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The AVAX Founder Experience: Gaming
Recorded: Jan. 5, 2024 Duration: 0:52:48Space Recording
Full Transcription
Holiday isn't great, but I think pretty much everyone I know is sort of addicted to this
space, so it feels good to come back.
Yeah, I was out of the country and it just meant I got less sleep because everybody's sending
messages and like PST and EST and you just don't sleep.
Well, I'm trading my cookie and cake addiction that happened over the holidays for Twitter
spaces and crypto, so we're back and ready.
Can Cooper or Sean, can you get Mark as a speaker up here?
Yeah, I invited Mark as a speaker, but he hasn't accepted it.
Okay, sounds good.
Well, we can just shoot the shit for the time being, I suppose.
Yeah, is this the first one of these?
It is, yeah.
Yeah, so I was able to join Colony Labs for one to share a little bit about, you know, what
we're doing here with Codebase.
But, you know, at the end of the day, these are going to be a series that we're going to
run.
So, really thinking about, you know, what the founder experience is for founders building
on Avalanche.
Obviously, Mark and Shrapnel are super excited about what they're building and really can't
wait to see what's upcoming.
But we're going to do this across a few different verticals between now and March as well.
So, you know, we have a great ecosystem.
I think you all probably know that.
But something that I'm particularly interested in, given my role here with Codebase is, okay,
what are the things that make an exciting founder?
What are the things that lead to their success?
What are the challenges of building today in this market?
Not only from the technology perspective, but from a broader, like, let's say, product
for the market and really what's upcoming.
So, yes, this is the first one where it's focusing on gaming because, obviously, we're
bullish on gaming, especially given Ed's quotes in an article on what was that yesterday.
So, I think there's a lot of energy here and excitement.
So, it looks like Mark made it to the speaker stage.
So, I'm going to shut up for a second and throw it around for a quick round of intros.
Cool.
Should I?
I guess I'll kick this off.
I'll go brief because we're all here for Mark.
But I lead our gaming vertical here at Avalanche.
I have the privilege of getting to know all of the great games in our ecosystem.
Shrapnel is one of the big games that believed in us really early on.
And it's been a pleasure getting to know the whole team and spend a lot of time with them.
So, excited to dive deep into these questions today.
Mark?
Hey, I'm Mark McCurie.
I'm the Chief Blockchain Officer here at Shrapnel.
What that means is that I have all the blockchain backend that we use for the game, as well as the game services.
And then also a new platform we're starting to talk about called Mercury, which takes all of what we've learned and built for ourselves and make it available to other games.
And also an unapologetic Avalanche fanboy.
I'm a big fan of the tech and what the team is doing.
And then right back at Ed, I have really enjoyed spending time and working with the Avalanche team, the Avalanche team over the past year or so.
I want Coop to do his intro, but Mercury, did you name it after yourself?
So, I didn't.
I didn't.
But it's so, and we had a different name.
It turns out Mercury is the god of commerce and trade.
Also, many other things.
And then they also said it's a bit of a hat tip to you.
So, I didn't pick it.
So, it's nice.
It's spelled differently.
So, it's Mercury with a Y.
But it's quite cool.
This is actually the first time that we're talking about it with that name externally.
And we're going to share more over the next week.
You know, that's great, like, etymology on that name.
There's definitely going to be an L2 or an L3 or an L4 that pops up soon called Mercury.
I guarantee it.
If it doesn't exist already.
Coop, on to you.
Yeah, hey, guys.
I lead marketing for the gaming vertical at Avalanche.
And I'm excited to be here.
And, Michael, I think this series makes a lot of sense for gaming.
Like, we hear from the founders, especially of NFT projects, a ton.
But, you know, some gaming projects, we don't get to hear from them all that often.
So, I'm excited to do these regularly if you can.
Yeah, I'd love that.
And, you know, like I said, I think that there's just such an interesting opportunity to kind of peel back the layers of, you know, I think everyone sees, okay, hey, the game is coming out in X number of months or whatever.
But at the end of the day, are we asking, like, okay, well, what's actually happening between now and launch?
And what's going to make it successful versus, you know, what are those key challenges?
So, maybe I will start there.
As, you know, Mark, I want to ask you first, and then we can throw it over to Ed just for the more broader industry perspective.
Like, what do you think are those key attributes to being a successful founder in the space?
I mean, it's a hard time right now in this space.
It's obviously coming out of a bull market or out of a bear market, we feel and hope.
But, you know, this is a, it's been a little building heavy, let's say, winter.
So, I'd love to hear your perspective on that, Mark.
Yeah, I think that the key thing is one of the things that the folks in the studio say a fair bit, right, is really going to focus on the fun, right?
And so, if you're a founder, I think the key thing is you've got to make a great game.
It's not a technology demonstration.
And it really is about how do you build a great game and then having this mindset of how can I really use Web3 and these technologies as tools in the toolbox to deliver more value to the creators, the players, and community.
It's not just about enriching yourself.
It's really about having that sort of the community mindset.
And along those lines, I think also just as where we're at, and you see this a lot in the folks that are building on Avalanche right now, is this mindset of like when we all win, we all win, right?
And so, we're building a new space.
And, you know, maybe in other industries, you know, games might trash talk each other.
Here, what I've been finding is that, you know, generally, we, A, don't do that, but more than that, we talk to each other behind the scenes and say,
Hey, we're trying to solve some of these problems.
How are you guys doing it?
And how are you guys doing it?
And so, I think, you know, the key thing there is just understanding what it is you do really well, what it is you want to do for your game, and then, you know, what are the partners that can help you in that space that are best to breed?
And then, what are your peers in the space?
And just comparing notes, which is just great.
I love that.
And I think that that's, you know, to me, that kind of ladders up to the broader perspective.
You're in a startup, and you're like, at the end of the day, you're solving customers' pain points.
In this case, the pain points that you're solving is like, how much fun can someone have?
But, you know, I think that that's a, it's a great perspective that you're right.
Like, at the end, you know, at the end of the day, this is just not technology for demonstration's sake.
The other thing I'd throw in there, too, is that also trust your gut, right?
So, a lot of Web3 is based around decentralized finance, right?
And so, if you think about that, one big example is that if I'm going to go buy a cryptocurrency or I'm going to go and buy an NFT, as a user, I make lots of explicit actions.
So, I'm saying, I want to go do this, and then there's a gas fee that's attached to that and things like that.
When you go to build things like a free-to-play game, there's a lot of people who, you know, are not going to want to pay for gas and that you're going to need to provide stuff for them.
But then there's a bunch of things that you'll do that we call them implicit transactions.
So, the user never sees those, right?
So, if you, in our game, it's an extraction shooter.
So, the stakes are real.
So, you go into a match, you can lose the items and win items while you're in that match.
But we also need to make sure that you don't list that for sale at the same time, right?
Because you can't put them up in both places.
And so, what we'll do is do a bunch of transactions behind the scenes at the game level.
And so, you're just understanding, like, hey, the way the gas typically works.
This is a great example of us working with Avalanche, right?
So, when we first started working with subnets, it was like, hey, we'd like to do gas a little bit differently,
where our token that's going to provide utility is distinct from the token that will provide gas.
And can we go do that?
And so, that was really, when we first started talking about that, it was kind of a contrarian view
because it didn't really map up to the traditional mindset and really helped us out when we went forward.
That's great.
And I think trusting your gut, especially as, like, an early-stage founder, like, it's kind of all you got.
And if you don't trust your gut, no one else will.
So, I really appreciate that perspective.
And obviously, I imagine our team trusts your gut, given that we're all working so closely together.
So, Ed, why don't you try and answer that question?
Like, from your perspective, seeing all these companies and games on a regular basis,
like, what does a successful founder look like to you?
Yeah, I think I like Mark's answer around, you know, like, this idea of, you know, community and this rising tide.
Like, a rising tide raises all boats, right?
I think we've been very methodical about who we spend time with, who we bring into the ecosystem.
And, you know, we've got a couple, like, groups and spaces and just, like, this really strong ecosystem that we're really proud of, you know?
And I think one thing that I've noticed, because I joined in, like, December of 2021, right?
And, like, I don't want to trigger anybody, but, you know, AVAX was at 80 on its way to 140.
Like, the good times were rolling.
Like, every day was, like, 20 different Calendly appointments, just different games trying to raise money.
And those were the good times.
And then we ran into this bear market that we've kind of been in up until recently.
And so, you saw a lot of people leave, but, like, this idea of, like, perseverance, right?
Because, you know, building a game is hard enough.
Building a game in Web3 with, like, speculators and a very active Discord community, which is a double-edged sword.
Like, you're so close to the fans and the people who care, but you're also so close to them, right?
And so, just seeing, like, the best founders in our ecosystem are the ones that, like, can take a deep breath, step back, you know, pivot as they need to, like, you know, build for the long term.
Like, also, like, follow this vision, because it's really hard to do that, right?
I think recently we had the team with Pegaxi join our ecosystem, and they got announced, right?
Like, Pegaxi was, like, one of the darlings of the play-to-earn era.
And, you know, they've got, like, token price is different, is far from, like, the peak, but they just had this vision of what they wanted to build, and they're executing on that.
So, it takes a lot of perseverance, it's a lot of, like, resolve, and then I think it's also just assembling, like, the best team you can, right?
Like, I think early on we saw, you know, maybe some teams that were, like, really strong Web2 game developers, but they knew nothing about the blockchain side, right?
Or, you know, some early blockchain folks who were like, I want to go build a game, how hard can it be, right?
And so, you know, finding a really well-rounded team is extremely underrated.
And I think the overall quality of teams that we see in this space is getting better and better.
But Shropmo is one example of, like, everybody we spoke to, right?
From, like, Don and, like, the team building the game, to Mark and his blockchain team, to, like, Calvin and the BD team, like, everyone, and, like, Tony on the marketing side, like, everyone was top-notch.
They understood it, and you can see, like, some of the fruits of the labor now, but, you know, obviously, like, the fun stuff and, like, the big stuff is coming very soon.
So those are some of the aspects that I think I've seen in some of the best founders that I've really admired.
I can't hear anything.
I can't either.
I think we lost Michael.
I think he's rejoining now.
All right.
Might have to remove him from sleep here and let him back up.
But while he figures that out and tries, I just back that up from Ed, perseverance has been big.
Like, some of the smaller teams especially.
It's been a hard year, worrying year.
Like, a team that I see in the audience right now, Bloodloop, is a great example.
These guys have just been working towards this same vision for the past two years.
And now they're starting to get some attention as the market comes back and as they make progress.
But it's not an easy thing to have that much conviction over the bear.
I'm adding Michael back up right now.
Yeah.
One of the other things, too, and I'll use Shrapnel as an example.
In terms of founders, just building that, assembling the team, but also having a great culture inside of the team.
And so, what was really interesting for me at Shrapnel is that, you know, a lot of the team had worked together before.
And they started, they built a studio during the pandemic.
And so, you couldn't bring people in.
And so, they got people that were really good at what they did and were friendly enough.
And they had worked with before.
So, they sort of weeded out folks that might be a bit more, less pleasant to work with.
And so, the culture here is just amazing in terms of you've got a lot of people that are not only good at what they do,
but there's a high level of trust between people inside of the team.
And the velocity that lets you go at is just so much higher than other places where there's politics and other things like that.
It's like, no, we're all just going to build a great game.
And I do the blockchain stuff, and other folks are doing economic design, and other folks are working on game,
and people are working on marketplace.
And we just have a tremendous amount of trust and support each other that is really, you know,
just a culture thing that, from a leader perspective, is great in any organization.
But when you're doing this sort of thing, it's just super, super important.
Yeah, I think, sorry for dropping off before, guys.
But, yeah, I think I just got back here with the, and I think that's right.
Like, we really can't underestimate culture and building that culture from the ground up at the beginning.
You know, I've been working in venture for the past five or so years.
And, you know, the teams that succeed are the ones who really understand what it is that they're building,
or mission aligned early, and then can build on that mission by adding the right key people at the exact right time.
And this is kind of where I was going before with a brief plug on CodeBase,
which is our new accelerator here at Avalanche that we are currently recruiting early stage founders for.
So if that's you, please consider applying.
But, you know, one of the things that we're doing, actually, in addition to those who are applying as companies,
we also are recruiting a talent marketplace.
So if you are a developer, or you're a product designer, or whatever, you may not be the founder,
but join the talent marketplace.
And, you know, our vision is that this is going to be an opportunity where, you know,
you can get in early with one of these companies and be part of that building that culture.
Because, like I said, you know, this is the most important thing that you can probably do from a non-technical,
non-business perspective as a company.
One thing I wanted to jump to, Mark and Ed, you know, we talked a little bit about the bear market
and kind of building in the bear market.
And I'm perhaps, you know, actually was a bit of a fan to a certain degree of the bear market
in so much as that it allowed teams to really focus on building
and be really good at the thing that they're building,
as opposed to exclusively being out there trying to fundraise against growth metrics.
But that said, there's obviously a challenge inherent there.
So we'd love to hear more about, like, what are those challenges that you're, A,
you had experienced recently, but then, like, what are the challenges ahead?
I mean, this is not going to be an easy road to launch, like, a game that's let alone, like, a world-class game.
So we'd love to hear your perspective on that, Mark.
Yeah, in terms of the bear market, we were fortunate that, you know, we had, I think, like, anytime there's a,
you know, I've been in Web3 for a long time, right?
And I know a number of folks here have as well.
And so there are times for exuberance where lots of people can get money,
sometimes not with business plans that may not be as well thought out
or some aspects of the business that are not as well thought out.
When you go to the hard times, like, those are the ones that tend to get impacted the most.
I think going back to the team, you know, there was a lot of thought put into tokenomics.
And, you know, the game was great and continues to be even better every day
as folks who've seen out in events and things like that.
And so I think that's been really helpful for us.
You know, also the pedigree of the team also, you know, from an investor perspective,
I think, you know, there's less risk when you've got a great game and a team.
I think if we look at some of the challenges that are out there, you know,
the biggest thing is depending on what you want to go build, you know,
getting talent and partners sometimes is something that's key.
And so depending on where you're coming from, you may or may not have the right questions to ask
and things like that.
You know, the technologies are rapidly changing.
You know, when we looked at gaming, you know, Avalanche was someone we were talking to.
And as soon as we looked at that, we're like, hey, this makes a lot of sense.
There were other people making a lot of noise.
But a year later, everyone's coming to Avalanche, right?
And so, you know, if someone and there are other people that are writing big checks.
And so if someone wrote, you know, the key thing here is like, don't just take it.
Don't take a check without understanding what that means, especially in tough times.
So some people might give away the farm or have things that impact their game.
I think understanding the tokenomics is super key.
We're now in, especially with subnets, we're a multi-chain world, right?
And so for some folks, you know, understanding, like, how is that going to work for them?
Like, if I have something in a subnet, I want to go to another subnet, or I want to go to
ETH or Avalanche or Binance for different scenarios.
Like, how does that work?
The good news is there's some great solutions that are there, both within the Avalanche ecosystem
and connecting to that.
And then, you know, on the talent side, you know, I would see resumes that came through
where someone three months ago was a roofer and they wanted putting, like, roofs on someone's
houses, and three months later, they wanted a salary of $500,000, right?
So, like, some of that was just sort of crazy in terms of what you can go do.
The other challenge that people don't really talk about is that there are state actors who
have been successful in stealing lots of money from games.
And so security is something you need to be really on top of.
You know, we've had folks interview for our company.
We're fairly certain we're from North Korea, for example.
And so there's the traditional things of, hey, I got to go build a business on a new,
rapidly evolving technology.
And then there's also, there's a lot of money potentially involved in this.
And there's some bad folks who are out to go after that and from a security perspective.
Now, the good news is, you know, the Mercury platform we talked about is, you know, we've
solved a lot of problems, both directly and with partners.
And so for our Mercury platform, we want to help people focus on the fun.
So that's a key focus for us is to allow folks to build on the game and not have to
know the, the, the, all the complexities and nuances of Web3.
Thanks, Mark.
I really appreciate you bringing up security.
Perhaps because I'm a boring nerd.
Things like that, I think are like super interesting and very important, you know, and something
that, you know, we can see sometimes projects launch and they do great.
And all of a sudden there's some sort of exploit and just kind of kills the energy.
So having that stuff as first principles is really, really important, but also super insightful
and shocking that I didn't realize that the attack vectors could necessarily be through
your recruiting process.
So, um, pretty, pretty fascinating.
Um, thanks and sorry for that happening.
Um, Ed would love your perspective when you're, like I said before, you're seeing a lot of
companies in this and when folks come to you, like, where are they falling short, you know,
by their own, by their own, uh, fault or not?
I'd love to hear kind of like what, what are the challenges that you're seeing them?
Yeah, I had, I had, uh, I had two, but I wanted to touch on one that Mark said, which
is like, you know, don't fully commit or sign something, you know, before, before you know
the implications of that.
Oftentimes I think we, you, we, we say that towards like which chain you build on.
Of course, that's, that's from my perspective, but there's a lot of things kind of within,
within, you know, the, the, the company that you need to think about.
Right.
And, you know, I will say like, I think we've, we've have an interesting point of view because
we've been through a couple of like rise and falls.
And when I started, like, you know, the biggest gaming chains aren't necessarily the biggest
gaming chains today.
Uh, and so it's, it's just like a really interesting push pool because every one wants
to invest in web through gaming because they think it's the future and it's going to bring
millions of new people on chain.
Right.
So, um, we've got games where, you know, we've, we've had conversations with them early
on and they ended up going somewhere else or, you know, didn't actually choose something
that fit the exact needs of what they needed.
And then when they come back later, kind of the offer is different, kind of the, the
value prop is different, kind of the ecosystem we have is different, just a different place.
Right.
So, you know, take the time to kind of learn what you're doing.
And so just plus one to what Mark said there, you know, from my perspective, the other two
areas that are, that are difficult for founders today.
Um, I think number one is, and I say this all the time, but it's like user acquisition,
right?
Like there's, um, in this next six months to a year is when, you know, these games are
going to be launching, uh, and it's, it's a very crowded space and I just don't see enough
games thinking about how to properly do UA.
Right.
So we still have games that come to us and say, well, well, we'll come deploy here if
you do marketing with us.
And, uh, you know, if you're relying on us to, to, to drive your first thousand, 10,000,
a hundred thousand users, like, I hate to tell you this, but no chain is going to be
able to do that for you.
Right.
And, um, you know, for the games that we are very bullish on, they think a lot about how
do you tap into that web two audience?
You know, there's more and more of these UA platforms that are similar to web two that
focus on web three that are, are popping up, you know, um, that I think make a lot of
sense, like the influencer marketing stuff that like Trapnel team and some other games
are doing, like all that stuff, uh, works it's tried and true in web two.
So seeing more of that, cause that's, it's an attention game, right?
Like just in web three, how many different first person shooters or racing games have
you seen?
And we're not even talking about the thousands in web two that, and there's going to be
some blockbuster games that are coming out in these next two years.
So you're always fighting for attention.
Um, I think the second is, uh, a lot of these games, you know, they don't, they raise enough
just to kind of get the MVP out or kind of build, you know, the alpha or the beta or get
to a production.
And they assume, you know, perfect conditions across all that, right?
Well, you know, crypto moves extremely fast.
Like for all of you who work in this space, like two weeks feels like two months, right?
In, in, in, in web two time.
So, you know, remember like move to earn, remember all these different metas, oftentimes
founders will raise the bare minimum just to build a, like a singular product.
And they just have like tunnel vision.
But I think it's an encouragement for founders to like, think about, you know, the other roadblocks
in the way, try to raise enough cushion, uh, have like lower your burn to a point where,
you know, if something catastrophic did happen or, you know, you weren't able to build what
you want, but you have, you know, the ammo or the firepower to pivot or to, to try new
things because going back to perseverance, you also need the runway to, to, to persevere.
Right.
I think that last point there at is a really great one and something that I think is really
gets back down to like, when you're building your company, what are the fundamentals that
you're building with?
Because yeah, you're going to more chances, more likely than not, you're going to need to
pivot, whether that is like entirely a full product pivot, or if there's certain features
that are going to require that, but like that requires having a good team that requires
having robust security that requires having, you know, process in place that allows you
to actually feel comfortable with doing so without say, you know, having to go back to
your investors and begging hat in hand to be able to do this X, Y, and Z thing.
One of the things I also wanted to touch on, and I think you guys really, you know,
elucidated it there, which is like, pick your partner as well.
So I'd be curious to hear what, you know, a, like who, who and how have investors and
partners specifically, let's say investors, Mark and Ben, Ben supportive of you.
What's been like the most supportive?
What's say Ben, the least impactful?
You don't need to name any names necessarily, but, you know, I'm asking for everyone.
Cause I think that this is something that if you're out there raising funding and,
you know, someone promises you the moon and every introduction that they can, you know,
possibly pull from their Rolodex, you know, what, what do you need to look out for to
actually understand that?
Like, well, okay, maybe this isn't the right thing or this is the right thing.
So we'd love to hear just kind of your perspective and all that stuff.
Yeah, we're, we're lucky.
We've got folks like Griffin and Polychain who know the space really well.
And they also are, are always interested in our perspective and, and learning and providing
feedback and things like that.
Like the earlier, the discussion about gas mechanics, we wanted to basically sort of
divorce like the gas token from the utility token.
That was fairly contrarian, right?
And so we had a bunch of conversations and we walked through that and they're like, yeah,
okay, that makes sense.
And, and, and like, how can we go and help you to do that and bringing, getting us connected
with different partners and things like that, I think is, is, is something that they do.
They, they're also regularly reaching out.
It's like, Hey, this is, this is really interesting company.
Have you guys chatted with them or those sorts of things?
So just, you know, connecting.
And they're also, they love gaming, right?
And so, you know, they're not asking us to commit, you know, I've worked in web three
in different capacities and different companies, and they're not asking us to, to like, do
something like a natural acts, right?
They just feel contrary to what the game experience is.
And so it goes back to like, we were saying earlier, like, like trust, like they, they
trust the team and they're like, you know, whatever you need to help, you know, they're,
they're there for us.
And, you know, we're very fortunate in, in, in that regard.
Um, and then an ecosystem partners, you know, the challenge is, is that there are so many
partners with, um, and, and, uh, potential, so many potential partners, and there's a lot
of unjustified confidence, like fake it till you make it in the web three space.
And so the key thing there is just making sure that you know how to either ask the right
questions, um, to, to sort of weed through like the, the, the, the nonsense versus the,
the, the good folks, um, and this is another place where like, when we all, when we all
win, so ask people in the space that are doing well, like, Hey, who are you talking with about
this?
We were talking with another big game on another subnet the other day, uh, and saying, Hey,
like, this is, this is something we're looking at.
How are you guys looking at it?
And we just compared notes and, and, and those things were, were great.
Um, so, you know, having partners that, um, are invested in your success.
And then part of that is just understanding how you do partnerships in general, like making sure
the value exchanges there.
Um, and so, you know, with, with us, um, you know, we have the luxury of building a game
and also the platform.
And so on the platform side, they're like, okay, you guys know what you're doing on the
game side and you know what you're doing on the platform side.
And if you do that well and bring a lot more games on the platform, that's going to bring
more people onto our networks or more people consuming data services and those sorts of
things.
And so any place where you, you know, it's one of the things that, that is just super key
where I've seen some folks sort of run astray in the business where they might
have like business models that change every three months.
It's like, oh, we're going to be this type of company or, oh, we're going to go pivot
here.
We're going to go pivot there.
Um, the key thing with partners is what do they do?
Well, do they understand that that's what they do well?
Um, and do they have a track record in other customers?
And that generally pans out.
Um, and then, you know, I'll just use, uh, use, uh, Ava Labs and, and, and Avalanche as
an example.
There were a bunch of things ranging from security and configurability and stuff we wanted to
do in the short term, but where we wanted to be long-term.
Um, and the, what I used to, when I was talking to, to colleagues and, and friends at other
companies, as I was looking at Avalanche, it's like, this is just really thoughtful, right?
In terms of, it seems like this is a partner who has actually listened.
And that's proven to be very true for us as we've sort of worked on stuff with them.
Um, and they've built things that are going to make my life easier and they didn't just
sort of cookie cutter something else, or just sort of, uh, YOLO something, um, as an MVP,
but it was really sort of thoughtful design.
And I think that's the key thing is, is don't, even if people tell you how great they are
and, and, and how important their partnership for you will be, like, it just goes back to
fundamentals.
Like, do you trust these people?
Do they have good customers?
Do you believe in their ideas?
And do you believe that you can, you can execute?
And there's no harm.
And if there's nothing signed, if your, your spidey sense is tingling, definitely walk away.
Um, we, we almost did something with one partner.
Um, and then in like the final presentation, they asserted some things that were not true.
And that just set off our spidey sense.
We went with someone else and we've been really happy with the other party we went with.
So, uh, it just goes back to like trusting your gut.
If something doesn't feel right, it probably isn't.
Yeah.
That's yeah.
I really appreciate the soberness of that response because I think that like this, the space
is, you know, often rightfully, but, um, often not rightfully filled with hype, um, in a way
that is like a, not sustainable, but then B is frankly masking, you know, something that's
a little bit more rotten at its core, perhaps.
Um, what would you say mark or some red flags?
You're chatting with investors or chatting with partners.
I mean, you just mentioned one there, but like investors are particularly interesting,
I think, because especially in the bear market, someone is going to offer you money and it's
like, great, been looking for that cash.
Um, what, but then, you know, you don't want to get into a relationship where suddenly,
you know, 18 months later, you're being pushed out of your company or your equity is being
crammed down or what have you.
So I'd love to hear your perspective on dealing with investors and thinking about those decisions
on the front end and also the red flags there.
Yeah.
I mean, so the, the key thing I would say is, first of all, just understand how you're going
to make money and how you're going to deliver value.
Right.
And so there's some modeling that you need to do just for your business.
You would do normally, um, and make sure you have that because the checks sound really
big, but then when you go and look at what, uh, their op, when, what the, the fine print
says, cause we've had, listen, the, the, the team has built a great game.
And so you've had lots of people come court us for all sorts of things, right.
And, and throw checks and things like that.
But when you, when you look at the fine print, a lot of times it's like, oh, okay.
So basically you'll, you'll get me to a point of success.
And then you're just going to take a lot of the value out of what I'm delivering, which,
you know, hurts what I can do for my community and for my employees and, and, and, and those
sorts of things.
Um, so, so definitely don't the, the dollar signs, we might be saying, oh, that'll buy
me X amount of developers and can help us go forward, but definitely like, look at the
backend, like going back to, if it sounds too good to be true, it generally, it generally
is, um, also ask them like, what, what level of success have you had so far and, and talk
to the people that have worked with them.
Right.
And just as you would in, in, in web two and web three, um, and the other thing that I
think this is just, you know, in my career in general, the people that, um, that, that
I like to partner with are people that actually want to partner.
And so it's not a hard sell.
Their first questions are not like, let me tell you how great I am.
It's, Hey, what are the problems you're trying to solve?
And then they, they try to work with me to understand what's there.
And if there's some nuance there, um, we can work together.
Uh, and then if you've got some questions for them and they just sort of like, like
I asked someone once about security for one of these vendors and they just like hand waved
it off.
Like, oh, that's not a big, not a big problem.
I'm like, okay, you clearly do not understand the space.
Um, and, and things like that.
But, um, yeah, so there's, there's, there's a lot there.
Uh, the good news is that, you know, as people are building things like shrapnel, um, and
platforms and, and, uh, networks like, um, uh, avalanche and accelerators like yourselves,
you know, the, the, the patterns are being established.
The reference points are there.
There are people that you can ask questions to and, and, and that are mentoring other
folks and other teams that are there and, you know, accelerators and other things like,
like, like code base that are, they can help get you connected with these people if you
don't know them.
Um, so I think, you know, the good news is, is that we're, we're on the cusp, you know,
as we go into 2024 with, with games that are going to come out that are going to be great
and show people how to, uh, you know, what, what this can be like without being like a cash
grab or anything like that and deliver value for content creators and that sort of thing.
And so I think that's, there's a lot of goodness that's coming.
So I don't want to make it all, all doom and gloom.
Um, and then the folks that have been thoughtful about what they've been building, they've been
figuring out how they can help other people not have to go through some of the pain or
have to sort of sort through all the different vendors that are there.
That's, that's really great.
And I really appreciated the kind of perspective there on like, just thinking about like, are
you aligned with your investors at the beginning, right?
Are these, are these people that actually want to build what you want to build?
Um, and also I think just something to mention here that is just adding onto what you said
there, Mark is the ability of referencing folks, like go on Crunchbase, make an account, see
who else are in these companies or in these investors' portfolios, go to their websites,
see who's in their portfolio, ping those people, get your references.
Because at the end of the day, if someone, someone's going to, another founder is going
to tell you the truth.
Um, and you know, you don't want to be surprised, um, after you sign the term sheet and giving
up X percentage of your company.
Um, Ed, I want to, I want to ask you too.
It's like, you know, when you're advising companies, early stage companies, like who are
the top five investors by name that people should not work with?
No, I'm sorry.
I'm totally kidding.
Please don't answer that.
But, um, please, uh, tell us though, what are some of those, what are you advising people?
What are the, um, what are the red flags that you're telling them to look out for?
Yeah.
I actually started thinking, I was like, oh shoot, he's putting me on the spot here.
Um, I think, uh, obviously Mark being, uh, on the builder side, he has great experience
and I think his advice was great.
And I think what I've noticed is, you know, if, if someone adds value, people will notice,
right?
So usually when you talk to a game or any, any, any dap, you say, Hey, who are your biggest
value add investors?
They're not going to say like, oh, these investors suck or don't do anything.
They're going to be like, oh, you know, off top of my head, these two investors have been,
you know, profoundly helpful for us and have like really supported us.
Right.
Like that's like, like, it's like, if they're helpful, you'll know it.
Right.
And I think, you know, Mark also had great advice.
And this is what I tell games too, right?
Like we are in crypto and there's some amazing tech, there's amazing folks who are building
stuff.
And there's also just a lot of vaporware out there.
Right.
So every chain is going to tell you, you know, that they can do 6 billion TPS and that transaction
fees are a fraction of a penny and that, you know, they're going to treat you like their
firstborn kid and they're going to give you a ton of money, right?
Because it's, it's no sweat off their back to kind of muddy the water.
So I think what we always tell game teams that we talk to is like, hey, you know, you're
never going to be hotter than you are right now, which is you haven't chosen a chain yet.
You've raised money.
Like you're, you're kind of in this, you know, you're in the crypto sphere, right?
Like people know about you.
People are hyped.
You are the most attractive to a chain or an investor you'll be right now.
So, you know, put, put the chain or whatever, whatever ecosystem partner or VC through their
paces, right?
Like you should talk to games that have deployed on a chain or games that have taken money from
that investor or games that have worked with a certain guild because they will, they will
tell you exactly what they think.
Um, and then I would say also like, uh, you need to feel really comfortable about who you're
in the trenches with, you know, you need to feel good that like when shit hits the fan
that you can pick up the phone and the other person's going to be there to like answer and
be like, all right, let's go figure this out.
Right.
So it's like a comfort level thing.
Um, so I think those are, those are some of the biggest situations, um, that I, that
I'd like really recommend, um, game teams or, or, or dafts to think about.
And, you know, at the end of the day, that may not even be my chain, but if you've thought
about it, you know, and you've really put in the work, um, you know, I think, I think
that you can feel pretty good about what you're doing.
One other thing too, is, um, some chains will say, well, we have this many games and it's
like, and, and, um, you know, I was at Microsoft a long time.
Right.
And so you'd have like the two people you had on stage that were big names and you talk
about like a lot of numbers.
I think the key thing to look at is like, there's a lot, some people may have, uh, logos on there,
but what do the logos actually translate to?
What kind of games are those?
Are they actually fun?
Um, are they still around?
Um, that's, that sort of thing.
Um, because I think, um, and then what else was available when those games were built?
Right.
And so some people win by default early on.
Uh, and so some people sort of rack up logos before there were subnets and other things
like that, but they're still on, on slides.
Look, look at the ones that are doing the things you find super interesting today for
sure.
Um, and see what, which, which chains and which tech that they're using.
And for the ones that, that, uh, may not be on the chain that you're looking at, ask them
like, what are your biggest pain points?
And then go back to the ones that you're looking at now, right?
Because there's a good chance that they ended up having to build a bunch of stuff because
they just happened to come six months earlier or a year earlier in a cycle where things weren't
available yet.
And there's, you know, some great solutions out there now.
Um, they were there.
Like when I came to, to, to shrapnel, um, like I hadn't worked, I worked with a bunch of
chains.
I hadn't worked with avalanche.
And so it would have been really easy for me to say like, Hey, like, let's just go use
something else.
Right.
Um, but I actually spent a lot of time looking at avalanche and it was just incredibly thoughtful,
like much more thoughtful.
Like I had literally written a paper at my last company on as a consensus on here are
all the challenges when you want to go do some of these things.
And it was like, uh, the folks at, um, Avalabs had really gone through that and said, okay,
here's how we're going to solve this in a really thoughtful way.
And here's how we're going to be able to handle this at a really thoughtful way.
Um, and so the, the key thing there is I think is just like, always look at where people are
moving now, uh, and, and the, the, the folks are interested in now, because they're going
to be leveraging the stuff that's available today.
And other people may have made commitments two years ago or taken checks two years ago,
um, based on some things that are no longer relevant or valid.
That's great.
Thanks guys for that.
Um, I see shrapnel came on the stage, uh, the official account.
Did you guys want to say something?
Yeah.
Um, I was just coming up here to say, Hey, to Coop.
Cause I love that guy and Ed Chang.
And I just love listening to Mark McCurie speak.
Um, but Hey, how's it going guys?
I'm Tony.
I look after a bunch of marketing stuff for shrapnel.
Really excited to be up here.
Wait, and just, I'm glad you, you, you're there, Tony.
Cause, uh, Ed was talking early about the importance of like growing the community.
And if you want to see how to do it, right.
Just look at, uh, the place shrapnel account.
It's, you know, at play shrapnel on Twitter and just see what, what Tony and the team are doing,
like from what they were doing at our bezel and what they're doing with, with influencers
and what they're doing with communities and the, all the shrapnel chibis and things that
are out there.
But it's just, it's really, um, building that community, having fun, um, and building the
brand in a way that just, um, I think I I'm, I'm in the company and I see what he's doing.
I'm like, Hey, I want to be there.
Like, that's looked really cool.
So, um, I think there's, um, there's a lot that's, that he's doing.
And then there's also the sort of the, the transmedia stuff that we do as well to bring
people into it, but that, that community stuff is there.
And, and I think, as you've seen with Tony and the stuff that he and the team are doing,
it's just been growing like wildfire and people are just having a lot of fun.
I mean, that's the thing that I see consistently.
It's not just about the game, which is great, but it's like, Hey, this is a lot of fun.
And also being really transparent about where we are in the process and giving people early
access to things and things like that.
It's just, just a lot of fun.
Well, thanks Mark.
I getting praise from a genius is always super nice.
Uh, I'm going to just blush now.
I'm looking forward to having you, Tony, uh, come and, uh, join us for some of the code
based sessions and tell folks about go to market and community development.
Cause that's, you know, this, this space particularly just like, I obviously loves
it, but, um, having some method behind the madness is always super valuable.
Yeah, man.
I mean, if we've got a couple of seconds here, I would, I'd love to, to just throw out some,
some cool insights into how Avalanche has really helped us supercharge what everything
that Mark's talking about.
Yeah, cool.
So, you know, one of the things that I'm super passionate about, just for context, I worked
at, uh, at Amazon for almost 10 years and I was on the team that bought Twitch and then
created this program called Twitch prime.
And one of the things that we found was that creating a community around live physical events
is just so powerful.
When you get to sit down with people, like you just, you fall in love with each other,
especially if you're passionate about the same thing.
And so I came to coop maybe six months ago and I said, Hey, I've got this guy, Sam.
He's in the audience here.
Same Stephanie and he was gamified, uh, with us every week.
Um, and that's also an Avalanche sponsored show.
Uh, I said, Hey, this guy is just, he, he is, he's kicking ass.
Sam is, is awesome.
And, and we, he runs this group called the Wolves Dow, which is a very prolific, um, group
within the web three space that talks about gaming all the time.
And so we've partnered with Avalanche and Sam to actually host a series of live, like,
uh, you know, call them content houses or hype houses at major events.
We did one at Basel.
We're about to do one, uh, in Vegas next week.
We're going to do one at GDC.
And basically the, the point of these houses is for all of these creators to get together
and hang out and have a place to be when there isn't like a show, a talk going on or a party
going on.
And what we found is that like all the people from the shows that aren't content creators,
the people that work at other games or work at other projects also end up coming through
the house and hanging out and just eating food with us and chilling.
Cause it's like a, a fun place to be to Mark's point.
It's just like, we want to create a good environment and have the context for that environment, be
shrapnel, um, and avalanche like we have, we have a lot of the growth that you've seen
in the last several months from us has been a function of us just getting really tight
with, again, people like Sam, like Kai Rose and the crowd down there.
I mean, we hired some of these people, Dub, my community lead came from these, these events
that we're throwing and they've been completely empowered by avalanche.
I mean, avalanche pays for all the food and shit at these things, right guys?
So just like really super excited to be, uh, partnered with, with this team that's up here
and helping us grow the community.
Cause they could, they couldn't be doing a better job.
That's awesome to hear.
Thanks.
Thanks Tony.
And also, you know, I will say subnets are good, but the pizza and beer is better.
Um, so yes, uh, excited.
Yeah.
Thank you guys.
Yeah.
Um, so Michael with avalanche, you don't have to choose.
Oh, well, look at that.
You're going to have both.
Jeez.
Parallelization and pepperoni.
Um, so, okay.
We're getting close to time here and I know folks have a calendar blocked.
2024 predictions.
Uh, Mark hit me what's going on in this industry in 2024.
Well, I think this is the year that, um, you know, you've got great games that are coming
out, um, that are a lot of fun to play.
Um, and they're going to help define for folks that in, for the mainstream.
Hey, this, you can have a, a game.
Um, that's great that leverages web three in a way that adds a lot of value for my users
and for my, uh, my players and my content creators and things like that.
Um, and so I think you're going to have a combination of, um, you know, you know, Xbox had halo.
And so I think web three is going to have their halos this year.
Um, they're going to show people, um, sort of the art of the possible with the technology.
Uh, but, you know, but leveraging it in a way that really adds value.
And I think that the folks that did that are going to be sharing both the patterns and
platforms, whether it's Mercury or the things that are out there, um, that make it much easier
for folks who have no idea about web three and it just coming from a traditional gaming
background to get into the space.
And, and so I think there's, there's an example, examples that are going to come out and then
a flywheel is just going to get established.
This is going to help drive more people into the space.
That's great.
Any alpha you can drop on, uh, what's, what trap got coming out other than Mercury?
Um, I don't know.
We've got, we've got Don on the line.
So Don is the guy who can announce anything that he wants.
So I can, I can, I can, Don was just tell me what to talk about.
Uh, so next, next week we will be in Vegas with Orangey and Cairo, uh, hanging out and
we will be launching, uh, what I think is the first interoperable, uh, UEFN Fortnite experience
that you'll see from a web three game.
We have been working with a group called Next.
Uh, they were previously called NGG.
They're a, a, a guild in the, in the community.
Uh, and they built us a UEFN map that is actually an extraction mode within, uh, Fortnite and
it's using shrapnel assets.
So the buildings that you see, a bunch of the broken down cars that look super post-apocalyptic,
those are all like straight from our library into UEFN.
Uh, and we've created this map.
We'll be hosting some prized events.
We'll be giving away $25,000 over the next, uh, few weeks as we lead up into our early access.
Um, and so if you, if you're interested in what, uh, real web three interoperability with
a mainstream game looks like, or can look like, uh, you should come hang out with us
next week and, and pay attention to our Twitter.
Cause we're going to be doing some shit.
Thanks.
That's, that's exactly what I was hoping we could talk about.
So shrap night is coming.
Cool.
That's great.
Thank you guys.
That's, uh, that's awesome.
And then Ed.
Okay.
Question for you.
2024 predictions.
If we're having this conversation in December of 2024, what are we talking about?
I think, uh, we will get our, at least our first web three native game with a million
MAUs.
Uh, I think that you'll see a lot of web, more traditional AAA web two publishers go back
to looking at crypto with a lot of the difficulties right now in traditional game development.
You look at what's going on in China, we're like, the government cracking down a lot of things.
I think they're going to look at blockchain to solve some of their issues or, or, or look
for more opportunity there.
And then I think that we will hit 20 gaming submits.
Okay.
Heard it here first.
I think you didn't announce this in your article yesterday.
Did you?
No, I just made it up.
Now we're talking.
Hey, Michael, one last thing is, um, I think up to now we've been calling these web three
games.
And so, you know, I was mentioning Don earlier.
He has a thing.
He says, like when we had Xbox live introduced, you know, they didn't talk about, you know,
TCP IP games.
They were just games that you could play with more people.
And so I think web three, uh, if we execute well, becomes a very powerful tool in the toolbox,
but ends up becoming more behind the scenes than the first thing we talk about.
So, you know, in early stage tech, we talk about the tech first, uh, but now like the games
are going to be the games that are going to speak for themselves.
And the tech will just make the magic happen.
I love that perspective.
And it's something that I'm really trying to encourage with folks when they're thinking
about applying to code base and the types of companies that we're looking for.
It's really like, listen, like at the end of the day, getting to the next billion users,
web three in that itself is not a value proposition.
Um, like when I'm doing my, you know, pay at the kiosk point of sale, uh, with my credit
card and it's tapped to pay, I don't think about the fact that it's running on AWS.
Um, and I think that yet that obviously controls 60% of the internet.
So what, what does that look like for web three?
And I think what you just said there hits it right on the head.
So I think that's a, that's a really great perspective.
And, um, I think let's just end there guys.
Um, I really appreciate all of your time.
Um, uh, thanks.
Thanks, Mark.
Thanks, Ed.
Thanks, Coops.
Thanks, uh, the whole Shrap team there.
Um, and you know, one was quick, one last quick plug for code base.
YC for web three, um, avax.network backslash code base.
Uh, our applications are open until mid-feb, uh, looking for early stage companies who probably
have some angel funding, maybe some friends and family.
Um, and ideally have not raised more than around 500 K.
And, uh, yeah, come build with us.
You know, we'll be working closely with our product, our eng team, whole suite of partners
have access to, you know, conversations with folks like Mark, folks like the Shrapnel team,
um, Ed, of course, and Coop.
Um, so, so yeah, come, come see us.
Uh, really appreciate y'all joining us today and, uh, we'll, we'll catch you next time.
Thanks guys.
Have a good one.
Thanks everybody.
Michael.
Great, great space.
Thanks for hosting.
Thanks.
