Virtuals Protocol, a decentralized platform for autonomous agents, is teaming up with blockchain and metaverse game giant Animoca Brands to advance the AI agents and gaming space.

The Virtuals Protocol (VIRTUAL) team and Animoca Brands will also work with Agentstarter, an on-chain AI agent accelerator on Base, according to an announcement. 

The partnership aims to fund the next wave of agent-driven games as the two ecosystems of AI agents and gaming continue to converge.

Regarding the collaboration and its mission, the partners stated:

“We are here to fund new experiences, not just tech. Our focus is on empowering dynamic gaming worlds of the future to deliver lifelike excitement and engagement to hundreds of millions of players globally,”

The crypto market has recently seen a surge in Agentic development, with multiple projects achieving significant early success.

Virtuals Protocol has gained attention through projects such as G.A.M.E, aixbt, and VaderAI. Now, it aims to leverage its collaboration with Animoca Brands and Agentstarter to support new AI gaming projects through capital injection, technical expertise, and incubation.

The investment will focus on developers seeking the thrill of autonomous agents for their projects.

Such projects will have bold ideas that go beyond traditional gaming limits, with potential attention on Sentient AI non-player characters, AI gamers and AI avatars. AI gamers are agents with the capacity to compete with real human gamers, while AI avatars are able to replicate the player to act as their digital twin.

Across the web3 gaming ecosystem, Animoca Brands has an extensive footprint, with investments in over 540 projects and partners. The company’s web3-related investments include The Sandbox, ApeCoin, Immutable, Axie Infinity, and Decentraland.