Twitch Co-Founder Raises $24M for Web3 Gaming Company Metatheory

By Kate Irwin

Metatheory, a Web3 gaming and entertainment company, has raised $24 million in a funding round led by Andreesen Horowitz, with Pantera Capital, FTX Ventures, Dragonfly Capital, and others participating. 

Founded by Twitch Co-Founder Kevin Lin, Metatheory is currently developing its flagship project, DuskBreakers, a sci-fi franchise with two minigames. The project makes use of NFTs, unique blockchain-based tokens that demonstrate ownership over digital assets. In this case, the NFTs grant ownership over DuskBreakers characters.

“After stepping away from Twitch to explore what’s next in the industry, I truly believe blockchain will open the door to even more possibilities and have a major impact in the gaming, storytelling and community building space,” Lin said in a statement.

Lin serves as Metatheory’s CEO, and he’s brought on a few former Twitch staffers to help him build his Web3 company. Former Twitch developer relations executive and engineer JT Gleason is Metatheory’s CTO, and VP of Community and Marketing Jason Maestas comes from Twitch’s Influencer Marketing team. 

And Metatheory’s Content Chief Bernie Su and Narrative Designer Jen Enfield-Kane come from the Twitch exclusive Artificial Next, an interactive livestreamed show about artificial intelligence that ran for four seasons.

Unlike most blockchain games, which are only playable through a web browser, Metatheory has its own game launcher, giving players the choice to either experience DuskBreakers through a browser or natively through the game launcher on their computers instead.

DuskBreakers is currently developing its main play-and-earn blockchain game, set to release sometime in Q3 of this year. 

Image: DuskBreakers NFTs on OpenSea.

Out of the 10,000 DuskBreakers Ethereum NFTs, which currently have a floor price—or minimum purchase price—of 0.22 ETH ($440), only nine NFTs are considered “canon” to the DuskBreakers game lore so far, meaning that no others are currently a part of the game’s main lore and storyline. Back in December, the NFTs sold out within a week after Metatheory launched a “play-to-mint” DuskBreakers minigame called “The Recruit Simulator,” where users could play to earn a DuskBreakers genesis NFT.

The DuskBreakers minigame that's currently playable on the site is an RPG dungeon crawler-style game. Image: duskbreakers.gg

But DuskBreakers’ lore is likely to expand very soon beyond its NFT collection and two minigames, as Metatheory is currently hiring a comic artist to adapt the game and its IP into an online graphic novel. The DuskBreakers team is also planning a second NFT collection, 3D profile picture avatars, merch, and events in addition to its upcoming play-and-earn game.

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