Nyan Heroes is shutting down

Solana-based PC shooter Nyan Heroes has announced via X that it is closing down.

Announced in 2022 and selling its first NFTs on Solana in 2023 and launching the NYAN token in May 2024, the mech shooter has been live via Epic Games Store for over a year, recently completing its fourth playtest.

In terms of players, the cited numbers looked pretty good with over 1 million players across all sessions, and 250,000 wishlists on Epic Games Store and Steam.

But despite this, developer 9 Lives Interactive states that it wasn’t “able to secure the required capital to see the game to completion”.

The company raised $8 million on a reported $100 million valuation during the boom times of May 2022, and a further $3 million in 2024 with investors over the two rounds including Mechanism, Shima, 3Commas, Sfermion and Infinity Ventures Crypto.

However, with web3 game funding at a four-year-low, it looks like its existing investors couldn’t refund the projects, nor could it attract new money.

In particular, and despite the player number previously mentioned, 9 Lives says that “the latest product failed to drive the player numbers that we’d been hoping for”, which likely was reflected in the lack of investor confidence to fund further development.

“The industry is in a tough spot right now and Nyan Heroes will unfortunately be closing its doors,” it says.

“In our time together, the team has achieved incredible progress and demonstrated that its possible to do amazing work while fostering a culture of fun and creativity. We’re collectively heartbroken that we wont be able to bring our cat-inspired universe to completion.”