Rising Star has to be one of my most pleasant gaming surprises in recent times. When I first took a look at it I found it to be an okay game but I fully expected to forget about it in time. Two weeks later I still found myself playing the game on a regular basis. It's now been almost 6 weeks since I first started the game and to tell the truth, I got somewhat addicted. Rising Star became my go-to game whenever I'm doing something else. Writing an article for publish0x? Playing Rising Star on the side. Playing Splinterlands? Playing Rising Star on the side. Right now? Playing Rising Star on the side. So today I want to give you a little impression where Rising Star is standing in its development right now and what to expect in the coming weeks.

Haven't heard about Rising Star yet? Let me give you an introduction first! Rising Star puts you in the shoes of an aspiring musician that's dreaming of becoming the next big show some day. You start the game with nothing but your guitar and a desire to become famous. Since stardom (usually) doesn't happen overnight you have to slowly earn it with some first baby steps. Illegally perform in the streets until the cops drive you away or go to the open mic night and give it your best. Once you've gained some fans you start to give a radio interview or perform in the local shopping mall.

It's a classical idle browser game at its core. You send your alter ego on different missions which have varying requirements and take a different amount of time to complete. Afterwards you wait for the mission to finish, claim your reward and start the next mission. Missions pay out a random amount of Starbits which are used as the ingame currency. They can be used to buy different items directly from the game or from other players via their marketplace. They can also be traded for Hive and other tokens on Hive-Engine at a pretty decent rate. Recently the game also introduced booster packs containing 3 random cards each. I've found these to be the best way to grow your collection as most of the rarer cards are exclusively found in boosters and can't be bought from the game directly.

Your ability to go on more missions is dictated by the amount of energy available to you. The easiest mission takes you 15% of your total energy and every 5 minutes you regenerate 1% of your energy. This is where the fun begins. Every mission you have a chance to find different items like a discarded pizza slice or a coffee. The former will regenerate your energy back to 100% immediately, the latter will increase your passive energy regeneration for an hour. You can buy special items like pizza boxes or coffee cups that allow you to store what you find instead of using it on the spot. This way you gain more and more control over your energy regeneration until you reach a point where you will probably never run out of energy again. By now I've been going 11 days without ever having to wait for passive energy regeneration.

You now have a basic idea of what the game looks like. It's mostly about managing your energy and balancing out the missions you take. It's a relaxed game and it doesn't take long to get into. I also like the setting, fighting for stardom in the music business is a breath of fresh air for the genre and something I've never seen before in another blockchain game. There's more to the game than that though, so lets look a little deeper.

A feature I really enjoy is the Rising Star Radio. It's like a dynamic soundtrack generated as you play the game. Basically its a mix of songs and music specially made for the game and actual music by independent artists. The sound is top notch and I already found several artists I would probably have never heard of without the game. You might want to check out Raven, Billy Korg or Trenton Lundy for example. I'd strongly advise you to play the game with Rising Star Radio running. It makes it a lot more enjoyable and you're bound to find some music that you are really going to enjoy. Some of the artists featured are also actively working with the game and provide new songs, sounds and artwork for the game. Personally I feel like the Rising Star Radio provides a lot of flair to the game. Just think about it, you are listening to aspiring musicians while you play an aspiring musician trying to get famous - I simply love the concept.

There's another feature coming to Rising Star soon and that one could potentially be huge. So far you only play missions by yourself and slowly build your fame. This is all going to be changed with the introduction of the Battle of the Bands which is nothing less than the PvP mode for Rising Star. We are still in the earliest stages of that game mode but it could potentially become a very important part of the game.

The basic idea is to pit players against each other in a rock off. Both sides are presented with a certain challenge like the Acoustic Battle in the example above. They then have to choose the musician(s) and instrument(s) best suited for the task at hand and fight it out until one player wins the favor of the crowd. The implementation we have right now is more a proof of concept but I see great potential for future iterations. Just think about the possibilities - different kinds of battles in different locations for different crowds with differing band sizes. All obviously providing additional modifiers, objectives and restrictions. If it's done right I see myself spending a lot of time battling fellow rising stars.

I really enjoy playing Rising Star and I think you might too! If you join Rising Star using my referral link I'll send you a bonus of 1000 Starbits once you've finished your first 100 missions. You'll also get a free booster pack from the game once you hit that threshold and doing these missions is only going to take you 2-3 days. Joining the game is completely free as well so there really isn't much to loose if you find you don't enjoy it. Please let me know in the comments or hit me up on Discord once you've finished your 100th mission so I can send you the Starbits.

As always, thank you all for reading and please let me know in the comments what you think about the game. See you all next time!