What is The Metaverse + 3 examples of brands that are embracing it

In this article, we are going to try to explain to you what exactly the Metaverse is and some inspiring ways that brands are using it. Metaverse, this hat concept of the virtual world for which Google, Nvidia and Microsoft are deciding to bet to such an extent that Facebook has changed the name of their company to Meta. It is not any kind of new concept, and we have already seen flirtations with it in the literary and cinematographic world, with films like ‘Ready Player One’, ‘The Matrix’ or ‘The Substitutes’.

What is the Metaverse?

The Metaverse is a virtual world, where you can connect using a series of devices that will make you feel that you’re inside it interacting with all its elements. It will be like teleporting to a whole new world through virtual reality glasses and other accessories that will allow you to interact with it.

Virtual worlds are nothing new, and there are a lot of them, especially in the videogame industry. You create a character or avatar, and you enter that world to live adventures through your computer. However, the metaverse does not seek to be a fantasy world, but rather a kind of alternate reality in which we can do the same things we do today outside the home, but without leaving it.

The word metaverse comes from a 1992 novel called ‘Snow Crash’ and is a term that has been settled to describe visions of three-dimensional or virtual workspaces. This metaverse, therefore, means a virtual world in which we can interact, and which has been created to resemble an external reality.

As for the precise concept of the metaverse that Facebook and other companies are betting on. The idea would be to create a parallel and completely virtual universe, which we can access with virtual reality and augmented reality devices so that we can interact with each other within it, and from the outside, with the content, we have inside.

The key to this metaverse is that it can be fully immersive, or at least much more so than current virtual reality. We will have glasses that are possibly similar to the current ones to immerse ourselves in it, but also sensors that record our physical movements so that our avatar within that metaverse does the same.

Even the devices we use can interpret our facial expressions so that our avatar in the metaverse can recreate us, so the rest of the people with whom we are interacting can understand how we feel. 

Another of the main ideas of the metaverse is that we have total freedom of creation, both to make our avatar similar to our physical person and to give it a different look, and also to create the environment and our businesses and rooms to our liking.

Think about what the Internet is like now. It is full of virtual communities, and social networks that we access from different devices. We interact with more people virtually than physically. Well, the metaverse would be to take one more step to narrow the physical and virtual world, mixing them both in a new universe managed by the company that manages to impose its metaverse.

Examples of brands that are embracing the Metaverse

We enter the metaverse in this article to learn about real cases of companies that have decided to bet on this space.

For example, many luxury brands are having a presence in the metaverse and videogames: Gucci with Roblox, Louis Vuitton with Louis The Game, or Valentino together with another gamer phenomenon, Animal Crossing.

Nike

This brand has created its place on the Roblox gaming platform where users can play sports with their avatars wearing the brand’s clothing and sneakers.

Nike has also acquired RTFKT, a company dedicated to the development of collectibles and digital assets of NFTs.

Balenciaga

Balenciaga launched the fall/winter 2021 collection through the personalized videogame Afterworld. At a time when fashion shows in physical format were completely stopped due to the pandemic in 2020 so they to innovate and bet on the metaverse.

Through the videogame, the user could level up passing through different areas of a city and a forest and enjoy the collection, being able to stop to appreciate all the details of the garment: fabrics, styles, colors…

The firm has also joined Fornite to “dress” its characters depending on how the player progresses.

After this test together with the firm, Epic Games (the company that developed this videogame) has also partnered with other greats such as Nike.

The fashion house has already formed an exclusive team to explore in-depth the marketing and business opportunities within this space.

Hyundai Mobility Adventure

At the end of 2021, Hyundai launched the firm’s new products and some mobility trends and solutions in Robox.

It created five rooms where users could interact, and the company also offered advantages and news about its vehicles. In addition, visitors were offered the opportunity to play with Hyundai “products”.

During the Consumer Electronics Show Las Vegas, this year it revealed its new concept of “Metamobility”. The company wants to pioneer an intelligent device-metaverse connection that will extend the role of mobility to virtual reality (VR), thus allowing people to overcome the physical limitations of movement in time and space.

Nowadays, brands are seeking not only to make advertisements on these platforms but also to offer experiences. 

These are just a few examples of great companies in the metaverse, but there are plenty of them that are doing great projects. You could be one of them, ask us how.

Is the metaverse the best for your brand?

There are several metaverse platforms such as Decentraland, The Sandbox, or even Roblox, or interactive 3D virtual events platforms such as vFairs Accelevents or Boomset. But what do all of these have in common? They don’t let you customize to your liking, and they also all provide the same functions, but at Stringnet we can develop your own metaverse experience on an interactive 3D platform completely aligned with your objectives.

Stringnet can help you develop every detail of the experience. Contact us here.