I am a big fan of Square Enix and so when the developer and publisher mentioned they were going to focus on blockchain games in November last year, I was hopeful. This hope was compounded right at the start of 2022 when Yosuke Matsuda, Square Enix’s President, wrote an open letter that included an insightful section on the value of blockchain to gaming.
While it’s fantastic to see leading giants of the gaming industry pledging themselves to a blockchain-infused future, I’m acutely aware of how far off genuinely large titles are from being playable. Game development — particularly to a AAA standard — is tremendously time-consuming at the best of times, but add in the lack of infrastructure for blockchain and we are likely looking at five years or more.
So, I was pleasantly surprised to see that Square Enix has partnered with The Sandbox to bring back their cult RPG title, Dungeon Siege, with The Sandbox metaverse.
Dungeon Siege Enters The Sandbox Metaverse
The three-part series of Dungeon Siege has been treasured by gamers for decades. The Diablo-esque RPG still has fans and is available on Steam, with Dungeon Siege III released in 2011. Though the third installation of the series met mixed reviews, that was primarily due to the difficulty of living up to its two predecessors. Since then, the Dungeon Siege series has been abandoned.
Now, 11 years later, the extremely successful metaverse project, The Sandbox, has announced they have teamed up with Square Enix to bring back the project, on-chain.
Dungeon Siege has always been about inspiring adventure and entering The Sandbox metaverse to empower players to craft their own personal adventures opens an exciting new chapter for the franchise. We’re looking forward to seeing Dungeon Siege come to life in The Sandbox, powered by the inspiration of RPG fans.
Hideaki Uehara, Director of Business Development, Square Enix
This is an interesting move and one that could spark a trend. Square Enix will occupy some land in The Sandbox on which they will enable Dungeon Siege experiences. If this is a fully-fledged game — even if more simple than we have come to expect from most modern games — it could be a genius move from The Sandbox.
We could see The Sandbox hosting many older game titles and indie projects within its metaverse walls. It looks as if it will get to the point where metaverses will focus on how they can keep their players in their space for as long as possible through diversity of experience. If we can already integrate some forms of games into a metaverse like The Sandbox, we may end up with the next Steam being a game in itself.
