Soulbound raised $4 million in funding for its Web3 social gaming ecosystem.
The corporate’s newest spherical concluded within the second quarter of 2024 with participation from main gaming and blockchain communities, mentioned Casey Grooms, cofounder of Soulbound, in an interview with GamesBeat.
The corporate’s buyers to this point embrace Blocklords CEO David Johansson, iAngels, Animoca Manufacturers, Massive Mind Holdings, NGC Ventures, Panony, Delta Blockchain Fund and extra.
The funding will advance Puerto Rico-based Soulbound’s work by enabling it to ascertain gaming partnerships, add social interactions, and develop streamer bounties and social questing. Since its inception, Soulbound has tripled its staff with consultants from the engineering, enterprise improvement, and community-building fields.
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The staff is at the moment implementing a Twitch livestream integration for Soulbound-partnered video games and persevering with to enhance consumer expertise. Soulbound’s TGE is anticipated to happen within the second half of 2024.
The cofounders have backgrounds in cellular gaming, consumer acquisition, and conventional gaming. The platform’s mission is to “empower the new creator economy” and they’re all about giving creators within the gaming area a brand new strategy to earn their residing.
Grooms mentioned they moved away from the DAO mannequin (with Saga) to rebuild a startup that might perform extra successfully. They began with a platform referred to as Popdrip that was centered on NFT (non-fungible token) sticker interactions and posting social content material.
However Grooms mentioned this effort advanced into Soulbound with the addition of recreation questing. The platform launched in March and April, and has grown to combine the streaming and bounty packages. They’re seeing steady progress over the previous few months.
Soulbound mentioned it’s poised to onboard the subsequent era of gamers, streamers, and creators into eb3 gaming. Customers can earn non-transferable DRIP tokens for partaking with Soulbound and partnered video games, showcasing their favourite gaming accomplishments linked to their distinctive gaming id and flexing on their streams.
The brand new UI and branding goes reside this month, and recreation streaming is central. That is the function that caught on essentially the most with their viewers, so the brand new interface has streaming as an integral element. They’re a giant supporter of the StreamFi motion and examine Soulbound streamers as a bridge between web2 and web3 gaming.
It capabilities as a cross between Twitch and Steam, the place customers can showcase their accomplishments but additionally have the group interplay element. These interactions are captured within the “slapping” mechanism. Artists can add their stickers to the sticker market, which is a pleasant new income stream for them, Grooms mentioned.
Gameplay movies, Twitch clips, and group “vandalism” interactions the place customers can slap stickers immediately on others’ posts are additionally redefining social gaming for Soulbound customers. Streamers and creators can have entry to recent income channels with streaming bounties and a sticker market for artists and collectors.
Some of the thrilling options Soulbound can be introducing is an in-stream wager mechanism, the place customers can guess whether or not a streamer will do one thing in-game (like a sure transfer) or one thing on the stream, like sneezing. It’s like Polymarket meets Twitch.
For collaborations, Soulbound works with Web3 and Web2 video games to launch activations, utilizing bounties as a reward for streamers or content material creators. They’ve heard from platform customers that this can be a welcome addition to the gaming area, as there are not any complicated contracts however simply straight pay-outs.
And recreation studios respect the fast entry to UGC produced by the bounty packages. Soulbound is a brand new place for them to foster group and encourage interplay, Grooms mentioned.
Gamers have “slapped” posts with over 20,000 stickers to this point. The Soulbound platform extends past avid gamers into the B2B area. Recreation studios leverage Soulbound to accumulate and work together with customers by launching streamer bounty swimming pools, featured quests and focused promotions by data-driven profiles and user-generated content material.
The corporate is at the moment onboarding two new video games per week to its platform. They’ve hosted streaming activations with Shrapnel and Echelon, attracting over 200 gamers in aggressive tournaments with over 10,000 minutes streamed.
“Gaming is no longer a solo experience,” mentioned A.I. Mansbridge, CEO of Soulbound, in a press release. “Game studios, gamers, and streamers want to reach new audiences. Soulbound is a bridge for traditional gamers, streamers, and game studios to the expansive blockchain gaming space.”
“Gamers, streamers, artists, and developers are tired of the gaming status quo,” mentioned Grooms. “Soulbound is building a social platform that shakes up the traditional community interaction model. With support from our investors, we will deliver a first-of-its-kind avant-garde social gaming experience.”
Earlier buyers included Animoca Manufacturers and Massive Mind Holdings.
