Gaming Studio Faraway Closes $21M Series A
- Led by Lightspeed Venture and FTX, the Series A brings the total funding raised by Faraway to $30 million.
- Using the funds, Faraway will be able to launch its “Mini Royale: Nations” browser game on the Solana blockchain.
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Gaming studio Faraway has closed a $21 million Series A funding round led by Lightspeed Venture and FTX to launch a browser-based game on the Solana blockchain, the company said in a press release on 4 November.
According to the announcement, the Series A brings the total funding Faraway was able to secure to $30 million, having raised $8 million earlier this year in a seed round also led by Lightspeed Ventures. Other participants in the Series A and the seed round include Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Sequoia Capital, Pantera Capital, Jump Capital, and Solana. The CEO of the gaming studio, Alex Paley, said in a statement:
“Our goal for both current and future games is to create extremely fun and social games with open economies, giving players true ownership over their in-game assets and a true voice in how the game evolves over time. We’re fortunate to have found such great partners who not only understand the potential of Web3 across various markets, but are actively driving businesses forward in this space.”
The Miami-based gaming studio will use this early-stage funding to launch its flagship browser-based game “Mini Royale: Nations” — a first-person shooter game similar to Counter Strike — on the Solana blockchain. The title will be the first multiplayer game to launch on Solana, and will utilize an economy compatible with FTX Pay and Solana’s non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
The game, which is already live and with an established player base, will not require any third-party client installations making it “instantly playable on any hardware”. Paley explained his company’s believe that “browser is the optimal platform for any blockchain game”, as it will assure users that the game will not be banned from a specific platform.
Anatoly Yakovenko, CEO of Solana Labs, said decentralized gaming is the next frontier for blockchain technology, and that it had the potential to bring “Web3 to hundreds of millions of users”. In fact, we have seen an increase in interest in blockchain gaming over the past few months, with companies such as Bitkraft and Huobi setting up GameFi investment funds. Recently, gaming startup Mythical Games also closed a $150 million Series C round led by a16z.
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Former CEO of FTX Sam Bankman-Fried leaves the Federal Court in New York after pleading not guilty, 3 January, 2022.
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