Inside PlayCo’s $100 Million Push to Make Gaming as Easy as Clicking a Link
As the world embraces mobile gaming at a rapid clip and player spending on games grows worldwide, a new social-focused developer based in Tokyo called PlayCo is gunning to capture the attention of gamers by integrating gaming into social apps like Zoom, or Facebook. PlayCo, which also has an office in San Francisco, plans for its games to be available to play just via a link, instead of the typical process of installing, then updating, game software to a hard drive. PlayCo chief executive Michael Carter told TheWrap that the company thinks that players want a lower barrier to entry to playing games, which includes less time to install. Compared to the process of buying, downloading, then installing and updating game software, the prospect of joining a game by tapping a link — just like participating in a video call — seems effortless. The company emerged from stealth mode in late September with a $100 million funding raise — putting it at unicorn status and an estimated $1 billion post-deal valuation before the company even completed its first game. Carter told the Wall Street Journal PlayCo pitched to 20 investors and expected only a few to invest, but all wrote checks,...
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