Category: gumi Inc

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The Mage’s Tale Developer Secures $4.5 Million Investment, Reveals Work on Open World Survival RPG

inXile Entertainment, the developer behind the recent launch of fantasy role-playing game (RPG) The Mage’s Tale has just announced a combined investment of $4.5 million USD for equity and project investment from gumi VR Inc.

The studio is currently developing The Bard’s Tale IV and Wasteland 3 – neither of which are for virtual reality (VR). However inXile Entertainment will use the investment towards its next VR title, an unannounced open world survival RPG which the developer plans to bring to all platforms.

The Mages Tale screenshot 2

“Gumi shares my passion for creating deeper virtual reality games and I’m fortunate to have a partner to work with in this spectacular new medium. We’ve had incredible feedback from our first game, The Mage’s Tale, and we want to continue to build on our experience and reputation. I’ve always been fascinated by the social dynamics of the open world survival genre and experiencing that in virtual reality will create powerful and terrifying moments. We’ll also be bringing our storytelling and RPG experience to the table to help enrich the genre,” said Brian Fargo, CEO, inXile Entertainment in a statement.

In addition to the investment, gumi Inc. CEO Hironao Kunimitsu also joins inXile Entertainment’s board.

“Brian is a legend in the games industry, and inXile Entertainment has a track record for creating ground-breaking PC and console games that feel AAA in scope and size using their creativity, ingenuity, and ambition. Over the past year, they’ve brought in very talented and experienced members as they shift their strategy from single player to multiplayer online games as a service, and we look forward to seeing how they approach the space,” said Kunimitsu. “Since breaking into VR, we believe they’ve already delivered the best VR RPG game to date with The Mage’s Tale. We’re honored to become a strategic investor and partner with inXile, and delighted for the opportunity to work together on the next VR title with such a masterfully skilled team.”

The Mage’s Tale launched last month for Oculus Rift and Touch, with VRFocus giving it the full five stars, saying: “If you’ve been looking for a decent fantasy RPG then you can’t go too far wrong with this.”

For further inXile Entertainment updates, keep reading VRFocus.

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‘Mage’s Tale’ Studio inXile Entertainment Raises $4.5M Investment, Open World VR RPG on Horizon

inXile Entertainment, the studio behind The Bard’s Tale franchise including VR dungeon crawler The Mage’s Tale (2017), today announced they’ve raised a combined investment of $4.5M intended for equity in the company and as funds to develop an unannounced open world survival RPG VR game.

Hironao Kunimitsu, image courtesy The Venture Reality Fund

Investment comes from Japanese firm gumi VR Inc., a subsidiary of video game publisher and developer gumi Inc. In addition to the investment, gumi Inc. CEO Hironao Kunimitsu also joins inXile Entertainment’s board.

gumi Inc. first expanded into VR and AR in early 2016 with the launch of Tokyo VR Startups (TVS), an incubation program focused on the Japanese VR market. The company later expanded their investment strategy to encompass US-based companies doing AR/VR with The Venture Reality Fund.

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“Gumi shares my passion for creating deeper virtual reality games and I’m fortunate to have a partner to work with in this spectacular new medium. We’ve had incredible feedback from our first game, The Mage’s Tale, and we want to continue to build on our experience and reputation. I’ve always been fascinated by the social dynamics of the open world survival genre and experiencing that in virtual reality will create powerful and terrifying moments. We’ll also be bringing our storytelling and RPG experience to the table to help enrich the genre,” said Brian Fargo, CEO of inXile Entertainment.

inXile is still playing it pretty close to the vest on their upcoming VR RPG, however they have said it will launch “on all platforms.”

image captured by Road to VR

“Since breaking into VR, we believe they’ve already delivered the best VR RPG game to date with The Mage’s Tale. We’re honored to become a strategic investor and partner with inXile, and delighted for the opportunity to work together on the next VR title with such a masterfully skilled team,” said Kunimitsu.

Following a successful Kickstarter to bring The Bard’s Tale IV to life, inXile has been busy developing several games including The Bard’s Tale IV, The Mage’s Tale and Wasteland 3. Before inXile, CEO Brian Fargo co-founded Interplay, known as the creator of the original Fallout series and as a publisher for the Baldur’s Gate and Descent series.

In The Mage’s Tale, you get to experience classic dungeon crawler staples like exploration, spell crafting, puzzles, and monster battles—and all of it in the immersive realm of VR using your own two hands with the help of Oculus Touch. In our review of The Mage’s Tale, we got a chance to step into a cohesive universe, that while a little rough around the edges, ultimately was a wonderful mix of charming throwback and modern, built-for-VR immersion.

The post ‘Mage’s Tale’ Studio inXile Entertainment Raises $4.5M Investment, Open World VR RPG on Horizon appeared first on Road to VR.

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VR Startup Playsnak Gets $2.5million in Seed Funding

Virtual reality (VR) videogaming company Playsnak has announced that it has received an additional $1.2 million (USD) seed investment from developer and publisher gumi inc. This is added to the funding already received from South Korea’s K Cube Ventures for a total of $2.5 million.

Playsnak CEO, Paha Schulz, said: “Investment from a well-established partner like gumi offers further affirmation that our vision for innovative VR content is on the right track. This funding will bolster our position and expand our capabilities as we build towards the announcement of our first VR game IP in the next weeks. We’re grateful to all our investors for their faith in us, and we look forward to giving players a first look at what we’ve been working on very soon.”

Playsnak were founded in 2015 and currently have offices in Berlin and Los Angeles. The company is currently working on it’s debut VR title, which is due to be released soon. Gumi inc have expressed that the investment reflected the company’s global ambitions and the quality of product that Playsnak are developing.

CEO of gumi Inc., Hironao Kunimitsu, said: “We’ve been extremely impressed by what Playsnak has been able to achieve in the short period of time the company has been up and running. Its focus on creating first-class VR experiences fits perfectly with our own portfolio of products and ambitions to break new ground for gamers, and we believe this strategic partnership opens the door to exciting opportunities for both parties.”

Further information on the upcoming Playsnak title can be found at the official website.

VRFocus will continue to report on developments within the VR industry.

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Nordic VR Startups Incubator Launched by gumi Inc. and Nordisk Film

Japanese videogame developer, gumi Inc. has been actively involved in supporting the virtual reality (VR) industry across the world for sometime now. Its latest venture comes in the form of an incubation program called Nordic VR Startups (NVS), which the company has recently announced the launch of, in partnership with Nordisk Film.

Nordic based startup companies will be invited to develop prototype VR products supported with dedicated seed funding up to €100,000 EUR, workspaces, and back-office services. Additionally, NVS mentors from gumi and Nordisk Film will support the participants, offering expert guidance, development and business support.

gumi Inc logo

Hironao Kunimitsu, CEO of gumi Inc., said in a statement: “The Nordic region brings tremendous creative and engineering talent to the gaming and film industries, and we’re focused on enabling this pool of talent to grow in the VR market with our available resources and expertise. We’ve already experienced great success with our Tokyo VR Startups program in the East, and by working with the accomplished Nordisk Film group, we’ll be able to expand our program further into Europe.”

Incubated startups in Finland will also be eligible for R&D funding from official supporting partner Tekes, a Finnish funding agency for innovation. Startups will be encouraged to participate in events and the community provided by FIVR, the non-profit Finnish Virtual Reality Association dedicated to advancing VR and augmented reality (AR) markets in Finland.

“By bringing together our strong Nordic entertainment expertise and gumi’s experience in successfully operating VR accelerators, we hope to take aspiring Nordic VR companies to the next level. Our partnership will offer the rising startups in this field a robust set of resources. We believe that Nordic VR Startups can help develop the Nordic VR ecosystem and propel the local VR industry in the coming years,” added Suman Rath, Senior Vice President of Nordisk Film.

This isn’t the first incubator gumi Inc. has been involved in. Last year the company started Tokyo VR Startups (TVS) to achieve the same thing in Japan.

VRFocus will continue its coverage of gumi Inc., reporting back with further updates.

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Gumi, Inc. Pens EUVR Agreement

Japanese game developer, gumi, Inc. known for role-playing games such as Brave Frontier and Phantom of the Kill has announced a new strategic business partnership. Becoming the latest studio to join with not-for-profit organisation EUVR.

gumi Inc logo

The company, founded in 2015 was set up to enhance development of virtual reality (VR) within the European Union. Active in over nineteen countries already, EUVR is the backer to a number of events – including the forthcoming UNCONVENTION on January 23rd in Amsterdam – an online portal and other activities designed to help spread the influence of VR; and the development of both the VR and AR ecosystems. This deal means that existing developers in the region will have further access to financial and knowledge resources.

 

Speaking on the agreement, which comes almost a year to the day since gumi Inc announced their VR incubator CEO Hironao Kunimitsu noted the development since then. “This past year has been tremendously successful for gumi as we’ve broken new ground in the VR industry. Amongst many milestones, we launched our own incubators in Japan and Korea, called Tokyo VR Startups and Seoul VR Startups, respectively. Additionally, we invested in and became a joint member of the venture capital investment group ‘The VR Fund,’ based out of the US.” On EUVR specifically, Kunimitsu noted. “Our partnership with EUVR is the next step toward our vision of being a global leader in virtual reality and working closely with innovative developers in the European region.”

“We’re thrilled that gumi has joined to help us further build the VR development community across Europe.” Concurred Co-Founder of EUVR Juan Bossicard. “The European VR community has grown to over 14,000 members to date, and gumi’s investment of time and resources is certainly a vote of confidence in EUVR’s commitment to the VR community. We will continue working hard to provide best-in-class resources that are knowledgeable and well-connected to our members in order to further the global VR ecosystem.”

As regular VRFocus readers know, deals and partnerships happen at a pace in both the VR and AR industries. We’ll continue to keep you up to date on all the latest goings on.