Carter, our lead dev and resident game nerd, had scribbled out a meta-game document layered over Fortnite. Success wasn't wasn’t about building the best game, rather getting wallets created, transactions firing, and users onboarded fast. Five weeks. No fluff. All-in.
Forget polished wireframes—we went dirty and fast. I mocked up lo-fi mobile wires just to make sure Carter and I were aligned on how the flow should work. Cool, makes sense. Next.
Initial low fi flow based on whiteboard session with the lead game designer & dev
Initial concept art to get buy in and tease the major investors
The create mission flow
We didn’t have time to crawl. We leapt. I jumped into concept design to sell the vision internally and hype investors. The whole idea felt like a collectible card game—so I ran with it. A modular system where your “cartridge” held your goal, reward, and any boosts. The look? A hint of Fortnite without poking the legal bear.
Midjourney’s NIJI model helped generate anime-style backgrounds that didn’t scream “AI sludge.” I ran some of those through RunwayML for motion, stitched together promo clips, and got buy-in from the top.
In parallel, I smashed through the UI/UX using existing design patterns and a healthy amount of improv. Gaston, our UI dev wizard, started building mid-sprint while I was still locking down assets.
I also pulled together a heap of marketing bits—social posts, paid ads, 3D visuals, all the shiny stuff.
3D model made in blender, though I cheaped out and used chatGPT for the other items.
In week three, I ran 1-on-1 moderated user testing sessions with players from around the world. Their feedback helped us fine-tune tokenomics, improve gameplay flow, and surface insights that shaped the overall UX. We didn’t have time for a big public beta, but these sessions gave us insights.to learn and iterate on,
Yeah, we could’ve used more time—especially to balance gameplay and improve onboarding. But for what we pulled off in five weeks, this was a high point. The whole product team locked in, went hard, and shipped something with gameplay, design, and lore that actually felt alive.
Two weeks after launch, we hit the #1 spot on DappRadar for Base Network. Engagement smoked all our past efforts, and the tweet-reposting engine we’d built was farming emeralds like crazy.
Crypto moves fast. Too fast to wait for perfect timing. You’ve got to build stuff that scales up (or down) with the market. Ideal conditions are a fundraising fantasy. Real value survives in bear markets—if you know what kind of value you’re aiming to create.
This had to be pulled as 'Honkey' is racist to white people, I didn't know that was possible. Haha!
Next projects.
(2016-25©)
