Venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) has led a $15 million startup round for Azra Games. The startup focuses on creating massive strategic role-playing games based on blockchain and NFT.

We are AZRA! And our vision to bring fun to blockchain games was funded by Andreesen Horowitz with $15M (@a16z), @NFX, @coinbase, @justinkanand a carefully selected group of other investors to help us succeed.

The subject is following 👇https://t.co/bpFbitaQVE

— Azra Games ⚡️ (@AzraGames) 19 May 2022

Tour participants include NFX, Coinbase Ventures, Play Ventures, and Franklin Templeton.

a16z has raised funding focused on “game infrastructure and metadata resources” through a recently launched $600 million fund.

Azra Games is co-founder and CEO by Mark Otero, former General Manager of Electronic Arts (EA). It has released several popular mobile games, including Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes.

Azra Games was co-founded by Sonny Mayugba and Travis Boudreau, entrepreneurs associated with the Azra Games studio, which Otero leads at EA. The 25-member start-up team was joined by a few more ex-specialists from the division.

The startup will use the funds raised to accelerate the development of its first project, codenamed Project Arcanas.

The founders of Azra Games noted that many developers and traditional players perceive blockchain and NFT negatively in the gaming space. According to Mayugba, this is due to the wrong approach in creating such games.

“They created games with a truly unsustainable economy. After reading several different whitepapers I can say that [плохая репутация] He definitely deserved it,” he stressed.

To increase user confidence, Otero says they rely on the support of venture capital investors rather than selling NFTs.

Recall that in April, Richard Garriott, the developer of the popular MMORPG Ultima Online, launched a multiplayer game project based on blockchain and NFT.