Exciting news - we've brought back the Metaverse Radar charts.
First published over 10 years ago, The Metaverse Radar charts take our Universe chart and re-presents the 170 different virtual worlds in the market and shows them by genre. This is a great tool for media planning, opportunity assessment and analysing over/under-penetrated categories in the Metaverse.
Here's an overview of the entire Metaverse Radar chart for Q4 2023.
Let's dive into the four sectors, starting with UGC (User Generated Content) and Education/Culture.
UGC (User Generated Content)
UGC virtual worlds are virtual world platforms that enable users to create, modify, share and interact with content created by themselves or other users. UGC virtual worlds often have specific game mechanics that enable and encourage UGC. With examples of these game mechanics being character/avatar customisation, item creation, sharing and distributing and workshop and community hubs. The combination of these game mechanics empowers users to become content creators and contributors to UGC virtual world platforms with a great example of this being Second Life, which is one of the longest standing and well-known platforms.
Education and Culture
Education and Culture virtual worlds are designed specifically for learning or research purposes, allowing students, teachers, and any type of student to engage in a wide range of educational activities. Educational virtual worlds are primarily targeted towards kids and teenagers, although within this digital revolution making education more appealing and up to date with current trends and hobbies has proven to show massive benefits due to the greater appeal for interaction and immersion educational virtual worlds provide in comparison to older more traditional forms of education such as books.
Next up, Casual Gaming and Music/Fashion and Social Hangouts.
Casual gaming
Casual Gaming virtual worlds focus heavily on easy-to-play games. These platforms are targeted towards a mass market audience and due to the large target audience these games typically have easy-to-learn controls and can be enjoyed in either short or long sessions, making them easier to consume and engage with. Casual gaming virtual worlds are extremely popular for younger audiences and if successful can bring in millions of monthly active users, with great examples being Roblox and Fortnite. These types of virtual worlds are typically very social and have low-level skill requirements which are quick and easy to learn and understand.
Fashion, music and Social Hangouts
Fashion, Music and Social Hangout virtual worlds are platforms themed towards these three specific verticals. These three user activities of fashion, music and socialising are all extremely popular pastimes in the Metaverse and appeal to users of all ages. Avakin Life and Zepeto are great examples of virtual worlds themed towards fashion.
Followed by Open Worlds and Real Estate.
Open Worlds
Open Worlds are virtual worlds where users can freely roam throughout virtual environments, as opposed to worlds with more linear and structured gameplay. Often within open worlds, there are multiple use cases or avatar activities as opposed to focussing on a specific vertical. Some examples of popular open virtual worlds are The Nemesis and Viverse which encourage users to explore their environments, which typically contain a lot of gamification, all kinds of events to join and enjoy and a very large focus on social interaction.
Real Estate
Real Estate virtual worlds are the cornerstone of Web3. These platforms sell virtual land and property inside their world for cryptocurrency or NFTs. Many of these platforms can also be defined as open worlds because aside from land purchase, they offer multiple activities for users.
And finally, MaaS and Misc.
MaaS
MaaS (Metaverse as a Service) platforms are virtual worlds offering companies and businesses the ability to create standalone, custom or bespoke virtual worlds. Examples of popular MaaS platforms include Odyssey and PixelMax, which focus on helping unlock the potential of the Metaverse for all types of companies, whilst also making them cost effective for a global audience, whether that be browser or VR headset-based.
Miscellaneous virtual worlds
Virtual worlds not fitting any of our other seven categories are assigned to miscellaneous.
