Guardian of the Week — Edition #15 Meet ‘Fries’
Welcome to Edition #15 of the ‘Guardian of The Week’ series!
This is our way of acknowledging and celebrating all the contributions, love and hard work you have all given to this family 🖤
We appreciate every one of you, and we hope this series gives you an insight into the brilliant people that make this community what it is!
In this edition, we honour Fries— An OG member of the Guild of Guardian’s Discord from day one. A real OG! Let us introduce you to our Guardian of the Week, Fries!
Tell us something about yourself and how you got your Discord handle, Fries.
My nickname, Fries, evolved from my nickname, Potato, from my counter-strike days. I was in a clan of vegetable names, and the potato comes from couch potato. When I played a game called lords mobile, a city-building MMO game, I had a few accounts that were food products of potatoes like mashed potatoes, fries, baked potatoes, etc. Fries is my main account. I guess it stuck partly because it’s easy to remember, and it’s an excellent icebreaker to start a conversation with people since it’s primarily people’s favourite food.
My real name is Frans. I’m a 3rd generation Chinese Indonesian. My grandfather migrated from Xiamen in southern China in the early 1940s to escape poverty and find a better life in Indonesia. He started by selling construction materials and tools, then moved on to producing condiments when he saw an opportunity in the field. I graduated in food science and technology from the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney, Australia. The same alma mater as Derek, Ryan and Howie.
I helped out in the family business straight out of university, like a typical Asian household. I usually go scuba diving when I’m not helping in the family business. I have a rescue diver certificate from PADI (professional association of diving instructors) and love to discover the underwater scenery and fauna in different parts of Indonesia. I also enjoyed snowboarding when I was in Australia and when I tried Japan’s powder snow, I was hooked! Unfortunately, all this adventure has to be put on hold since the birth of my fraternal twins (boy-girl twins). Hopefully, when the pandemic is officially declared endemic in most countries, and they are fully vaccinated, I can introduce them to these sports.
How did you get into crypto, and how have you come to know Guild of Guardians?
I heard about Bitcoin in 2012-ish but only got into crypto in early 2021 when I saw an influencer shilling about BNB coin. I started investing a bit into BNB, and once it took off, I never looked back. I consider myself a hard-core gamer, and my research led me to Axie Infinity before it became popular in March 2021. From there, I found out about YGG. And from YGG’s discord server, I discovered GOG. It was pretty funny back then in the early days when only Nick and Derek were there. People thought the project was dead because there was not much chatter on the server.
You have been known to translate some GOG infographics into Indonesian. What drove the passion that made you start this initiative?
When I started in Guild of Guardians, there wasn’t much information/content regarding the project regarding gaming content. Most of them were just about the monetary rewards or ROI. At the other end of the spectrum, the white paper was aimed at crypto natives, with the technical terms and jargon which might turn non-crypto gamers who only want to play the game for enjoyment off. Therefore, I recognised the need to bridge the information gap for those groups. My purpose is to bridge the gap by translating the already available infographics made by Firebolt into the Indonesian language. I am thankful for the opportunity to translate the infographics by Firebolt, which deliver information in a short, concise, comprehensive, and beautiful format. The infographics help immensely in both my job as a translator and the reader to understand the vast and complex information about the world of GOG.
The initiative was also started to encourage the adoption of Play-and-Earn since I have observed the economic impact they bring in developing countries. As you know, last year, during the height of those play-and-earn games such as Axie Infinity, many people made it their primary source of income with better working hours and better pay than their regular jobs. With more information and content available in the Indonesian language, hopefully, GOG’s adoption in the Indonesian community will be much easier and effortless.
Guild of Guardians’ development as a project is steadily mounting. Where do you think GOG is heading a few years from now?
I think GOG will be one of those games that will stay long-term for several reasons. It will be the first of the few mobile play-and-earn, AAA-quality games in the dungeon-explorer genre. It will have the first mover’s advantage. Also, because it is free to play, I think millions of people will play it. Furthermore, the partnership collaboration with the significant esports teams will bring a change of scenery in the esport environment initiated by GOG.
In the long-term goal, just like the team said, it will merge into mainstream players and be called just “games” and not “crypto games” anymore. I am very optimistic that we will see GOG evolve into something big, and I’m so excited about its future.
Exciting milestones are cohesively being accomplished. What are your thoughts about them?
I am very bullish on GOG as a project compared to other web3 games so far. GOG has been one of those projects that have always been transparent with their work progress during this bear period. In contrast, most of the other projects I follow have been put on hold for an unknown period, or some have even been aborted.
Looking at the roadmap, I am very optimistic about the grand goals the team aims for since, from my experience, the team always tries to underpromise but over-deliver.
Now with more than 800k pre-registered accounts. A lot of new players are flooding our Discord server. What advice can you give to our new incoming members?
Don’t be shy to ask questions when you don’t understand something. Indeed, members in discord and moderators will be happy to help you answer your questions. Or maybe, if you are lucky, Ryan, our Community Manager, will answer it personally. Hopefully, the new members will see how welcoming and fun the Discord community is.
Where can we contact you?
In discord, my username is fries#8171, or on Twitter @friesgaming8171
