Welcome to the write up from Monday the 8th of May’s AMA, and wasn’t it quite the AMA! with twenty-nine pre-asked questions we are very happy to have such an engaged community and of course we love answering all your questions! So here we have it!
We have grouped together some of the questions which asked the same thing. This roundup is just a very brief summary of the answers Conor gave, for all the insights — please check the recording here
Onto the questions!
Why spend money on more events that show no measurable impact? How much did the team spend in flights/hotels/event fees etc? Why not put some money behind tournaments and have users playing towards something? — Professor V on Telegram
We did not pay anything to attend this event, as we were there by invitation from the Online Casino Summit Italia. We attended to give our expert input on social casinos and non-gambling ventures. We also gave our insights to traditional casinos on all things blockchain, play to earn and online poker.
No matter how many months pass, we can almost never get a game going. Why isnt that an issue for the team to solve? — Professor V on Telegram
Our game is live, it is playable and we are working on getting the full release out in the near future with some really cool new features.
For user experience it takes a lot of time just to play one hand, because of downloading the installer & the game & suggests it should be a web browser game, are there any plans to improve the time between finding Polker and playing a first hand? — Professor V on Telegram
This is something we spent a long time figuring out in the early stages and decided against. Having a web client is something we may consider further down the line, however, it is of low priority as the loss in graphics is significant. It is the graphics and immersive experience offered by UE5 that gives Polker an opportunity to stand out. The first thing will be the full launch of the Windows version, then the Mac version, mobile versions (IOS & Android), then we can look into a web client.
Is it possible to know how many hours players are playing Polker? Maybe a month stats about how many new players joined and how many have played, Maybe show us a graph every month about active players / hours played. — from Sergio on Telegram
You can see the leaderboards in the game already. After full launch, we hope to have lots more interesting stats up on our website and in the game. Hold tight it’s coming!
The white paper promised an exchange listing in Q1, however we’re now in Q2 and there’s been no listing — can you please explain why? — from Sajith Dissanayake on Telegram
The simple answer is road maps aren’t fixed in stone. Nobody can predict the future. Unfortunately, a lot has changed in the world. Regarding the roadmap, we have faced bumps in the road, mostly external in terms of the environment but also development delays, these things happen. So there is no precise reason, as there are many reasons. However, it would not have benefited the team, game or community if we had listed at that time. We need to adjust to the environment we’re working in — the next couple of months will dictate when we will list. Uncertainties are not a good time to be listing.
Is PKR a token only for the Polker game or will there be more games using the token in the future? — from Cryptogem on Discord
Currently, only the main Texas Hold’em game of Poker. However, mini-games are coming. This will give users the opportunity to win $PKR directly and will give more use cases to the token.
What are the benefits of involving Conor in the Online casino Summit Italia? — from Kulbir Singh on Telegram
We were invited to speak to a lot of large traditional casino companies, traditional banks, economic professors, google and early Ethereum developers. The talk was a lot about how casinos can benefit crypto and how crypto can benefit casinos. We were there as an expert. We were there to learn from traditional casino companies to see how we can apply these same teachings to Polker as an online social casino.
Couldn’t the token (SPADES) be correlated to the value of PKR or to some stablecoin? Or through algorithms to both? Or earnable only on the basis of experience points? — from Salvo on Telegram
Price wise, Spades pretty much do correlate to USDs already as 99 spades is 1USD.
Do we have any news on the external security check? — G P on Telegram
The only required changes on the backend have come back and been changed. I imagine we will have a report back tomorrow (9th May). As far as we can see from their end, we are close to having full completion from them.
Could Hector speak in an AMA to explain the experience behind all the development (team dynamics, human resources, deadlines that are challenging, and a bit of the vision from his perspective)?— G P on Telegram
Yes, Hector will join next week’s AMA per your request. So any questions for Hector? Please get them to us right away ready for next week!
What are the top priorities for the team right now in the short term (before Q3)? — G P on telegram
Have the game live on Windows
Have this ported into Mac
Finalize the wireframes for IOS and Android (don’t think we will be live on IOS/Android in Q3 — but will be close)
Begin launching the Polker Dao
How long can the team survive with their raised funds from the VC investor? Cause it’s been 2+ yrs with only dev and a bit of marketing? — G P on Telegram
Obviously, we cannot tell you the full financials but let’s just say we have a decent amount of runway. Our project is very complex. We are not just a DApp or staking contract there is a lot that goes into this.
Have you grown the team size over this period? In what way has the team changed or evolved during this time? — G P on Telegram
The team grew from around 16/17 people to around 50 at our peak in the beginning of 2022. We are around 20–28 currently. The team is often expanding and shrinking based on the company’s needs. We had a lot of graphic designers working on the user interface and graphics for example — once we have all of this we do not need to retain them. Many still have ongoing contracts with Polker but on a freelance basis — when we need them we will bring them back in. This is how it works in the industry.
What is the current cost of the team for a whole year and when do you expect/intend/plan/estimate to break even? — G P on Telegram
The costs are fairly high as we have staff and systems to pay for each month. The hope is to break even and start making profit around early 2024 approximately, but this is not fixed. It depends on many things, we think the mobile launch will have a big positive impact on this.
Are you thinking of any other way of revenue besides the game itself in the short term? — G P on Telegram
Once we have the game running, we will see if there’s other options available. We’re not selling the tokens so it would only be from the game itself.
How many active players do you aim to attract as a goal for the PC game launch. (Like the marketing pushed after the PC + Mac full game launch but before the ios/Android launch? — G P on Telegram
First point, we may have found a faster way to launch IOS and Android. So this is a fast developing topic, please ask this again in 2 weeks or 1 month and we will have a good answer for you.
What is the number of active players you aim to validate the business model and the game itself? — G P on Telegram
Due to the nature of the game, active players don’t really validate the business model. Once we have all the features live, we should know. We are revamping the referral scheme currently to make it more lucrative for referrals. But we really don’t have enough data to give a full answer yet.
(Follow on) Will you push efforts to get there before or after the mobile game launch? — G P on Telegram
It depends, most likely after the mobile game launch or around the same time.
Are we solely focusing on poker or eventually will you be a casino? — Crypto Lord on Telegram
We will have other games, but whether they will be casino games we’re not sure. We will likely be sticking to Poker (ie. Polker) as our main game. This could be a great chance to use our DAO and ask the community.
What is the revenue model for this project once the game rolls out? — Crypto Lord on Telegram
The revenue model is similar to Zynga poker. We are a social casino — it is gamified and social. You can buy play chips, you can buy the PKR pass (5 tiers), you can purchase the in game currency (SPADES). We have a whole game economy so it’s really not a large cost to the consumer. We don’t like the barrier to entry like some other P2E games. Ultimately we are an Unreal Engine game, with poker elements and with crypto elements.
Do we have any partnerships with other projects (after the game comes out) and how can other metaverse projects emerge with ours and vice versa? — Crypto Lord on Telegram
Our big partnerships that will grow in the future are Polygon and Chainlink. We continue to have regular talks with our friends at Sandbox and Decentraland, so there’s some possibility there. For the full list of our partnerships, please check out our official partner list here: https://polker.game/ (scroll down to the bottom).
What will be key steps to make this project successful after game release? — Crypto Lord on Telegram
This is tough in such a small answer, marketing is of course important, and this will be targeted. However, player retention is the most important, therefore, we need to make the game fun! Having all of the utility within the game to keep them there and coming back and staying is fundamental. Listening to the community is also very important and something we continue to do.
Instead of weekly AMAs, why not come to social media from time to time to answer questions and give hints on what’s coming next? — Crypto Lord on Telegram
Conor is personally on Telegram most days answering questions. The weekly AMA was a request from the community and there are multiple team members jumping in to answer questions and solve problems in Telegram, Discord, Twitter and other socials everyday.
Can we have some updates on game development? When will we be able to see the final game launch as we’re now in the middle of Q2? — Kulbir Singh on Telegram
We cannot give you an exact answer. As soon as we have a much more detailed timeline, we will communicate it. It’s not months away.
Is UE5 showing all its strength on the graphic aspects of the game? and how will you set all the game options on the phone? — Salvo on Telegram
UE5 is very versatile and we are using a lot of the graphics and aspects already. There will be more bits we can play around and have some fun with them. We did try talking to dealers on UE4 but it really didn’t work out well. Regarding the mobile versions, we will obviously have to optimize it for mobile — I don’t think we would have the full graphics but we will try to.
Did the Italy event give Polker new ideas for development? — Salvo on Telegram
Listening to the development and gamification of regular casinos and how regulatory boards are going to be working with decentralized concepts really helped. We learned a lot about IGaming and it was hugely beneficial for Polker. The insights we managed to give were very beneficial for traditional IGaming too. We think there is likely some good symbiosis with other projects and there will likely be some new partnerships coming from this.
If you have not yet joined our Community Launch then download the game now here! Questions? Reach out on Telegram, Twitter, Discord, or contact us by email at hello@polker.game.
