In 2012, he became the co-founder and chief technical officer of an aspiring social network startup for food bloggers called Lozi. Trung Nguyen from Vietnam was at that time only at the age of 20.
The startup social media network became popular with teens and also with young adults which led to around 8 million users. Because of this, in 2015, Golden Gate Ventures placed a seven-figure investment on Nguyen’s Lozi. But as the startup network developed, Nguyen felt that the path he is currently pursuing is different from that of other co-founders’.
So, in 2015 he decided to leave the company and became a software engineer for almost three years at Anduin Transaction which is a company that is under Silicon Valley with a platform of making deals or transactions more efficient, transparent, and faster.
The Origins
The moment people started to talk about blockchain, it instantly became popular. But a lot of Vietnamese want only Bitcoin and not other cryptocurrencies. There were even some companies that would take note of the disadvantages of cryptocurrencies based on the initial coin offerings. But Nguyen understood how cryptocurrency works. He understands how it is not a speedy process to earn from investments and that profits can be risky. As a dedicated player, Nguyen became more interested in CryptoKitties compared with other cryptocurrency platforms. CryptoKitties is one of the first blockchain-based games in the world. Here, players buy, trade, and raise virtual cats. Hence, the name CryptoKitties, which have distinctive and certified by the structure of the Ethereum network. From this, Nguyen had a clear view of a possible new way of developing games through blockchain technology.
Addictive CryptoKitties
After a few months of playing CryptoKitties, Nguyen had an addiction. He even ended up buying 1,000 virtual cats. He confessed how his interest in the game sparked his imagination and creativity. Furthermore, he invested around US$600 when he played CryptoKitties from which he got a fascination with the monetary transactions embedded within the game. At this point, he came to realize that he can design his own blockchain-based game. He did so by putting together the game concepts found in CryptoKitties. He included the gameplay built of the Pokemon series or Neopets with the importance of original ownership. And after several months, Axie Infinity began to form its shape with the help of Nguyen’s friends.
The game became a sensational yet unexpected hit. The number of pre-orders of Axies coming from investors became sufficient. It can provide its developers a runaway for a full year. Presently, the number of players got up to 3,500 upon the release of its desktop version. Currently, it has an estimate of US$1.1 million in digital asset sales. Also, merchandise that sold on its marketplace has about US$1.8 million worth making it one of the highest-grossing blockchain-based games worldwide.
