Bandai Namco recently announced its intention to create its own Metaverse called GUNDAM. The company has invested $130M for the success of this project. Bandai Namco has released more details on what it plans to do with the upcoming Metaverse.
Metaverse is a virtual reality space operating on blockchain technology. It is a futuristic digital world that will completely revolutionize the world’s economy.
The metaverse is rapidly developing with new projects and collaborations on the way. According to Citi Bank, Metaverse has the potential to grow and be worth $13 trillion by 2030. This huge figure has grabbed investors’ and big companies’ attention.
GUNDAM Metaverse is Bandai Namco’s project to kick start their entry into the virtual world. The video game company has invested about $130M to release IP metaverse.
Gundam is a popular robot manga series with video game and anime adaptations. Having tons of fans, the company announced its plan on creating a more inclusive and interactive community through virtual technology.
“[This metaverse will be a] platform of opportunities for Gundam fans worldwide to come together to converse and connect in a variety of categories.”
The company also said they plan on creating a solid foundation through various projects in the future. “The first step for the metaverse is to create virtual communities for each category, and to enable connections to the categories through the use of the Bandai NAMCO iD.”
Bandai Namco iD will blend Gunpla, Game, Anime, and Music together to create a more immersive virtual community for fans.
“These virtual communities will meld with the world of GUNDAM as the virtual spaces will be made in the form of space colonies, which will be connected to the ‘GUNDAM Metaverse’ space hub under the name ‘SIDE-G,’” said the company’s representative.
The SIDE-G colonies will include various virtual spaces for members to enjoy. The company shared an illustration of how the “Gunpla colony” would look inspired by The Gundam Base Virtual World. Furthermore, it also released the Esport colony where multiplayer games will be operated.
Future of Gundam Metaverse
Once Gundam Metaverse becomes a progressive virtual space, the company will include 2C2 business in it by creating an economic domain as a SIDE-G colony.
The economic colony will “allow general users to conduct C2C business using the Gundam brand in the form of user-generated content (UGC).” The customer-to-customer (C2C) blockchain companies will use the customer-generated model to earn. Although many hope it is not NFTs, the company hasn’t released any details on how it will accommodate these businesses.
The businesses might originate from Bandai Namco’s investment project on global startups that operate on blockchain technology.
There will be other separate colonies in the coming years based on their worth. “In order to grow to an even larger scale after 2026, Bandai Namco Group will promote the development of each colony with the ‘Gundam Metaverse’ as a pillar of the Group,”
Bandai Namco has only issued the announcement focused on the Gundam metaverse. The company plans to do the first limited tests in Autumn 2022.
