The total funds raised by blockchain gaming-related projects increased by 9% ($85.8M vs. $93.2M) compared to June, with the number of deals announced also increasing by 22% (9 vs. 11).
Following on from our June Gaming Roundup, and Konvoy Venture’s broader Q2 2023 Gaming Industry Report (recommended read), the current funding landscape is looking very flat. With the recent memecoin run, it is entirely possible that we see a little more excitement filter down into the gaming sector by Q4, but this will largely be contingent on a successful launch by one of the leading incumbents.
Some of the standout rounds included:
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Futurverse’s $54M Series A round of funding helped to prop up metrics this month. The company’s goal is to create “an immersive and vertically-integrated metaverse platform,” and funding will be used to for R&D efforts for the Root Network, an EVM-compatible blockchain integrated with the XRP ledger. The news comes after Ripple won its court case against the SEC (Ripple is a key investor in Futureverse, and the Root Network uses XRP as an exchange/gas token).
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Xterio, a game discovery platform + Web3-in-a-box service provider, raised $15M from Binance Labs. Funds will go toward accelerating the development of Xterio’s incubated games, implementing new AI features, and the launch of its token (on the BNB Chain).
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Hexacore raised $3.5M in an undisclosed round of funding. The studio is well experienced in mobile game development, amassing a reported 350M downloads across titles such as Sushi Roll, Blend It 3D, and Merge Animals, and is now transitioning into the worlds of Web3 by introducing new hybrid monetization models that leverage interoperable NFT assets, token rewards, and more.
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Gamecraft raises $5M for its AI-powered, skilled-based PC/console gaming rewards platform. Gamecraft’s proprietary scoring system tracks player’s scores, which provides performance assessments and insights using AI. The platform leverages the AWS Quantum Ledger and ML-based anti-cheat system. With a reported 300k users, Gamecraft plans to use the recently raised funds to expand its engineering and platform capabilities as well as explore opportunities in blockchain gaming.