Nearly two years after officially becoming a unicorn, Seattle-based startup Rec Room continues to expand the reach of its eponymous flagship app, Rec Room, with new physical gift cards, a virtual haunted house, and Mattel’s Masters of the Universe branding. the possibility of crossing and, perhaps most importantly, the legs.
The free Rec Room app is currently available in 2D on PC, Xbox, PlayStation, iOS, and Android, and in VR on the Meta Quest store. Rec Room users can create, customize and dress up simple avatars. They can then use these avatars to enter one of the millions of player-created “rooms” where they can play games, create their own experiences, and interact with other users.
During the 2020 pandemic, Rec Room’s player base grew rapidly, with users creating “rooms” on the app for events such as community birthday parties, school lessons, and therapy sessions. The company then rode the wave, hitting a $3.5 billion valuation by December 2021.
As of this month, Rec Room has reported mobile app growth of 640% year-over-year, with 29 million active users across all platforms in the first quarter of 2022. It is estimated that during this time, players in the app created a new “room” every three seconds.
Although it is a virtual social space, Rec Room does not consider itself a “virtual world” company.
“One of the things we’re talking about is that Rec Room is a place where you can go and not a substitute or replacement for real life,” Mike Schmid, Rec Room’s head of publishing, said in a recent interview with GeekWire.
“We don’t use the word ‘metaverse’. We don’t talk about ourselves as creepily as some other experiences do. We’re just adding to real life. ”
The app also allows users to create and monetize content within the app, such as unique avatar outfits that other users can purchase with real money. In the first quarter of 2022, Rec Room paid out $1 million to these creators and recently announced a series of physical gift cards available at Walmart stores nationwide.
Rec Room hosted its third annual “Rec Con” in its virtual event space in September, gathering over 400,000 subscribers to promote its upcoming Rec Room Studio app. This set of Unity-based features is designed to speed up and simplify the process of creating “rooms” and open up the possibility of collaborating on each individual project.
On December 13, in celebration of MOTU’s 40th anniversary, Rec Room announced a deal with Mattel to move the Masters of the Universe franchise to Rec Room from December 15 to January 15.
The in-app Rec Center now features a photo booth and a pop-up store that allows Rec Room users to dress up as He-Man, Skeletor, and Teela. The three items that make up each costume, as well as a separate accessory similar to He-Man’s Power Sword, will be available until March 31st.
“We’re in a space where we’re thinking, ‘Let’s test something with some partners and see who we can spend a lot of time with,’” Schmid said. “If you look at other people in our space, physical goods and toys are really important.”
Schmid added, “Maybe you can connect the dots above and see what Rec Room will look like two years from now.”
“We want to start building those relationships… we want to build the physical version of the Rec Room material in a way that really fits with Rec Room, and building and creating is a big part of that. plans right now.
The opportunity to enter the realm of toys is part of the motivation behind the option currently being developed to change the distinctive appearance of Rec Room player avatars, known internally as “beans”. These avatars now have a distinctive round appearance with no arms, neck, or legs.
Over the next year, Rec Room plans to experiment with changing the avatar to add more personalization options. The Rec Room is currently entering its Ready, Shoot, Aim phase, and the first adjustments will likely be made to the app by the end of Q1 2023.
These settings may even include some or all of the limbs currently missing from the Rec Room avatars. Feet are clearly in particularly high demand, as this will allow Rec Room content creators to launch a new line of stylish virtual shoes.
“We really like the way the avatars are stylized and they still fit nicely into the game space,” said Schmid. “How can we provide this opportunity without completely destroying the brand identity? It’s really important to us.”
Rec Room plans to explore more brand partnerships next year, especially with local Seattle-based companies. This may include music, clothing, or other video games, as well as more official “gaming” content from Rec Room, such as quizzes.
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Post time: Jan-04-2023