The undisputed champions of onboarding, The Sandbox, have recently announced a new mini-game has opened. Someone rotate the golden arches, it’s no longer an M, it’s the 3 in web3.

I have written a lot on The Sandbox and that isn’t because I hold tens of thousands of $SAND tokens (I have none) or I am an ambassador for their metaverse (I’m not), but rather because they continuously give me cause to. Let’s do a brief rundown.

I believe The Sandbox is a brilliant example of a meta-game — a game that contains lots of games. The Sandbox is also incredibly strong at onboarding; how’s this for an eclectic mix: Snoop Dogg, the Saudi Government, Hell’s Kitchen, TIME, HSBC, Paris Hilton, Square Enix, Tony Hawk, The Walking Dead — the list goes on. All of these have involvement in The Sandbox metaverse, whether their own games, experiences, or NFTs. Finally, we’ve had The Sandbox Co-Founder and COO, Sebastien Borget, on the podcast:

Right, so where does McDonald’s fit into this?

McNuggets Land in The Sandbox Metaverse

McDonald’s Hong Kong is celebrating the 40th anniversary of the chicken McNugget by opening a sensory assault called McNuggets Land in The Sandbox. This limited-time game will allow players to take on quests that will reward both real-world rewards such as free food at McDonald’s, to NFTs and in-game items for The Sandbox.

This isn’t McDonald’s first foray into web3, during the hype peak, they did release an NFT around the McRib — do with that information what you will.

As for this latest experience in The Sandbox, I’m unsure what to make of it. The Sandbox, to my eyes, has a clear vision: build a web3 Roblox and make a metaverse that can be played right now, on the current tech. On that front, it can work, it just needs some more games that draw in higher player numbers. As soon as they have large quantities of players for a game, they will have people loitering in The Sandbox when they’re not playing, which will lead to players exploring its other experiences.