Blockchain gaming startup company Azra Games raised $15 million to flagship play-and-earn RPG title, “Project Arcanas”


A blockchain
gaming startup company Azra Games has raised $15 million in a seed funding round
which is led by Andreessen Horowitz. The funding was aimed at building
mainstream collectible and developing Azra’s first play-and-earn game which is an
epic, fantastical collectible and mass combat RPG title, “Project Arcanas.”
for the Web3 era.
The participants
in the round were NFX, Coinbase Ventures, Play Ventures, and Franklin
Templeton. From both the newly announced games fund and their crypto fund, Andreessen Horowitz led the round. The game "Project Arcanas" will
include a lot of NFTs, which are unique tokens used in blockchain transactions.
The NFTs of Arcanas will serve as deeds of ownership for specific characters or
items in the game. The NFTs of Arcanas will serve as deeds of ownership for
specific characters or items in the game.
The first NFTs of
the game will be Arcanas’ Genesis Collection. To earn interest characters can
be staked or locked up for a period of time. It will play an important part in
the game’s lore. These non-fungible tokens are called "Play Forever
Passes" or "PFPs" by Azra.
Azra team is working
on creating a game that recreates this joy by re-engaging adults' imaginations
with collectibles fantasy and fast-paced mix-and-match combat that is
accessible yet highly strategic. In a web3 world, roleplaying giant monsters,
robots, creatures, and leading favorite heroes and villains into battle is the
most compelling and complete experience with a vibrant marketplace and
sustainable economy only web3 can unlock.
An Azra Games
job posting provides a few possible hints that Azra’s team is not sure about
the blockchain on which “Project Arcanas” will be working although the team
appears to be ready to take on the blockchain gaming world. As per the company it’s
looking for a Web3 engineer with experience using Ethereum’s programming
language Solidity, Solana’s programming language Rust), “or another modern
smart contract framework.” The company has also hired veterans from Capital
Games. Recently Electronic Arts announced that those who stayed at Capital
Games are working on a pretty exciting mobile game based on The Lord of the
Rings franchise.
CEO Mark Otero is working with some entrepreneurs Sonny
Mayugba and Travis Boudreaux. In an exclusive interview with GamesBeat Otero
said with a specialized in-game economy and virtual collectibles, powered by
Web3 technology such as non-fungible tokens (NFTs) Azra Games is working on creating deep, immersive game universes. Mark Otero run the company and
previously led the development of Electronic Arts’ smash mobile game hit Star
Wars: Galaxy of Heroes while he was the general manager of the EA subsidiary at
powerhouse gaming company Capital Games. The Star Wars game hit 100 million
downloads last year.
Michael Noriega
is the game director of Azra who also comes from EA. There he spent long term nearly
a decade as a software developer and technical artist. Hoover Abejero, a senior
3D character artist, worked on a "Mass Effect" mobile game. Creative
writer Cathleen Rootsaert previously worked on EA’s “Battlefield 2042” as its
supervising writer.
Azra might be
new to Web3, but it is filled with video game industry veterans and former
Electronic Arts employees. Azra's website reports that Otero worked on more
than 50 different mobile and free-to-play titles, including "Star Wars:
Galaxy of Heroes," which, according to its website, generated over $1
billion in revenue for EA.
Ubisoft and
Square Enix are the company focusing on and encouraging NFT-based games. They
believe that NFTs will allow gamers to be able to truly own and trade their
in-game assets.

Indrani bose
CBW - External Analyst
INDIA