A New Chapter in the Web3 Gaming Ecosystem: Insights from Sonic Co-Founder Chris Zhu

Transition from Traditional Internet to Web3

Chris Zhu's career began at ByteDance, where he accumulated extensive experience in consumer entertainment and SaaS market research. He then joined a team focused on the intersection of AI and Web3, deeply exploring the combination of AI with NFTs and AI with cryptocurrencies. These emerging business models sparked his strong interest in Web3, ultimately leading him to fully commit to this field.

The Birth and Development of Sonic

After founding Mirror World and focusing on game asset distribution, Chris discovered the variability of market demand. He identified three core issues:

1. The correlation between game asset diversity and user diversity
2. The computing resources and congestion issues on a certain blockchain network
3. Insufficient Game Publishing Capability

Based on these observations, Chris collaborated with the relevant foundation to propose the development of a dedicated game chain called Sonic, aimed at addressing the scalability issues within the ecosystem.

The Impact of Diverse Experiences on Entrepreneurship

Chris's diverse professional experience has provided him with valuable insights. At a large internet company, he learned about corporate management concepts and efficiency management methods. In an international team, he honed his management and talent recruitment skills. These experiences became particularly important after he entered the cryptocurrency field, helping him adopt more flexible management strategies to cope with the rapid changes in the industry.

The Transformation of Mirror World

Mirror World initially focused on the issuance of NFT assets, but as the market changed, the team began to develop broader infrastructure support, including in-game wallets, markets, deposit, and exchange tools. In 2023, facing new market challenges, they decided to develop an expansion chain called Sonic specifically for gaming services, leveraging previous R&D experience to address scalability issues.

Different Paths for Blockchain Scalability

Chris pointed out that the scalability of certain blockchains is primarily to address issues of mainnet speed and cost, while other blockchains, due to their already high TPS and low transaction costs, are more focused on meeting the specific needs of different fields, providing dedicated chains to ensure that each field has independent economic effects and computing resources.

Sonic's Hypergrid Expansion Plan

Hypergrid is an expansion solution by Sonic on a certain blockchain, aimed at creating an environment specifically for gaming services. It provides proprietary chains for different domains through horizontal scaling, addressing the scalability issues of specific fields. This approach not only enhances the professionalism and efficiency of each domain but also improves the overall performance and scalability of the ecosystem.

Challenges Facing Layer2 Expansion

In terms of Layer 2 scaling, blockchain faces multiple challenges:

1. Assess which areas truly need independent scaling chains.
2. Technical challenges in the splitting and maintenance process of the codebase
3. The rapidly evolving ecosystem needs to continuously address new issues.

Future Prospects of Web3 Games

Chris is optimistic about the future of Web3 games. He believes that the quality of current game content and the toolkit for monetization have significantly improved compared to the last cycle. Although the price performance of Web3 game tokens is not ideal at the moment, the quality of the games and the willingness of users to pay have reached a high level.

Future game design will place more logic on the chain. Once the technological costs and speeds reach a certain level, fully on-chain games will become possible. Chris believes that with advancements in technology and market maturity, Web3 games will achieve breakthroughs in gameplay and asset innovation, and there may even be a hit fully on-chain game.