Verse8, an AI-native platform that enables creators to instantly transform ideas into playable games, today announced the completion of a $5 million seed round financing. This round was co-led by Story Foundation, NEXPACE (the Web3 division of Nexon), Neowiz, MARBLEX (the Web3 division of Netmarble), Solarium Labs, and NEXUS, with participation from various investors in the gaming, media, and technology sectors.
The new funding will be used to advance Verse8's core AI system, expand creator onboarding and incentive programs, and enhance its publishing and distribution infrastructure.
This financing round comes at a critical turning point in the development of interactive media. Generative AI is significantly reducing the costs and complexities of content creation; however, the creation of interactive experiences remains constrained by lengthy development cycles, large teams, and centralized studios. Billions of people globally create videos, music, and images, but only a tiny fraction have the skills and tools to produce games. Verse8 is built to meet this inflection point, aiming to allow anyone to engage in real-time, multiplayer game creation.
Verse8 allows creators to use natural language prompts to generate fully playable multiplayer games within minutes, without the need to write code, install engines, or build large production teams. A simple idea can transform into a real-time interactive experience, instantly deployable and accessible to players worldwide.
Since its launch in July 2024, the platform has seen over 3.5 million monthly active users in gaming creation and play, with more than 5,000 active creators, and the number of games generated has reached 25,000.
Verse8 was co-founded by JC Kim and Kevin Lee, seasoned entrepreneurs with extensive experience in blockchain gaming, platform building, and strategic investment. Their backgrounds include pioneering blockchain initiatives at LINE Corp, successfully founding and exiting startups, and deploying over $200 million in game investments, which has allowed Verse8 to focus on speed, accessibility, and creative iteration from its inception.
Lauded as the creator of the iconic Korean "Lineage" series and co-founder of Nexon, Jake Song will serve as a core advisor, providing strategic guidance for Verse8's AI-driven gaming platform.
Reconstructing the Way Interactive Media is Created
Today's game development is capital and labor-intensive. Production often requires lengthy cycles, multidisciplinary teams, and budgets reaching tens of millions of dollars, concentrating creative and economic power among a few studios. Verse8 significantly lowers these barriers by enabling creators to transform text prompts into real-time, shared game worlds within minutes, allowing for large-scale experimentation and creativity.
S.Y. Lee, co-founder and CEO of Story, stated, “AI is lowering the cost of creation across all media formats, but games have been the last bastion. Verse8 is tackling the most challenging part of this problem—condensing months of development and millions of dollars in funding into a few minutes of natural language prompts, and achieving this from day one by coordinating creators, IP holders, and distribution channels. We believe this marks the beginning of a new creation stack for interactive media, with Verse8 at its center.”
Verse8 automates art, code, design, and quality assurance, while supporting ongoing iteration and deployment. Through integration with Story, it provides on-chain ownership, licensing, and distribution, enabling creators to retain authorship rights, earn royalties, and safely mix existing IPs.
Verse8 believes this approach lays the foundation for a new category of creator-led, AI-native interactive media, where gaming represents the first scalable application scenario in a broader shift in digital content creation, ownership, and distribution.
About Verse8
Verse8 is an AI-native creation and publishing platform that allows anyone to turn ideas into interactive games and stories. By combining generative AI, integrated game engines, and on-chain ownership, Verse8 lowers the barriers to interactive creation and supports a new generation of creator-led digital worlds. The platform is being developed in collaboration with Jake Song by Planetarium Labs, leveraging deep gaming expertise and strategic partnerships to deliver high-fidelity interactive experiences at scale.
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