Published on: 11/03/2022

Online RPG, blockchain Epic League raises $1M in seed funding

Online RPG and blockchain ecosystem company Epic League has raised $1 million in its first seed funding round. Investing in the company were WeMade, YGGSEA, Global Blockchain Innovative Capital (GBIC), Infinity Ventures Crypto (IVC), Thomas Vu from Moon Holdings, and many leading seed investors.

Epic League also announced that they would soon finish the alpha phase of the first game in their ecosystem, Dark Throne, adding that they would soon reveal more details.

Who’s in the team

Within Epic League’s leaderboard are top-tier game developers who have experience in creating the world’s top games including Lineage 2M, Marvel Future Revolution, Marvel Future Fight, and BTS Universe Story. Also in the team are blockchain experts.

The members of the team include Marvel and DC Comics cover artist Ji-Hyung Lee, who fills the position of art director; former Netmarble COO Young-hoon Baek; and former head of creative and current advisor to Sandbox Thomas Vu

“We were given early access to play Dark Throne, the first game of Epic League,” YGGSEA CEO Evan Spytma said. “Although it was still in a pre-alpha stage, it received a warm reception from our team and truly has the potential of becoming “epic”. We also love how Epic League supports the YGGSEA community by offering a guild friendly management system through the Epic League Platform. Dark Throne is a must play in 2022.”

Speaking on his part, Vu added: “As a game-maker for over two decades, I am seeing more and more game developers move into the blockchain. Epic League team is one of the most stacked teams that I’ve encountered coming into this space, with an average of over 15+ years of game development experience and the number of global hits that they’ve produced.”

It was also revealed that Epic League would release two games in 2022. Being the first game of the company’s ecosystem, Dark Throne is expected to be released in the first half of this year.

“The whole ecosystem we are building is entirely for our game players and community,” Epic League executive director Jay Kim said. “By supplying well-made games, and providing an innovative and stable platform that supports players, guild managers and community managers, we would like to lead the P2E industry.”

Others

Also securing a huge investment this year was one of the world’s largest gaming-focused venture funds, Griffin Gaming Partners. Recently they raised $750 million to develop Web3 and blockchain video games. The fund was headed by founders Peter Levin, Phil Sanderson, and Nick Tuosto. It focused on gaming and its related markets including esports, gaming infrastructure, tools, social gaming platforms, streaming, and the cloud.

“[Web 3] is one of our central theses from a macro perspective within games,” Tuosto said. “It’s our view that the enablement of digital asset ownership within games may be the single most important technological unlock in the history of games.”

This was the company’s second nine-figure fund. It was far larger than the first fund which was worth $235 million, spread to 13 companies with additional seed-round support for eight more.

The first fund was raised in 2020. The 13 companies operate in the gaming and gaming-adjacent sectors. These included Discord, AppLovin, Superteam, Forte and Overwolf. The new fund is expected to bring more than $1 billion in gaming-focused assets under management for the venture capitalist.