands Discord server are the two founders. Both are from the Pennsylvania area. While Reich is a former scientist and chemistry professor without any professional gaming experience prior to Splinterlands, Rosen worked as a developer for RockYou and Ryzing, both gaming projects, albeit not blockchain-based.

In total, the Splinterlands team consists of 12 employees as per their LinkedIn page.


## What Makes Splinterland Unique?

Splinterland aims to capitalize on the growing demand for blockchain-based games that offer the possibility to own unique digital assets. At the end of July 2021, it closed a private round for $3.6 million in exchange for only 6.6% of the entire token supply.

Splinterlands runs on the Hive blockchain, meaning all actions in the game are recorded on the blockchain. That means anyone can join the game by creating a Hive blockchain address, making the game permissionless. It also provides Splinterlands with a transparent record of all actions in the game, including battle results, which ensures fairness and transparency.

Players have a base set of cards and can purchase booster packs or specific cards from other players. These cards can be leveled up and used in battle against other players. In these ranked battles, players compete for Dark Energy Crystals (DEC), the in-game currency of Splinterlands. Players can also obtain DEC by converting unused cards in their collection. DEC can be used to buy in-game items or trading cards from other players on the Splinterland market. DEC are also tradable among players and on third-party exchanges. The utility of DEC will continue to increase as more features are added to the game.

The Splintershards (SPS) token will work as a DAO on the Binance Smart Chain platform. The SPS token is a governance token that will be integrated into the Splinterland game, giving players the option to influence decisions about the game and the ecosystem. Players may also propose their own changes, such as changing the tournament schedule, modifying the battle settings, or a change to the DEC inflation pools.