HYTOPIA co-founder ArkDev has outlined an idea for what its team could build following the platform’s failure: a free-to-play exploration game combining Minecraft-style building, RuneScape character progression and a Path of Exile-inspired equipment economy.
The proposal is exploratory. ArkDev is asking whether people would play it and what they would change, rather than announcing a game with a production schedule or release date.
At its center would be a permanent, peaceful home world. Players would use this space to build, store possessions and craft equipment, creating a base that develops alongside their character.
Resources would come from expeditions into randomly generated worlds, reached through an NPC caravan guide. Each expedition would offer a 1024-by-1024 environment containing biomes, wildlife, caves, ruins and dungeons. Players would explore, collect materials and discover equipment before returning to the caravan to bring their finds home.
The central risk would be deciding when to leave. Dying would cost players everything collected during that expedition, but equipment brought into the world and skill progress would remain safe. Continuing deeper could yield better discoveries while putting the haul at risk.
That distinction would allow runs to have consequences without erasing the character’s longer-term development. Resources brought home would support construction and crafting, producing equipment that opens up more exploration and access to rarer materials.
Skills would improve through use, following RuneScape’s model, with mining, fishing, climbing and crafting among the examples. Each could reach level 99. Higher levels would improve abilities, including movement, survival, resource gathering and access to crafting recipes.
Equipment would add another layer of progression. Inspired by Path of Exile, items could carry random modifiers, such as increased climbing endurance or diving time. Players could discover equipment during expeditions or craft it and add bonuses using collected materials. Gear and resources could also be traded between players.
Alongside generated worlds, the team would create handcrafted dungeons and challenges. These would provide goals to prepare for, with encounters, rare loot and achievements rewarding stronger characters and better equipment.
The proposed game would support browser and mobile play, either solo or cooperatively with up to eight people. Players could bring the same character and equipment into sessions with friends.
The more focused proposal follows the learnings of the team’s original project NFT Worlds, which became HYTOPIA following Minecraft’s restrictions on blockchain, announced in July 2022.
However, HYTOPIA – a standalone platform, combining Minecraft’s visual style with a Roblox-like ecosystem of games made by outside developers – proved too complex and expensive to build and market, hence this new experimentation.