NPC Labs, a web3 gaming infrastructure startup founded by former Base team members, announced it has raised $21 million. This amount includes $18 million from a seed round led by Pantera Capital, according to a July 22 statement shared with CryptoSlate.
Other investors included Makers Fund, Hashed, Collab+Currency, Sfermion, Mirana Ventures, Bitscale Capital and Mantle EcoFund.
Onboarding 3 billion gamers
NPC Labs noted that Web2 developers see the potential of on-chain gaming, but often underestimate the complexity of creating a protocol with sufficient liquidity and user base, while managing the infrastructure for smooth gameplay.
The company hopes to solve this challenge by accelerating the onboarding and development processes of on-chain gaming. To achieve this, it is currently working as a core contributor to B3.fun, a pioneering horizontally scaled gaming ecosystem on Coinbase’s L2 network, Base.
B3 is designed with built-in chain abstraction, eliminating the need for users to bridge or switch networks. The ecosystem is currently in the testnet phase and supports games built on Ethereum, Base and other EVM chains.
With a proprietary, highly scalable technology stack, B3 could also seamlessly onboard games from other chains like Solana.
NPC Labs co-founder and CEO Daryl Xu noted that developers are struggling to market their games in today’s competitive gaming world, pointing out that they are at the mercy of “publishers for support, marketing and distribution.”
However, B3 would help restore control to game developers and gamers by making it easy for them to take advantage of the on-chain.
Co-founder and COO of NPC Labs Viktoriya Hying said:
“Imagine if every published game had its own console and infrastructure. It’s impractical. Every gamer just wants one place where you can play many games. B3 is that console, and the B3 ecosystem solves these problems by managing the chain and providing the necessary infrastructure so developers can focus on delivering the best experience to their players.”
Franklin Bi, General Partner at Pantera Capital, said B3’s infrastructure and tooling will add a new dimension to Base, allowing developers to build great games and on-chain consumer experiences.