‘Pirate Nation’ Studio Raises $33 Million to Build Fully On-Chain Games

Proof of Play, the sport studio behind the blockchain-based social role-playing recreation Pirate Nation, introduced as we speak that it has raised $33 million in seed funding in a spherical co-led by Andreessen Horowitz and Greenoaks Capital.

The studio, co-founded by CEO Amitt Mahajan—beforehand co-creator of the smash informal recreation FarmVille at Zynga—says it should use the funding to develop the corporate and additional scale its know-how, which permits absolutely on-chain video games that may reside on indefinitely.

Emmett Shear, co-founder and former CEO of online game streaming platform Twitch, has joined Proof of Play’s board alongside the increase. Different contributors within the $33 million seed spherical embody AngelList co-founder and former CEO Naval Ravikant and entrepreneur and former Coinbase CTO Balaji Srinivasian, based on the announcement.

Welcome to Pirate Nation, an on-chain RPG by @ProofOfPlay, constructed on the intersection of informal gaming, web3 know-how, and shared possession & incentives.

A thread 🧵 protecting what it’s essential to learn about our recreation, ecosystem, & group.

Let’s bounce in. 👇 1/many pic.twitter.com/aS9e4OvAuJ

— Pirate Nation (@PirateNationNFT) July 5, 2023

In a press release, Mahajan mentioned that the expertise of seeing Zynga pull FarmVille offline in 2020 impressed him to discover using blockchain know-how to design and deploy “ceaselessly video games.”

“Over a billion hours of playtime, creativity, and funding was misplaced,” he mentioned of FarmVille’s demise. “Realizing this, I felt compelled to discover a higher technique to make video games timeless.

“We’re creating multi-generational merchandise—video games that may outlast us and are owned by the communities that play them,” he continued.

Why Pirate Nation Is Leaving Polygon and Setting Sail In the direction of Arbitrum Nova

Pirate Nation was initially deployed on Polygon, but it surely set sail for an additional Ethereum scaling community—Arbitrum Nova—earlier this 12 months, searching for cheaper community charges. Regardless that it runs on a blockchain community, Proof of Play says that gamers can remix and add their very own content material to the sport, customizing and increasing it all of the whereas.

Alongside the funding information, Proof of Play introduced Thursday that it’s beginning to roll out free-to-play entry to the sport, which suggests gamers will be capable to create a free character with out proudly owning an NFT. Nonetheless, NFT homeowners get numerous added advantages over free gamers. The free-to-play model is designed to be a extra informal expertise suited to a broader viewers.

Pirate Nation quickly goes F2P, beginning on a community-invite foundation. 💌

Incoming gamers will be capable to create a Pirate without spending a dime to entry the complete recreation.

A 🧵 of key variations between Pirates (our F2P assortment) and Founder’s Pirates (our genesis assortment).

1/many pic.twitter.com/5Y5Ewzm6t7

— Pirate Nation (@PirateNationNFT) August 9, 2023

Proof of Play plans to open-source its tech for constructing absolutely on-chain video games in an effort to let different creators develop their very own video games and apps utilizing the identical instruments.

“We’re thrilled to be backing Proof of Play as they construct an on-chain gaming future with composability, interoperability, and permanence on the core of gameplay, enabling gamers to actually personal their property and anybody to create a brand new recreation on high of one other,” mentioned Andreessen Horowitz’s Chris Dixon, in a launch.