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