- Korea’s largest game media community, INVEN’s Web3 subsidiary, Vortex Gaming, has been confirmed for onboarding onto NEAR Protocol

- Vortex Gaming aims to break the stereotypes of current Web3 games through multilateral collaboration, and to form a solid environment with a robust user base

[June 23rd, 2023 - Seoul, South Korea] Korean Game media, INVEN (CEO Seo Hyeong-joon) announced on June 23rd that its subsidiary, Vortex Gaming, has signed a strategic partnership with NEAR Foundation, and has agreed to onboard onto NEAR Protocol. Vortex Gaming is a content-based Web3 gaming community of INVEN, which is Korea's largest game media with a monthly active user (MAU) count reaching 7.2 million.

Besides onboarding onto NEAR Protocol, Vortex Gaming will be collaborating to grow and strengthen the NEAR Gaming environment, hold offline hackathons and events to foster developers and vitalize the environment, and form an active partnership system to increase brand recognition and strengthen business network.

Vortex Gaming is a content-based game community that builds services optimized for Web3 games and provides a global social media platform and features such as Gaming Guild. Vortex Gaming aims to break stereotypes of current Web3 games by offering specialized content such as thorough analyses of in-game economy and the completeness of the game. By leveraging its successful experience in building Web2 communities, Vortex Gaming plans to establish a robust user base by incorporating both high-quality content and INVEN’s existing wide pool of users.

NEAR Protocol is a global Layer 1 blockchain that focuses on usability and scalability. NEAR  is also the Blockchain Operating System (BOS), an OS that allows Web2 companies and developers to effortlessly build decentralized apps and experiences for the open web. With BOS features like FastAuth, Web2 companies and developers can experience an onboarding process similar to login via email. These features facilitate the entry barrier present in the current Web3 game industry, and will play a pivotal role alongside Vortex Gaming in popularizing the NEAR ecosystem for gaming.

Vortex Gaming CEO, HOON JAI LEE, stated: "The ultimate goal is to build an integrated gamer community that encompasses both Web3 and traditional Web2 gamers by providing high-quality Web3 and Web2 content alike." LEE added: "Gamers and their communities are the most crucial components of the game ecosystem. In addition to offering game content for gamers and their communities, Vortex Gaming envisions to establish a sustainable cycle by incentivizing gamers’ production of content such as character builds and game guides”.

Commenting on her support for INVEN joining the NEAR Protocol, Marieke Flament, CEO of NEAR Foundation, said: "Following the leading companies in the gaming industry such as Kakao Games, Wemade, Netmarble's Marblex, we expect our sustainable game ecosystem to be further enhanced through this partnership with INVEN and look forward to making further inroads in this dynamic space.”

Scott Lee, Co-CEO of NEAR Korea, emphasized: "While the strong content competitiveness of leading companies plays a crucial role in attracting many users to the NEAR ecosystem, community is the key driving force in maintaining this competitiveness." He further highlighted: "The synergy effects resulting from the onboarding of Vortex Gaming will further strengthen NEAR's position as the optimal mainnet in the Web3 game ecosystem, accelerating ecosystem development."

About INVEN

INVEN is the largest game media·community in South Korea, serving as a leading company in the game industry and driving the development as the top online game media platform for over 20 years. Based on content generated in-house, INVEN innovatively continues to expand to industries such as entertainment and Web3.

About Vortex Gaming

Vortex Gaming is a content-based game community that builds services optimized for Web3 games and provides global social media and features such as Gaming Guild. Vortex Gaming aims to break stereotypes of current Web3 games by offering specialized content such as thorough analyses of in-game economy. Furthermore, by leveraging its successful experience in building Web2 communities, Vortex Gaming plans to establish a robust user base by incorporating both high-quality content and INVEN’s existing wide pool of users.

About the NEAR Foundation

The NEAR Foundation is a Swiss non-profit that supports the growth and development of the NEAR Protocol and its associate ecosystem, a high-performance carbon-neutral blockchain that is designed to be super-fast, incredibly secure, and infinitely scalable. NEAR Protocol is built by an award-winning team of engineers and entrepreneurs to be simple to use, inclusive and good for the environment.