Blockchain Gaming Is Changing, Banger Games & Borja Villalobos Wants To Lead It In A New Direction Blockchain-based decentralized technologies have been experiencing growing popularity in recent years, as consumers have caught wind of the decentralized ecosystem which offers privacy and heightened anonymity. Q4 2021 hedge fund...

Blockchain-based decentralized technologies have been experiencing growing popularity in recent years, as consumers have caught wind of the decentralized ecosystem which offers privacy and heightened anonymity.

Q4 2021 hedge fund letters, conferences and more

As decentralized technology in the market advances, with companies pushing the boundaries on innovation, and consumer demand increases - adoption is looking imminent, with more brands willing to become part of a hyper-modern industry.

With growing opportunities for companies to be more inventive, a range of new developments in the blockchain market has made it possible for small players, and major investors to combine their efforts.

After closing a recent seed funding round of more than €10 million, the blockchain-based gaming company, Banger Games is now ready to expand and develop a whole new ecosystem of gaming. Blockchain platforms, in a variety of industries, have been on the fast track to expand their influence, making the technology more accessible and user-friendly.

Banger Games has been working on a host of exciting new developments in the last few years which has enabled them to create and establish a gaming ecosystem that puts the power back in the gamers' hands.

As more investors become interested in what blockchain-based gaming can become, and the consumer market grows, Banger Games is quickly advancing its innovative spirit to establish a platform that aligns the incentives for both players and publishers.

We recently had the opportunity to speak to the CEO and co-founder of Banger Games, Borja Villalobos, how he and his team at Banger are taking on the coming months to advance the blockchain-based gaming experience and find industry-centric solutions to current problems.

In a recent funding round, you've managed to raise €10 million. What do you plan on doing with that money?

With the growing demand for technology, blockchain, and also gaming, the industry is becoming highly competitive, and to ensure you keep innovating and developing, you need to have a financial backing that will help get you there. We're looking to go from startup to unicorn status.

Originally we focused on building a revolutionary business model which involves members of the community, and so far the planning is looking quite good. To be able to design the best products and services, you need a like-minded team and a bit of robust marketing. We are a community-first platform, and as such, we aim to build it as fast as possible through community strategies that deliver a truly exciting experience within the platform.

How is Banger Games looking to fix the problems the industry is currently faced with?

It's taken us some time to perfect but Banger Games is a platform that looks to bridge the gap between Web 2 and the continuously-evolving adoption of Web.

Simply, our objective is to give gamers, regardless of any demographic a stake in the industry through the use of our platform. We're building technology that can provide permissionless access to Web 3, for both our gamers and the publishers as well.

With blockchain, everything works a bit differently, so this can only be possible through our interoperable token, the Banger. This will act as a primary reward system across all the game genres, which makes it easier for games to control, own and transact with the free market.

Why is blockchain beneficial to players?

There's really no better way to put it, but blockchain is the ultimate transparency tool giving power back to the end-user. It's completely changing how gamers and players buy, earn, rent, sell and trade in-game, which is quite similar to what anyone else does with goods and services offline.

Can gamers currently use the Banger Games platform to supercharge their gaming experience? If so, with which games?

We're still in the Beta testing phase, limiting the number of players to around 10,000 before we launch the full open version. The first game we fully integrate, allowing players to earn rewards based both on in-game and around-the-game objectives, is Counter-Strike Global Offensive. This will be our first fully automated game, but we will be adding many more soon.

So far, the gaming community has met blockchain with a healthy dose of skepticism. How long will it take for the gaming community to fully embrace blockchain?

To properly predict an estimated timeline is quite elusive in the tech world. Blockchain is still developing, but the support it has received has provided companies and enthusiasts with a new business model which will help blockchain-based games reach the quality of traditional games.

There is enough ground to safely say that a seed has been planted within traditional players and publishers, and those who don't grow a better rewards tree for themselves and their users will have a tough time adapting, and meeting consumer demand.

It's happening a lot faster than anyone would've anticipated, but we should remember that gaming remains a form of entertainment, not work - precisely what Banger Games is focusing on.

The Play To Earn (P2E) concept offers a rewarding dose of improving the overall gaming experience of blockchain-based gaming, all of this in an ecosystem that helps to maximize the experience at the center core.

Will blockchain gaming help drive metaverse adoption, or will metaverse adoption help drive blockchain gaming?

Both of these add value to one another, and we're quite certain that one needs the other to harmoniously continue growing. We'll see regular gamers transition into blockchain gaming, without them realizing it. The metaverse is still a vast concept that most people do not understand. For me, the biggest driver will be blockchain gaming, becoming a massive door towards mass adoption to the metaverse most likely.

What does the future of gaming look like?

The industry is constantly changing and evolving, from where we've come to where we are heading, there's no doubt that the next few years of the industry will be packed full of excitement. Some concepts such as P2E dwindled a bit, and were considered a fad, today it's making a return with some hefty improvements.

All players will now have the opportunity to supercharge their gaming experience and this will help change our perception of gaming, and the landscape of those titles players will want to pursue in their free time.

What's next for Banger Games?

We will soon finish off our Beta testing round and will have a public sale round for the Banger around early spring, either April or May 2022. There's also a lot of interest regarding our NFT collection, and demand has been keeping us on our toes. The biggest effort is obviously our full platform launch, where we get to show what we have been working on these past 3 years.