Using AI and in-house live ops tech to make a better shooter experience on mobile
Los Angeles-based mobile developer Carbonated Games has closed $8.5 million in a seed funding round to help fund development of its debut mobile shooter.
The funding round was led by Andreessen Horowitz, Golden Ventures, BITKRAFT Ventures, and AH Cultural Leadership Fund. Further participation came from angel investors such as Kent Wakeford, Shanti Bergel and Chris Ye.
Carbonated’s main focus is its upcoming mobile shooter, which uses AI to make the typically hardcore genre more accessible and easier to play with just one hand. It is also developing its own live ops system, Carbyne, which it will use to quickly deliver updates to its game.
Aiming high
“The reason we started the company was that as folks with busy lives and living rooms, we missed playing hardcore competitive games on console and PC,” the team said in a blog post.
“We realized pretty quickly that we’re not the only ones and there’s a huge underserved market which continues to grow as younger core gamers age up and enter the workforce, like we did.”
Carbonated Games is headed up by CEO Travis Boatman, formerly of EA Mobile and Zynga. We will have an in-depth interview with Boatman discussing the funding round and the studio’s plans live on PGBiz in the coming days.
– Ric Cowley, Editor
