Last Tuesday, April 5th, The Sandbox Co-founder and COO Sebastien Borget held a press conference at the Non-Fungible Conference in Lisbon, Portugal. Borget introduced the latest Sandbox releases and some exciting news that promises to shake the gaming platform and the Web3 ecosystem. The HackerNoon team got the scoop and rushed to tell you, our most curious readers, all about it.
First things first, how’s The Sandbox doing?
The Sandbox numbers have undergone an impressive growth both in terms of adoption and engagement as well as the landowner community, which is now at more than 20,000. The number of unique landowners is particularly remarkable, looking back a year ago when Sandbox was at 4,000.
Albeit these figures already hint at a success trajectory, the full force of Sandbox can be attested by its other developments: 350,000 active users, 2.3 million registered users with wallets, 20,000 landowners, 200 employees, and many partnerships with famed fashion and music names and brands, such as Gucci, Adidas, Snoop Dogg, and other.
Moreover, The Sandbox just concluded the Alpha Season 2, held in March. It collected 10 million SAND Tokens (approximately $30 million at today’s exchange rate) from the team and distributed it to over 10,000 users. Borget also released other interesting metrics achieved by the Alpha Season 2:
- 350,000 MAUs
- 1.12M hours played
- 4.7M visits to the Experiences
- 17M quests completed
- 75M+ $SAND staked on Polygon.
These are some remarkable figures, but what about the new releases?
New Partnerships and Interoperability
During the press conference, one of the central topics was interoperability within The Sandbox metaverse. The foundation’s team is currently working on NFTs interoperability, making all Non-Fungible Tokens usable in the metaverse, whether that may be in avatars, land, game assets, etc. And this is where the newly established partnership with World of Women comes to play.
The prominent World of Women NFTs collection acquired $25 million from The Sandbox to continue its development and roadmap. In turn, WWM NFTs owners will be able to access them on Sandbox and get their in-game avatar to reassemble the woman drawn on their NFT. The Sandbox COO noted the diversity brought by the collection as one of the driving forces for this partnership, as well as the foundation’s desire to invite women into the metaverse, blockchain, and Web3.
Other famous NFT collections have been offered similar deals, such as Snoop Dogg’s Doggies, a series of 10,000 avatars in 3D created by the well-known rapper for use on the metaverse.
But the news doesn’t stop here! Borget announced the latest metaverse song, composed by Snoop Dogg. The song’s trailer was exhibited at the press conference, displaying the rapper’s mansion on Sandbox. In the future, collaborations with Blond:ish and Steve Aoki can be expected.
Through partnering up with artists, Sandbox is interested in seeing how they’ll leverage all of the possibilities behind NFTs to engage with their fans. In addition, the metaverse will also work with Warner Music to develop an amusement park where fans can connect with their favorite musicians.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WD38OueA5zk
When it comes to partnerships, one stole the spotlight: The Sandbox partnership with Arianne, a fashion company. The COO of Sandbox disclosed they've collaborated with Arianne to create a scan that will allow the buyer to use their clothes on and off-screen: on themselves and as NFTs on their avatar. This partnership aims to close the gap between physical clothing and its digital twin in the metaverse.
Cybersecurity with Ledger
The Sandbox Foundation has demonstrated concern over their users’ security online, wishing to improve education on the topic - this is where Ledger, the cryptocurrency hardware wallet provider, intercedes. Ledger will operate within Sandbox to promote crypto education in a gamified way, tapping on topics such as security, wallets, and crypto. This collaboration aims to help users protect their digital assets and achieve authentic digital ownership.
True digital ownership is very powerful but also comes with the idea that you are responsible yourself for the security of your content. And unfortunately, there is also a certain number of bad actors in this ecosystem, like there's always been in any new technology, so it's not specifically new. - Sebastien Borget
Decentralization: the next step for Sandbox
The Sandbox has been a mix of centralized and decentralized metaverse. However, ongoing efforts have been made to turn it fully decentralized, a feat that could be expected in two to three years, according to Sebastien Borget.
Although The Sandbox grants its users many abilities through SAND tokens, it still lacks full user autonomy regarding roadmap and gameplay control. However, steered by the desire to turn it into a user-driven metaverse where everyone would be able to develop independently, The Sandbox foundation may become a DAO.
Lastly, Sandbox is working on a mobile version of the app, as well as console games, an option still under maturation.