AMA with CONTANGO

Grady Teske : Finally before we get started. On behalf of the entire #Contango venture crew ( of which we're well represented in the community this am). I would like to say thank you. Thank you to the Nakamoto team, for the vision and tenacity to buidl buidl buidl a great ecosystem, WE ARE JUST GETTING STARTED

Michelle : The pleasure is ours. We keep on building and delivering no matter what the market does. This week we’ll release an update which will bring a significant increase in platform usage and user increase.

Grady Teske : Over the last 2 months we have collaborated with Nakamoto Games to take a deep dive into the process of Diligence, what this means for investors, particular using Nakamoto Games as a use case for not only meeting key Roadmap milestones but also exceeding the expectations of their investors and community, we have been honoured to get to know the team and community better.

Over this time we have also given an opportunity to applicants to submit their own analytic report. The goal was to find a superior diligence reporter and allow them more opportunities to hone their skills and allow to help them build a career in due diligence.

The chosen submission will receive an allocation of $2,000 USD worth of Naka tokens and a contract for (3) paid research articles each by Nakamoto Games AND Contango.

We have our finalists here today and will be asking them a few questions after which we will announce the winner. We’d like to point out that all these submissions were very well thought out and in-depth and we appreciate the time taken by each participant.

Grady Teske : Let’s dive in! One of the more obvious criteria that analytics dig into is User Adoption. For the #NAKAMOTO team could you give us a overview of the current statistics?How big are your social channels? What is the growth rate over time? What is the community engagement and how does it compare to competition?

Goto : We are nearly half a million followers in all socials combined. The stats are constantly positive as we are constantly mentioned in third-party social monitoring metrics for TOP most engaging community. We are always proud of our quality community members for showing support and insightful suggestions. Organic growth and we always welcome newcomers!

Grady Teske : Incredible growth and organic with strong engagement. lots to love. thank you @gotoism. now i'd like to introduce one of our top finalist Patrykos$ welcome to the AMA this morning and thank you for creating a thoughtful and well crafted submission.

Patrykos$ : hello team! 🤘

Grady Teske : Patrykos$ on User Adoption: You clearly share our excitement for Nakamoto, and as an investor it is important to consider the ‘players’ and audience. Who do you believe Nakamoto Games core audience is and can you share your thoughts on their user adoption strategy, in particular engaging users potentially outside of this ‘core’ group?

Patrykos$: To answer this question I would divide the Nakamoto Games project audience into several smaller groups

players: this is the group that should be the driving horse of the whole project. They are the ones who build reach and are able to create positive PR through their love for games. At the moment the problem is the adoption of players from the classical world to the blockchain world. The barrier may be fees, technology or a wide fear of leaving the classic model of gaming. This is changing, but still very slowly, which is why I think Nakamoto can be a pioneer in this topic.

Imagine replicating the classic Steam platform, with such a mass of games and audiences but in the world of blockchain. It is possible, it just takes time and the right product in the form of quality games. At the moment, games on blockchain are largely very poor quality productions that are based on the purchase of NFT and speculation, which often ends in a loss of the player. This has to change and Nakamoto's platform has to cut out the speculative value of NFT and the requirement to purchase expensive items to start playing. Therefore, an important aspect is the introduction of free gaming options.

Another roadblock is also technology. The player has no desire to connect to the exchange, purchase tokens, and link the Metamask wallet. He wants to go to the site, click one button and play. This I believe needs to be streamlined but looking at the plans for the project and the desire to introduce fees in the form of FIAT or their own stablecoin may work. We need to give a clear message that from now on players can play their favorite games and collect items, trade them, earn money and have fun at the same time. That is, what they have done so far, but now with the option to multiply their funds.

Current games on the platform do not build a community around them because they are simply short and often not very engaging, but with the emergence of external projects this may change. The game needs to be interesting, addictive for hours and give the option to compete against an opponent. Naka Strike is a foretaste of that. It is also worth adding that currently players are blocked by the aspect of the possibility of losing their funds by losing games. This is normal in this model, but why not give them something in the form of "comfort". You could implement a drop system for items that players could collect, or give them the opportunity to participate in random ticket drops from time to time. In addition to the aspect of earning $ naka, there must also be a system that builds the willingness to play in the weaker ones in a small %, otherwise only a few best players will remain, without much demand from others.

investors: people who want to be in the project but not to play, but to invest their money in order to earn over time. Nakamoto here is moving away from the speculative function of NFT and land in the Nakaverse which in my opinion is positive in the long term. Investors can't just be people who put in their $ thinking that in a few months they will run away from the project and take the profit. Yes, they are here to earn money, but also to participate in the life of the project. An interesting solution would be the ability to lend your shares to third parties. For example: I have a lot of money but no time, so I lend my NFT to someone who has no money but has time to devote to the project. Such a mechanism would invite more investors but also Nakaverse users who could be employees for rent.

If we talk about Nakaverse as a place for investors a good solution would be to implement municipal functions: electing Nakaverse mayor and people in different positions to give them additional functions. So that they feel important and at the same time encouraged to live in this environment. By the way if Nakamoto is to build a place for other gaming projects then it is worth thinking about a model like $ATOM has for example, where some allocations in the form of aidrops are given for owning cryptocurrency. A small thing but increases loyality and the desire to be in possession of $Naka.

I also strongly believe in it, I know that we are at the beginning and the adoption is yet to come. and the last point that popped into my head

observers - people who neither play nor invest, but build a range. Who of us does not sometimes turn on something on Youtube or does not watch broadcasts of Esports events. Why not create a place for people who are only interested in following the actions of players. I believe that more broadcasts with UpOnly will be realized because it is a good direction along with betting on winners.

Michelle : The core focus is on marketing the available products. First, people have to realize that on Nakamoto Games you can come and get paid for playing games. On UpOnly you can join and make money as a spectator. All is available now, it’s not a vision for the future.

Grady Teske: thank you for the excellent insight. As the community can see Patrykos$ clearly has a mind for analytics and diligence. Pivoting for a moment over to the next criteria Competitor Research I'd like to introduce another finalist @ntan85.

@ntan85, You gave some very clear competitor research and comparisons, what do you believe is the standout for Nakamoto, where do you believe they are leading the charge? In contrast, where do you believe Nakamoto games has the most opportunity?

Nicola Tan : GM everyone, There are a lot of play 2 earn blockchain games in the gaming world. However, the high quality play 2 earn games are still under development (especially the 3D and VR kind) and Nakamoto is actually one of the few play 2 earn blockchain based games that is available right now to users. Nakamoto stands out not only by its ability to bring new games to the ecosystem in a short span of time but also being able to provide different kinds of games and styles under its umbrella for all kinds of players. There are games suited to some people who have good reflexes as well as some who have slower reflexes; and this provides a rich variety of games for every kind of player possible out there.

Grady Teske : True. #NAKAMOTO stands out to me because it's actually really fun and engaging! So many have yet to achieve the playability that just one of the $NAKA games offers

Nicola Tan : The beauty of Nakamoto is its own SDK (software development kit) which allows the game to attract independent developers to build games, thereby providing a variety of play2 earn options. Through SDK, the team is able to leverage on other developers in the P2E space. In doing so, the team doesn’t need to take on game developers just to crunch out new, fresh and captive games to its players. The reward pool is designed to incentivize these independent developers to participate in Nakamoto’s ecosystem.

Grady Teske : Exactly - scaling development through invitation, innovation comes from without and drives value within.

Nicola Tan : The key to continue to attract people is the availability and the freshness of the game, ie. Updates. They’re really important to keep people coming back for more. With the SDK and tokenomics, Nakamoto is expected to be coming up with new games on a timely basis.

The trick is to get blockchain games available to everyone, this may be a long shot but I believe Nakamoto Games may be able to get more opportunity by making the whole experience of “entering and playing the game” as seamless as possible!

which could be made available on an App in the future that is also connected to their social media channels. Such integration would allow the players a platform to share achievements and allow Nakamoto to showcase the top players and their earnings through their leaderboards. All of this might be able to entice people to join the game and try to get some earnings.

Grady Teske : What I love about web3 and particularly this community is the ideas that come from anyone, to drive projects forward. Not only does this community foster innovation. The #NAKAMOTO team clearly embraces and focuses on the innovation for value creation

Nicola Tank : This could boost Nakamoto’s reach and the public awareness of this game (through word of mouth, marketing campaigns, referrals system, influencers on their social media channels). I understand that this could be quite a stretch from an IT perspective and there would be certain rules to adhere to in order to be but if Nakamoto Games are available through Apple appstore or Google playstore on devices, Nakamoto may be able to tap into the non-crypto exposed phone users.

Grady Teske : WELL DONE @ntan85. @gotoism How do you feel this compares to your own analysis? Do you believe to have a direct competitor and how do you feel you differ?

Goto : I think there is an enormous addressable market and it remains largely untapped by blockchain gaming projects.

Grady Teske : so the idea of competition at this point actually drives all particpants to greater markets. Rising Tides Raises All Boats. love it

Goto : When we started out, we came with the vision of becoming the leading play-to-earn ecosystem in the blockchain gaming industry. We succeeded in delivering gamers with unprecedented optionality when it comes to blockchain gaming options, not to mention lucrative earning opportunities.

This is a significant market in its own right but we are now focused on broadening our applicable market by offering free-to-play gaming options where gamers worldwide can tap into blockchain gaming rewards without the need to connect a Web3 wallet.

Grady Teske : ecosystem doing the heavy lifting here, not just development but a space for the industry itself. Increased opportunity and competition but this drives for development to achieve the best they can! Thank you Nicola and Nakamoto team. Competition is always healthy and can often push projects to continue to be innovative and building!

Goto : Yes. Although blockchain projects are representing a growing share of this market, Nakamoto Games is bridging the gap between the traditional gaming industry and the blockchain industry by offering any online gamer anywhere in the world the opportunity to play and earn in a broad suite of blockchain games and SDK with third-party developers.

Speaking of building, it’s important to consider the team behind the project; To @gotoism or @NakamotoGamesTeam What do you believe is the secret ingredient behind the teams success, beyond your previous experience?

Goto : We have a full team of experienced professionals in their areas and everyone is passionate about crypto gaming. That's our core fundamental. We are fully transparent within the team and that carries on to the community as well. Dedication and passion is the key. And also resilience. We welcome creativity but that comes with being realistic too. We have mutual objectives to reach for NAKA.

Grady Teske : At this stage one of the greatest competitive advantages for a project is team. and evaluating team is an art. Past success alone isn't indicative of future success. Especially within blockchain projects, free thinkers, the daring and willing to execute drive projects from wild idea to in market growth.

@crypto_doi also dropped a well articulated review on the project. I'd like to ask you to join us on the topic of team. @crypto_doi, With the backing of the likes of Polygon, your review states that they are in a great position to avoid pitfalls. What other notable partners do you believe have strengthened their forecast? Team for projects is more than just developers and business managers

it's the open ear (and transalation) of community managers to embrace users. it's investors that help to network and support growth. At #Contango we always work to check in with projects to see where we can network and add value. it's early adopters and users driving development. we're all in this together

Cryptodoi : With the recent collaboration with Khon Kaen University and Naka arena, I feel like the Nakamoto Games is slowly integrating themselves into the lives of gamers through a non-intrusive lifestyle change.

The whole play-to-earn space is still in its early days and it’s certain that we’re still in the early adopters bell curve where the only people who are active in Nakamoto Games right now are only invesotrs and not so much on the gamers side

Through the courses of lecturing on blockchain in Khon Kaen university, Nakamoto Games is introducing the play-to-earn space in a non-intrusive manner where students can adopt play-to-earn games from Nakamoto Games in a safe enviroment that won’t lead to a ponzi scheme and leave negative connotations for the gamers

Although many investors do not see any differences in terms of price action for the things Nakamoto Games are doing with Thai universities, I for one sees this as an opportunity for Nakamoto Games long term growth where blockchain knowledges are being integrated into the student’s lives and will slowly adopt P2E gaming not just for a quick ponzi scheme bucks, but rather for a more sustainable play to earn profits

It’s just a matter of time when more and more adopters starts coming in through the vast ecosystem that Nakamoto Games is trying to build that we will start seeing the difference in number of players, which is the leading factor for Nakamoto Games success

Grady Teske : YESSS!! Team builds through cross networking. Finding audience and increasing buy in through partnering in out of the box relationships that are often overlooked

Cryptodoi : Obviously it won’t be something we’ll see within this year or maybe the next, but businesses that survive the market are the ones with a long term plan, and I see this collaboration as beneficial for Nakamoto Games’ future

Grady Teske : Projects that win always mantain the long vision but service the immediate needs as well.

Cryptodoi : Yes, the one thing that I don’t see from other projects is the tendency to go beyond what’s expected in the crypto space, and Nakamoto Games surely made a huge effort trying to integrate P2E into the lifes of the many rather than making effort to please in short term. Nakamoto games ALWAYS deliver EVERY SINGLE week

Grady Teske : @gotoism this is definitely an area where I see your sustained and developing roadmap as an advantage. Any further thoughts on your team and how it's changed, expanded? (everytime I come into this channel the $NAKA team is growing and expanding)

I want to take this moment to again remind everyone that today's AMA is a review of submissions from the #NAKAMOTO Diligence Bounty, created by Contango Digital We created this bounty series to increase crowdsourced diligence and showcase/find new voices or mindsets on analyzing projects. One thing that stood out is the % of submissions that came from within this very community.Thank you for that

Goto : Yes, I'd like to add from earlier point that besides introducing a new game. We evaluate the previous games' performance and quality too. We enabled single-player option for NAKA Strike when it was launched for multiplayer, always optimize gameplay. Creating interactive games, gauging the pulse of the market, taking feedback from our growing communities and developing games and solutions that catered to the needs and expectations of our users have been some of the most challenging yet rewarding aspects of our phenomenal roadmap growth. We have the plan laid out, adjust based on the market, users and community.

Grady Teske : We have one final participant to introduce and I would like to say thank you to @crypto_doi again for providing deeper insight into the project. Each participant had unique perspective and through the collective submissions we are able to see a strong vibrant project moving forward. I'd like to thank @king_isher as our last finalist joining us today

I think we can collectively agree that the criteria where Nakamoto has Truly excelled is their roadmap. @king_isher, We can certainly agree that Nakamoto Games blew their original roadmap out of the water, what do you believe their most impressive achievement is to date? What are you excited for most in their future developments?

Pruny : Quick thank you to the $NAKA and #Contango teams for the opportunity to join in this AMA and in the due diligence contest. Compared to the other finalists my answers are pretty short and as follows:

We know that crypto projects need to be constantly adapting to the environment, e.g. 1 month ago hardly anyone knew about move2earn and now it’s quickly becoming mainstream. Out of all the successes (e.g. original roadmap had 1 game scheduled for released in 2021, $NAKA released 6..), for me $NAKA’s most impressive success so far has been the $NAKAVERSE, as a reminder this wasn’t at all in the initial published roadmap… The team has come up with an original concept and launched public sales within a few months, an amazing achievement.

For the second question.. I’m a pretty lousy gamer (but fully enjoyed the $NAKASTRIKE tournament), I’m most anticipating the full $NAKAVERSE launch.. passive income is important and I’m excited to see how the team delivers on that.

Grady Teske : The beauty of the #NAKA project is that it provides excitement and value to gamers, whether world class or casuals. Now with the introduction of Nakaverse there are even more opportunities for particpants to enjoy without the time or skills as a leading gamer. Love it!

@mikecontango and @joshcontango When projects approach you for the first time you have to look at vision and team, but it all combines in their roadmap. How do you, as VC partners evaluate an early project's roadmap? BTW @mikecontango and @joshcontango are my partners in Contango Digital, a venture firm focused on driving adoption for the entire web3 ecosystem; particularly supportive of early stage projects.

@pruny one thing to add on diligence and analytics. Curation is a value, determining the right points to look at is more valuable for consideration than having a tremendous amount of data to sift through. Nice work!

Mike Grantis : Great question @GradyT, and thanks for moderating such a fantastic AMA. Roadmap is extremely important in our decision making process. We look for depth and detail in a roadmap. How precise can the team be with their deliverables? Do they have an understanding of their burn rate and how they will get from one stage to the next? Do they have a history of over or underperforming their expectations? Often times, the more detailed the roadmap, the better the founders know their business

Josh Contango : The roadmap has to to be ambitious but realistic. Technically its not just about roadmap. Its about deducing that the team will be able to execute on the roadmap. If those two things are present, you can be assured as an investor that the team will build exactly what they say they’ll build

Grady Teske : great answer, detail shows increased vision and hints at a plan to execute. just like my response to @king_isher above though curation of the RIGHT information to add on a roadmap is important. We suspect the #nakamoto team had stablecoins and metaverse in their vision all along, but shared an achievable road map while quietly buidling into further direction.

We're running down on time and I'd like to offer @joshcontango a second for insight as well. @joshcontango What is the conclusion of your due diligence now, with the hindsight of investment into $NAKA and the excellent analysis of our participants today?

and while @joshcontango is responding let me thank all participants into the #NAKAMOTO Diligence Bounty, by #Contango. We're going to announce the winner in a moment but I want to say each submission was excellent. When we thought up this opportunity we hoped to see the excellent analysis but we're blown away by the clarity and professionalism.

Josh Contango : The conclusion of my due diligence on Nakamoto Games when we initially invested was obviously quite good or we wouldn’t be here today.. lol. I saw an experienced team that had the right developers and advisors to pull off the roadmap. I loved the idea of creating a P2E ecosystem, and I trusted in the team to make that a reality. The tokenomics were on point, and they were able to onboard some great backers.

Mike Grantis : Exactly, this is also key as we enter bear market. Teams that outsource development are reliant on steady streams of income to pay their contractors. Nakamoto Games has an opportunity to leapfrog a lot of their competition while other projects go into hibernation mode. The real work gets done during the bear market

Grady Teske : The last thing you can anticipate but always hope for is a strong, engaging community. And all of you push this project to new heights. Thank you!

Goto : Thank you all for participating. I enjoyed your research analysis, recommendations. We will definitely implement where we can.

Grady Teske : We again, are honoured to have partnered with Nakamoto games- with no further delay we would like to announce the winner of the Diligence Bounty - @king_isher .

Congratulations , you have won an allocation of $2,000 USD worth of Naka tokens and a contract for (3) paid research articles each by #NAKAMOTO games and #Contango.

@Pruny your analyis was complete thorough and showed a great understanding of the opportunity. The Nakamoto Games team has excelled in the development and execution of their roadmap. What is one idea that you would like to suggest that may not have potentially been thought of or explored?

Pruny : I would like to see the Nakamoto Games team focus more on developing a mobile app version for the $NAKA games.

Why is that?

1. Mobile phones dominate market share in Asia (one key target market), with on average 66% of users being online through a mobile, and up to 76% in India. Mobiles are generally cheaper and more within budget to even those with lower income.

2. It is more practical to play games from your mobile, whether in bed or on the sofa or on the move, people are generally more likely to have access to their mobile (e.g. in their pocket) than their laptop/desktop/tablet.

3. Smartphones are becoming much more powerful and can compete with desktops/laptops for graphics and processing speed.

Mobiles will not currently replace desktops/laptops but they open up a new market segment. For some of the games such as $NAKA Runner, Candy Shop, Nakar, a mobile app would be ideal.

and probably a point 4.. we can enable a M2E feature

Grady Teske : Agreed - community led ideas like this will continue to drive $NAKA up with the lead of the excellent #NAKAMOTO team. thank you again to all participants but especially the #NAKA team for allowing us to explore their project in greater detail as they build to success.

I have to say the openness and wiligness of the team/community made this very enjoyable. so stay tuned in the community and keep playing... more to come?

Michelle : It’s a honor working with you guys. Everything been so perfectly organized. Friday we have a relevant news release.

Grady Teske : To @gotoism Any final thoughts here?

Goto : There are many things going on at the same time, and some of them tie in the growth plan asked earlier. For example, we partnered with Chainport to provide secure, cross-chain bridge services. With a sleek and intuitive user interface for providing cross-chain functionality for different tokens and blockchains, Chainport makes it easy to transfer assets between different blockchains and across different protocols, all in a safe, secure, and reliable manner. Our partnership with them will bring new services and Nakamoto Games titles and opportunities to millions of new users. This, in turn, helps in our project's growth. Exemplary marketing campaigns also play a huge role in our growth plan such as what we are doing here, tournament, holiday campaigns.

Grady Teske : Thank you again to all participants for your submissions! We’ve enjoyed this journey with Nakamoto games and look forward to seeing them reach new heights! and personally I really appreciated the opportunity to join multiple AMAs with this community. This is a true pleasure. TY!