Getting Started with Initia: A New L1 for Appchains

I'm a big fan of onchain games, which is how I found Kamigotchi. It's a fully onchain MMORPG, and I think it's one of the most promising and charming titles in crypto's gaming scene today.

In following Kamigotchi, I learned the project was launching its own virtual world appchain, Yominet, on Initia. Admittedly, that was the first time I'd ever heard of Initia.

Fast forward to the present, and Initia's mainnet is freshly launched, its INIT token is deployed, and its first appchains are gaining steam. If you're looking to explore a new ecosystem, it's worth getting caught up on the basics here.

🪢 What is Initia?

Built using the Cosmos SDK and leveraging Celestia for data availability, Initia is a newly launched Layer 1 designed to make building and running Layer 2 rollups streamlined and more interconnected.

At the core of Initia is its Interwoven Stack: a fully integrated toolkit that bundles together all the common services that L2s need, like bridges, explorers, liquidity hubs, and oracle feeds. Everything fits together out of the box.

The idea is to reduce fragmentation without sacrificing flexibility. Developers can still customize things like their rollup’s virtual machine (EVM, MoveVM, or CosmWasm), gas tokens, and fee structures. But under the hood, every rollup still shares a common set of standards and rails, making crosschain activity much simpler.

The Initia L1 itself acts as the central hub for the ecosystem, coordinating liquidity, governance, and security across its appchains. It offers a native decentralized exchange, InitiaDEX, and also a built-in incentive system, the Vested Interest Program (VIP), which rewards both rollups and users with $INIT tokens based on certain achievements.

The grand vision here is that a tighter, opinionated chain stack will foster deeper network effects and better value accrual over time.

🧭 How to use Initia

If you're interested in exploring Initia, it's easy to get started.

First, head to app.initia.xyz/onboarding and connect a popular wallet like MetaMask, Rabby, Rainbow, Keplr, or Phantom. Doing this will let you generate your account on the Initia L1.

Next up, the onboarding flow will bring you to a deposit interface so you can fund your Initia account. Keep in mind that Initia accepts either INIT or USDC as gas tokens, so depositing either will suffice to proceed.

At this point, you can deposit $INIT from a centralized exchange like Binance, or you can acquire $INIT on a DEX like Osmosis and use the Initia Bridge to deposit from there. You can also use this bridge to deposit USDC from chains like Ethereum, Arbitrum, Base, Celestia, Osmosis, etc.

If you just have ETH and want to keep bridging simple, you can use an external service like Gas.zip to automatically convert ETH deposits into INIT once they hit your Initia account.

After your wallet is funded, the onboarding flow will give you the option to register an Initia username, which is like Initia’s version of ENS domains. You can skip this step, or search for a name you want. The cheapest names go for 10 INIT a year, roughly $10 at current prices.

With your wallet all set up, you'll be ready to dive into the Initia ecosystem. Now, time for some appchains.

If you're not sure where to begin here, projects that are part of Initia's VIP program are a good starting point. This program is a rewards system that distributes esINIT—an escrowed version of INIT—on a recurring basis.

In this system, each participating appchain defines its own scoring system to reward meaningful user actions, like staking, trading, gaming, minting NFTs, etc.

These rewards are escrowed, meaning they can’t be transferred immediately. To unlock them, you must either maintain ongoing participation or convert them into a long-term LP staking position via Initia DEX.

The next distribution here is set for May 8, with over 550,000 esINIT up for grabs across projects like:

• 👾 Yominet — Kamigotchi's gaming world | VIP Task: Harvest and burn VIP tickets in-game
• 🌌 MilkyWay — A liquid staking hub | VIP Task: Bridge INIT to MilkyWay and stake there
• 🌇 Civitia — Onchain city-builder | VIP Task: Accrue SILVER through in-game activity
• 🎉 Zaar — A fun, degen L2 | VIP Task: Play "Flip," stake tokens, or trade via Sudoswap
• 🪙 Echelon — A lending protocol | VIP Task: Supply or borrow assets
• 📈 Rave — Perps trading platform | VIP Task: Bet on BTC, ETH, or SOL
• 🛒 Intergaze — NFT launchpad and marketplace | VIP Task: Mint or trade NFTs

Keep in mind, these projects all have varying commission rates on their VIP rewards.

For example, Kamigotchi's Yominet is currently the only appchain here that takes 0% commission, so all its rewards go to its players. Something to think about as you decide where you want to explore on Initia!