Zentry - Turn your life into an epic MMORPG
Zentry - Turn your life into an epic MMORPG
The Metagame Layer
Welcome to the alpha please newsletter.
gm friends,
Today I have another really interesting project for you. Zentry is a really ambitious and exciting project looking to build the “Metagame Layer”. They basically want to turn your life into an epic MMORPG.
If you play any games at all (PC, console, mobile or web3 ones) then you will want to read this.
Zentry wants to unite all of your activity across different games (web2 & web3) and platforms and allow you to play and be rewarded through another metagame.
This team has already had a lot of success in the past with GuildFi and are backed by top tier investors (Binance, Animoca, Coinbase Ventures, Defiance Capital & more). They also have a treasury worth a massive ~150M.
Make it to the end of the piece and I’ll tell you how you can start playing and earn shards with their first product.
I had the pleasure of speaking with with Zentry co-founder Jarindr about their vision, and also web3 gaming in general.
This piece is in collaboration with Zentry and I am likely to work with them going forward, as I love the vision. I want to support as many high quality crypto consumer apps as possible.
Here is their official cinematic video to get you started (expect this level of quality):
Firstly, can you say a quick word about GuildFi and why you decided to launch Zentry?
We started GuildFi over three years ago. GuildFi is a gaming platform. If anyone is familiar with Axie Infinity, it created millions of jobs for people in Southeast Asia. Since we are based in Thailand, we saw a huge market opportunity in Southeast Asia. That's when we started, around two and a half years ago.
At that time, Axie Infinity was one of the biggest games, actually the only game that brought in the game guild narrative and scholarships. We created thousands of jobs for people to start playing games and earn rewards and revenues from it.
As a gamer and an investor in businesses for 10 years, I have seen many protocols being built. Given my background in engineering, I knew that the play-to-earn model was not really sustainable. You can't just keep giving out tokens to people who come in to speculate on earning. Eventually, this sort of pyramid is going to collapse.
This realization led us to pivot from GuildFi to Zentry. The biggest reason for this pivot was the change in the narrative and business model. GuildFi was focused on game guilds, but we are now building something much bigger with Zentry.
The name GuildFi still implies a game guild, and since we are building something more ambitious and revolutionary, a rebrand was necessary for people to understand that Zentry is not just about gaming. We are aiming to revolutionize the industry in a significant way.
What is the main problem Zentry is trying to solve?
With Zentry, we are building a "game of games." So, what are we trying to solve here? We are addressing two of the biggest problems in the gaming space, and not just gaming, but the broader industry. This includes both Web2 games and Web3 games, though I don't really like to separate them.
The first problem is distribution, and the second is monetization. Gamification has always been a big part of consumer apps. If you're familiar with applications like e-commerce apps or Duolingo, you'll know that gamification has been a crucial element forever.
Looking at some of the largest consumer apps, like TikTok or YouTube, you'll see they always apply gamification to create better engagement for users, keep them coming back, and enhance the overall experience.
This can be as simple as a daily login streak. If you know Duolingo, one of their biggest features, though it might seem trivial, is the streak of how many days you keep logging in. Some people have 700-day streaks of logging into Duolingo every day. This shows how consumer apps use gamification to keep people coming back.
We are building a layer that overlays consumer apps, which could be games, social networks, or any other platform. This layer helps these apps monetize better, improve retention, and create real lore based stories that actually keep people coming back.
Zentry is an ecosystem with multiple interconnected products, all based on the same goal. Imagine it like a universe of interconnected games, with stories, IP, and characters that people can immerse themselves in. To progress in our games, you might need to do something outside the game, interacting with different layers and apps.
Our layer helps these apps monetize and improve distribution. For instance, if you usually play games like Dota, League of Legends, or Axie Infinity, each of these games has its own mini-games and achievements. Our layer adds another layer of engagement. For example, every time you hit someone in Valorant or finish a game in Axie Infinity, you might get rewards from our layer as well.
These rewards could be various resources from our Zentry Universe. Playing different games earns different resources, which can be used to craft items, gift cards, or enhance profiles. This encourages players to go back to their favorite games, helping those games monetize better.
First-party publishers might not want to use mechanics like timed loot boxes or gambling mechanics, because users might think they’re trying to just suck more money out of them. As a third party, we can apply these gaming mechanics on top of different games without those concerns, enhancing the user experience and monetization without harming how people view the original game or app.
So Zentry is sort of like the film Ready Player One, where everyone plays in a persistent universe, but is essentially playing a bunch of different games. Is this how people could think of Zentry?
Exactly. If you look into our daily lives, this kind of thing is already happening, but it's just scattered around. For instance, if you've played Dota for 20,000 hours, that's valuable. You're an important piece for game publishers who are looking for experienced players. Let's say I'm a new game developer and I want to contact people who have played mobile games for at least 10,000 hours to test my new game. This is a good example of why this is important and how you can finally monetize your own data and skills.
What Zentry does is give power back to the users, helping players within the Zentry Universe to grow, thrive, and monetize what they do daily. Instead of relying on unsustainable play-to-earn models where you play games to earn tokens, we have a more sustainable model.
This goes for both physical and digital as well. Imagine you want to craft a rare sword in Zentry, which requires resources from different games. We're not forcing people to play different games because that wouldn't be practical. Users usually play a small set of games. For example, if you want to craft the sword, and you need resources from Game A, but you only play Game B, we have designed it so you can still create those resources because other players are playing Game A.
Also imagine the last resource you need can only be found in a physical store. You could get it from a new partner store, like Dunkin Donuts, and be one of the first 500 people. This creates a collaboration between digital and physical spaces. Remember when Pokémon Go had rare Pokémon appear in specific locations which sent massive groups of people to certain stores? We have the power to create similar experiences with anything, from digital to physical.
So yeah, it is like an MMORPG that overlays your life and your social network.
Zentry will have a number of interconnected products, starting with Nexus. Could you tell us more about your products?
Let’s start with Nexus which has been live for a couple of weeks. We have more than 100,000 users already onboarded. Nexus gamifies social networks, building games on top of them. We create a social graph to identify power users in the web3 ecosystem. We provide a gamified experience that is not just about a farming platform like everyone else but is built as a game. Even though the current version is more simplified, focusing on direct engagement, our next launch will turn Nexus into a full game.
In this full version, every time you tweet about different games or earn resources, you can use those resources to craft items and equip them to your profile, pvp against someone or create clans. We want to encourage a gaming-like experience that turns users into content creators while playing the game. We believe Web3 doesn’t have enough content creators, making the industry rely on a small set of influencers, streamers, and gamers. There is a big gap compared to web2 gaming.
For example, hiring a YouTuber or streamer with 1 million subscribers to play your game might cost $5,000 to $7,000 per stream. However, hiring a similar Web3 influencer could cost five to six times more. Nexus aims to solve this by gamifying content creation. Instead of directly incentivizing people to create content, we make it fun through gaming, improving how people engage with social networks.
The upcoming product we are launching in Q3 is Radiant. Radiant is a game of games designed to enhance your daily gaming experience across different games, whether Web2 or Web3.
It acts as an overlay, adding new layers of engagement and rewards. For instance, if you play games like CSGO or Apex Legends, Radiant introduces mechanics like loot boxes to all games you play. These loot boxes offer items and resources, encouraging players to engage more with their games. We want to create win-win scenarios for both game publishers and players.
The third upcoming product is Zigma, our main NFT collection. While we’re not sharing too many details yet, Zigma will serve as a global metapass for the entire Zentry Universe.
What do you think gives Zentry an edge in the market?
Zentry is a layer that runs on top of potentially 1000’s of existing games. If some games fail, we don’t fail with them. Our layer is integrated into both existing successful IPs and new games.
One of the biggest advantages we have is our team, which is a mix of industry veterans from Web3, ads, ad tech, and gaming. Also, we are one of the biggest gaming ecosystems with $150 million in our treasury. This allows us to incentivize and build the whole central Zentry Universe and invest in games. Zentry itself couldn’t fail from a single game failing. The entire gaming and industry would need to collapse for us to not be able to build on top of them anymore.
What role does the $ZENT token play in the Zentry ecosystem?
Zentry tokens will play many roles in multiple universes and will be used in every aspect of our Web3 builds. First, Zentry is profitable, and the revenues we generate could go back into buying and burning those tokens. The tokens will be the main currency for all our products, including trading and transactions. This applies to games, social networks, and all the layers we build on top. Zentry tokens will be the only tokens used across all our platforms and by partners who want to onboard with us.
For example, if a game wants to join the Zentry universe, they would need to use our token to pay us to manage resource drops into their game. Also when you stake Zentry tokens, since we are also investing in various sectors like games, social fi, and AI, you are exposed to the entire ecosystem of Zentry.
We call this "staking rewards." When you stake, you earn rewards, which can be used to buy tokens or gain additional tokens if you participate in different games. For instance, if you love running and we invest in a running ecosystem, you can earn more tokens from that ecosystem. We want to give the right tokens to the right people, to make sure they have the highest possibility of being used again in that ecosystem.
What is your take on the current web3 gaming industry?
I think we all have experienced the evolution of Web3 games through various cycles. Since the beginning, if you remember back to 2017, people were already looking into gaming applications and how to integrate them with blockchain, even though the concept wasn't fully developed at the time. It's been close to six or seven years, and we've moved from having no trust or belief in Web3 games to having legitimate players and higher-quality developers entering the space. These new entrants are trying to create something different from what Web2 couldn't achieve.
If we look at the current state of Web3 game users, I would say it’s still early, but there's potential for massive growth. No other industry has the potential to bring millions of users like gaming does. Right now, people are still trying to build games on top of blockchains without fully understanding the unique benefits that blockchain technology offers.
Traditional gaming industry practices like using Kickstarters for funding are different from Web3. In Web3, people invest in your company from the beginning and stay with you as you develop your game. We need more quality developers from creative industries who understand both traditional gaming and Web3.
There have been attempts by major companies like Ubisoft to enter the space, but they often fail because they don't understand the Web3 culture. Similarly, there are Web3 game studios that don't know how to build compelling games. However, we are seeing progress with people who understand how to make it work in both Web3 and Web2.
We are still waiting for a fully successful Web3 game. Competing with established gaming giants like PlayStation, which have huge budgets, is challenging. Blockchain provides a unique way to distribute games and acquire users, something that wasn't possible with traditional games.
For example, Mavia launched a campaign in the Apple Store using token airdrops to incentivize downloads. This strategy helps acquire users who become hardcore fans because they earn tokens they can spend in the game.
We are still in the stage of discovering the actual benefits of blockchain in gaming. Many Web2 studios are exploring Web3 because it offers new ways to engage and incentivize users. We just need one successful game to showcase the power of blockchain in gaming and help people understand its potential for user acquisition and engagement.
Is there any games out now that you think could be the one to break through to the masses?
To be honest, I personally feel quite bearish on AAA games. AAA games require tons of time and massive budgets to build, not to mention the know-how needed to create high-quality games. Instead, I'm more interested in indie games that require less time, have good designs, and the right incentives.
For example, Pixels is a simple game—a farming simulator similar to FarmVille—that will later evolve into an RPG game. It has a significant number of users, which likely includes a mix of humans and bots. This example shows how powerful incentives can be in getting users to start playing games. Of course, whether it's sustainable is another question, and that's what everyone is trying to solve.
If you ask me to name one sustainable model, I can't really do it because it's still an evolving space. However, I think games on Ronin have a good user base because they are familiar with both blockchain and gaming. The success of Axie Infinity on Ronin shows that there is a dedicated user base that has wallets ready to play games.
Ronin was able to onboard millions of users in Southeast Asia by using incentives. If someone can replicate that success, I think some indie games with bootstrapping from Ronin could serve as good examples.
I am also enthusiastic about Parallel and what they are building.
Zentry resources:
• Join Nexus and start earning shards - Invite here for 8% bonus shards
• Check out the Zentry website
• Infuse ZENT and start earning fragments
And that’s your alpha.
Not financial or tax advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Crypto currencies are very risky assets and you can lose all of your money. Do your own research.