Quick take:
- Major League Baseball will hold a celebrity all-star game in the metaverse.
- The league is debuting a virtual stadium for the celebrity softball game this weekend.
- MLB said the metaverse-based stadium gives those unable to go to the live game an opportunity to interact with it.
Major League Baseball (MLB) has launched a virtual stadium for the All-Star Game festivities this weekend. The league will host a celebrity softball game in the metaverse, allowing fans across the globe to interact with the live game.
However, according to the announcement, the virtual stadium will not offer anything close to VR/AR experiences, with users only able to interact with the live game via a website. Users will be able to walk around the virtual stadium in their avatars and play some mini-games.
According to a report by Front Office Sports, crowd sound will shaft and vary depending on where the digital avatar is located in the stadium.
“When you hear the crowd roar, it’s not a canned thing. It’ll actually be the other people present. More broadly, this takes the experience of being at a stadium and opens it up to a global audience in a way we haven’t been able to do before. Doing experiments like this is really important for us,” Gersh told Front Office Sports
This announcement follows the Major League Baseball (MLB) Players Inc.’s partnership with fan token platform Sorare in May 2022, which involved launching an NFT-based free-to-play game.
Today’s announcement takes the MLB to another vertical in the emerging industries of web3 and the metaverse. Announcing the launch via a Twitter post, MLB said the CelebSoftball allows viewers to join a watch party during the game. Participants will also stand a chance to win World Series tickets by competing in challenges.
Commenting on the announcement, Kenny Gersh, MLB executive vice president, of media and business development said in a statement: “Not everyone has the opportunity to attend Major League games or enjoy a Major League ballpark experience, but now we can provide this opportunity to anyone with an internet connection, no matter where they are.”
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