If you ever hoped to find a game that you could jump into with absolutely zero prior knowledge and instantly know how to play, then you've come to the right place...
Welcome to Rising Star!
So is it really that simple? The answer is Yes and No. It's all a matter of how much time and effort you wish to put in really.
Let's start at the very beginning and assume you simply want to join, get started and see what happens before venturing any further with the game.
Somebody told you about Rising Star, you noticed an advertisement, viewed snippets by one of the communities many exciting streamers, or just stumbled to the site by complete accident, but how do you get involved? The process is unbelievably simple and within a mere couple of minutes you'll be performing your first mission on your road to being a rockstar. (100% hyperbole because this game in no way promises to launch you into global mega stardom with trans-atlantic Number One albums, millions in the bank to spend on slightly out-of-date magnums of Lambrini, nor mansions in the foothills hills of Skegness filled with bleached blonde supermodels clamouring to play with your Lego minifigure collection)
Step 1 - Create an account on Hive-Engine.
Step 2 - Install Hive Keychain onto your browser.
Step 3 - Head to Rising Star https://risingstargame.com
Step 4 - login with your Hive-Engine username, authenticate the pop-up by keychain to grant access and hit the most obvious button on the page... START
Congratulations, your first mission is now running with no need to do anything else.
As a complete beginner, you'll find yourself only eligible to play the very first mission in the game. It is called "Illegal Busking" and it is part of the "Home Town" zone of the game map.(We'll cover "map zones" shortly)
As you can see in the image, there is a retro style speaker on the right, and within it is a brief synopsis of that mission. Below the synopsis you will see four symbols beneath which are some very key numbers you need to know to move forward in the game.
Symbol 1 is of two people dancing. This symbolises the amount of "Fans" you need to have to start that mission.
Symbol 2 shows a person climbing stairs. This symbolises the minimum experience level (otherwise known as "XP") needed to start that mission.
Symbol 3 shows a clock face/stopwatch. This symbolises the duration of that mission in real-time minutes.
Symbol 4 shows a battery. This is your energy meter which depletes when running a mission and recharges naturally over time.
As you can see in the image, to run your very first mission the requirements are to have 10 FANS, your XP needs to be at LEVEL ONE, the duration of the mission is FIVE MINUTES and it will consume FIFTEEN PERCENT of your energy.
At the bottom of the speaker just above the all important mission START button you will find the rewards you can earn.
"Starbits" (the in-game currency and tradeable token found on Hive-Engine. More on that shortly.) You will notice it has an ambiguous range of 1 to 611. Completing the mission will reward you with a completely random amount of Starbits within that range. PLEASE NOTE: When you first join the game you will notice that the highest potential amount of Starbits you can earn for this mission is lower than 611. The maximum amount increases as you accumulate more "Fans". Starting the game with the assigned card loaned to you means you have 10 Fans and so your rewards will be minimal. (How to increase Fans will become clear as you continue to read.)
You will also be rewarded with 10 XP to climb towards your next level, and you will, at some point in your advancement in the game, receive 2 "Ego".
It is important to realise that Ego is a feature that will appear once you reach a certain level. Immediately upon starting you will not see this mentioned, but it does come into effect when you reach either Level 15 or when you have accumulated 1000+ Fans. If you reach the level where Ego becomes a feature then you will see a small Ego Meter appear next to your Energy Meter in the top left of the screen, and Ego earned for a mission will appear on the Mission Speaker.
There are also further random rewards that can be gained when completing a mission. These are most certainly not guaranteed but a hidden perk that can be awarded if you are lucky enough. When the timer ends and you complete a mission, scroll down to the bottom of the page where you will see your Diary entries. This is the section that will tell you the Time the mission ended, followed by the amount of Starbits earned from the variable range. Should luck be on your side you might see further diary entries with a matching timestamp for that mission. This will tell you if you managed to gain a little added extra for the mission you just completed. The extras are as follows:
1 - Coffee. Every wannabe rockstar likes coffee. It's one of the only energy boosters to trust now since the unfortunate episode of the mystery bag of white powder in the dressing room turning out to be a highly potent blend of baby talc and laxatives. Finding a coffee will increase the recovery rate of your energy meter.
2 - Discarded Pizza Slice. Sure, it's a little nasty to ferret through a bin and eat something covered in rogue hairs, but when a gig doesn't even pay your bus fair home you're not in a position to complain. Finding this will completely refill your energy meter to 100%.
3 - Drunk Fans. People like your music. These fans increase your Fans stats and therefore increase the amount of possible Starbits you could win on your next missions. However, Drunk is the key word to remember. Drunk people have severely impaired judgment! Drunks think SuBo looks as hot as Princess Leia in a gold bikini and will desperately try to get her back to their den of despicableness. They also think you sound like a rockstar. Come the morning they actually see SuBo in her Bridget Jones pants and realise it's Coyote Ugly time, and they also realise you're less talented than a one handed orangutan attempting to play a guitar with 4 snapped strings. Yes, you suck and they're no longer your fans. Your potential mission rewards decrease back down to where they should be.
So you now now the basics. You have all the requirements to play the Illegal Busking mission the moment you login for the very first time. All you need to do is click that beautiful beacon of hope... the START button. But you hear the awesome music playing in the background, courtesy of Rising Star radio and featuring the hottest up and coming musicians, and you want to linger a little longer. What else do you need to do? The truth is... nothing very difficult at all!
Rising Star is intended to be simple and fun. A somewhat retro stylistic interface that is very appealing to look at whilst you listen to great music. You don't need to pay to play like pretty much every other venture in this space, just enjoy the atmosphere and earn a little money by completing the missions. As you continue to play you will accumulate enough Starbits where, if you choose to spend them within the game, you can venture into the marketplace and buy your very own NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens). Although you are not forced to do this by any means, you can withdraw them to your Hive-Engine wallet and convert them to any other crypto token on the platform instead, it is advisable in my opinion to reinvest. As you start to gain XP and move up the levels you will see that the missions require you to have a certain amount of fans before you can play it. These missions have a higher amount of potential rewards that you can earn, and as mentioned earlier, more fans also means higher potential Starbits earnings. If you buy NFTs from the marketplace (also available from some third party sites) then the cards not only give you a funky looking collection, but each card carries their own individual stats boosts. These stats stack and give a cumulative total which in turn allow you to advance to higher missions.
A great example of an NFT in the game is the newly added Special Edition in conjunction with 1UP. S30 Juan Up is found in the "People" tab of the market which features a variety of Musicians, Roadies, Managers, Promoters and more.
The stat boosts of this card are displayed in the middle, 2 on the left of the card and 2 on the right. All cards carry this format for displaying stats.
100 FANS - This means you will receive 100 permanent Fans to your account rating (As long as you own it. Should you choose to sell the NFT then those stats will be removed.) Remember, Certain amounts of Fans are needed to start different missions and they also increase your Starbits rewards!
200 SKILL - Skill is something that is necessary to balance out the amount of Fans you have, both permanent and temporary drunks. Always strive to keep your Skill higher than your Fans otherwise you will incur the wrath of the Ego Meter. If the Ego Meter starts to fill up then you will be penalised by receiving lower possible Starbits rewards when completing missions.
5 LUCK - The more Luck you have, the more drunk fans you can potentially attract when completing a mission. As explained earlier, although they will wake up and no longer be your fans after a certain amount of time, you can capitalise on the temporary increase to complete missions during that time with a higher possible Starbits reward.
1 IM - This is your Income Modifier. There are leaderboard rankings on Rising Stars with Hive available as a reward for being ranked high enough. I.M. is one of the criteria that determines your rank so the higher it is, the better.
There are other sections in the marketplace too besides People. If you would rather invest in buying NFTs of Vehicles for instance then you would click the vehicle tab. Or perhaps you wish to collect Instruments and build a collection of these, so hit the Instruments tab. Pay Attention to the stats of differing cards so that you know which stats that particular NFT will boost on your account.
Lets look at a Legendary Vehicle...
Here you can see the much more significant amount of Fans, Luck and I.M. compared to S30 Juan Up, although notice that it has zero skill boost. Some cards may only have Fans boost and zero for everything else, or Skill boost only.
The significant amount of Fans on the Pink Lambo is because it is classed as a Legendary Card. (The centre bottom of the card tells you this, as well as the designation number at the top L4, "L" referring to Legendary. The other status category of cards are Epic, Rare, Common, Special and Seasonal.
Instrument cards do play a different role in the game compared to the other NFTs. They only give a Luck stats boost.
Again, a Legendary Card, this will increase your luck by 1000. As mentioned earlier, the higher your accumulated luck, the more potential drunk fans you can gain when completing a mission. But too many fans compared to skill is bad because of the Ego Meter threatening to reduce those Starbits earnings. This is where the instrument cards play a very fundamental role in the game.
Upon reaching Level 10 and up, you may start to carry out Music Lessons as a mission. You do not gain Starbits for completing these, but you instead get a reward of Skill. The same principle applies. It is a range of a lower skill amount and an upper skill amount, with a randomised skill reward given upon completion.
Different Music Lesson missions require different XP Level entry requirements so open up as you progress more within the game. At Level 10 you can perform Basic Singing Lesson or Guitar Lesson so early on in your adventure it would be advisable to invest in Instrument cards that fall into those categories. Here is where the Unique Cards and their Luck play the different role. - The amount of potential Skill learned is based upon the amount of accumulated Luck for all of your instrument cards within that instrument type. For example, the combined Luck of all owned cards such as Harps, Violins etc will boost your Skill rewards in Orchestral Lesson, whereas Luck from Instruments such as Keyboards, Grand Piano, Santa's Big Organ (such a funny double entendre) will boost the potential Skill Rewards in the Piano Lesson. Build your instrument collection around an Instrument subset that you are eligible for and try to concentrate on them to maximise your rewards.
In the above image you can see that the requirements to run the Piano Lesson are 1000 Fans, Level 25, it will take 60 Minutes to complete, and it requires 40% Energy.
The game menu does have a comprehensive guide for F.A.Q.s and information, which has a very detailed section on which Instrument NFTs fall within each Music Lesson category. This is an absolute must to refer to in order to build the most efficient collection needed!
Another important tab within the marketplace is Boosters. Here you can buy NFTs which will aid you in your progression throughout the game. Do you gain too many drunk fans and can't control them because your skill isn't high enough? You can buy a "Risky Whiskey". This acts as a storage container for those drunk fans gained at the end of a mission so you can use them at a time of your own choosing rather than them being instantly active on your account.
And those nasty discarded pizza slices that you might be lucky enough to find can be stored in a "Pizza Box" so you can save that energy refill for a time you would like to use it instead of it instantly refilling your energy the moment it is found.
Another must have (in my opinion) is the "Cold Pizza Slice" NFT which again refills your Energy Meter, but it recharges so can be used again 24 hours later. If you want to run a few missions a day and maximise your earnings then Energy refills are very important else you will need to wait 8 hours for your Energy Meter to naturally refill, hindering the speed at which you can make progress.
Other Boosters are available for Fans, Skill, XP etc, so it's a matter of deciding which are the better fit for you to invest in when you have a good grasp of the game mechanics and your own preferred method of playing.
The Marketplace itself is not just for buying. You own these NFTs and they have real value. If one becomes suddenly very in-demand by other players, or by opening packs you are lucky enough to find a rare card with a high value, then naturally you may want to sell it. This is where Rising Star offer a great twist on how you can earn!
In the above image you can see S30 Juan Up is available to buy using 3 different crypto tokens. Whilst the native currencies of Rising Star are Starbits and StarPro, you may choose to sell your NFTs in any crypto token you desire, as long as it is a token available within the Hive-Engine platform. The buyer would then buy whichever token is needed and use that to pay for your card.
An Important Piece Of Information To Remember:
All transactions for Rising Star are taken from your currency balance on Hive-Engine. You do not transfer any currency or tokens to the Rising Star game. If you buy, your token balance MUST be in your Hive-Engine wallet! When you make a sale of an NFT, the token you choose to be paid in will be sent straight to your Hive-Engine wallet!
When you list a card for sale, you will see the image of the card and underneath there will be two white boxes. The first, Price Symbol, has a dropdown box arrow which will give you the three most common currency tokens. The second box, Price, is simply where you enter the amount you would like for your card in whichever token you choose.
If you want payment in a different token to one of the three most common, then do not click the arrow in the Price Symbol box, simply click inside the box furthest away from the arrow and a text cursor will appear. Then you manually enter the token symbol for the currency you would like to be paid with.
It is vitally important when manually entering a token currency symbol that you spell it correctly. Incorrect spellings could result in failed transactions, people unable to buy because the token doesn't exist, or even you receiving a completely different token to the one you was expecting, thus potentially having significant price differences. It is 100% your own responsibility to get this correct because there is zero possibility of anyone rectifying a mistaken sale!
Lastly in this article, i would like to briefly explain about "Zones". On the main page you will use, the missions page, you will see a map in the centre. When you start, you will only have access to "Home Town" until you have successfully completed each mission in that list a certain number of times. Obviously that involves obtaining the required XP Levels and Fan requirements as well as devoting the necessary time to completing the missions multiple times. Upon completing the final mission you will be able to move on to the next Zone on the map. In this case it would be Local Gig Circuit which then has its own list of missions to accomplish. As you progress through zones you will notice a significant rise in Starbits earnings as a reward for the dedication and time put into building your account and playing the game. There are additional requirements to fulfil to unlock each zone such as to unlock the second zone, Local Gig circuit, you must own an "i6 Mid Range Acoustic" guitar card. This is one of the very few occasions where it is necessary to spend currency to be able to progress further in the game.
Anyways, i thank you for taking the time to have a read of this and i sincerely hope you get a little help that makes your path easier in the game.
Kindest Regards, mr-dingleberry - musically talentless hack but aspiring King of the Death Metal Mosh Pits
