Revolving Games
Revolving Games is a web3-native studio building out immersive, rewarding, and scalable gaming experiences. The company recently raised an exciting $25M round led by Pantera with participation from Animoca, Dapper Labs, and Polygon, among others.
Gaming is well-known as one of the most exciting, creative, and rapidly growing sectors of web3. With all the buzz around play-to-earn, many web2 gamers have made the switch to web3 games due to the autonomy and financial upside gameplay entails. Having the ability to earn in-game attracts a greater user base and keeps players engaged for a longer period of time.
Blockchain games are also a lower-stakes (and more fun) way for less cryptonative players to get onboarded to web3. This is seen in practice: DappRadar recently reported that gaming dapps were responsible for 60% of blockchain traffic in July 2022. While the rest of the crypto industry has been suffering in recent months, web3 gaming has been incredibly resilient and even growing during this period. Blockchain gaming usually involves less financial risk than other areas of crypto and has much of the web3 backend abstracted away from users, allowing the sector to remain highly attractive to users during downturns.
Games in the pipeline
Revolving Games is focused on building social, fun, and long-lasting games that push the web3 gaming ecosystem forward. The team purposefully joined specific elements of gaming in web2 – free-to-play – and web3 – ownership, autonomy, and trading – to uniquely design their games. The company announced its first title – Battlestar Galactica Eternity – this past June, in partnership with Gala Games and NBCUniversal. Given the company’s free-to-play background, Revolving Games is taking a hybrid monetization approach: selling consumables through fiat (traditional in-app purchases) as well as offering NFTs and virtual land sales on-chain. The game will be introduced on all major platforms including mobile phones. Battlestar Galactica Eternity is currently in production and is expected to launch in Q4 2023 – more details about the game will be released next quarter.
Design from Revolving Games’ first title, Battlestar Galactica Eternity. Source: Revolving Games
Revolving Games’ next title, announced in October, is a decentralized MMO (massively multiplayer online) RPG (role-playing game) called Skyborne Legacy, built on Polygon. Skyborne’s momentum so far has been huge: three days after the announcement, its Discord grew to 10,000+ members and Twitter grew to 2,000+ followers. The game is inspired by iconic Nintendo games such as Animal Crossing and The Legend of Zelda. Players can socially explore the world and are able to trade artifacts and build within biomes and islands in-game. The team behind the game are gaming industry veterans that have developed successful games such as Star Trek Timelines, Kim Kardashian: Hollywood, Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery, and others. You can watch a trailer for Skyborne Legacy here.
Skyborne will be a highly interactive and explorative game. Source: Revolving Games
For its next game, Revolving Games is designing a smaller, engaging web game where players are able to stake NFTs for in-game rewards in Skyborne Legacy after it launches. Target launch for this game is Q3 2023.
A team of gaming veterans
Revolving Games was co-founded by brothers Saad, Ammar, and Shayan Zaeem. The three brothers previously founded Caramel Tech Studios, a game development studio, and Saad and Shayan co-founded Fizz.io, a cloud chat service. Saad, Ammar, and Shayan all have decades of experience building and scaling tech, entertainment products, and teams. The Revolving Games team is now 120+ individuals across production, engineering, design, product, art, community, and marketing. Many team members have been creating products in the gaming, entertainment, and / or tech industry for years. Dan Houser, the game designer and co-founder of Rockstar Games, the company behind Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead Redemption, also recently joined as an advisory board member and investor. Altogether, the team has worked on many blockbuster games that have generated over $3B in revenue.
The Zaeem brothers, Saad, Ammar, and Shayen (left to right). Source: Venture Beat
Closing thoughts
Web3 games are increasingly being built out, so keeping the user’s gameplay experience top of mind is critical. “As the world moves from a developer-owned ecosystem to a player-owned ecosystem, Revolving Games will be at the forefront of this evolution whilst continuing to release titles that compete with the best in the traditional video games industry,” Saad stated. We’re excited to partner with the amazing Revolving Games team as they release immersive games that set the standard for game design and quality and help pivot web2 gamers to web3.
Scene from Skyborne Legacy. Source: Revolving Games
- Paul Veradittakit
DISCLAIMER
Pantera Capital Puerto Rico Management, LP and its affiliates (“Pantera”) makes investments in crypto assets and in blockchain-related companies. Pantera and/or its affiliates or personnel may be an investor in, or have relationships or other business arrangements related to, certain instruments, companies and/or projects discussed herein. This document does not contain any advertisement for Pantera’s investment advisory services, or any other services or products, whether provided by Pantera or otherwise. The information and opinions presented in this document are solely those of Paul Veradittakit; they do not represent, and should not be interpreted as representative of, the views of Pantera or any other individual working for Pantera, and do not represent investment, legal, tax, financial, or any other form of, advice or recommendations. Neither Pantera nor Mr. Veradittakit is acting, or purports to act, as an investment adviser or in a fiduciary capacity with respect to any recipient of this paper. Information contained in this document is believed to be reliable, but no representation is made regarding such information’s fairness, correctness, accuracy, reasonableness or completeness. There is no obligation to update this document or to otherwise notify a reader if any matter stated statement or information contained here changes or subsequently is shown to be inaccurate. Nothing contained herein constitutes any representation or warranty as to future performance of any financial instrument or company. Forward-looking statements should not be relied upon, and performance or outcomes may differ materially from what is contemplated herein. Opinions included here incorporate subjective judgments or may be based on incomplete information. This document does not constitute or contain an offer to sell or a solicitation to buy any securities or a recommendation to enter into any transaction, and no reliance should be placed on this document in making investment decisions.
DIGESTS
FTX Bankruptcy Hearing: Bahamas Liquidators Transfer Case to Delaware, Creditor Names Remain Redacted
James Bromley, counsel to FTX’s new management, called the bankruptcy "one of the most abrupt and difficult collapses in the history of corporate America."
BUSINESS
Digital Currency Group Says No Imminent Threat Despite Owing Genesis $575M
DCG CEO Barry Silbert sought to reassure investors today following the collapse of FTX, detailing its intercompany loans with Genesis.
Cathie Wood's Ark Invest Scoops Another $1.4M of Grayscale Bitcoin Trust
Ark Invest has made back-to-back investments in Grayscale’s Bitcoin Fund despite the asset’s massive discount.
REGULATION
Binance US Steps Into National Politics With New Campaign PAC
As FTX and its political-minded executives fall from their brief heights as campaign-finance giants, rival Binance has decided now is the time to enter the vacuum.
New York Imposes 2-Year Moratorium on New Proof-of-Work Mining After Gov. Hochul Signs Bill
The new law sets a two-year moratorium on new and renewed air permits for fossil fuel power plants used for energy-intensive proof-of-work (PoW) cryptocurrency mining.
IN THE TWEETS
NEW PRODUCTS AND HOT DEALS
Saudi Arabia’s NFT Collection Soars After Unexpected Soccer Win Against Argentina
Argentina's fan token, on the other hand, slid 21% following the team's loss on Monday.
Binance's Crypto Mining Pool Adds Ravencoin Support
Former Ethereum miners have been drawn to alternative coins like ravencoin after they had to leave the Ethereum network post-merge.
LETS MEET UP
New York City, Nov 28 - Dec 2
Los Angeles, Dec 21 - Dec 30
PEER Summit, Salt Lake City, Jan 6-8
Walks and coffee meetings in San Francisco throughout the year!
ABOUT ME
Hi, I’m Paul Veradittakit, a Partner at Pantera Capital, one of the oldest and largest institutional investors focused on investing in blockchain companies and cryptocurrencies. I’ve been in the industry since 2014, and the firm invests in equity, early stage token projects, and liquid cryptocurrencies on exchanges. I focus on early-stage investments and share my thoughts on what’s going on in the industry in this weekly newsletter.
Thanks for reading VeradiVerdict! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.