Terra Virtua in 2020 — A Review by CEO Gary Bracey
2020 was the year Terra Virtua was revealed to the world and although inconsequential by comparison to other events this year, we wanted to relay our journey over the past 12 months so our community have a little insight into what we are about and maybe what is to come.
2019 ended solidifying some licensing deals we had been negotiating. Both Paramount Pictures and Legendary Entertainment were showing their leap of faith and had agreed to license some of their top brands to us; Paramount with The Godfather and Top Gun (and a few others!) and Legendary with the Netflix hit TV series, Lost in Space.
So fast-forward to January 2020. COVID was just ‘some flu virus in China’ and we were planning to launch the first iteration of Terra Virtua. Money was tight as we had been running this thing, unpaid, for over two years, syphoning any investment funds into development in order to actually have a product at some point!
Development-wise, under the diligent and watchful eye of CTO (and co-founder) Jawad, the monumental task of finishing the core NFT Marketplace (for desktop and mobile!), the 3D immersive environment of the Fan-Cave and the mobile AR App had to be combined with the design and development of assets from the licenses to turn into desirable collectibles. The clock was ticking, the money-pot was diminishing and the market was moving.
We needed to test the market first as there were very few metrics indicating the appetite of the market for licensed collectibles so we needed to test the NFT waters. Our friends at Opensea kindly hosted an auction for the first Terra Virtua NFT based on the Godfather. Paramount had provided us with a wealth of iconic assets from which we were able to produce a number of stunning Godfather-themed posters, most of which had never been seen before.
The auction was a success and we proceeded with a small release of set-priced Godfather posters on the Opensea platform which, again, were well-received and sold through. This bolstered our confidence somewhat and so our talented designers continued to innovate and mint further Godfather pieces.
In the meantime, Legendary had delivered some awesome Lost in Space assets and materials to us and we were thrilled to get the actual data for the digital models they used in the TV show — the characters, the Robot, the creatures and the vehicles were all provided in CGI for us to downscale, model and animate. This underpinned our core strategy of producing high-fidelity, animated 3D collectibles, the like of which didn’t seem to exist elsewhere in the NFT marketplace back then
Over the next few months our developers really pulled a rabbit out of the hat and by May we released the beta of the website, the FanCave and the AR App together with a portfolio of wonderful NFTs for both Godfather and Lost in Space. The market reacted well and those first 3D animated models caused quite a stir and generated a fair amount of buzz in the community as they set a new, high bar for NFTs.
Speaking of community, we were blown away by the rapid growth of our Twitter, Discord and Telegram followers, which enabled us to engage as never before and elicit comments and suggestions regarding features and content they would like to see. This is something we have continually encouraged and love the relationships we have formed with our loyal userbase.
Bearing in mind that the site would continually evolve as we received and acted upon the above feedback, we planned our roll-out of products for the remainder of the year — Top Gun, Pacific Rim and an Art Gallery launch were all road-mapped. But we wanted to solidify a lot more licenses we were negotiating and also implement the next critical phase of our strategy; to begin marketing to the ‘mainstream’ and introduce the concept of digital collectibles to the mass-market. However, although we were generating reasonable revenues from the sales we had started to make, it was nowhere near enough to cover our development overhead, let alone the acquisition of licenses and a marketing plan!
For once, though, timing was on our side as, in September the crypto market began buzzing strongly about NFTs… and we had already started to make waves in that sector. As a result, we put together a small token sale to give us a ‘war-chest’ in order to accomplish the above strategy.
That same month we had also launched our first foray into digital art and released our 3D interactive Art Gallery enabling us to showcase the wonderful works in a unique and engaging way. The community responded accordingly and the pieces we exhibited began selling through.
By early October, we had closed our fundraise at just over $2.5M — not only was it encouraging but was actually 5X oversubscribed! This was a huge validation that what we were doing was right and encouraged us to continue with the strategy we had implemented.
Realising the popularity of the Art Gallery, we hosted an exhibition of work by renowned comicbook artist, Nick Percival and launched with a livestreamed Q&A on Twitch which also seemed to resonate well with the community.
The buzz over Terra Virtua was building. At the beginning of the year, we had promised ‘Innovative and super-high quality NFTs’, ‘ground-breaking interactive environments’, ‘A simple and intuitive Marketplace’ and ‘Big brand names and familiar characters’ . By the end of October, we had delivered on all these promises and more, lending a legitimacy to the NFT market which before had just been regarded as ‘niche’. Yes, we were starting to execute on our biggest ambition of all — bringing Digital Collectibles to the mass-market.
And that legitimacy was sealed when we launched our major listing on Bitmax, bringing our TVK token to the fore and revealing our tokenomics so interested parties could participate in what we hope will be a major growth-spurt for the company over the coming months.
So we close out the year riding on a high with much acclaim from the community for our Top Gun and Pacific Rim collections; our range of own-character vFlects seem to have touched the hearts of collectors also and the press/media are starting to take notice of this company that, only one year ago, was ‘just another start-up with ambitions beyond its capabilities’.
As for 2021, we really do have a host of amazing things planned. Not just the growth of the current Marketplace and metaverse, but also the introduction of brand new features which will take the immersive and interactive elements to the next level; Our TVK token will provide enhanced benefits for those who truly want to invest — both financially and emotionally — into the TerraVerse; we have the biggest licenses lined up across all genres of entertainment including Movies, TV, Sports, Games, Music and Art, coupled with an innovative NFT strategy which will disrupt the space even more and finally fulfil our ambition of opening up the sector to the entire world.
To those of you who have already packed your bags and joined us on our journey, thank you — Thank you for your faith, support, encouragement and loyalty. The journey has only just begun and it’s going to be a helluva ride!
To those who have never heard of Terra Virtua until today, please come visit us at www.terravirtua.io. We know you’ll find something of interest and there is plenty to do and download without having to spend a single dime. Just explore and see what we have to offer… and be part of the future!
Finally, all of us Terra Virtuans wish every one of you a happy, healthy and peaceful new year and here’s hoping 2021 brings you everything your heart desires.
Gary Bracey — CEO
Follow us at
Web: www.terravirtua.io
Twitter: http://twitter.com/terra_virtua
Discord: https://discord.gg/yb4cR49
Telegram: https://t.me/terravirtua
Coingecko: https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/terra-virtua-kolect
