Virtual land sales are booming lately following Facebook’s metaverse push, but upcoming Ethereum-based fantasy game Ember Sword made a big statement even before the recent hype. The game sold more than $200 million worth of NFT land in July—and now its developer has raised new funding and recruited veteran game industry talent to deliver on its aims.

Last week, developer Bright Star Studio announced an investment round led by BITKRAFT Ventures that brings a number of veteran gaming and esports luminaries into the fold as investors—and a pair of them will also work with the team as advisors.

Rob Pardo, former chief creative officer at Blizzard Entertainment and lead designer of the enormously popular World of Warcraft, will serve as an advisor, along with retired esports player Dennis “Thresh” Fong, widely known as the first professional competitive gamer.

Ember Sword is also a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), like Blizzard’s genre-defining World of Warcraft before it, so Pardo could be a major addition to the team. It may also serve as a stamp of approval for traditional video game players, some of whom are vocally opposed to crypto games and NFTs.

Bright Star Studio founder and CEO Mark Laursen told Decrypt that Pardo will advise Ember Sword’s play-to-earn game design and ongoing development, and potentially help…