The Sandbox expands to Germany with acquisition of developer Sviper | Pocket Gamer.biz

Decentralised virtual world The Sandbox, a subsidiary of Animoca Brands, has acquired German developer Sviper.

Sviper adds development, engineering, and creative talent to the Sandbox’s team, and aims to empower the creator generation to build engaging and fun forms of experiences with a focus on social features, multiplayer, and game making.

Led by CEO Ole Schaper and CPO Mark Buchholz, the leadership team at Sviper has over 25 years of experience across mobile and PC platforms and multiplayer gaming. The studio has collaborated with The Sandbox for over a year and is fully integrated into the platform’s ecosystem. The Hamburg based studio is now operating as part of the Sandbox umbrella.

“The Sandbox’s German team is a creative powerhouse that is already advancing the gameplay possibilities available to our internal teams and The Sandbox creators at large,” said The Sandbox COO and co-founder Sebastien Borget. “From adding social features to designing rules creators can use to prototype game logic to implementing powerful multiplayer features, our Hamburg team is supercharging the metaverse’s creative potential.”

“We’ve built a high level of trust with The Sandbox Germany team as they’ve demonstrated tremendous innovation and quality by both working with major partners and ideating on new gameplay concepts,” added The Sandbox CEO and co-founder Arthur Madrid.

New Horizons

The acquisition of Sviper highlights The Sandbox’s growing footprint in the emerging metaverse. Since its founding in 2012 The Sandbox has partnered with more than 400 IP’s and brands, including the likes of The Walking Dead, Square Enix, and Ubisoft.

“We are thrilled to join The Sandbox and contribute to the creation of a cutting-edge virtual world that combines gaming, creativity, and community,” said Sviper CEO and co-founder Ole Schaper. “We believe that The Sandbox has enormous potential and we look forward to working with the team to bring this vision to life.”

Sviper CPO and co-founder Mark Buchholz was also optimistic about the acquisition, stating “The Sandbox is a visionary enterprise with countless fascinating aspects beyond traditional game development. The ability to create innovative, social user-generated gaming experiences, the growing social platform, and the revolutionary aspects of web3 are just some of the key features.”

We listed Animoca Brands as one of the top 50 mobile game makers of 2022.