Exclusive: Sequence sunsets Horizon Blockchain Games in rebrand

Crypto gaming infrastructure firm Sequence — which also owns Horizon Blockchain Games — is shutting down its Horizon brand. 

Horizon Blockchain Games is no more. Existing resources and products under that brand, including its flagship 2019 game Skyweaver, will now exist solely under the Sequence brand, Sequence shared exclusively with The Drop and Blockworks. 

“This name change is a commitment to clarity — and our mission to unify blockchain ecosystems and empower builders across Web3,” said Peter Kieltyka, cofounder and CEO at Sequence, in a statement.

The move also finalizes Sequence’s pivot away from game development as it allocates more of its resources to building crypto infrastructure.

“Skyweaver still has a community,” Sequence cofounder and Chief Storyteller Michael Sanders told Blockworks in an interview, noting that the game remains playable. 

“A lot of the inspiration for Skyweaver was to understand how to build a developer platform, right? Like, to understand the pain points that players are dealing with, that game developers are dealing with, regarding things like accounts and payments and wallets and transactions and marketplaces and, you know, all of that,” Sanders said, adding: “Skyweaver really taught us what’s required in a development platform.”

Horizon Blockchain Games raised a $40 million Series A in 2022. It had also raised another $13.3 million across three prior seed funding rounds, per Crunchbase data.

Sequence also said it’s acquired Light, a crypto tech firm focused on tackling the Ethereum “chain abstraction” challenge. Because there are so many Ethereum L2 and even “L3” blockchains — as well as “sidechains” and other separate EVM-compatible L1 chains — it can be difficult for non-technical or new users in crypto to navigate the space without encountering hiccups, roadblocks, glitches, delays or other problems.

The goal of chain abstraction is to make as much of the technical side of a multichain experience happen under the hood, so that users don’t have to do things like manually bridge tokens, pay to “wrap” tokens, “sign” with a wallet frequently, or face delays when trying to complete transactions.

“Developers need access to all of Ethereum and its buying power, and users want

intuitive and seamless experiences. That’s the Web3 we’re building—fast, accessible, and seamlessly interoperable,” said Light founder Shun Kakinoki in a statement. 

Kakinoki is now Sequence’s head of cross-chain post-acquisition.

Sequence provides infrastructure for some of the biggest players in the crypto gaming space, typically offering those services as “white-label.” That means you don’t see their name on a product that they provided to another brand. Instead, the wallet or feature shows the client’s branding.

For instance, crypto gaming platform Immutable uses Sequence’s embedded wallets. Sequence also counts Ubisoft, Polygon, SKALE, Avalanche and Base among its clients.

Sequence also offers an in-app payment system via Sequence Pay. The firm has its own indexer so game devs can assess activity across multiple chains. It also offers analytics and a marketplace API, and it allows devs to cover gas fees for user transactions.

Sequence’s investors include Brevan Howard Digital, Coinbase, Initialized Capital, Bitkraft, Polychain, Morgan Creek Digital, Polygon and Ubisoft.