Blockchain Gaming

Blockchain Brawlers PvP Open Beta

Blockchain Brawlers open beta banner

Blockchain Brawlers, the first game built by WAX studios, prepares to enter open beta. On September 20th, 2022, players will be able to experience PvP action, followed soon after by a new crafting interface

For open beta, Blockchain Brawlers enters a new era. The previous phase was known as the Mining Phase, during which players passively earned BRWL tokens by staking their Ring and Gear NFTs. But now that the Mining Phase has ended, Rings and Gear NFTs no longer have a use case. And so, Blockchain Brawlers introduces a limited time burn event.

During this event, players can burn their extra NFTs to receive tickets for a chance to win one of fifty, “Billion Dollar” Swag Kits! This event only lasts for a few days, so start burning those NFTs!

The beta starts on September 20th, at 1pm PST. This open beta is still a testing phase, so no tokens, NFTs, or experience points will be awarded. Also, all stats and results will be reset once the game goes live. The Open Beta will release via Steam. Watch their Twitter and Discord for upcoming details on how to connect.

For open beta, the Blockchain Brawlers team has fixed a bunch of bugs, made some interface improvements, and added a few quality of life features. But, the real draw with this release is the PvP!

PvP in Blockchain Brawlers

Blockchain Brawlers PvP is a poker-style card game where players make bets, fold, Flex, increase their power meter, and try to bring their opponent’s health down to zero. Designed by Richard Garfield, Blockchain Brawlers features special attacks and finishing moves to use when you beat your opponent. For full details on how to PvP in Blockchain Brawlers, read this official blog post.

During the closed beta test, players tended towards a defensive strategy, often folding repeatedly during the first few turns. To counter this turtle strategy, the team has added power bonuses to 1 and 3 power cards to encourage more attacks. Players who use these cards and win the round deal some extra damage to their opponent. And then, to counterbalance this push to more aggressive strategies, player health has increased to 25 (from 20).

This new round of beta also brings some new PvP features. When players win a hand, they can select a special attack and see it enacted in the ring. At the moment, these are limited to Eye Poke, Face Slap, Knife Edge, Thigh Kick, Straight Kick, Uppercut, and Cyclone Uppercut. These are mostly the more common attack types. The full range of attack moves will be included at a later point. Players can also choose from a limited selection of Finishers when they win a match. These are Straight pin, Rollover Pin, Super Kick, and Doomsday Piledriver.

To participate in PvP , players will need cards numbered one (1) through eight (8), a Common Attack and at least one (1) Taunt and one (1) Finisher.

Brawl-O-Seum Crafting

And hot on the heels of the open beta comes the release of the BRAWL-O-SEUM crafting. Players who own BRAWL-O-SEUMS can craft NFT packs. Diamond landowners can craft as many as 25 packers a day! A new crafting screen shows your arena(s), their experience level, and how many crafting packs they have left for the day as well as a bunch of switches and dials.

But it’s not just about clicking a few buttons. Players have some choices when crafting packs. They can take the low risk, guaranteed common pack, or they can take a chance and try to craft a pack with a higher rarity. This option becomes available when a player levels their BRAWL-O-SEUM up to level 25. The higher level the arena, the greater the chance for a rarer card. Players can also spend Gold to increase their success chances. The center panel will show details on your crafting attempt.

BRAWL-O-SEUM crafting machine
BRAWL-O-SEUM crafting machine

Packs that are crafted by players can also be outfitted with custom skins. This is something interesting that I haven’t seen before. And though there is no definitive value to owning an NFT pack with a different skin, players do like customizations and special items! The items in these packs will consist of playing cards, attack moves, taunt moves, and finishers. These items can only be generated by crafting, making this a true player economy.

Players will be able to upgrade cards as well. Combine multiples of one rarity to receive a random car of the same type of the next highest rarity. This is a fairly typical feature, but the randomness of the upgraded card makes it more difficult to follow a specific upgrade path.

Crafting and upgrading in Blockchain Brawlers should kick off on September 21st.

Phil Hall has been a gaming enthusiast since birth and a crypto enthusiast since 2017. He enjoys new discoveries and sharing those with others via blogging and photography. You can follow him on Twitter or read his other articles on Medium.