This piece was published December 31st, 2022 on The Cryptonomist.
This week’s guest on the Cardano NFT Column is a cross-media, cross-chain Metaverse that is aiming to become the world’s first Enlightenment Simulator: Mandala Metaverse.
The previous guest was the most used NFT store on Cardano working hard towards supporting creators and building a great solution for users.
This initiative is a point of reference for NFTs on Cardano and every week or two we will invite someone to answer some questions and give us an update directly from within the Cardano community.
Considering that many of our readers are new to the crypto space, we will have a mix of simple and technical questions.
Hey, glad to have you here. Please introduce your team, where are you from, what are your backgrounds?
With a strong academic and experiential background in comparative mythology, the creators of Mandala are uniquely suited to be at the core of developing and producing this disruptive intellectual property. Imagine a cross-media franchise in the vein of The Matrix or Avatar that is imagineered to actually effect a real paradigm shift.
Currently involved with the project are Hollywood producers (including Kevin Foxe, executive producer of The Blair Witch Project), artists (including Disney and Pixar concept artist Bruce Zick and Adult Swim/SNL artist Tony Millionaire), writers (including veteran Marvel and DC writer/editor Stuart Moore), strategic advisor executives (including Nate Jones, former VP of Digital Games at Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, and Brooks Brown, former VP of Digital Development at Lightstorm/Lucas Arts), and an online beta community of over 25,000 users from around the world. The advisory board includes Columbia University Professor Emeritus Robert Thurman, a longtime student and personal friend of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Thomas Gewecke, former Chief Digital Officer of WarnerMedia, and Giedra Rackauskas, former President of Jim Cameron’s Earthship and production executive on the Titanic and Alien films, who was an early investor and adviser. Dark Horse Comics, IAMX, SingularityNet, MindMaze, and LionTree are strategic partners.
What is Mandala Metaverse? How are you implementing NFT technology in your project?
Mandala is the world’s first Enlightenment Simulator: a cross-media, cross-chain Metaverse combining Avatar NFTs with a geolocation AR mobile game + AAA Unreal Engine MMORPG, live-action TV series, and graphic novels (Dark Horse Comics).
A part of the Mandala project involves the publisher Dark Horse Comics
Players start a journey of identity creation and self-sovereignty to exit the Matrix by first minting an Avatar NFT. They are introduced to the basics of the blockchain via the Mandala storyline: acquiring a wallet, an NFT, staking and DIDs (Decentralized Identities) through the Mandala Clan App. They become a Special Agent, a unique part of a critical mass of sovereign individuals forming the nucleus of a digital meta-nation state grounded in the power of decentralization and value of human consciousness itself. Enter the Mandala.
Hidden in the metadata of the NFTs is a QR code that leads players down a story rabbit-hole to a narrative driven token event called the Sacrifice. Players are given the opportunity to enact one of the oldest human rituals: to make a sacrifice (of their cryptocurrency of choice) to the Tree of Life and help manifest a sharing economy based in abundance and freedom.
Mandala creates a new story for our world, woven from existing mythology and contemporary culture. It exists to connect, creating an engaged audience and inviting people into the story to wake up and engage in a shift in consciousness.
You are building on Cardano but also on Ethereum and Polkadot. Can you share more about this? How do these collections interact with each other?
We started building in Cardano because of first principles outlined in Charles’ whiteboard presentation. Sovereignty, decentralization and making the world a better place are at the core, particularly evidenced in the architecture of stake pools with strong missions.
Partnering with Ben Goertzel and SingularityNet to create our NPC AIs and build the Mandala Metaverse side by side with SophiaVerse also led us to Cardano, along with a vision of interoperability to “gather the chains” in our game. We identified the three chains founded by the original founders of Ethereum as offering unique strengths and communities to create the Layer 1 substrate to a decentralized metaverse standard.
Besides Cardano, the Mandala Metaverse project is building also on Ethereum and Polkadot
Mandala is a perfect project to actualize possible synergies — such as by providing DIDs that connect users who may be staking or gaming on multiple chains — and to also narrativize the “tribal” difference, such that we can recognize unity in diversity on our way to mass adoption. For example, our recent mint on Ethereum, featuring the art of globally acclaimed artist Tony Millionaire, is named the Regens collection to help elevate the culture by framing the NFT revolution as a “Regenaissance” rather than short-term flipping and greed. This collection sits alongside our Sovereigns collection on Cardano. Both invite players to become heroes of their own lives!
Ultimately, we see Layer 1s receding “under the hood” altogether as dApps and games offer experiences and the real power of Web3 for less tech-savvy folks to be empowered and enjoy.
What’s your goal with Mandala Metaverse?
Mandala’s end goal is not only entertainment but something bigger, extending from the personal to the global. Imagine a metaverse that not only simulates the individual path to enlightenment but the collective one too, alchemically marrying ancient time-tested wisdom and bleeding-edge technology to unleash the potential of human consciousness for good.
Imagine a metaverse with a contemporary meta-narrative and story woven from the archive of world mythologies to help inspire the global awakening already afoot, in which the world becomes the game board and you become the hero, playing your part in creating a sustainable reality for future generations and the Earth, for real. Imagine, for a moment, a metaverse where fiction becomes reality.
Great contribution. Any closing thoughts? Where can people learn more about your project?
Mandala’s creative universe is vast, providing endless content, but its story is also relevant to the age and world in which we live, driving the audience to “wake up.” Mandala originated from the need to create stories that truly affect us in a persistent and meaningful way, not just during the entertainment experience. Remember the feeling of realization provoked by The Matrix, but then flip that story. Rather than presenting this world as an illusion and reality as a dystopian future, in Mandala the “red pill” awakens the audience to the potential to shift things here and now.
There has never been a more urgent time for humanity to wake up and become heroes. Mandala contains the architecture and the vehicle for them to engage — a Metaverse to Nirvana.
Join us in building the world’s first Enlightenment Simulator. All are welcome.
Disclaimer: The opinions and views of the people interviewed are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Cardano Foundation or IOG. Moreover, this content is for educational purposes, it doesn’t constitute financial advice.