Participated · Series D · Jan 2024

Build a Rocket Boy is a game development studio led by Leslie Benzies, the former president of Rockstar North. The studio is developing a suite of titles including MindsEye and an immersive, community-driven open-world platform called Everywhere, plus a set of user-generated content design tools called Arcadia. Its first titles have not yet launched and are slated for release "in the near future." The company announced a $110 million Series D round of funding ahead of those launches. Prior to this, it had raised at least $40 million to develop and commercialize its games. Build a Rocket Boy is headquartered in Edinburgh and also operates development hubs in Budapest and Montpellier. Benzies founded the project after leaving Rockstar and ultimately reached a confidential settlement related to his prior legal dispute in 2019.

Participated · Series C · May 2023

VARK Inc. builds a virtual live music event platform, metaverse templates, and video-creation support tools for 3D avatars, including its VARK service and recently launched VARK SHORTS. Its metaverse templates have been used for large-scale events such as the TV Tokyo Virtual Music Festival in collaboration with Dentsu and TV Tokyo. After product enhancements funded by Series B, the number of virtual live music events on the platform more than doubled year-over-year. VARK SHORTS, released earlier this month, was adopted by more than 10,000 users within days of launch. With the new funding, the company plans to strengthen its product development system and pursue new businesses using a lean startup approach. CEO and founder Takuya Kato has indicated plans for international expansion and the need for substantially more capital to scale globally.

Participated · Equity · May 2021

Lightforge Games was founded in 2020 by veterans from Epic Games, Blizzard Entertainment and other AAA studios and focuses on creating storytelling-rich player experiences. The studio is developing a major unannounced RPG that blends elements of Minecraft or Roblox with tabletop‑RPG‑inspired, open-ended narratives. That project is being built in Unreal Engine 5. Lightforge currently employs 18 developers, has an open salary policy, and is actively hiring to support ambitious growth targets. The company has attracted a number of high-profile industry figures as supporters and angel backers. CEO Matt Schembari said the $15 million round and its partners will help the team meet its ambitious goals and push the boundaries of player-created stories and worlds. Lightforge Games is an all-remote studio building a cross-platform social video game focused on enabling players to create worlds and tell stories collaboratively. The team aims to redefine how developers make role-playing games and emphasizes emergent, shared storytelling rather than classic UGC publishing. The studio is led by CEO Matt Schembari, a former lead engineer at Blizzard and director of user interface at Epic, and includes veterans from Blizzard, Epic, Riot, Bioware, and ZeniMax. Lightforge has 11 people and is on the verge of hiring three more, and it is hiring for remote roles. The company is based near Epic Games in Raleigh, North Carolina and raised $5 million to open the studio.