Though overall player numbers for web3 gaming continue to grow, not all projects have the success or funding they need to continue to develop and grow. In some cases, such as Neopets, this leads to a shutdown. In other case, such as Star Atlas, it results in a severe downsizing instead.
Despite positive trends in the web3 gaming scene, a number of developers are still struggling. There are many factors that could be in play here — overambitious projects, lackluster NFT markets, not enough funding, etc, etc. But whatever the reasons, we have news from two projects this week. Neopets announced the closing of Neopets Metaverse, while Star Atlas saw a major downsizing of their development teasm.
Farewell Neopets Metaverse
The Neopets team recently announced the closing of their Neopets Metaverse project. Neopets Metaverse was a web3-enabled game in the Neopets universe. This game will no longer be developed. Instead, Neopets is returning to their web2 roots.
Neopets Metaverse already released and sold several collections — Genesis, Pizzaroo, and Masterpiece. The Neopets team says that they will “support the community that has embraced ownership of these collections.” What this means exactly is unclear. It seems apparent that Neopets is pulling back from blockchain and NFT integration, so it seems unlikely that these NFTs will have any future use case in the Neopets suite of games. They say that they will leave the Neopets Metaverse Discord open and mention the possibility of future benefits such as access to physical merchandise, Neopets game items, and IRL events. We’ll see if anything actually happens on this front.
Star Atlas Downsizes
Meanwhile, Star Atlas also had their own announcement. But this one was about a downsizing rather than a complete shuttering of the project. Rumors have it that half of the team is being released.
This downsizing leads to a restructuring of priorities as well. The first focus of the reorganized team will be delivering their SAGE feature. SAGE, short for Star Atlas: Golden Era, will be a top-down, webGL-based, grand strategy game with some of the same game loops planned for the ultimate, 3D game. They are also developing a move to earn app called Crew Mobile, that will let players level up and train their Crew while walking! The move to earn space is already pretty crowded, but integrating it into the primary game is a smart move.
They will also continue to release their graphic novel. But, expect development of their grander, 3D, Unreal-based game to progress at a much slower pace.
This sudden downsizing from Star Atlas was a bit of a surprise. They did take a major hit with the collapse of FTX, but I thought they had managed to pull out of that hole. They have received positive reviews for their releases, put together a successful tech test / mini-game, and they have a gorgeous, base exploring app that runs surprisingly smoothly. However, while Star Atlas has plenty of NFTs up for sale that could increase the company’s cash flow, many of them are so ludicrously priced, that I am not really surprised that they don’t sell. It seems whoever is deciding on these prices for the top tier items is still living in the play to earn bull run of early 2021!
The Star Atlas team is holding a public, company update meeting on their Discord server later today (1pm EST, July 26th). So if you have any questions about the company downsizing and future of this project, this is the place and time to get some answers.
To learn more about Star Atlas, Visit their website, follow them on Twitter, and join their Discord.
