Public Chain Research Series: The Development and Upgrade Path of Ethereum

Ethereum, as a pioneer of blockchain and smart contract technology, has been leading the industry's development since its inception. This article will review the development history of Ethereum, explore its performance in the field of blockchain gaming, and provide an in-depth analysis of the Ethereum 2.0 upgrade plan.

1. The Origin and Development of Ethereum

At the end of 2013, Vitalik Buterin released the Ethereum white paper, marking the beginning of a new era for smart contract platforms. In 2014, the ICO was launched, raising 18 million USD. In July 2015, Ethereum officially released the Frontier version.

2016 was a turbulent year for Ethereum. The Homestead upgrade was launched in March, improving stability and security. The DAO incident occurred in May-June, leading to a hard fork, splitting into Ethereum (ETH) and Ethereum Classic (ETC).

2017 was the year of prosperity for Ethereum. The Ethereum Enterprise Alliance was established, attracting many well-known companies to join. In October, the Metropolis Byzantium upgrade was completed, improving privacy protection and smart contract security. At the same time, the ICO boom swept in, and the price of Ethereum soared.

At the beginning of 2018, the cryptocurrency market experienced a significant downturn, but the development of Ethereum 2.0 made progress, confirming the transition from PoW to PoS. That same year, the DeFi ecosystem began to rise.

In 2019, Ethereum continued to innovate. The Ethereum 2.0 project made significant progress with the launch of the Beacon Chain. The DeFi ecosystem experienced explosive growth, attracting a large influx of funds.

2. The Rise of Ethereum-based Blockchain Games

Multiple phenomenal chain game projects have emerged on Ethereum:

• CryptoKitties(2017): The first popular NFT game that caused network congestion.
• Gods Unchained(2018): a "Hearthstone"-like card game
• Axie Infinity(2018): A representative work of the P2E model, with a peak monthly revenue exceeding 300 million USD.
• Decentraland(2020): a metaverse concept game, a virtual land trading platform

These games bring innovations such as true ownership, scarcity, and economic ecosystems, but also face scalability issues.

3. Ethereum 2.0 Upgrade Plan

Ethereum 2.0 aims to address issues of scalability, decentralization, and security, mainly including:

1. Shard Chain: Improve transaction efficiency and scalability
2. Proof of Stake ( PoS ): Reduce energy consumption and improve decentralization.
3. Beacon Chain and Casper Mechanism: Enhancing Security

The upgrade roadmap includes six phases: The Merge, The Surge, The Scourge, The Verge, The Purge, and The Splurge.

The Merge was completed in 2022, achieving the transition from PoW to PoS. The Surge will enhance scalability through Danksharding. The Scourge aims to mitigate MEV centralization. The Verge will introduce Verkle Trie to simplify validation. The Purge will clean up historical data. The Splurge includes miscellaneous upgrades such as account abstraction.

Summary

The Ethereum 2.0 upgrade will significantly enhance network performance, security, and innovation potential, but it also faces technical and ecological challenges. With the advancement of the upgrade and the development of Layer 2 solutions, Ethereum is expected to achieve a more powerful and efficient ecosystem, bringing new opportunities to the blockchain and GameFi industries.