Web3 Escape Rooms: The Next Big Thing?

GM GM. It’s Lootbox on Friday, the dots for your Pac-Man.

Here are the gems we found for today

• Web3 escape rooms are here

• Unity lays off 8% of its workforce

• The Sneakies

Web3 Escape Rooms: The Next Big Thing?

Escape rooms are all the rage these days, and it's not hard to see why. They offer a thrilling, immersive experience that challenges players to solve puzzles and clues to escape a themed room before time runs out.

But what if we told you that you could experience the excitement of an escape room from the comfort of your own home?

Well, you will soon be able to.

The scoop

ERM LABS is teaming up with The Sandbox to develop intellectual properties related to real-life escape rooms within Escape Room Metaverse (ERM) – a 12 x 12 land plot of The Sandbox.

This collaboration will enable several gaming studios to create experiences for The Sandbox-based ERM community and let players enjoy virtual escape rooms from their homes.

Why make virtual escape rooms anyway?

• Accessibility: Virtual escape rooms eliminate the need for players to physically be in a specific location. This makes the experience more accessible to people who may not have had the opportunity to try an escape room before.

• Affordability: Going to a physical escape room can be quite expensive, especially for larger groups. With virtual escape rooms, the cost can be significantly lower, making it more accessible to a wider audience.

• Customization: Virtual escape rooms can be customized in ways that physical escape rooms cannot. Game developers have more creative freedom to design rooms with themes and puzzles that are impossible to create in the real world.

Lootbringers take

It's exciting to think about the possibilities of virtual escape rooms in the web3 gaming space. It’s also terrifying…

To the many friends who subscribe to us and are itching to invite us to a game. Please. Don’t. We don’t like being locked in small rooms, virtually or otherwise.

Unity Announces Large Layoffs

Well, it seems like bad news in the tech industry just won't quit. Another round of layoffs has hit one of the biggest players in the gaming industry, Unity.

The game production software giant announced a steep 600-person staff reduction.

The key takeaways:

• This is Unity’s third round of layoffs in less than a year, and it amounts to about 8% of the company's headcount. They say it’s all about prepping for higher growth 🤷‍♂️

• The company is also planning to reduce its physical footprint, cutting down from 58 offices worldwide to fewer than 30.

• Unity CEO John Riccitiello says the layoffs will focus on reducing middle management layers.

In addition to Unity, many other tech companies have also announced layoffs in 2023, including Amazon, Facebook Meta, Microsoft, Google, IBM, SAP, Salesforce, and more.

The bad

Cuts are never great for those involved, and this brings up questions about the continuing development of experimental features like the web3 SDKs in the asset store.

The good

600 talented individuals looking for opportunities. With the web2 gaming industry not exactly firing on all cylinders as web3 gaming continues to grow, they might start looking into web3.

As they say, more devs, more apps games, more players.

The Sneakies

• Solana is looking to boost innovation in the NFT space with a new announcement of the NFT Showdown. The pitch competition is set up to encourage aspiring NFT community builders to focus on product innovation and business. Projects in fashion, gaming, entertainment and creative agencies can pitch.

• Hxro & Bitblox Games are teaming up to bring on-chain PVP gambling games to Solana.

• Immutuble’s Robbie Ferguson announced the beta launch of Immutable passport, and it looks like a baby-back smooth onboarding experience.

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