In real life, Alamo Square is a quaint area in District 5 of San Francisco. Other areas that comprise this district are Inner Sunset, Japantown and Haight Ashbury. It’s most notable and Instagrammable landmark is the row of Victorian houses known as the ‘Painted Ladies’ located on Steiner Street and overlooking the park, imaginatively named ‘Alamo Square Park’.

In Upland, Alamo Square sold out on 8th of June 2020 amidst a flurry of minting activity, you could see the properties changing colour before your eyes! The reason? Have a read of the Property and Business Roadmap (extract below) where it was announced that there is a possibility of new collections spawning in well-developed communities.

Developing Neighborhoods

Each neighborhood in the city will have a development rating: a score given to a neighborhood that is based on a combination of the number of developed properties and their quality (elements that affect the quality of development include size, residents associated, supplemental items, number of businesses, and so on). Once a neighborhood has reached a certain development rating, it will automatically spawn a collection for that neighborhood (if one does not yet exist) and further advancement in the development rating will lead to an increase in the collection boost. For newly spawned neighborhood collections, elements such as level, one-time reward, and earnings boost will be automatically determined by a combination of market value and total availability of properties in the neighborhood.

It wasn’t just this announcement though, this neighbourhood has been months in the making. In early April, an Uplander named Choyna had an idea.

“I had an idea that Uplanders could collaborate as communities to develop neighborhoods that weren't included in existing Collections. I scouted what I thought to be the ideal location, Alamo Square. This neighborhood is centrally located in 'The Heart of Upland', is a great size for development, has a park located in the center for community ownership, includes the famous Painted Ladies and is an ultra-desirable neighborhood in real life.”

He discussed the idea with ThankMeLater and they started to spread the word about their plans, inviting players that they thought would buy into the idea. Properties started getting snapped up, especially the ones facing the park – players love a park facing property. This ‘community’ began to grow with more people getting involved, discussing future proposals and spreading the word further. This involved a mention on TML’s blog on 21st April and on the Bad Crypto Podcast (those unfamiliar with this, you may have noticed a couple of block explorers of faces with a red ‘B’. That’s the hosts, Joel and Travis). You can see what Alamo Square looked like on 20th April on TML’s image below, sold out less than 2 months later!

I must admit, I heard something about Alamo Square around the time but I was still fairly new in the game. I had a look at the Square and thought they were just talking about the park. I saw all the properties surrounding it were sold so didn’t bother with anything at the time but bought one in the area later on. As soon as the Roadmap was announced, I made sure I bought 3 more to ensure I have enough if it makes it to Community Collection status and plan to make it my primary residence by building and developing once we can. I have to say, I’m pretty excited to see how it progresses. Choyna has sent surveys around owners of addresses in the area so we can all have a say in the next steps and what we want for the area.

Choyna has also discussed plans with Dirk and Idan (the founders of Upland for those that don’t know), presenting them with a paper around Upland Communities which included details around Alamo Square amongst other things. Was this what prompted the idea of new Community Collections? Quite possibly! That’s another great thing about Upland in Beta – it evolves with player input as it progresses. Imagine saying your idea became a reality in a Blockchain game, that can happen with Upland. Make that reality happen, use this link and receive a 50% bonus on your first purchase - https://discover.upland.me/ukuplander

The next big idea after development is to purchase the park as a community once that is available, not cheap at 1.9 million UPX but would make a great community project. Whatever happens, this promises to be very exciting.

Upland Contributor Network

In other exciting news, the UCN launched officially this week on the 1st of July starting with Broadcasters (other categories will be introduced later). According to the recent Medium post:

Broadcasters are Uplanders who are creating content: articles, blogs, videos, podcasts, etc. You name it! These contributors do an excellent job of accomplishing several goals that attract new Uplanders and encourage them to stay. Those include:

• Informing new players and providing content such as walkthroughs, tutorials, tips, and general news.
• Spreading the word internationally, with localized or other interested communities.
• Making Upland more fun for example via unofficial competitions or by sharing unique creations with Upland’s upcoming builder tools.

The official list so far is as follows:

• Myself (Gawbie)
• ThankMeLater
• LeftHouse
• Bdag
• junjunpnoy57
• Nik
• TheMarketLlama
• Turbo, and
• ZHIDALGOKIDZ

I'm looking forward to seeing what the guys produce! Comment below if you have any ideas of things you want to see.

I’ve mentioned in previous posts how important I think the community is for this game. The players involved are really helpful and willing to help people progress. Check out the Discord server Here.

Further links:

Keep an eye on the dedicated Alamo Square website for when things are added - https://alamosquare.me/

The Upland Action News’s YouTube channel

Promises to be a lot of fun, watch out for yours truly possibly making an appearance in the near future https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCN45ZeLq9Btw0X0WOamWtcA

ThankMeLater’s website

Hot off the press, a one stop shop of UCN links https://upland.guru/

Upland Central's YouTube channel

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCK4Q70mXQKtlPxSXCS-4DXw 

Tutorial and Treasure Hunt videos are good.

Comment below if you have any questions.

Thanks all and I hope you enjoyed reading! 

Gawbie.

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