As NFTs have become more popular, more and more games are using crypto assets to make in-game products that are interactive and tokenized economies. But a new company in the space is taking a different approach: they are making a platform for casual games where the prizes are NFTs.
Today, Burn Ghost told Decrypt in an exclusive interview that it has received $3.1 million to help it reach its goal.
The seed round, which ended in April, was led by Drive by DraftKings and the gaming-focused fund Bitkraft Ventures. Pillar VC also took part in the round.
Burn Ghost will focus on making simple, easy-to-understand casual games with a skill element instead of complex, all-encompassing games based on non-monetary transactions, which have annoyed some gamers. Steve Curran, the CEO, and co-founder of the company said that trivia experiences will be among the first original games available on the web platform.
He said, “We feel like we’ve cracked the code on making it accessible to anybody so that it’s not just the Ken Jennings of the world that are going to play this and be good at it.”
The best finishers in Burn Ghost’s games will get NFTs, both ones that the company bought and ones that came from deals with NFT makers. Players have to pay a fee to play the games that give NFT prizes. However, they can earn credits by playing other games on the site that are free to play.
At first, the entrance fees will be paid in cryptocurrency, but eventually, the platform will also accept regular money. Burn Ghost could also charge placement fees for projects that want to show their NFTs to players. The platform could be a way for producers to reach a larger audience through marketing.
An NFT is a token based on the blockchain that shows ownership of a unique item, like a profile photo (PFP), a collectible, or a work of art. Last year, the number of trades on the NFT market shot up to $25 billion, but in recent months, the market has lost steam along with the rest of the crypto market.
Burn Ghost is set to come out in the first quarter of 2023, but Curran said that more and more gamers on the waiting list will be able to use the platform in the meantime. Aside from games of trivia, there will be more arcade and action games that give out NFTs from Ethereum and other blockchains.
Teaser art made by the company shows collectibles from popular “blue chip” Ethereum NFT projects like the Bored Ape Yacht Club, Doodles, and CloneX.
FTX Game is a funny “endless runner” game in which players guide a character through environments that were inspired by the recent collapse of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange. Curran said that it was getting pleasure from the FTX scandal.
In the 1980s, he was vice president and creative director at GameTek, a studio that made games based on TV shows like “Family Feud” and “Jeopardy!” The co-founders of Burn Ghost, like CPO Jason Krupat and CTO Bret Siarkowski, have worked in the video game business for a total of 60 years.
As the NFT industry grew, they saw an opportunity to get into “entertainment commerce,” which Curran explained is a mix of gaming, rewards, and marketing that lets consumers have fun while also helping brands and initiatives. Also, the co-founders see it as a possible important way to get people to use Web3.
Curran said, “It’s always a surprise to a lot of people that a majority of gamers in the world are female, and casual games are more of the type of games that they play. Our goal is to be an on-ramp for a wide variety of non-crypto players.”
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