Creator of Final Fantasy to Invest in Animoca Brands and The Sandbox

Square Enix, the company behind game brands such as Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, has plans to invest more in Animoca Brands and The Sandbox. The Japanese tech conglomerate and games publisher is allocating a greater proportion of its capital into blockchain-based gaming. Its looking to capitalize on the technology while the market is still open.

• Square Enix announced in its Q1 earnings report that it will put more money into Animoca Brands and The Sandbox. 
• The company also has plans to launch its own token.
• Lots of companies see their future being wrapped up in blockchain technology and web3 as everyone scrambles to secure their part of an industry worth $100 billion in the US alone.
• Animoca Brands and The Sandbox are both enticing opportunities as they have ready-made expertise and an entire ecosystem that continues to grow.

Square Enix moving further into web3

Square Enix has released its Q1 earnings report and it seems the company is happy with how its foray into NFTs has worked out. In fact, it’s so happy that it plans to put more of its money into web3 companies by investing in Animoca Brands and The Sandbox.

Chairman of Animoca Brands Yat Siu tweeted about the news yesterday and was clearly excited to be working with a company that has meant so much to him personally.

Square Enix’s Q1 report shows that the company dipped its toe into web3 when it piloted NFTs in its Shi-San-Sei Million Arthur game in February this year. Obviously it went well because they’re bringing out a second season of NFTs and are also establishing a team to issue, manage and invest the company’s own gaming token.

Square Enix is also planning to expand its relationship with venture capital firm Animoca Brands by investing more heavily in the Hong Kong-based web3 giant. And as well as putting their money behind the company, they also want to get more involved in the virtual world The Sandbox.

What is Square Enix

Square Enix is a Japanese game developer and entertainment conglomerate known for classic titles such as Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest and Kingdom Hearts. Alongside making games, the company also has business interests in arcade and amusement facilities, merchandising, and manga comics and graphic novels. 

On May 1st, Square Enix announced that it would be selling off its North American subsidiaries Square Enix Montreal, Crystal Dynamics and Eidos-Montreal. The purpose of the sale is to raise capital as the company looks to move into web3 and blockchain technology.

Swedish company Embracer Group paid $300 million in the deal, which included the acquisition of legendary game titles such as Tomb Raider, Deus Ex and Thief.

Animoca Brands and The Sandbox

Animoca Brands is one of the biggest names in web3 gaming and investment. Headed up by Yat Siu, the VC company has a long list of titles and platforms that it plays an active role in supporting and guiding.

Here’s a non-exhaustive list of games and projects that Animoca Brands is involved with:

• Otherside, the BAYC social gaming metaverse
• Star Atlas
• REVV Motorsport
• Phantom Galaxies
• Crazy Defense Heroes
• Benji Bananas
• Arc8
• Torque Squad

It also owns the flagship virtual world platform The Sandbox, which has been going through a rocky patch since the beginning of the year. Despite this, the game, which hasn’t even fully launched yet, still sits at number 39 in DappRadar’s game dapp rankings.

Built on the Ethereum and Polygon blockchains, nearly 11,000 unique active wallets have interacted with The Sandbox over the past 30 days. The volume of trades interacting with the dapp’s smart contracts in the past 30 days amounts to over $150 million.

When the game gets its full release later in the year, expect it to shoot up our dapp rankings and expect the SAND token to rise in value. Whatever happens, we’ll bring you the latest news in our blog and the fastest updates on our Twitter feed. Follow both to stay up to date with everything in the world of NFTs and web3.