Dead or Alive creator Tomonobu Itagaki’s new studio creates NFT games

Former Team Ninja boss Tomonobu Itagaki has announced that his new studio is making an NFT game called Warrior.

The Japanese game designer, who is best known for making Tecmo’s Dead or Alive series and for reviving the Ninja Gaiden series, said last year that he would return to game development with a new studio.

It’s called Apex Game Studios and is focused on producing “high quality and immersive 3A Web3.0 games”, Itagaki so on Tuesday.

Apex Game Studios currently has over 100 employees based mainly in Japan and Singapore.

The debut project is Warrior, an NFT game for mobile and PC built with Unreal Engine.

“The Warrior Project is in the process of launching its first decentralized exchange offer, or IDO, and releasing the first Alpha version, and a series of Giveaway events are underway in the communities,” according to a press release from Apex Game Studios.

It added: “Itagaki expressed that one of the main characteristics of a blockchain game to be successful is to be a real game that is fun and attracts attention – exactly what his team wants to achieve with Warrior.”

According to a roadmap on the official site, the beta version of Warrior is scheduled for release in the first quarter of 2023.

Today’s press release said: “[Itagaki] also commented that he was not only interested in developing games based on non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, but also Metaverse and plans to use the technologies as a great weapon.

“Itagaki believes it is important to embrace change and address the new challenges posed by blockchain technology.”

Sales of NFTs fell to a 12-month low in June amid a broader decline in the cryptocurrency market, which has fallen in value from around $ 3 trillion in November 2021 to below $ 1 trillion.

Earlier this month, Web 3 company Polium announced its ‘Polium One’ system, which it claims will be “the world’s first multi-chain game console” that will be able to run games built on different blockchains.

Last month, Sony Interactive Entertainment veterans Michael Mumbauer and John Garvin announced the creation of a new gaming and entertainment studio called Liithos, which is working on an NFT game called Ashfall.

The title, which will see players struggle to survive in a world scarred by global warming, is the idea of ​​Garvin, the former creative director and writer at Days Gone developer Bend Studio.