FaZe Clan Joins The Sandbox!

Esports teams are always looking for new and innovative ways to engage with their fans. In a bold move, FaZe Clan , one of the most popular professional esports teams in the world, has decided to join The Sandbox Metaverse. This will give fans a whole new level of engagement with the team, as well as provide an immersive experience that can’t be found anywhere else. So is this the beginning of a unique esports team offering deeper experiences for fan engagement, or just a quick way to diversify their revenue?

Enter FaZe World

Through this partnership, FaZe Clan and The Sandbox will work together to develop “FaZe World,” a 12x12 area within the game that embodies FaZe culture (which hopefully consists of drinking Mountain Dew and hitting 360 no-scope trick shots). They’ll also be collaborating on events, games, digital products and other content for their fan base and The Sandbox community. This deal gives FaZe an opportunity to create new streams of income by gamifying their world and providing fans with more ways to interact with talent and members.

“FaZe Clan’s leadership position at the apex of gaming and youth culture presents an ideal opportunity to build bridges and lead the gaming community at large into the metaverse,” says Lee Trink, CEO of FaZe Clan. “Through FaZe World and our partnership with The Sandbox, our already digitally native fans can experience FaZe Clan in a new immersive way.”

If you think that this move came suddenly, you’ll be surprised to know that FaZe Clan has been looking to expand into Web3 for quite some time now. FaZe partnered with The Sandbox in large part due to its creator revenue share model—where creators who sell their NFTs on The Sandbox’s marketplace receive 95% of the proceeds. This was appealing to FaZe Clan when compared with other companies, like Gucci who launched the Gucci Garden experience on Roblox .

Check out our article Walmart Enters the Roblox “Metaverse” with Two New Virtual Experiences by clicking here.

While there isn’t a set date for the upcoming FaZe Clan land sale yet, the tweets and videos by FaZe Clan and The Sandbox mentioned that FaZe Clan would be coming to the platform in 2023…

Esports Entering the Metaverse

Esports entering the Metaverse and Web3 is going to become more common in the next few years as teams look to increase their value and presence. Current stats from 2022 show that the top ten most profitable esports companies have skyrocketed 46% in the past year, now being worth a combined $3.5 billion. As an example, in July of this year, FaZe Clan made history as they became the first esports team listed on Nasdaq . This listing caused their value to instantly spike from 400 million US dollars to 725 million US dollars, making them one of the most valuable esports teams in the world.

Check out our article Esports - How NFTs Are Changing the Game by clicking here.

We do have to accept that the majority of the shift we’re seeing with esports teams looking to break into web3 is being motivated by the need for esports teams to diversify their revenue. For the most part, esports teams are still largely supported by sponsorship revenue with more successful teams also having merchandising streams as well as media rights/ticketing sales. FaZe Clan jumping into The Sandbox is a way for them to continue to diversify and grow as an organization.

Is there an aching need for them to sell scarce digital land? Not really. It’s all going to boil down to how invested they become in the creative experience and delivering something that is truly unique to their fan base.

What do you think about FaZe Clan joining The Sandbox? Is this a smart move on their part? Or are they just joining in on a fad? Let us know your thoughts!