Lol. I think you are missing the point, it is a symbiotic relationship and without the community backing, the product would have very likely struggled to make an impact. Literally, tens of millions of dollars from Hive directly have been poured into the game in various ways and that is highly unlikely to have happened if they had built elsewhere. At the time, Steem was pretty much the only blockchain (or forks of Steem) that would be able to handle what they did...
How are cryptokitties going btw?
So all these new Spl accounts being created and new users were from the Hive ecosystem?
This has nothing to do with how Splinterlands came to attract them in the first place, does it?
It has everything to do with a product that is attracting the money and users and not the blockchain. SPL for sure would have equal success on any other blockchain in todays environment. In 2018, no you are right, the options were limited. My argument is that Hive is stagnate and not contributing to any of SPL recent parabolic success. Agg is simply a brilliant sales man who teamed up with a brilliant dev who could help create his dream project. Hive blockchain was just a vessel, a well designed one albeit, but not responsible for SPL success.
It wasn't created in today's environment and, it would have to also compete in today's environment. Success is never guaranteed in business, specially startup gaming and blockchain business.
I think there is still plenty coming in through Hive. I don't know what you hold there, but I have only been in Splinterlands for four months.
Anyone who doesn't point to the community as a large part of the success of SL, is fooling themselves. It was the initial investment, the ongoing support, the PoC, the mass needed to attract additional investors... You really should go back and dig it up.
https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/steem-monsters/company_financials
Are you really implying that The millions of dollars pouring into splinterlands is not from outside investors and users from other blockchains and simply the existing Hive user base with their their bots?
Millions of dollars now are coming from outside - but without the millions from inside and the community support at the beginning, the new investors would have no Splinterlands to invest into.
This is the way businesses are built - they don't go global at the start, they are built at a local level with local community support.
Do you really not understand this?
I do not think millions was necessarily poured into it through the community before the ICO funding periods. Maybe I am wrong. But def tons of community involvement by highly talented people worldwide who made lots of sacrifices to get the project up and going.
Since it is mostly on chain, perhaps you should go back and look at what happened. Also, have a look at the the top holders of cards and the like.
https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/steem-monsters/company_financials
Go back on chain and see the first two years before the first funding round.
Is the market cap here from the Hive community or outside investors?https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/splinterlands/
What about here? Is all this money coming in from the Hive community or is it from outside investors and new users?https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/dark-energy-crystals/usd#panel
Ultimately, I respect your position. I am confused why futurethinker said you don't get support on Hive when in all actuality over the years I see your content well supported by the community. My argument is simply the freemium structure for SPL is not as big of a deal in SPL's success as you might think it does especially since SPL has this push and shove mentality pushing for big money investments into SPS and cards. They really are going hard towards the ETH crowd and in general big money investors.