Gunzilla Games is set to launch the early access version of its upcoming cyberpunk battle royale third-person shooter Off the Grid in October 2024, now making a bold move into cross-genre, blockchain-driven gaming with Off The Grid (OTG), a story-driven battle royale-themed third-person shooter.
The game is in early access on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X & S, using a re-mixed free-to-play model while featuring digital in-game items secured by blockchain technology.
Gunzilla Games is the team behind OTG, composed of several veterans from the gaming industry, particularly the creators of CRYENGINE, the engine behind the (Far Cry) series of games, while Warface is an online shooter that has surpassed 150 million players since its release and once set the world record for the most players online on a single server in a shooting game.
The founding team also includes Oscar-nominated film director Neill Blomkamp, who serves as chief creative officer, best known for directing feature films (District 9), (Elysium), (GT: A Romance), and (Chappie).
Gunzilla leverages its expertise in creating hit shooting games and scaling them to hundreds of millions of players, innovating the standard battle royale shooter with an all-new business model, compelling new features, strong narrative elements, and blockchain-based in-game items.
As Web3 director Theodore Agranat said in a recent interview with OpenSea, “This team is strong and ready to take on the biggest battles in the market.”
Off the Grid will launch an OpenSea skin, including weapons and shirts, with more details on supply to be announced in the coming weeks. To gain deeper insights into how Off The Grid plans to stand out in a competitive environment, we spoke with Theodore Agranat about the project's origins and future direction.
How Off The Grid plans to stand out
Battle royale games are dominated by several mainstream titles, almost all of which adopt a free-to-play (F2P) model, typically profiting by selling limited-time in-game cosmetics and battle passes, which are often unlocked through a progression system.
Considering the market size of battle royale games, revenue is expected to reach $23.1 billion by 2031, covering hundreds of millions of players. The OTG team believes the game has room to carve out a niche market and attract new players in unique ways.
In terms of gameplay, Agranat revealed that the game will feature the largest map among all battle royale games, accommodating up to 150 players simultaneously and allowing the purchase or sale of any in-game item in a peer-to-peer marketplace.
Players will be dropped onto Tear Drop Island, a battlefield covering one square mile, contested by three factions, where each player can collect and equip mechanical limbs that provide specific abilities and upgrades, such as legs that can increase speed or jumping ability, or arms that can launch grenades.
These mechanical limbs can be shot from opponents or stolen from defeated foes, allowing players to change and mix their gameplay styles in real-time.
The team has carefully crafted the storyline of OTG, aiming to engage players through the plot. The game promises over 60 hours of story content centered around a compelling core conflict, a first for battle royale games. Additionally, Gunzilla periodically releases short films produced by Blomkamp to advance the game’s narrative.
Gunzilla's research indicates that players invest more emotionally in games with strong central narratives and often reject battle royale games.
Another aspect that differs from battle royale game rules is that OTG will only directly sell battle passes to players, and in-game items can only be obtained by collecting them in-game or purchasing them from the peer-to-peer marketplace operated by Gunzilla, which will integrate with OpenSea.
The company will make money only through marketplace fees and the direct sale of battle passes, which players must do when listing items to sell on the marketplace.
Additionally, they plan to collaborate with major brands for sponsorship events. As Agranat said, “Brands are always looking to advertise to audiences they understand, and through us, they will gain a wealth of information and establish relationships with our player community.”
Learn how Off The Grid achieves on-chain integration
OTG runs on GUNZ, which is built on the Avalanche blockchain subnet, and will integrate with OpenSea. Its currency is the GUN token, used for buying and selling in-game items. Players will be able to use GUN tokens to buy and sell OTG items on the soon-to-be-launched OpenSea.
Items marked as NFTs in the game include weapons, clothing, bionic body parts, and cosmetics for player characters. Players can add NFTs to their collections by purchasing from the secondary market or extracting NFTs during gameplay.
“We expect to drop a large number of in-game items every year.” Agranat said, “All items will be tokenized, so you can own them and trade with other players. There will be tens of millions of players in the game, so we expect a lot of transactions, sometimes to purchase truly useful or rare items, and sometimes to buy basic items you’re running low on.”
When players first enter the game, they only have a basic pistol as a weapon, guiding them to search for 'Hex' items, which are boxes containing NFT-supported game items. For traditional gamers, this is like a seamless robbery and shooting battle royale.
For web3-friendly gamers, they will build a potentially valuable and rare collection. Agranat mentioned that they can showcase these collectibles in the game or sell them if they wish.
“How many times have you wanted to show off a certain skin in a tournament while playing a live service game, but couldn’t find anywhere to purchase it?” Agranat asked. “The marketplace for in-game item sales is viable, and we are integrating it into Off The Grid.”
Next steps for OTG's development
With hundreds of thousands of players joining the release waiting list, OTG has entered its early access phase. Interested players can add it on Xbox Series S & X, PC, and PlayStation 5.
The GUNZ chain will integrate with OpenSea, opening the availability of OTG items and showcasing the game to a wide audience of NFT collectors.
Off the Grid Launch
On October 8, 2024, Off the Grid launched its early access phase on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and the Epic Games Store, forming streaming partnerships with top creators Ninja, Scump, and TimTheTatMan, generating buzz and even giving Ninja his own in-game skin.
Off the Grid quickly climbed to the top of the free game charts on the Epic Games Store for most played and downloaded, and since then, support from GeForce NOW has brought the game to mobile devices, tablets, MACs, old PCs, and TVs.
According to a tweet from Piers Kicks, founding partner of Delphi Ventures, the game has already garnered over 1 million hours of watch time on Twitch in the first three days since the early access version's launch.
As of today, GUNZ has over 13 million wallets, with a total transaction volume exceeding 370 million, averaging 2.5 million transactions per day.
Gunzilla Games announced a partnership with Delphi Ventures to establish the GUNZ Foundation on December 13, 2024, in preparation for the upcoming GUN token and GUNZ blockchain mainnet, which is planned for launch in Q1 2025.
“Our ultimate goal is to attract 100 million players within a year of the game's official release.” Agranat said, “We have a top-notch team, a unique battle royale gameplay, and a seamless on-chain gaming economy. We are confident about the future of Off The Grid.”
Editor’s note: This article was co-written with Gunzilla Games; references to tokens are for informational purposes only and do not constitute financial or investment advice.
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