Forward the Original Title：”项目速览：顶级机构加持的AI+游戏项目Ultiverse”

Introduction

Web3 gaming has always been a track closely watched by Mint Ventures. Although the concept of Play-to-Earn brought about by the last bull market is no longer mentioned, it is worth noting that both Axie and StepN have fallen dramatically, but their peak-level and highly sticky daily active user data, which once reached millions, marks the first time the crypto industry has come so close to “Massive Adoption.” Compared to another social product category with potential for Massive Adoption, games inherently possess a richer and more complex economic ecosystem, and their teams can fine-tune taxes from multiple angles and sustain relative balance within the ecosystem for a longer period. Furthermore, web3 games can more effectively utilize the assetization pathways offered by crypto, making investors generally optimistic about the prospects of web3 games.

Since Axie and StepN, web3 games have also benefited from the following favorable conditions:

• Further improvement in infrastructure. Today, in 2024, game developers have a richer selection of chains to choose from: whether it’s directly based on existing L1s (such as Solana) or L2s (such as Arbitrum), or using one-click chain issuance services provided by L1s or L2s (such as Avalanche subnets and OP Stack), or following the modular trend for free combination, game developers have many high-performance and low-cost options. In terms of wallets, MPC and AA wallet solutions are now mature enough for commercial use, addressing the headache of private keys for ordinary users.
• The market is gradually improving, with the recent approval of a BTC ETF leading to a strong rebound in the overall crypto market, attracting more attention from the general public and providing a larger potential user base for games.

Compared to traditional Web2 games, Web3 games still have very obvious advantages:

• In the typical lifecycle of web3 games, “NFT sales - FT issuance - game launch,” there are many income streams such as NFT royalties and FT transaction fees even before the game is launched. This helps game teams generate revenue from the first day of game development, offsetting the long development cycle and hefty development costs. After the game is launched, taxation at various stages of the game is also far more flexible than in web2 games. Earlier and more diverse commercialization options are key factors in attracting game teams to enter web3.
• Web3 games do not have strong-channel parties with dominant discourse power, which also means that the high acquisition costs of web2 games do not exist in web3 games. In other words, web3 games are not “involutionized,” and capable teams are needed to explore this frontier.

We also see many experienced game development teams entering the web3 game market, building a large number of narrative-rich, well-experienced, and highly playable games. The supply side of web3 games has undergone considerable development, constituting the support of the people for web3 games.

For these reasons, Mint Ventures has been continuously focusing on the gaming track. Ultiverse is a gaming project that Mint Ventures has been following since the bear market stage. They have been continuously building during the bear market, enriching their product matrix, actively expanding the narratives contained in their products, and have an excellent investment background. Recently, they have launched multiple airdrop activities aimed at attracting new users, making them worthy of attention.

Stakeholder: Mint Ventures participated in the Builder Round minting of Ultiverse ElectricSheep NFTs and still holds ElectricSheep NFTs.

Introduction to Ultiverse

Ultiverse is a metaverse world based on blockchain and deeply integrated with AI. Its architecture is divided into 4 layers:

Protocol Layer: Ultiverse relies on the Bodhi Protocol as the foundation of its entire ecosystem. According to official documentation, the Bodhi Protocol utilizes large language models and Stable Diffusion models to generate various in-game content. AI is used to assist various stakeholders within the ecosystem, such as generating smarter NPCs and enriching background content.

Infrastructure: Ultiverse abstracts a series of infrastructure needed for games into SDKs, which can be used by other developers in the future. These infrastructures include MPC wallets and AA wallets, built-in trading markets, and DID systems. In addition, Ultiverse’s user-facing live streaming platform, Ultiverse Live, has garnered attention from 350,000 followers and nearly 40 million likes on Binance Live, bringing significant exposure to its partners. Ultiverse’s infrastructure also includes its own task platform, Mission Runner.

Core Assets: Ultiverse’s core assets currently include Electric Sheep NFTs, Meta GF NFTs, and World Fragments.

Electric Sheep NFTs are the first assets in the Ultiverse ecosystem and serve as its core assets. There are 7,000 Electric Sheep NFTs, which were minted in July 2022 at 0.5 ETH. Currently, the floor price is around 2 ETH, bringing holders returns of 4x in ETH and 8x in USD. Electric Sheep NFTs provide holders with priority access and reward boosts in various projects within the Ultiverse ecosystem, as well as airdrops of Ultiverse governance token $ULTC.

Electric Sheep’s historical floor price changes

The Meta GF NFT was issued at the end of 2022, positioned as an AI companion that supports custom face sculpting and can accompany players in exploring the Ultiverse world.

The World Fragment NFT has not yet been issued and will be airdropped to Electric Sheep holders in the future. According to official documentation, players can synthesize world fragments into worlds. Holding different world NFTs can provide players with different personalized experiences supported by AI in the game, including different storylines, characters, world objectives, and core conflicts. In other words, holding different NFTs can provide completely different gaming experiences.

Dapp: Dapps within the Ultiverse ecosystem are also called “Micro worlds.” Dapps within the Ultiverse ecosystem can be divided into two categories: one category is Dapps that have partnerships with Ultiverse, such as the previously launched casual development game Meta Merge, and the upcoming racing game BAC to be launched on Blast. These ecological projects have a higher level of trust and asset exchange relationship with Ultiverse, such as Meta Merge once airdropped its token $MMM to Electric Sheep holders, and Meta Merge’s NFT can also receive part of the upcoming $ULTC airdrop. The other category is self-developed Dapps by Ultiverse, mainly including Ulti-pilot, Terminus, Endless Loop, etc., which were just launched at the end of February.

Terminus was launched in March. It is the core platform within the Ultiverse ecosystem, built using the UE5 engine, including PC and VR versions. According to official documentation, Terminus is a virtual world where NPCs are driven by highly intelligent AI. They can engage in multi-path, highly interactive conversations with players, which may ultimately influence the gaming experience and outcomes. Additionally, characters can be driven by AI, allowing them to evolve continuously even when players are offline, making Terminus an always-online gaming world.

Screenshot of Terminus

Ulti-pilot was launched in February and is a portal for users to experience the Ultiverse world. Users can send their characters to explore the Ultiverse world, and at the same time receive considerable Soul incentives (which can be used to subsequently redeem the governance token $ULTC).

Endless Loop is an MMORPG game from Ultiverse, also built with the UE5 engine. The game has not yet been launched.

From the product architecture, it can be seen that Ultiverse is not just a game; its goal is to become an AI-driven metaverse platform. On one hand, it connects with a massive number of end-users; on the other hand, it interfaces with various stakeholders in the web3 industry, ultimately realizing its Meta-Fi vision.

In terms of future roadmap, Ultiverse’s main task this year is to fully launch its products, including the PC and VR versions of Terminus, and introduce more game partners. They plan to launch the Game Launchpad in the second half of 2024 and roll out their own Rollup, thereby better serving game partners and realizing their vision for a Web3 gaming platform.

Investment Background and Partnerships

Ultiverse has completed a total of three rounds of financing with an impressive lineup of investors:

On March 18, 2022, Ultiverse completed a $4.5 million seed round financing at a valuation of $50 million. This round was led by Binance Labs and Defiance Capital, with participation from Three Arrows Capital and SkyVision Capital.

On March 25, 2022, Binance Labs made an additional investment of $5 million in Ultiverse, which was conducted through equity acquisition. Nicole Zhang, head of Binance Labs, stated that this investment was made to ensure that Binance Labs maintains a certain degree of influence over the future development direction of the Ultiverse team.

On February 14, 2024, Ultiverse completed a $4 million strategic round financing at a valuation of $150 million. IDG Capital led this round, with participation from Animoca Brands, Polygon Ventures, MorningStar Ventures, Taiko, ZetaChain, Manta Network, DWF Ventures, among others. Additionally, a series of NFT influencers also participated in the strategic round, including Dingaling, Grail.eth, Christian2022.eth, 0xSun, and others.

Investors of Ultiverse

Overall, Ultiverse has an impressive investment background, encompassing top-tier VCs, market makers, exchanges, public chains, and influential KOLs, which can help drive various aspects of Ultiverse’s development.

Founder Frank graduated from CMU and is a passionate gamer. Currently, the team has over 200 members, many of whom have previously worked at major gaming companies such as Gameloft, Blizzard, Ubisoft, and Tencent, and have been involved in the development and design of well-known games like Elden Ring, Assassin’s Creed, and Prince of Persia.

As the goal is to become a platform that connects players and games, Ultiverse has numerous partners, collaborating extensively with various project parties and communities within the gaming ecosystem.

For example, the Terminus finding your path partners event in March was jointly launched by Ultiverse in collaboration with public chains (Zetachain), other games (Ainchess), infrastructure service providers (Rpggo, Particle Network), game guilds (N9Club, GuildFi), NFT communities (Weirdo Ghost Gang), and others.

Source: https://twitter.com/UltiverseDAO

In addition, Ultiverse has just announced partnerships with over 300 web2 and web3 AI and gaming teams, essentially encompassing all top-tier web3 games, which will help realize its vision for the gaming platform.

Token economy

Ultiverse has already unveiled the use cases and economic model of its governance token $ULTC:

In the Ultiverse ecosystem, $ULTC has the following three main functions:

• Governance
• If a Dapp wants to enter the Ultiverse ecosystem, it needs to pay $ULTC, and part of these ULTC will be given to the user.
• $ULTC is the payment method for assets in the Ultiverse ecosystem

The total amount of $ULTC is 10 billion, and its distribution is as shown in the figure below:

Source: https://docs.ultiverse.io/ultiverse-tokenomics/token-structure-overview

One notable aspect is that 8% of the token supply will be allocated for airdrops, which will include holders of Electric Sheep NFTs, MetaGF NFTs, Soul holders, and holders of other assets within the ecosystem.

Currently, Electric Sheep NFTs have a floor price of around 2 ETH, with a total market value of 14,000 ETH, approximately equivalent to around $47.6 million. If we calculate that Electric Sheep NFT holders receive 2% of $ULTC, the corresponding fully diluted market capitalization of $ULTC would be $2.38 billion. This fully diluted market capitalization is comparable to that of Portal, a Game+AI project previously listed on Binance, indicating a reasonable valuation. Additionally, Electric Sheep NFTs have various other utilities within the Ultiverse ecosystem, such as the ability to obtain World NFTs mentioned earlier.

Soul currently serves as “points” within the Ultiverse ecosystem, initially obtainable through staking Electric Sheep NFTs as a reward for early adopters. The team previously announced an exchange rate of 100:1 between Soul and $ULTC. After unveiling the token economic model, Ultiverse launched several activities to attract new users, aiming to further promote the Ultiverse brand with the help of Soul. One such activity, the Ulti-pilot event starting in late February, will release 10 billion Souls (equivalent to 100 million $ULTC, or 1% of the total supply), attracting lots of users to participate.

Summary

Ultiverse is a project worthy of attention for the following reasons:

• The web3 gaming sector is currently in a favorable position within this market cycle, poised for potential growth during bullish market periods.
• Throughout the bear market, the Ultiverse team has consistently built and delivered impressive products while also cultivating a cohesive community.
• The rapid advancement of AI technology over the past year has garnered significant attention globally. Ultiverse has deeply integrated AI throughout its architecture, positioning itself favourably for potential market recognition when the concept of AI + gaming gains traction.
• Ultiverse boasts a strong investment background, further bolstering its potential for success.

Disclaimer：

1. This article is reprinted from [Mintventures]. Forward the Original Title‘项目速览：顶级机构加持的AI+游戏项目Ultiverse’.All copyrights belong to the original author [Lawrence Lee]. If there are objections to this reprint, please contact the Gate Learn team, and they will handle it promptly.
2. Liability Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not constitute any investment advice.
3. Translations of the article into other languages are done by the Gate Learn team. Unless mentioned, copying, distributing, or plagiarizing the translated articles is prohibited.