Forte buys a N3twork
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Despite raising close to $1 billion in funding — the most of any blockchain game project — I’ll admit I don’t yet have a good take on Forte.
Apparently it has a lot of developers signed up, including Zynga, has some live games and it’s also hiring good people. Everyone keeps telling me it’s great. Best thing since sliced Wonder Bread.
After all, has $1 billion of VC money ever been wrong before?
Personally, however, I’ve not been impressed in terms of my interactions with the platform, at least as it’s initially been deployed with Kongregate and Will Wright’s new game Proxi.
No doubt — with a $1 billion to deploy — many of these UX issues will be sorted out but fundamentally I’m not sure how well its model of each project sending users to Forte to create an account (or link a game to their existing account) is going to scale.
There’s also the issue of having a fiat-centric platform currency that gets converted into project-specific currencies.
Everything feels too clunky, especially compared to the open blockchain, easily accessed with Metamask.
Problems to fix
Of course, one of the main issues Forte is trying to solve is handling legal compliance in terms of the US’ stringent money laundering and crypto tax laws.
By definition that introduces a lot of friction.
Still, I’m hoping Forte’s acquisition of N3twork will help it solve some of its more soluble issues.
Although not particularly well-known, N3twork has great pedigree. Originally called Ngmoco, it was a pioneer in free-to-play mobile gaming, building out a publishing and social network that was quickly acquired by Japanese mobile giant DeNA for $400 million in the previous industry disruption.
N3twork was effectively a reboot of that business; one that’s created its own hit games, as well as creating a highly optimized UA-focused publishing network for third party games.
Both parts will be useful for Forte.
On the game side, N3twork is now using Forte’s platform for two new titles; Triumph and Legendary Heroes Unchained, a multiplatform sequel to N3twork’s Legendary: Game of Heroes, which was one of the first successful western-developed midcore mobile games.
More significantly, Forte will integrate N3twork’s tech platform, also gaining its founder Neil Young (and his executive team) to lead its games industry business unit.
And maybe that’s the real bonus. Having worked at EA back in the days of Ultima Online and Majestic, and pretty much seen-and-done everything in console and mobile gaming — notably in terms of building successful technology platforms for developers — Young is extremely experienced, well connected and charismatic.
Certainly I’ve enjoyed crossing swords with him on many occasions in the past, and his Mirror article about how he sees the impact of blockchain on gaming is well worth reading.
Building new networks
More importantly, I think it’s industry veterans such as Young who will knock off some of the edges that have hampered the rise of blockchain games as a replicable mass market phenomenon.
Sure, we have Axie Infinity, but I’m not sure where the next blockchain games with 1 million DAUs is coming from — and believe me — I’m looking!
Of course, the main driver will be a great game experience but that’s not enough. Axie Infinity was accelerated by the emergence of thousands of guilds offering scholarships.
Of course, the next million-player blockchain games will be able to leverage that muscle even as it atrophies, but they’ll also have to start building out and scaling more traditional marketing and UA networks too.
We’re starting to see the first movements in that direction, but the addition of N3twork’s established tech is a big deal for Forte, no matter how much money it cost.
Terms were not disclosed.
Random Friday links!
New NFT marketplace LooksRare is still doing gangbusters, with over $1 billion in trading activity.
My staking rewards are up to $247, although claiming it will involved 2 gas fees. (Still not investment advice).
Talking of which, ever spent too much on gas? There’s a new airdrop for that.
Anyone who’s spent more than 0.05 ETH on Ethereum gas fees can now claim the WTF token from the fees.wtf website. Check now using my referral link! (not investment advice).
Konami is selling Castlevania 35th Anniversary NFTs on OpenSea. Very odd.