The Bank is eyeing the lot E-T6, and the prime lot of E-T5 next to it is still unsold (6 q @ 600 mil). If any of our noble citizens or companies is willing to buy it, now there could be a possiblity to make a joint architect project and give the city a grand edifice with a 50 m facade (second only to Royal Palace). The planned style is Neoclassical with high rooms, architectural symmetry, pilasters etc. The backside of the building may feature lower roomsfor servants and rentals etc. In the parade side, everything can be added in - halls, offices, shops, restaurants, hotels, museums, ...

If interested, contact us.

"We are so happy that a Hypothecary Bank is founded under our guidance that we gift it with 10 LDC's, worth 100,000,000 m."

Founding of The Hypothecary Bank in CryptoTown

The recent additions of new lands, and the soon coming new players that will inhabit the lands (and existing players willing to enter profitable real estate developments) have necessitated the opening of a Hypothecary Bank.

The Hypothecary Bank has the following business model:

- We issue long and short bonds and thus borrow money from investors. The current players of the game who have excess balances of moneretos are qualified, but also external investors that seek good returns for their XMR balances that hardly have any investment schemes outside of this game.

- The money is loaned out to characters against secure guarantees (a rule-of-thumb is that 50% money down of the property development (price of land - cashback + building project), then the other 50% we give as a loan, against a 100% mortgage to the whole property).

- Profit is made because the interest we pay is lower than the interest we receive.

- Risk to the bondholders is shielded, because the delinquency of one houseowner is borne by the Bank's profits. If the whole economy suffers a serious downturn and all property values are cut by half and all loans are foreclosed, then only the Bank's shareholders are affected first and bondholders second. If the whole game is shut down, this likely results in total loss to share- and bondholders as well as all the other players.

- In addition to bonds, the Bank is offering an IPO, and this money will be used for constructing a posh office building in the newly inaugurated Culture Square. The building will have much income-generating activities apart from the offices. The Bank's accounting will be transparent and show the share capital and loan capital separate for easy auditing.

- The Bank seeks to make profit (as they usually do) but also fulfill the necessary function of providing low-risk loans. High risk loans are not in the interest of the Bank. The excess share capital may be conservatively invested to housing projects, with the intention of rather quick exit, to release the funds.

The IPO consists of 1,000 units priced at 1 million each, and no founder's of finder's fee is paid (all money goes to the company).

The Series A bond is a 50-year bond paying 0.30% APR and comes in 10 million coupons, secured by all the Bank's assets. Every coupon pays back 11.5 million at maturity in 1554 (2014-12-26).

Participating in the IPO requires purchasing at least an equal number of bonds.

Market making will be provided for both the stocks and the bonds.

HM The King subscribes 300 stocks and 300 million worth of Series A bonds.

1. Excellent decision. Now the Church financed are balanced as well as yours, Bishop.

2. Please, as Architect of the unforgiving Church Offices building let me introduce, its current shape contains a rooftop apartment for a visiting dignitary bishop, with 114 sqm floor area and 5 m average height, with the additional 72 sqm for his servants, all windows facing your palace, Bishop. This was the reason that you sold all your Noble Palace shares. (Not the building cost I mean, but the fact that there is less use for it now since you have your own).

When Prioré is added to the mix, the Church is becoming a prominent owner of developed land.

HM does not have extra suits. The clothes merchant in town is Lord Jacket, who bought the excess stock of HM (containing no blue, though). Also Karl, the Marquess, ordered several noble suits as part of the most recent round and might have done it for business, I don't know...

It appears that Zechariah's haw can hardly be found in the Old Town then, since all the ones available are quickly gone to the other Barons.

Roopatra, you may build the basic walls, do it in the order of requesting the haws (the order determines on whose side the walls is built on).

With pleasure, granted. Please try to update all the DB's with
- the introduction of new land
- perimeter (city) wall
- your haw wall
- KH theatre can also be built now to its dignified place.

When I wake up, Zechariah will slowly and surely start buying land. This character is played by me and is a businessman, trying to do things as efficiently as possible. Zechariah does not get privileges: he has started from 10,000 gold and now has 15 mil/year income.

Land Grab Starts Again

The much-awaited year 1504 is here. The online version is officially delayed due to self-inflicted feature creep by the developers. It is lamentable that such happened despite all the precautions all of the project managers tried to take. Well - we do what we must: give more time for development, and continue playing what works. The worst consequence of the delay is that the wealth gap between a most ancient and ancient character grows alarmingly as the Old Town lands will practically all go to the ownership of the most ancients. And they are the ones that have the highest leverage for sure, in the scenario that the game goes to the moon.

All 500 quadrats of land left in the Old Town are now implemented and zoned. There are 4 ways to gain land now:

(1) Buy 1-SE-V lands that have an added tax burden of 100,000 m/real-day. Due to this, they are cheaper than other lands. SE-V is planned to be a village with many commoner PC's living there and self-sufficient in basic services, around the central village square. These lands are sold as dutch auction (last time used in connection with University lands). The price starts at 100% and goes down 10%-units every day, until the property is bought or the seller (town - who needs to finance one more week of game development) withdraws it from market.

(2) Buy 1-E-E lands. They do not have an extra tax and are located very centrally, and are sold in 1 q increments. These also are in dutch auction, meaning that there are deals every day, but waiting may also mean that others take the lands

(3) Buy 1-E-T lands. The best lots around the new, prestigious Culture Square are spacious, with lots of sides open to the square and the streets. They are sold at fixed price, but the pricing is active and checked according to the changes in the market daily, at the same time as the dutch auctions are updated.

(4) Apply for the haws. If you are a Baron or higher, and do not have a haw, you are entitled to one. The ones offered are located in 1-NE. Haw does not have any tax, even the normal property tax.

Land Discount Coupons (LDC)

His Majesty has given land discount coupons worth 1,000,000,000+ to his subjects. They can be used for payment of any land, or part of it. The balance of every character shows in the Character DB /CHAR tab.

Cashback

The land is meant for building on it! If in 10 years you build something on the land you bought, you are entitled to a cashback of 10% of the purchase price of the land. If you build something with e=50% or more (the floor area is at least 50 sqm per quadrat), the cashback is 20%. Finally, with e=100%, the cashback is 30% of the purchase price!

If the owner of the land changes, the 10 years do not start over. It is always from the initial sale by the town.

Gold dividends will be paid from Version 4 on, from the town council surplus (tax income minus costs). They will be paid in the game currency (moneretos).

There are many other loops operating in the game economy that give sort of dividends:

- Gold ownership currently gives dividends in stone.
- Being an Earl or higher will give dividends of food resources from V.4 onwards
- Owning any kind of service (rental room, hotel, bar, restaurant, brewery, shop) gives Services pool dividends (moneretos).

The emission D&V round is ongoing. Normally it would take only 1+1 week but this matter is delayed by my decision in search of the right time and consensus of the decision. Having the launch of mymonero.com behind us is also a good one to have. The MEW will vote about it soon.

Well said, David.

To answer the remaining question, the game is "owned" by itself - meaning that the "shares" of the game ("company" if you wish) named gold (CKG) pay their dividends ingame. So if you buy gold and the game becomes a success, you will get periodical rewards to your game accounts. The early players were required to buy gold (to keep the number of players small and dedicated) but now that requirement is no more.

The license is closed source, and will remain. On the other hand, I am not a great fan of IPR so if someone copies all our databases and their formulas (anyone can do it), I won't probably do anything.

Inside the game, architect designs, for example, are royalty free so if a theatre you designed is copied and built a thousand times all over, your joy of contributing to success is your reward

The release time of 12:00 GMT is also delayed. I am waiting for communication from Riccardo and sXpher any minute now. I make decision about what is released and at what schedule, just need to have the information from them to make the decision

ADD: I got contact with them and the situation is as follows: The database is ready, and the 4 required interface views as well, but they are not streamlined for ease of gameplay yet, and many data (such as facades of the buildings) are not there yet. Also financial procedures like formulas for distribution of pools need to be added still.

I still have not seen the product, and do not have knowledge of how many hours of work it still needs before being ready to be used as part of the gameplay (large part will always be outside that system still). I am sad that the matter was not communicated to me when I still could have baked it in the flow of the game, and that I must make this announcement without seeing the state of the game with my own eyes, as was promised. Little delays end up being big deals when they try to be hidden instead of communicated openly.

The gameplay resumes at 12:00 GMT in the google DB version, which is unfrozen and may be used by admins normally from that point.

- The year is already 1504, which will last until Monday.
- The Most Ancient era has ended and things done now are only Ancient.
- It is currently not possible to become a new character. This is a situation that we will fix soon.
- XMR deposits still work by David, and you can use your existing payment ID given by David.

Long time ago, the quantity of land inside our City Walls was locked in anticipation of the barbarians and the Version 2. I promised that no new land will be released until 1504. Well, now is the year 1504, and the land offering was in my pipeline. Our Royal Majesty considered the matter and decided to accept a potentially huge loss and open the land sale now regardless, even though the online version is not usable and the confidence has taken a large hit, since it was just Friday when it was announced, and now immediately failed, in a way fitting for the other coins but not for Monero products. 

The next post will tell about the intricacies of the last land grab in the old town.

Quick update: testing will happen later, the testing time of NOW, today, is cancelled. 

Baron Zechariah minted a medal weighing 50 gold, to commemorate his 50th anniversary of introduction to the Royal Court.

Only 10 were made, and they were gifted as follows:

His Majesty the King
The University
The Noble Palace
The Monero House
Paulson - thanks for a nice land deal
Rhadamanthus - my only neighbor
Bishop - always good to have good relations
Marquess Karl - many good businesses
Marquess NL - long term mentor
Zechariah himself


Google Databases are now frozen. Do not touch any of the information there, it will not be updated to the new version.

Developers: Your turn!

Can we have the designers' names please?

1. The Casino will be built in A4 by Roopatra, try to make contact with the designer, add the luxury to 120%, do the costing. Deficit of stone can be bought from HM at the Luigi sell price. Congratulations to the winner!

2. 500 gold will be added to the sponsor (this is a commissioned royal design, as was quite evident from the design elements). Congratulations! At the reasonable convenience, this Theatre will be made a centerpiece of a new Theatre square (possibly in 1-E), and Marquess Karl will be given the chance to sponsor the operations until A.D. 1600.

3. 300 gold will be added to the designer. Congratulations!

4. 200 gold will be added to the designer. Congratulations!

5. 100 gold will be added to the designer. Congratulations!

Yes, I also did not buy before researching it thoroughly. And it's the only altcoin I have (ever had).

The votes cast after deadline do not count, and I have scheduled my time such that the results should be out already! Lots of things to do in ~3 short hours before freeze!

EDIT: MY BAD. Had left accidentally one yellow cell when I though they were all green... too many things...  

Roopatra: T_MON is now available for addition of house costs.

For Monero to have a chance of real success (which I don't see that other altcoins have), it must also beat them (and hopefully Bitcoin) in the functionality of distribution.

There has been many opportunities to acquire an inordinate stake in Monero in the last 2 months. Some people would have liked me to do it, others have sold because of fear of that happening.

But Monero is a true community coin, which means that there is a large group of large and midsize owners, and (to my knowledge) no extra-large ones. My position is <5% of coins and it is financially not a significant part of my assets. This is the case with the other large owners also that I know.

I have moved from speculation to building the economy around Monero, and mymonero and CryptoKingdom are examples of it. The MEW will have other initiatives also.

New version launch:

Version 2.0: Ancients

Features

- Play directly from URL
- Click City Map lots for seeing the details of buildings and their uses
- Manage Character finances and stuff yourself
- Tavern view for chatting and trading with other players

Data transfer

The current game will freeze in 2014-11-29 0:00 GMT (in about 9 hours!). Data will be ported to the new version and tested during Saturday (the Centennary Jubilee of 1500).

If you want to be a tester (rigorous work for an hour at least, not playing, Saturday 18:00 GMT onwards), inform me by PM or IRC.

Further development

We have a team of 4 full-time developers, 2 project coordinators and 1 King for the ongoing technical development. The new features will be added as soon as this team can add them, and no sooner. New versions can be released on schedule, the next one being Version 3: Sandbox in 2014-12-21, before which there will likely be minor tweaks to the version now released.

Some features of the game remain in google DB's, and they will be transferred to the main DB in every new version. New features can easily be added to the google DB's.

Redemption of existing characters

Will be announced.

Commencement of play

The game is again playable Sunday 2014-11-30 12:00 GMT.
The URL of the online version is (to be announced soon).

Schedule

No more changes to the databases, except the ones in progress.
Do not update the /DETAILED, no use, it will not be copied.
Check that your information is correct. The transaction history will not be copied so you cannot check your old finances.

The links in the OP show all the current databases and balances of all characters.

Some have sent 1,000s to acquire game assets, some have only bought the initial gold needed to play.

It can not be compared to other similar games financially, because they have a separate company that makes good money (if the game is successful). This game does not have an external entity that takes out money, it is all circulated internally.