Please describe your proposed solution.

Cardano needs more generic users to succeed in the Web 3.0 Space. One way to do that is to enable gaming capitalizing on Cardano Blockchain. This will attract NEW USERS to the blockchain, creating a NEW DEMAND for Ada. Having fun is a sure way to expand the Cardano Community.

Our team wants to do that introducing a “Stake to Play and Play to Earn” Chess Gaming Platform leveraging on the Cardano Blockchain.

Chess is one of the most widely played game in the world. According to United Nations, about 70% of the adult population (US, UK, Germany, Russia, India) has played chess at some point in their lives, 605 million adults play chess regularly. This will mean that there are no lack of players for this game, even among the Cardano community.

Chess Played on the Streets of Salzburg

Essentially, our platform operates on a “Stake to Play, Play to Earn” concept. Players will need Ada to play on the platform.

The mechanism of the platform as follows:-

• Average number of moves in a game is 40 moves.
• Each move is recorded on the platform
• Player has to register with an email address
• When player opens a game, he is the game creator and he has to define the parameters

The Parameters for playing the game on the platform is as follows:-

• Creator define the maximum amount of time allowed to make a move. Minimum amount of time is 1 minute. This means that maximum cannot be less than 1 minute.
• If the time lapse, the player that did not make a move will lose automatically.
• Competitor can request creator to change maximum amount of time.
• Creator can also define the stake of the game for each player. Minimum stake is 20 Ada. If creator defines the stake of the game to be 30 Ada, competitor must match. In this case, the total Ada stake for the game is 60 Ada.

The operation of the Platform as follows:-

• Before the game can start, the Ada must be deposited into an escrow wallet.
• Administrator takes 3% of total stake to keep the lights of the platform on
• Once the game is over, the moves of the game is stored on the blockchain as a single transaction funded by the escrow wallet
• Winner takes whatever that is remaining in the stake.
• The game will expire in 24 hours if no top ups are made

An example of how it will work is as follows :-

1. Player A and Player B stake 20 Adas each in the game, making a total of 40 Adas staked by both Players.
2. The platform takes 1.2 Adas excluding transaction fees.
3. The game is played on the platform.
4. Player B wins the game and the Platform will send the moves made by both players on the game to the to the Blockchain as a single transaction of 2 Ada.
5. Player B as the winner of the game will take whatever that is left from the Stake Pool in the Escrow Account after Platform Fees (1.2 Ada), Game Record Fees (2 Ada) and associated transaction fees.
6. A key will then be made available on the platform so that anyone can view and analyze how the game is played on the platform.
7. This record is immutable as it is stored on the Cardano Blockchain.
8. The winner will win points on the platform which other players can see to give other player a sense of how good a player the opponent can be.

Various permutations of the game may exist. Including timed game, where the player who takes the most number of pieces or the highest weightage of the pieces will win. There can also be group games and sponsored games.

The concept of "Stake to Play, Play to Earn" in Chess is not a Gambling Philosophy because Chess is not a game of chance but a game of skill. Our concept resides on the idea of reinforcement learning, such as Q-learning. This learning pit the player against another player and if that player win, they get positive reinforcement from winning the stake pool. The losing player will lose what they invested on that stake pool. This is negative reinforcement.

Reinforcement learning and training sharpens the focus of the players and help them play with higher intensity. This can help improve their game by leap and bounce. In addition, the players will have a chance to see all their moves on the Cardano blockchain and learn to play better the next time.

How does your proposed solution address the challenge and what benefits will this bring to the Cardano ecosystem?

Our team want to address the challenge in getting more people interact with the Cardano blockchain via gaming. We do so by building a platform for chess, one of the most widely played game around the world.

Kids learning how to play Chess

The team attempt to innovate with the idea that players play against each other in a "Stake to Play" format with a "Play to Earn" dimension for the players with the winner of the game taking the stake pool. As the platform operator, we take a small cut to keep the platform running and marketing the platform to chess players worldwide.

In order to play, the player has to have Ada to place onto the stake pool. Our team will inform players on our website of how they can buy Ada and how they can stake those Ada for the game.

With 605 million Chess players in the world, we believe our platform has the potential to bring in new users to the Cardano Blockchain in a fun and simple way while at the same, increase the demand for Ada.

Once these users are familiar with Cardano Blockchain, they will be inclined to see what other prospects and applications are available in the Cardano Blockchain.

How do you intend to measure the success of your project?

We hope to bring new users to interact with the Cardano Blockchain. This will have a direct benefit for the Cardano eco-system in three ways: -

a. As players need to stake Ada, the value of Ada may increase. This is a function of supply and demand.

b. Many of these players will be new to Cardano They could be interested in what other opportunities and applications are available on the eco-system.

c. There will be more transactions on the Cardano Blockchain when more games are played on the platform. Each game is a transaction. Although each transaction is low in Ada, there will many games played.

In addition, Cardano will grow with more games played on our platform as each game is a transaction.

Please describe your plans to share the outputs and results of your project?

On our platform, we would show the number of registered players and the number of games played to date.

If the platform finds success in attracting a good number of players, we can improve the permutations on how the game can be played based on feedback from the players. We could in theory introduce other abstract strategy games to introduce even more users to the Cardano Blockchain.

What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability?

Our team has built and delivered two prior projects in Fund 5 and Fund 8. These are complex ideas which we have developed solutions for.

A. Storing images with metadata for AI training data on the blockchain: -

https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/61884

B. a baseline API to our SDK that leverages the immutable ledger and transparency of the blockchain as a public tool for AI/ML developers to train their AI/ML programs and algorithms on a decentralized network for better transparency and elimination of bias: -

https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/58220

Both projects were funded. We have developed both Proof of Concept projects and make available the tool as promised. Please refer to the following link: -

https://gitlab.com/thecorpora/poc_cardano

It is evident that our team has the competencies and abilities to deliver this project. Our track record speaks for itself.

What are the main goals for the project and how will you validate if your approach is feasible?

With the objective of getting more users to interacting with the Cardano Blockchain, the project success matrix is measured on the number of players signed up to play on our platform and the number of games played on the platform.

These are measured on two parameters: -

a. The number of players signed up to play on the platform - 100,000 players in 1 year.

With the right budget, this is an achievable target. There are over 600 million Chess players in the world according to UN. We believe a fair portion of them will be interested with the idea of "stake to play and play to earn" with this game.

b. The number of games played on the platform - 200,000 games a year.

This is also an achievable target. The world number one chess playing website has over 10 million games played in a day.

These two parameters should increase in tandem with each other. We intend to seek a marketing budget to get new users play on our platform to achieve

Please provide a detailed breakdown of your project’s milestones and each of the main tasks or activities to reach the milestone plus the expected timeline for the delivery.

1st Month | Workplan 1 - Planning and designing Frontend of the website where the platform is going to operate on. Designing the UI/UX of the interface.

1st Month | Workplan 2 - Code and the database wire framing for the platform and plan for server communication + API/SDK architecture planning to work with wallet providers (for escrow wallet function).

2nd to 4th Month | Workplan 1 - Front end application development including HTML development for web interface, optimized test for the latest browsers, testing, iterations and debugging.

2nd to 4th Month | Workplan 2 - Backend development including API integration from backend to 3rd party wallet solution providers, API integration from frontend to backend and notification setup and notification event behavior on web interface.

5th Month | Workplan 1 - Deployment of front end interface at development environment and integration to backend.

5th Month | Workplan 2 - Wallet communication framework deployment. Testing data acquisition layer to ensure game protocol communicates and works with wallet. Setup authorization protocol to ensure player's credentials and wallet is authenticated.

6th Month | Workplan 1 & 2 - Testing, Debugging and Deployment of Platform from development environment to production environment.

Extension - Marketing of platform to new users via social media and Search Engine Optimization as well as participation in selected blockchain events.

Please describe the deliverables, outputs and intended outcomes of each milestone.

Our development can be verified by

1st Month - Mock up of UI and UX of the intended platform and documentation of backend wire framing including API/SDK architecture in communicating with the wallet.

2nd to 4th Month - Evidence of frontend development on development environment. Documentation of backend development and documentation of notification setup and notification event behavior.

5th Month - Video evidence of how wallet tool works according to the platform's logic in the development environment.

6th Month - Deployment of platform in the production environment, set up of social media account and start of marketing campaign.

Please provide a detailed budget breakdown of the proposed work and resources.

What are we going to Spend the Money On?

Essentially, we are going to spend the money on two parts

Part A - Development of the Platform. As with all development projects, this will be budgeted according to man hours.

Part B - Promotion of the Platform to Chess Players and Attracting New Users to the Cardano Blockchain

Putting a Price on the Vision

We need a team that consist of 2 front end developers, 2 backend developers We will do all documentation work ourselves. The budget for this will be estimated at 40,000 a month

Budget for 4 Developers = 50,000 Adas x 6 months = 300,000 Adas

We need to push SEO and through Social Media that such a "Stake to Play and Play to Earn" platform is available on Cardano. We will spend 5,000 Adas a month on this effort over the next 12 months once the platform is launched. This will work out to about 60,000 Adas a year.

Total budget for this project is about 300,000 Adas, which is about US$87,000 at the time of writing. If Ada manage to rise in value in future, we will have more resources for marketing. The reverse is true if Ada drops in value.

For an estimated 100,000 players on the platform, this works out to an investment of less than U$1 per player.

Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

Our team is an experienced team involved in developing deep technology projects over the past many years. The key leadership of this project has been instrumental in programming and developing three generations of robots. Their expertise has allowed us to sell over a thousand robots in 48 countries and collaborate with numerous universities worldwide, including Stanford University, Cambridge University, among others.

The main role of the project leaders are to keep tab on how the budget is spent, maintain discipline on the development and deliver expected outcomes. As discussed, the team output is evident in the POC delivered for Fund 5 and Fund 8.

How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?

This project should be highly valued for money for the Cardano Ecosystem as it endeavor to bring in each new user to the blockchain at less than S$1 per user. When realized, this would be the most cost effective way to bring new users to interact with the Cardano Blockchain in the history of Catalyst.