Another quarter is just about in the books, and it has been one for the ages! The llamas have been putting in extra effort to grow the Upland economy, features, partnerships, and in-app experience. And the work is showing! Upland is getting stronger every day. In fact, more than four million NFTs have been sold in Upland, and we have over 100 Metaventures.
Combine the momentum building in the economy with the tools and connectivity we’re giving partners and developers (which we’ll cover later), and you can see that Upland is more than a virtual real estate game. Upland is a platform where creators and entrepreneurs connect with the community in ways that weren’t possible a few years ago.
The future is bright in the Upland metaverse. But, none of this would be possible without amazing players and a community like no other in the metaverse!
In this Q3 Roadmap Update, we’re happy to go over the highlights from the past quarter and key initiatives coming in the weeks and months ahead. Check out our Roadmap Panel and AMA Live on Monday, September 26 at 11:00 AM PT to get the inside scoop with General Mort, X1TheGamer, and the Upland Co-Founders Idan Zuckerman and Dirk Lueth. And make sure to join the conversation on Reddit before the AMA!
Before looking forward, let’s take a quick look in the rearview mirror to reflect on key milestones and accomplishments.
Over the past few months, Uplanders have been able to get their hands on Metaverse Motors (MV Motors), with some of the vehicles hitting the sales floor for the first time. This includes the Series 2, Series 4, Series T, and Series S.
In July, we held the first Great Racetrack Challenge. This competition tasked players with creating custom race tracks using real city streets in Upland. Players were able to experience the racetracks for themselves in the first Alpha Race. Here, we saw Uplanders race against computer-generated opponents around the city.
After months of closed-beta testing with a small group of players, Metaventures opened to all players! This includes the opportunity to operate Block Explorer Shops, NFLPA Fan Shops, and new Football Fan Shops.
Factories are key to Metaventures in Upland, as they allow players to manufacture custom-made items they want to later sell in Showrooms. In July, we introduced these structures with limited use where only a few players in the beta could manufacture. At this point, all players can build a Factory, while the ability for everyone to manufacture is coming soon.
Outdoor decor is one of the key ways players can contribute directly to the look and feel of Upland. With the introduction of outdoor decor manufacturing, the community has the tools to design and produce their own creations. We are currently in beta testing with a few players working out all the kinks and improving for future creators and the greater community. Beta players can create a queue for outdoor decor production inside their factories by allocating Spark towards production. Once an item is completed, it is placed in the Factory’s inventory lot, ready to be sold in their upcoming Showrooms between San Francisco and Fresno, CA.
Knowing that Factory lots will fill up eventually, we launched 3D item movement along with Outdoor Decor manufacturing. This mechanic allows players to move 3D assets from their inventory lots to other properties to make space for newly produced items. This includes outdoor decor and other 3D items, such as vehicles. All users may now utilize the unused space around their inventory lots to place other items like cars or Outdoor Decor, if they’ve gotten their hands on any pieces through newly enabled swaps.
In September, we saw our first football (aka soccer) Legits. FC Porto Essentials are collectibles of all players on the roster and include a Boot and a Shirt. We also introduced a tier system based on an athlete’s performance.
The 2022 football season got off to a hot start thanks to the NFLPA Legits Collections for the new season. This release brought 12 Legits Collections for starters for every football team, with another two Collections coming later in the season.
What is a metaverse mapped to the real world without a home address? With this release, players can set a single property as their Upland Home Address. Why is this important? It lays the foundation for several mechanics and features, including in-app voting, neighborhood ratings, neighborhood competitions, community governance, and more. Plus, you can download a custom neighborhood profile pic to rep’ your Upland neighborhood.
With the release of Upland Home Addresses, we also launched Micro Houses. These residential structures allow players with small parcels to build a home, which is a requirement for having a Home Address.
What might be the single most important release contributing to Upland’s shift to a platform, Community Dev Tools opened the door for developers and creators to connect their content to Upland. Through APIs, any developer in the Upland Developers Network (UDN) can now connect their games, applications, and other content to Upland. Players find this content in the app by going to new structures called Dev Shops. In Dev Shops, players access third-party applications designed by developer partners. Upland’s economy and player assets can be incorporated into these third-party experiences if the developer chooses. Through Community Dev Tools, we expect to see cities and neighborhoods become hot spots of activities where there’s a new adventure around every corner.
Recurring Rush is a new twist on the Standard Treasure Rush mode designed to encourage exploration while allowing for more frequent treasure hunts.
As a result of the July Master Builders Contest, we saw 17 new player-designed building models introduced to Upland!
Upland is continuously growing its borders. This was a fantastic quarter for cities, as we saw the first two international cities open to immense popularity!
Here’s a list of the cities that opened in this quarter:
In Q3, we brought exciting new partners in Upland. Check them out!
The following projects are currently in development. Some of these items may be delivered in Q4, while others will likely come in Q1 of 2023.
As an evolution of the Racing Alpha and subsequent non-competitive races, Multiplayer Racing puts players head-to-head against each other. If you don’t have a vehicle, you can join these events as a spectator.
Instead of trains, planes, or watching your Block Explorer jump around a neighborhood, vehicle transportation gives players a new way to move about the world. This form of transportation offers more freedom when traveling between cities. This will change movement in Upland forever and bring the world a little closer to how we travel in real life.
Complementing the Factory structures announced in Q3, we recently introduced the Showroom structure. At this stage, all players are welcome to construct a Showroom. There will be various sizes to choose from, each with different features and capacity. When fully launched, these structures will allow Uplanders to sell 3D items that have a physical presence on the map. For now, these capabilities are being tested by players in the Outdoor Decor beta group and only pertain to their inventory. In the future, other players can request to sell their assets from another player’s Showroom as a sub-merchant.
Structure Ornaments are essentially skins for buildings that allow players to add unique visuals to their structures. Structure Ornaments Metaventures are planned to be released in open beta where players will be able to manufacture Structure Ornaments in factories and sell them in Showrooms. This phase is similar to how Outdoor Decor manufacturing has evolved and much of the groundwork has already been laid thanks to the deployment of Factories and Showrooms. One key difference from Outdoor Decor Manufacturing is that Structure Ornaments will launch in open beta and not closed beta.
To round out the FC Porto Essentials launched last quarter, FC Porto Mementos allow players to collect Legits of their favorite football performances from FC Porto matches. These Mementos will go towards FC Porto Collections that will be announced during the football season. The Mementos and Collections all contribute toward a Fan Score Leaderboard coming soon for FC Porto.
FC Porto Mementos and Collections may not be launched simultaneously, but they are both in development for this football season.
Ad hoc voting is the first of two in-app voting types coming to Upland. Ad hoc votes are “one-off” topics that determine a single outcome and will be active for a fixed amount of time in the profile. A good example of ad hoc voting is in the last economic update where there was a proposal for a new funding approach for the Upland Pool.
Bringing more impact and importance to where Uplanders hang their hat, each Upland neighborhood will be assigned a rating based on various factors. Neighborhood Ratings will be the deciding factor for neighborhood Collection spawns. Stay tuned! More details on Neighborhood Ratings will be revealed soon.
When Upland’s connection to Ethereum is complete, players will be able to download their Upland NFTs to the Ethereum blockchain. In the upcoming beta, Block Explorers will be the first downloadable assets. With Ethereum downloading, Upland assets can be accessed in decentralized applications (dApps) on the Ethereum blockchain, such as NFT marketplaces like OpenSea. This is another major step toward building an open, interoperable ecosystem that will give players more utility for their assets in Upland and beyond!
After launching Community Dev Tools to the UDN, players should expect to see new experiences and applications come to Upland. Developers can tap into the economy and assets already established in Upland. Through Dev Shops, developers can connect their third-party content through Dev Shops. Some will be location-based events triggered by moving your Block Explorer to different locations in Upland. These experiences will be built by the community and developer partners and will transform the day-to-day experience in Upland! From here on out, Upland has become a “layer one metaverse” and a platform for creators to bring their content to web3 environments.
While Discord and Reddit are fantastic places for players to talk shop, in-game communication will take collaboration and community to a new level. Being able to say hello to neighbors. Tailgating at stadiums. Throwing other players off the trail of a nearby treasure. These are just a few examples of the dynamics introduced when players can directly interact in the app. And we can’t wait for it!
With 3D Avatars, players will have a “humanoid” form they can use in certain situations in Upland. This may include experiences built from Community Dev Tools, for example. 3D Avatars will be customizable, giving players more ways to express themselves and build a digital identity.
As announced in a previous economic update, Upland is moving from a passive earnings model toward a more active earnings mechanism. Specifically, we will be introducing a cap on the accumulation of uncollected earnings. We want to encourage players to remain as a working part of the ecosystem. The first and critical step in doing this is to have players log in.
As such, players will be required to log in to collect their earnings before their accumulated earnings reach a certain threshold, variable by Upland status. This does not mean that Upland is placing a cap on how much players can earn. Rather, it is a cap on how much UPX can go uncollected before it stops accumulating.
We have more partnerships in the works! It’s exciting to see household names and brands ready to join the Upland ecosystem, and we can’t wait to see how the new activities take Upland to the next level. We’ll make official announcements soon, so stay tuned!
We’ve been building toward this moment in Upland’s history for a long time. Between the international cities, expanded activities, new mechanics, and tools that give developers and the community the ability to add to the ecosystem, Upland is truly ready to transform into something the world has never seen. Thank you for being on this journey with us! Please join us for the LIVE AMA to ask questions and let us know your thoughts.
And if you’re as hyped about the roadmap as we are, jump into Reddit to join the conversation and submit questions.
