Do you love Cryptos? Do you love kitties? Then how about CryptoKitties!#1

Hello Friends

As many of you already know, CryptoKitties is the latest viral Dapp (Decentralized app) on the internet. It is basically a Neopets, Beanie Bunnies like multiplayer pet game, where you can collect, breed and trade your kitties. In essence:

CryptoKitties =(collect + breed + trade unique digital kitties) * ETH blockchain

The game was launched on 28th November 2017 and since then it has gone instant viral. Right now the traffic is majorly coming from the West, but as soon as Asian countries jump into this, its growth is going to be even more tremendous. 

In the first few days, CryptoKitties was responsible for more than 25% of the ETH network transactions and the gas costs reached to shocking 60 GWEI for standard speed transfers. Things were pretty fast with 2 Gwei also before the launch of CryptoKitties. So you can just imagine from that how much pressure these kitties exerted on the ETH network!

Kitties jammed the whole ETH blockchain!! #2

Many people actually tried to bring CryptoKitties in the negative light as gas costs had increased and the time to scale ETH had come! People were losing money on their trades and were obviously angry.  But they didn't realize that the actual value of any crypto-currency comes from the large scale adoption. I am sure in the coming year, ETH will be the currency to HODL and not Bitcoin. Although EOS can also win, in case ETH does not scale. 

Me and CryptoKitties:

I actually came in contact with CryptoKitties via Twitter, which I have just started using. I joined within the two days of the game launch and can call myself as an early kitty adopter! I invested around $200 worth of ETH and since then just breeding and trying to get rarer cats. I already got 2 fancy cats - 1 pirate and 1 duck cat. Fancy cats are very rare kitties that are dressed in a non-kitty way, like Dracula, pirate, diamond etc. The diamond one (Genesis) is the rarest one, being only 1 in the market and 1 player actually spent 250 ETH (approx. $125,000) to buy it!!

The most expensive and rare cat in CryptoKitties!

The market is a bit slow right now, but I am certain that it will bounce back again. The devs are daily adding new features to make the game more fun, accessible and easier to use.

How to play CryptoKitties:

To play this game I would recommend a PC with internet connection. The reason being, it is much easier to play CryptoKitties on it and to troubleshoot issues, in case you encounter some. But if you don't have a PC, then you can download Toshi App (Android or iPhone). This app will allow you to play CryptoKitties on your smartphone or tablet. Just yesterday only, Toshi and CryptoKitties released this feature. Or you can also play this game on new ETH browser for mobile called cipher

Another thing to note is that every transaction in CryptoKitties costs you ETH fees, be it breeding, selling, buying, gifting etc. Except for the breeding fees, all other fees just go to the miners. 

Steps to play the game:

1) First of all, you need a browser add-on called Metamask (not required for the Toshi app), which allows you to interact with ETH Dapps. Normal browsers don't have the ability to send or receive the ETH or its tokens. But with Metamask you can do that and it also acts as an account on any ETH Dapp. You can download the add-on here: https://metamask.io/. Just make sure to download it from this site only as there are some scam sites out there with a similar name. 

2) Install the add-on as per your browser. After that, click the Metamask add-on in your browser and follow the steps to create a new account. Save the seed phrase and private keys on your pen drive or paper. Don't forget this step because if you lose your seed phrase, then you lose everything.

3) Now head to https://www.cryptokitties.co/ and click on sign in. Enter your email address and a name and you are ready to enter in the CryptoKitty world. Please know that email and name are just for the notifications. If you wish you can just enter random email and username also. Your account is mainly the Metamask account itself, with its ETH address acting as username.

4) In order to use the CryptoKitty site, you would need some funds in your Metamask wallet. Those funds will be mainly used for the gas fees and for breeding fees, which changes according to the traffic. Right now it is 0.008 ETH per breeding session.

Hmm, cats giving eggs! Interesting!!

5) After that you can buy your first few kitties and start breeding. You will get 1 new kitty per pair of kitties. If you are lucky you may also get kitties with rare traits or even fancy kitties! I have myself got 5 fancy and many rare kitties this way. Do note that every time you breed a kitty, its cooldown time increases; which basically means you can't mass produce kitties and flood the market. This cooldown time will go down until your kitty becomes a Catatonic kitty, which means only 1 breeding session per week for that kitty! 

6) Then if you feel you can either sell you kitties or just hold them. After all, they are your own kitties with unique designs/features and will live forever on the ETH blockchain, until the zombie uprising begins! I am myself holding lots and lots of kitties!!

Some common issues and their solutions while using CryptoKitties:

Since many of us are limited to using cryptos for trading or some Dapps like Steemit, which do not require any extra add-ons etc; this game might seem a bit confusing in the starting. But eventually, you will figure it out. When non-crypto users can, why not you!

1) Pending transaction is the biggest issue that players face. The reason of a pending transaction is that there are already many transactions pending to be verified on the ETH blockchain and if your gas price is lower than recommended, then it will remain pending for a long time, up to some days also. So before making any transaction on CryptoKitties, do check the standard or safe gas price on https://ethgasstation.info/. The value on top is what you should enter in the GWEI section of Metamask popup for the transaction. The gas limit can be limited to 200000 per transaction or lower if it's by default. 

Also, you can change the default node on Metamask to https://mainnet.infura.io/ in the settings section. Or better, download Parity and host your own node. Although be prepared to download lots and lots of data if you want to host your node. It takes a long time to sync, even with a fast internet connection. If you download Parity and its completely synced, then just change the Metamask node to  "Local Host 8545". Now you are ready for even faster transactions. 

But in case you have sent a transaction with a low gas price, and it has been pending for many hours, then you can resend that transaction using Metamask's dashboard option of sending the transaction with higher fees.

2) Transaction failed even before starting. This also happens because of the low gas price.

3) Transaction not found. This happens when there are a lot of pending transactions. This solves on its own. You can speed up things by using your own node.

4) Transaction successful on Etherscan but not reflecting on CryptoKitties. This issue also resolves on its own. It mainly happens due to the large number of transactions happening on CryptoKitty. If your transaction shows success on Etherscan, then it will eventually show on CryptoKitty also. You can also try clearing your browser cache, re-enable Metamask add-on and see if the issue persists. But beware that clearing browser cache will also delete your activity history on CryptoKitties!! 

Some tips:

There are some tips which can help you get more out of CryptoKitties.

1) Buying lower generation cats and breeding them leads to new cats with faster cooldown times. So if you see cheap 0,1 or 2 gen cats, don't miss them! Although, Gen 0 cats are far from the reach of most players as they usually cost 1+ ETH.  

2) Breeding cats with similar cattributes increase the chances of getting those cattributes passed to new kitties. This can be especially useful if you want to generate cats with specific attributes. For example, if you want a fancy Santa cat, then the easiest way is to breed 2 Santa cats together!

3) To find which of the cattributes are rare currently, you can use this kittyexplorer. At the bottom of the page, you can find which cattributes are rare currently. 

4) If you get a cat with a rare attribute, make sure to click that attribute and set the filter to "cheapest". This will help you know the worth of that cattribute. So basically don't blindly sell your cats, first see how much they are worth. Or you might end up selling a 10 ETH cat for 0.01!!

5) To know about which kind of kitty is currently selling more and at what price, you can check this http://www.kittyexplorer.com/prices/. 

Massive CryptoKitty Giveaway Contest announcement:

Within 2 days of this post, I am going to start a CryptoKitty giveaway contest on Steemit!! More details will follow in that article. But be assured, it will be a big giveaway!

So now you know more about CryptoKitties and its craze, make sure to check it out. And do mention your experience in the comments section!!

        

Thanking You

Siddartha Gupta

Image Courtesy:  1, 2. All other images have been taken from CryptoKitty website and other social media links.

Page dividers and above art by @aleister

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