Atomic Object System: An Innovative Game World Design Pattern

The atomic object system is a novel design pattern that allows for the creation of composable objects while maintaining the overall balance of the world. In this system, each object is composed of a set of basic particles, with its characteristics and statistics derived from these constituent atoms. Unlike traditional game worlds, this system allows the inhabitants of the world to create objects with entirely new properties.

Design Motivation

Traditional game worlds typically contain a set of predefined items, as designers need to prioritize the entertainment experience of players over their autonomy. To provide players with an interesting and reliable experience, various systems need to be balanced to ensure that players receive the appropriate items at the right time. Powerful or valuable items often require a significant amount of money or are restricted by skill trees and upgrade paths to prevent game imbalance. Game designers carefully adjust these systems to optimize player experience while maintaining proper challenge and sense of reward.

This balance is particularly difficult in multiplayer games. Single-player games can adjust based on the individual progress and skills of players, subtly changing the rules of the game world. However, multiplayer games cannot easily change one player's reality without affecting other players. A shared space that allows players of different skill levels to interact requires an economic system that operates more like a normal one, which has historically been challenging to achieve.

Part of the appeal of autonomous worlds lies in the residents' ability to freely collaborate in designing, constructing, and creating entirely new things. To achieve this, we cannot rely on game designers to carefully refine mechanisms when new objects are added to the world. Instead, autonomous worlds depend on clear narrative rules or digital physical laws that delineate what can physically occur within the world and define the conditions under which it can expand.

System Mechanism

The atomic object system provides an easy-to-understand and self-balancing mechanism for composability. Players can freely invent new objects of any power level, but they must first acquire the necessary atoms by destroying existing objects. By viewing basic atoms as building blocks, players can invent objects that go beyond the hard-coded crafting tree limitations. At the same time, the effort required to acquire these atoms is balanced by imposing costs proportional to the complexity of the created objects.

In this system, the units controlled by players live on a hexagonal tiled map, and every state change is an on-chain transaction. Units use buildings to craft items, with each item composed of a specific set of basic particles represented by sticky substances of different colors. Players first collect the sticky substances, use buildings to create new items based on those substances, and then use these items to enhance their units, trade with others, and design new game modes.

The basic production process includes:

1. Collect sticky substances from the extractor
2. Use buildings to craft items
3. Add items to the player's inventory.

The most common use of items is to enhance the attributes of a unit. The number of sticky atoms in an item determines the type and amount of attribute enhancement. Red sticky increases strength, blue sticky increases defense, and green sticky increases vitality.

Technical Implementation

The system uses a node graph architecture, representing all entities (players, buildings, etc.) as contracts with their own addresses, and items are represented as ERC-1155, with names and balances that can be assigned to these entity addresses. The basic atomic composition of each object is encoded as metadata, allowing contracts to check the required constituent materials.

Application Prospects

Currently, the most widespread application of the virtual world composability system is the crafting mechanism in games. Many games with crafting mechanics have blurred the boundaries between the gaming world and real life. Game types that offer similar functionalities include survival sandbox games, farm-themed life simulation games, factory or colony management simulation games, and massive multiplayer online role-playing games.

Future Development

One way to expand the system is to increase the atomic types. Currently, there are three atomic types in the system, but there are plans to add at least two or three more. Another possibility is to allow atoms to not only affect combat data but also influence other players' actions and attributes, such as movement speed or RPG-style skill acquisition.

The atomic object system provides an innovative approach to game world design that maintains the balance of the world while granting players greater creative freedom. With the continuous development of virtual worlds and game design, this system is expected to play a larger role in future games and virtual environments.