Solana launches Layer 2? How will the Sonic testnet impact the ecosystem?

The MirrorWorld team, which previously built the Solana Web3 game infrastructure, announced the launch of the Solana Layer2 - Sonic testnet this week. What is Sonic? Why is Solana, which is known for its single-chain architecture, also starting to introduce Rollups? What impact will this have on the ecosystem?

Solana to Launch Layer2 Network

The MirrorWorld team, responsible for building the gaming infrastructure on Solana, announced in the first quarter of this year that they would be launching a Layer2 network on Solana called Sonic. This week, the team officially released the Sonic testnet and related marketing activities.

Sonic Becomes First SVM Layer2

With the launch of Sonic in the Solana ecosystem, the community has begun to consider the possibility and necessity of Solana Layer2. Discussions on this topic have arisen from various network congestion and downtime incidents in the past, leading to the birth of the Sonic project.

Why have transactions on Solana been failing frequently and experiencing congestion recently?

Executing transactions on the Sonic network, similar to Ethereum Layer2, allows project teams and users to operate directly based on Solana Layer1 accounts and liquidity without the need to redeploy and configure programs and accounts on Solana.

Unlike Layer2 in the Ethereum ecosystem, Sonic is the first modular SVM Solana virtual machine network, enabling high-performance gaming applications on Solana while enjoying the security of the Solana network to enhance player gaming experiences and provide customizable network settings for specific games or applications.

In addition, Sonic provides native integration tools for payments and settlements, as well as development kits for building Web3 games.

Sonic Built on HyperGrid Stack

Sonic is the first Layer2 built using HyperGrid technology stack. HyperGrid is an extension mechanism developed by the Mirror World team for the Solana blockchain, based on the framework developed by CosmosSDK.

HyperGrid allows developers in the Solana ecosystem to quickly build network frameworks and, similar to the Superchain design in the OP Stack ecosystem, share sorter designs for efficient interaction between different subnetworks Grid while maintaining the autonomy of each network. It is anchored on the Solana mainnet to achieve consensus and finality, ensuring atomic interoperability of transactions.

Inheriting the design principles of CosmosSDK, HyperGrid introduces customizability, scalability, advanced data types, and can be integrated with Solana natively. Networks built on it can customize network settings, for example, Sonic chooses to use SVM, while other networks may choose EVM, providing flexibility for development teams and maximizing potential market reach.

The Sonic team believes that this HyperGrid design may integrate decentralized liquidity of EVM gaming chains together.

Sonic Marketing Activities

The Sonic points system and activities were launched on the 19th - Sonic Odyssey, and interested readers can participate accordingly.

Event Website: https://odyssey.sonic.game/

Why Does Solana Need Rollups?

The Solana ecosystem has been known for its high-performance monolithic architecture since its inception, and the community has rarely seen projects that contradict this concept under the official guidance. However, why are Solana Rollups starting to emerge now?

Why now? And why the need?

Official Viewpoint: Capturing Value of Gaming Applications

The Sonic team believes that as Solana-related applications gain market attention and the number of network users gradually increases, it often leads to network performance issues and congestion. For example, recent mining activities like Ore and meme coin issuance platform Pump.fun have had a significant impact on the network.

Recommended Read: What is Solana's Fair Mining Project Ore? Why Did the Founder Suddenly Call it Quits?
Reason for Recommendation: This article introduces the design principles of the Ore mining project and supplements how it affects Solana network performance and disrupts mining activities, showing the project's popularity and network space limitations.

Therefore, to improve network performance to meet the operational needs of future games and allow projects that attract market attention to gain more value capture and customizable space, the motivation for building Sonic emerged.

Community Viewpoint: Compromise of Project and Public Chain Interests

Cryptocurrency researcher Jason Chen believes that the main reason is the consideration of the project's self-interest.

Jason Chen states that although the Solana founders had previously expressed that Layer2 was not needed, with the increase in network usage, Solana's downtime remains a significant issue. Currently, Layer2 is considered the most effective way to expand Solana and have an impact, so Solana had to move towards Layer2 development.

On the other hand, for top projects, the fuel fee income brought by a large number of users and traffic is a significant source of revenue. Why contribute it to the Solana network or other public chains for free? But at the same time, they are concerned that completely isolating their own growth system would have a negative impact on the project, so creating a Layer2 is a solution where both sides can accept and benefit from it.

Is Solana's Monolithic Architecture Narrative Outdated?

The launch of the Sonic network opens up new development areas for Solana.

Some users in the Solana community have always believed that the future development of the Solana ecosystem will be primarily based on monolithic chains. However, the emergence of networks like Sonic's Rollups, as well as projects like Cambrian or Picasso for staking, indicate that Solana is gradually moving towards a multi-layered architecture.

Recommended Read: SOL Version of EigenLayer? Staking Craze Hits Solana Ecosystem
Reason for Recommendation: This article summarizes the current development of staking in the Solana ecosystem, providing a clearer understanding of the trend and diversity of staking and multi-network architecture development in Solana.

In fact, projects like Pyth and MakerDAO have intentions to build their own application chains in the Solana ecosystem. However, the initial concepts were based on the idea of Solana forked sidechains, but now there may be more options like Solana Layer2 to try out, looking forward to seeing the diverse and rapid development of the Solana ecosystem in the future.