Video-game developer CCP Games has raised $40 million in a funding round led by investment giant Andreessen Horowitz, the company said Tuesday in a statement.

The new capital will help CCP Games expand its research-and-development team to help create a blockchain-based massively multiplayer online (MMO) game title set within the universe of Eve Online, the pioneering online game first released by the studio in 2003.

Andreessen Horowitz, which is known as a16z, announced its first gaming-specific fund in May 2022 with $600 million in committed capital. The firm is also one of the largest investors in the crypto industry, announcing its fourth crypto fund that same month with a $4.5 billion purse.

Iceland-based CCP, which was founded in 1997, said in the announcement that the new game would use smart-contract technology to create relationships between the virtual worlds and players. Other investors in the round included Makers Fund, Bitkraft, Kingsway Capital, Hashed and Nexon, among others.

“CCP Games is a pioneer in virtual worlds and digital economies with 25 years of experience creating living sandboxes with unparalleled depth,” said a16z general partner Jonathan Lai in the statement. “They're a veteran team, and we believe in their ambitious vision to deliver incredible player experiences at the intersection of best-in-class game design and blockchain technology.”

A16z Gaming Funding Rounds Venture Capital

Brandy Betz

Brandy covered crypto-related venture capital deals for CoinDesk. She previously served as the Technology News Editor at Seeking Alpha and covered healthcare stocks for The Motley Fool. She doesn't currently own any substantial amount of crypto.