Welcome to our 58th newsletter on Star Atlas! This weekly newsletter is published by Aephia Industries and focuses entirely on Star Atlas. Here we try to aggregate all the newsworthy tidbits that were dropped by the team throughout the past week.
As we rolled from the second into the third week of the Start Sequence campaign, ships offered by the team have remained on their shelves. This does not come as s surprise, as the team has been reducing the discounts week after week.
Like last week, all eyes are still set on the upcoming land sales, which now have gotten an official launch date of December 20th, and the SAGE Game Manual that is being worked on by Chip (Game Systems Designer) should go live a little earlier.
Another topic that kept people talking during the last week was the outcome of the Joni Award nominations. Given that official news more or less dried up, let’s start there!
Joni Awards
The Star Atlas Joni Awards are in full swing after the deadline to nominate people and projects ended last week on December 5th, and the committee shared the official (top 4) nominations for each category.
Voting opened on December 8th and will be open until December 14th. You can cast your votes here!
Nominations
Below are all the nominations for the 12 catagories.
Community Member of the Year:
- Metaverse Explorer
- Morpheus
- Signal
- Funcracker
Most Knowledgeable Community Member:
- JohnKeel
- Prometheus
- Funcracker
- Metaverse Explorer
Community Helper of the Year:
- Morpheus
- Metaverse Explorer
- Odvb
- Funcracker
Small Guild of the Year:
- Syntax
- Dark Matter
- The Unseen
- Scythe
Medium Guild of the Year:
- Heimdall
- Skull & Bones
- ROME
- Gargantua Industries
Large Guild of the Year:
- The Club
- Aephia
- Final Frontier
- Quimera
Best Guild Website:
Content Creator of the Year:
- Metaverse Nomads
- MetaVerse Explorer
- Morpheus
- Khal
Video of the Year:
- How to Play Star Atlas | FULL WALKTHROUGH | Buying SOL, Buying ATLAS, Buying Ships & Staking Ships
- On Mission for the MUD Faction
- Star Atlas Copa Event - Coexist Game Video
- J33VES the Robot Music video - Motion Capture Dancing
Meme of the Year:
Community-Created Project of the Year:
- COEXIST Fan-made Showroom
- Redspatula.io
- The Club Pitstop
- Tufa Attack
Favorite Solana Project:
- Jupiter
- Phantom
- Step Finance
- Magic Eden
Award Show
The Joni Awards buzz will peak on Friday, the 16th of December, with the team hosting a live show during which the winners will be announced. This show will start at 17:00 UTC and will take place on the Star Atlas Discord server. It will also feature several guest speakers, three of which have been announced on Twitter:
The Star Atlas #JoniAwards is less than a week away, and we’re excited to announce that the LEGENDARY @jblsolg, General Manager of Games at @SolanaFndn, will join us! 🚀 https://t.co/bVf3DPYE9L
We are happy to announce the second #JoniAwards guest speaker, @JustinBarlow from @SolanaVentures. He will join us on December 16 to celebrate everything #StarAtlas, especially our community! 💫
Don’t forget to vote until December 14! 🗳️ 👉 https://t.co/phCbTMQoPK https://t.co/VWhJBOmURD
Our third and final guest for the upcoming #JoniAwards is the Head of Developer Ecosystem at @SolanaFndn, @therealchaseeb 🚀
Join us on Dec 16 for a day of celebration and recognition of our INCREDIBLE community! 💫
Get your votes in before Dec 14! 🗳 https://t.co/Dmxz1A2beq https://t.co/aabUtZWpqe
On that same Friday, possibly as part of this show, though that has not been confirmed, the team will also host a new Townhall on their Discord.
CORE - Issue 2
Last Wednesday, December 7th, the second issue of the CORE Graphic Novel was published on both Magic Eden and the Galactic Marketplace. Like last time, both platforms offer their own unique collectible cover.
The issue is being sold at 1.5 SOL over at Magic Eden, roughly the equivalent of $20. As we suggested during our previous newsletter, the team has decided to offer start offering this new issue for 20 USDC on the Galactic Marketplace instead of its ATLAS equivalent.
Like always, the new issue can be read for free via most big e-book publishers (such as Apple).
News Tibits
DAO
The team has launched an update for their DAO portal that came with the following features:
- Interface updates
- Bug fixes
- Dark Mode
Other
- The team will go on a holiday break on December 21st.
- Leaderboards for R2 won’t be on-chain, meaning the UE5 experience will remain playable without requiring any Solana transactions (costing SOL)
- You will be able to name fleets in SAGE. These names won’t be unique, so that multiple players can have similarly named fleets.