Super excited to introduce Polkadot Play, a BD effort for a gaming hub in Polkadot.
Nick Douzinas

Mission Statement

At Polkadot Play, our mission is to unify the fragmented gaming ecosystem within Polkadot, offering a seamless onboarding experience for game studios and developers. As a two-sided organization, we economically qualify projects for Polkadot while ensuring technical compatibility. Our goal is to serve as a central hub for technical solutions, fostering collaboration among teams and acting as an integration partner to propel projects toward long-term success within the Polkadot ecosystem.

Vision

With a focus on accelerating gaming adoption, we aspire to position Polkadot as one of the top blockchains for gaming through essential integration solutions and sustainable business development support. Operating as a neutral collective, we are committed to achieving enduring success for projects within the Polkadot community.

Background and Bootstrap

Polkadot Play originated as a collective effort in June of 2023, at Decoded in Copenhagen. As a first operational task, we set our focus on tooling for the ecosystem. In October of 2023, Polkadot Play as a collective of parachain teams from Ajuna Network, Astar, Moonbeam, Tanssi, Unique, and Parity Technologies successfully worked together in Partnership with Unity, for the Verified Solution Polkadot SDK for Unity. Combining technical efforts from Parachain teams, and BD effort from Polkadot Play with Parity, support was then provided by the community via the Treasury.

As of February 2023, Polkadot Play has successfully delivered the Verified Polkadot SDK for Unity in partnership with Unity Technologies. This allows fast and frictionless development for mobile applications as well as PC/Consoles. Additionally achieved:

• x Secured the naming rights for the proper use of Polkadot Play with Parity and Web3 Foundation
• x Signed up Polkadot as a Gold Member of the BGA until March 2025
• x First place Prize at Polkadot Winter Hackathon, for Unity Demo Game, Hexalem
• x Presence at GDC in San Francisco

Business Development

Developing a Sustainable Deal Flow

The primary focus is establishing a robust and consistently replenishing pipeline of opportunities within the gaming sector. This involves proactive outreach and engagement strategies aimed at forging valuable partnerships and collaborations. Polkadot Play is attending GDC in collaboration with the BGA and has an extensive events participation plan across regions.

Creating a Dedicated Gaming Portal within Polkadot

Initiate the creation and deployment of a centralized hub dedicated to serving the gaming vertical within the Polkadot ecosystem. This hub will serve as a hub for relevant resources, information, and networking opportunities tailored specifically to the gaming industry stakeholders.

Facilitating Project Onboarding to Polkadot

Actively facilitate the integration process for gaming projects seeking to leverage the capabilities of the Polkadot network. This entails providing guidance, support, and necessary resources to expedite the seamless transition onto the platform. Additionally, Polkadot Play will ensure each gaming project is matched with the most suitable ecosystem partner or partners, offering the best sustainable solution for the project's growth and success.

Optimizing Outbound Support for Parachain Team

Efficiently streamline the provision of outbound assistance to parachain teams operating within the gaming vertical. This involves enhancing communication channels, refining support mechanisms, and ensuring the timely resolution of any queries or challenges encountered by these teams.

Ecosystem Tooling

Identifying and implementing ecosystem solutions for game developers is a cornerstone for onboarding. This approach has been underscored by the successful partnership with Unity, following the implementation of the Verified Polkadot Unity SDK, a collaborative endeavor between Parity and Polkadot Play.

Going forward, we intend to lead the implementation of other solutions such as Unreal Engine and GoDot, in collaboration with Ecosystem Teams, aiming to create a comprehensive gaming vertical within Polkadot.

Polkadot Play has committed over $150,000 as part of the Treasury Proposal, to become visible as a verified solution to the 2.1 million Game Developers using the Unity Asset Store.

Ecosystem Funding

For curated and qualified proposals, we access Ecosystem funding initiatives such as Game Bounties, and direct-to-treasury proposals and tap into the large VC network in the Gaming Space.

As Polkadot Play grows, we seek to set up a “Tech-First BD hub” for the Gaming Vertical that offers the best solution for the project to flourish in the Polkadot Ecosystem. Pushing to onboard high-quality gaming partners, benefiting DOT holders, enhancing the Polkadot brand, and attracting global venture capital interest back to the ecosystem.

Team

The cornerstone of Polkadot Play is built around Mike Vorhaus, whose gaming network has been built over the past 20 years in the US, and Nicholas Douzinas, who has been working on the gaming vertical in Polkadot for the past 3 years. The Technical Guild will be led by ecosystem experts.

Our team brings a wealth of experience and an established network to this endeavor.

Mike Vorhaus founded Vorhaus Advisors in November 2018. Previously, Mike worked at Magid for 24 years. Mike founded the Magid Internet practice in 1995 and began the Magid Gaming Practice in 2001. Mike has worked with major operating companies such as Roblox, Zynga, Sony Entertainment, EA, Forte, and Epic Games, as well as start-ups. He has been an early investor in Draft Kings, and Animoca Brands. Mike is a member of the Board of Directors of Perion (Nasdaq: PERI), Turtle Neck Studios, Popreach, and Maestro.io, and has been an advisor for PvP, Gale, The Game Fund as well as Stream Labs (sold to Logitech), Tenor (sold to Google) He is focused on strategy, investment opportunities, product development, and marketing. Mike has appeared regularly on MSNBC, CNBC, CNBC Asia, NPR, and Fox Business and has been quoted in various newspapers and Websites, such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Reuters, MarketWatch, TheStreet, and others. Mike is also a member of the Screen Actors Guild and appeared in 2009 in "Imagine That" starring Eddie Murphy and Thomas Hayden Church. Mike also provided consulting services to Warner Bros. regarding "The Matrix" and "You've Got Mail"

Nicholas Douzinas is an experienced entrepreneur and business development executive. Nicholas has been operating in the Polkadot ecosystem since 2021, specifically on the Gaming vertical. You will often find him on the AAG show, at gaming events evangelizing Polkadot and working late into the night with Cedric, to bridge the barrier of gaming on Polkadot. He holds an MSc from Cass Business School and Imperial College London and a BSc in Economics from the University of Warwick.

Technical Guild

The current working group (since May 2023) includes 24 members including members of Apillon, Ajuna, Astar, Aventus, Tanssi, Parity, OpenDive, Unique, and others. The Technical Guild will be initially led by ecosystem experts such as Cedric Decoster, Hoon Kim. That ramps up to a technical funnel, that acts as a solution hub, for the gaming vertical within Polkadot. An established feedback loop for technical challenges that are faced by gaming projects, will help to indicate how to evolve Polkadot in a Gaming Hub.

Discussion

We are looking for your feedback before posting the full proposal to the treasury. Although initially intended for the DFF, we consider speed to be a critical factor. To that end, if the DFF proposal is successful, the funds will be returned to the treasury. The Polkadot governing community has already invested $350,000 through the treasury. Polkadot Play is looking for an additional USD 1.100.000 to operationalize the BD team with Mike Vorhaus and build out a gaming hub for Polkadot.

Looking forward to your feedback. The detailed proposal will be linked here in a few days.

Nick

Contact: nickdouz (telegram & twitter)