Ubisoft Announces the “One-Stop-Shop” for NFTs
Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot unveils the developers’ digital collectibles platform, Quartz.
Quartz is designed to be the “one-stop-shop” for consumers looking to buy and trade NFTs, which can be used across all forms of Ubisoft games […] The company has also launched an equity crowdfunding campaign on Wefunder. The goal is to secure $500,000 for Ubisoft’s blockchain initiatives.
Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot unveiled Ubisoft Project Consortium at E3 2019–a new initiative that brings together third-party publishers and studios under a shared vision for a blockchain-based digital entertainment ecosystem. They joined forces with Wevr and Animoca Brands to develop the Distributed Application Token (DAT), which will be used in the upcoming platform, Quartz. Ubisoft projects that the DAT wallet will launch alongside Quartz later this year.
– Ubisoft reveals quartz – Ubisoft project consortium NFT platform – Ubisoft launches Wefunder campaign for NFT initiative
“I think it’s outrageous that Ubisoft is asking gamers to crowdfund their latest project – considering Division 2 costs $60 just by itself I have no idea how Ubisoft expects us to pay for Quartz as well.”
This isn’t Ubisoft’s first foray into alternate reality games; in 2008 they launched I-play uPlay, an iOS app for their own Ubisoft Club portal. Players earned points by playing Ubisoft mobile games and submitted photos of Ubisoft merchandise or Ubisoft cafés they visited for additional prizes.
The Ubisoft Club app was retired when Apple opened up Game Center support in 2010, but Ubisoft has continued developing similar apps sporadically since then for various platforms.
Ubisoft is also known to have joined Google’s Ingress XM Anomaly series and the first few Ubisoft Club mobile games were released as Google Play and iOS “app-le exclusive” titles. Ubisoft has worked with Niantic before, collaborating with them on the Ubisoft-sponsored Pokestop at fountains of Bellagio in Las Vegas
The Quartz platform itself is no stranger to ARGs either. While still in closed beta, its initial teaser site featured several viral marketing schemes including fake news articles, blogs, an alternate reality game promising access to the Quartz beta, and even physical postcards.
Ubisoft will start their Quartz promotion next week with a focus on players visiting Ubisoft cafés for a chance to register for sweepstakes entries or discover locations around them that offer Ubisoft-exclusive in-game items. Ubisoft has not yet revealed any plans for this promotion past its initial announcement and it is unknown whether Ubisoft will re-use the Quartz platform for future Ubisoft ARGs or simply use it as a promotional tool to accompany traditional Ubisoft marketing initiatives such as store opening events.
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