Anthony Tori is one of the many creators and developers in the Blend Media community who are building for the metaverse. Based in the US, Anthony recently developed a game in Sandbox based around Amelia Earhart, find out more about his journey from web development into developing for web 3.0.
I remember waking up one morning in 2009 realizing that the web developer I hired for my first business took my money and had no intention of finishing my project. At that point, I already quit my corporate job and spent all my money starting my business.
“Mom, can I move back in with you for a little bit?”
“...”
“You’re the best mom ever.”
With no money, a half started business and a humbling living situation, I decided to learn how to finish the website on my own. After a couple of months, my website was finally finished and my business was running.
During the process, I realized how much I enjoyed web development so I started creating websites for friends. And then friends of friends. Eventually, Motivo Media turned into an official business.
Over the past ten years, Motivo Media has evolved as new forms of storytelling became more accessible, from social media to video production. In 2020, I started experimenting with metaverse projects like The Sandbox and Decentraland. After realizing the potential of XR and the metaverse, I decided to go full-time in the industry.
It was a tough decision at first because a lot of my clients have never heard of the word metaverse, NFT, DAO or any of the buzzwords that were thrown around after Facebook rebranded to Meta.
Now, businesses are starting to realize that the metaverse is going to be an extremely important platform to not only tell stories, but to allow people to experience them. That’s what excites me the most. We’re going to be able to create experiences that make it hard to distinguish what’s real or digital. Some people find that scary. I find that exciting.
Every era, past and the imaginable future, will be represented in the metaverse. Roam open land with dinosaurs, fly a plane with Amelia Earhart or explore an extraterrestrial world with different physics than Earth. We’re still a couple of years away from an ideal experience, but I plan on growing with the technology instead of falling behind and playing catch up. I’d also like to create experiences that show businesses how to get started in the metaverse.
One of those experiences is “Find Amelia” for my fragrance company, theo & amelia. It’s named after Theodore Roosevelt and Amelia Earhart so I decided to create an experience in The Sandbox that challenges players to find Amelia. She went missing in 1937, but did she really? What really happened? Players who find Amelia are rewarded with a promo code that they can use on the website for a pretty nice discount. Watch the game in action here
The game includes 85 custom assets including replica planes that Amelia flew, a custom built home with RH inspired furniture, a gallery with a few of my favourite photos of Amelia and four different quests.
Find Amelia was the first game I submitted in a Game Jam for The Sandbox and it ended up winning in the top ten. I wasn’t expecting to win anything since it was my first game, but I’m pretty proud to look back on the progress since making the decision to go full-time in metaverse development.
If you'd like to discuss an XR project or have a chat about how your brand or business can get started in the metaverse, please get in touch at hello@blendmedia or book a call here.