BYM

**Backyard Monsters** (also known as **Backyard Terror** and commonly shortened to **BYM**) was originally a competitive grand strategy game launched on the social network Facebook centuries before the Unification. During several centuries of existence, the game became so significant that it's in-game resources became usable as real currency, and played a major role in the black market during the early Dark Ages. Ultimately, the game itself did not play as great a role as it's currency, which became synonymous with the term *BYM*.

## Game content

The game consisted of a playing field known as a *yard*, with each player possessing a single one. In this yard, players would build resource-gathering machines that would generate resources over time. These resources would be used to build *monsters*, that were used to attack enemy yards, and *towers*, that were used to defend one's yard from enemy attack. Attacking a players yard and destroying their resource harvesters resulted in the gain (i.e. theft) of resources form that player. The game also contained *outposts*, which players used as colonies of their main yard in order to generate more and more resources. Unlike yards, outposts could be taken over in their entirety by one player from another. In addition to resources, the game also included an in-game currency known as *shiny*, which could be used to purchase various decorations, boosts and various other utilities. The currency was generated at a slow rate within each player's yard and outposts.

## History

Backyard Monsters was created by the company Kixeye as a social game for Facebook. Less than a decade after it's creation, Backyard Monsters fell into disuse and was largely abandoned. However, saved player data from numerous accounts remained on Facebook before being reclaimed by former Kixeye shareholders after the collapse of the company some decades later.

BYM was re-released as a peer-to-peer system, functioning in a manner similar to bitcoin, with all player data being backed up by numerous peers. This system largely protected the game against hacking. After regaining popularity, BYM became a staple in grand strategy, with no central authority. By 200BU, the game had amassed over one billion accounts, and the game became so internationally relevant, that in-game material began to be used as real-world currency. In fact, *two* currencies ultimately emerged from BYM: A *resource* currency (known colloquially as *BYM*) and *Shiny*. By 100BU, the game became synonymous with underworld trading, at times being viewed as more reliable than many more common cryptocurrencies in circulation at that time.

Although much of it's data was lost during the Century War, Backyard Monsters as a whole survived as a game until after the Great Unification. During the Dark Ages, the Averte Statum attempted to purchase large numbers of BYM accounts in an attempt to control it's share of the underground market. However, these attempts were met with great resistance, with huge numbers of account holders attacking government owned yards, and players refusing to trade with government agents.

The importance of BYM waned in the late Dark Ages as more and more accounts were either destroyed or seized by the World Empire. At the end of the Dark Ages, surviving BYM accounts were sold back to investors and enthusiasts. As many formerly repressed goods, services and practices became legal under the World Republic, restricted local currencies replaced by the Credits. By the second century AU, the oldest BYM accounts were over 500 years old.