Have you heard of Vibe Coding?
I love Hive. I really do. I think it has such awesome potential but alas I have no coding skills. Well, I can program in BASIC from decades ago but that doesn't really translate at all to modern coding. Or does it? You see I still know about logic patterns, variables and all that stuff its just the syntax that is missing. I tried learning Python and Java a little while ago but just didn't have the time but now that you can use AI to do coding? That changes everything. My dreams of making a dApp that can run on HIVE are no longer dead.
In that light for this week’s Creative Sunday, I wanted to share my first steps for a work in progress that brings together DIY, game design, and blockchain: my Dragon Genome project.
Reality Check
I have ideas.... but no guarantees .... that even with help I'll be able to bring them to a working app. Still I use Actifit all the time but wish it had more of a game atmosphere to it. More interaction with the other people on the app. Of course I also wish it wasn't so hard to get setup! I've tried to get others to use the app but that has been more than a little frustrating.
I also have been waiting for the Holozine app to come out. Still waiting....but so far no luck.
So, enter my idea. Simple actually.
- Get a dragon to call our own.
- Walk with it daily.
- Watch an ad to post your steps for the day
- Watch your dragon grow each and every day.
- Battle against other dragons and see how your training increases your win percentage.
- Hidden in the background earn GLD tokens by having your battles curated on HIVE
Side Note: I'm hoping to have different ways to upgrade your dragon on the android app. I'm also hoping to make a little money from the ad's in the game. The idea is that all the money from upgrades and ad's goes to purchase actual HIVE to turn into HP. Hive provides the engine and app users provide the income. Any curation rewards get turned into GLD tokens which in turn help to upgrade the dragons so they win more fights.
However, while I have the entire game logic and links worked out getting the actual pieces working is challenging for someone with no coding skills. Also with no artistic skills I'm relying on AI created screens as placeholders while I'm working on an alpha version.
What did I work on today?
I wish I could say I worked on something cool like an awesome skin for the app, of a battle simulator.
I do have my introductory screen ready to go:
and some of the user choice screens are ready to go also.
Attack training image
Or perhaps fighting style
But at the end of the day I just did very basic things.
What did I accomplish today? I made a Python app which would give me the genome of a dragon setting a basic code that will allow me to tell one dragon from any other dragon and give me the base stats to see how they attack, grow, look and thrive.
That's what it looked like when I ran the output on Thonny (a Python editor). Of course by itself its not very useful. The real fun part was when I was able to export that genome and the dragons name to Hive. Sure it is just in a memo but now the dragon lives forever on the Hive blockchain. Only as a code but still.
Look at the fine print and you will see "Madricar" sitting there with his genome setting. I can bring in that stat every day and watch Madricar evolve everytime he (or she) watches an ad and hits post.
But now I have two dragons. Madricar and Cephalim. From that we can do mock battles. Of course I'd want a larger pool, but for now its just proof of concept. Proof that YES I can get a computer program to make something and send it to HIVE where I can access it forever. Honestly I'll need to make the dragon creation portion far more robust but I'm still in prototype stage and just knowing I can get things from my PC to HIVE is huge. Well, huge for me, I'm sure the dev's on Hive will scoff at that being trivial. Still, every kid starts on a bike with training wheels :D
Well, from a genome battle spec Cephalim kind of sucked only winning about 39% of the time but here is the fun. He was bred to do better at home than abroad. Switch the scenario to where he has home court advantage? He fares a lot better.
Win rate goes from 39% to 50% or so. Which means you never quite know how a battle will go as there is a lot of variability but knowing the base stats and battle scenario it is provable not random. Also every dragon that is loved and an owner that makes choices develops differently over time. A weak dragon today doesn't have to stay as one.
I have a lot more work to do and this part is just one small step but that's how I spent my creative Sunday. If anyone has thoughts or ideas I'd love to hear them. Hopefully I'll get the OK to post updates on future Hive Learner Creative Sundays in the future.
Thanks for dropping by.
And just for fun: Hive-Learners asked that we show how we did our work so that other users can do it at home. However, everyone's code will be different depending on what you make but in case you are curious what Python code looks like here is a little snippet.
Until next time :)
Final Note: Please leave comments. Any advice would really be appreciated.