The Beta Class Metaverse

Everything in this industry is connected. It is not a coincidence that so much engineering effort and thought has been dedicated to interoperability, composability and general interconnectedness. No other industry sees so much crossover between protocols and communities. You don’t have to look further than the Sanctor Turbo Beta Class to see the links.

Welcome to the Metaverse

2021 has been a breakthrough year for NFTs. They form the technological backbone of the crypto art, collectibles, gaming and virtual world sectors. We see a bright future for this vertical as the new frontier for people to settle and develop.

As such, Sanctor Capital has backed KnownOrigin and Rainicorn as platform bases for the growing ecosystem. KnownOrigin, led by James Morgan, David Moore and Andy Gray, was founded in 2018, and is one of the oldest creator platforms in the space. It has been home to the artworks of notable artists such as XCOPY, Hackatao and Trevor Jones as well as promising up and comers.

Rainicorn is similarly a creator platform. It’s core product though, is a trading card game, The Lords of Light, whose first drop has already sold out. Also, with a launchpad in the works, Rainicorn stands to become the go-to place for creators, collectors and gamers.

Showing flare to bring players together

P2E has been a catalyzing force for crypto gaming with pioneers like Axie Infinity and Splinterlands paving the way. That is why we are so excited about the prospects for The Lords of Light.

However, this nascent category is currently plagued with unhealthy patterns that were present during the DeFi boom: yield-chasing, low user loyalty, overdependence on subsidized engagement.

This is where Blast and its tournament infrastructure comes in. While current farming trends focus on PvE engagement, tournaments put PvP back in focus. Among many reasons gaming is so synergetic with crypto is its focus on community. Tournaments strengthen those relationships and promote healthy growth for games.

Finally, Sandstorm brings it all together. Led by Steve McGarr, this virtual world events platform enables creators, collectors, publishers and gamers to engage on their native turf and infuse auctions and sales with tangibility and real purpose. Sandstorm (the name may be a giveaway) is starting out as one of the few active venues in The Sandbox, but is already looking at other worlds like Decentraland.

So far we have places to: learn, engage, create, buy, launch and compete, but that is only the beginning.

Infrastructure, the hidden layer that makes things go

DeFi has shown us that reading from the blockchain is just as important as writing to the blockchain. As usage grows and dapps become more and more interconnected, efficient communication becomes critical. Remember how everything broke when Infura experienced interruptions a year ago?

This is where BlockVision comes in, offering a new approach to communicating with the blockchain layer that the team has shown to be effective and scalable.

From information providers like NonFungible, NFTBank, CryptoSlam and CryptoArt to dapps relying on timely and accurate information from the blockchain like OpenSea and NFTfi, industry actors rely heavily on being able to retrieve on-chain information in a timely and efficient manner. As the industry grows this need will only increase.

Furthermore, as the number of users in the space and the volume of transactions grows, the need for automation will become apparent. Here is where Brink, one of the leaders in the space when it comes to RPC, could help. Brink has been working on bringing vital functionality like limit-orders and stop-loss to DeFi, which would enable the likes of Uniswap and SushiSwap to be more competitive with CeFi alternatives.

However, with NFT-backed loans becoming more relevant, and gaming ecosystem DEXs becoming a reality with Katana, RPC utilities will become critical in the gaming and collectibles space as well. Not to mention that auctions and drops could use some automation as well.

This brings us to an important matter: liquidity. Generally speaking, art and collectibles are considered illiquid assets. NFT technology, coupled with sharding technology, has made their closed markers more open, but liquidity still remains an open question. More so because markets are currently fractured around different L1 and L2 ecosystems.

This is why platforms like Sumer are critical, as they provide a bridge between the different markets. Sumer is working on making similar assets appear more homogeneous across different chains. The vouchers-based approach will unlock liquidity for individual assets and hopefully for different L1 ecosystems, including Ethereum, Polygon, Avalanche and BSC.

DID — the passport of the Metaverse

With more virtual worlds springing up and more capital attracted and transacted, the question of decentralized identity is bound to grow in importance. For years, regulators have voiced concerns over economic activity in the crypto space. We expect the question of KYC / AML will not go away, and only become more prevalent.

Many in the industry view the terms as antithetical to the concepts of privacy and decentralization, but what if privacy is the answer. Xiao Zhang is leading a team of talented engineers to offer a solution to identity validation that does not compromise privacy (computation happens on user devices) as a part of a growing Polkadot ecosystem.

As users start to populate virtual worlds, they will also want to be able to travel across them in a seamless way. They will want to enjoy different services offered on various infrastructures, while maintaining their identity and not sacrificing privacy. We believe DIDs are the answer, and zCloak’s approach puts us on the right path.

The beauty of the hybrid stack

Here we have eight projects that would normally be viewed as part of completely different sectors working towards a grand vision. The wonderful nature of the crypto industry enables everyone to grow and evolve in a decentralized manner while still being part of a greater whole.

Join us on Tuesday December 14 at 1:00 PM EST for the Sanctor Turbo Beta Class Demo Day, and watch as these eight projects put more building blocks into place for our shared crypto future.

Disclaimer: This commentary is not investment advice. It does not purport to include any recommendation as to any particular investment, transaction or investment strategy, or any recommendation to buy or sell any investment. It does not reflect any attempt to effect any transactions or render any investment advice.

This post is solely for informational and entertainment purposes. It is inherently limited and does not purport to be a complete discussion of the issues presented or the risks involved. Readers should seek their own independent legal, tax, accounting, and investment advice from professional advisors. The views reflected in this commentary are subject to change at any time without notice.

The authors or their affiliates have ownership or other economic interests or intend to have interests in several of the organizations and crypto assets discussed, including KnownOrigin, Rainicorn, Blast, Sandstorm, BlockVision, Brink, Sumer and zCloak, as well as other crypto assets not referenced.