When it comes to game creation, especially within the pretense of interoperable virtual experiences, seamless development infrastructure is lacking. This causes a bottleneck for creators and players that limits the potential of development platforms. Making a game isn’t as simple as just building it and users will come. It requires analytics, publishing tech, monetization, networking, databases, and other features that are not supported on most UGC platforms.
Most “user-friendly” engines are generally limited to preset tooling that doesn’t benefit developers or players. This ends up leaving platforms empty as players don’t have compelling experiences due to misaligned incentives for developers. As a result, even strong developers do not have a player base to build for. For any platform to succeed, tooling must not only be readily available but also allow for expansive creation that can attract users.
This is why we invested in The Mirror. The Mirror offers developers all of the tools they need to create powerful gaming experiences. The team has forked the Godot engine and is maintaining it internally to offer a version that works specifically for The Mirror. It is also built so that developers can build anything they want on one platform. This requires features like out-of-the-box multiplayer, co-building assets and worlds, a physics sandbox, and a built-in creator economy.
This is also important for brands and enterprises that want to engage users digitally. Having these tools out of the box and integrated into a larger platform allows for direct access to a development ecosystem that users are already engaging with. Brands shouldn't be building siloed experiences, they should be building experiences that are extensions of larger virtual experiences.
Jared McCluskey, CEO of The Mirror, has seen firsthand the progression of virtual experiences as far back as Second Life where he built an online business in 2007. Since then, there has been almost no success for game platforms outside of Roblox, especially when it comes to companies looking to build “metaverse” platforms.
Our team at Konvoy is excited to back Jared, Alec, Micah, and the rest of the team in their $2.3m Pre-Seed round alongside Founders Fund and Abstract VC.
