Ready Player Me, the world’s top platform for creating and using interoperable avatars, announced on Friday the release of its Premium Skins Catalogue.
The initiative between Ready Player Me, Warner Music Group (WMG), and Universal Music Group’s merchandise wing, Bravado, has led to an unprecedented interoperable use case for creating wearable content.
Additional franchises involved in the partnership include Rovio’s Angry Birds, McLaren Racing, and ITV Studios ‘The Voice’, with the latter working with the Virtual Brand Group.
The new wearables catalogue will allow developers to monetise their creative content by selling their premium avatar skins across multiple metaverse platforms, games, and others. Thousands of games and apps compatible with Ready Player Me’s avatar technologies can use the new content to generate revenue streams for their brands.
Real-Time 3D Content, Real Monetisation Potential
Avatar personalisation remains a key focus of developing real-time 3D (RT3D) content for businesses as well as their fans. With Ready Player Me’s latest integrations, people can now increase their revenues with additional monetisation tools from the collaboration.
Many enterprises are learning that the direct-to-avatar economy creates billions of dollars in additional revenues. This has helped the gaming and metaverse industries to skyrocket in monetisation, leading to a thriving ecosystem of content creators and their customers.
For example, Fortnite earned over $9 billion in its first two years of operation, The Verge reported in 2021.
Ready Player Me is taking this a step further with its Premium Skins Catalogue, which it states is a “critical step in tapping into this market for every developer, regardless of size.”
Also, developers can also sell their creative content in their own bespoke virtual stores or leverage Ready Player Me’s Avatar Creator for direct sales to their respective player bases.
Initially, the partnership unveiled collections from UMG’s Bravado. German metal band Electric Callboy and UMG-owned hip-hop lifestyle brand STOKED are some of its first content providers.
Furthermore, UMG Germany launched a further fan platform—YOUniverse Berlin—where fans can interact via their Ready Player Me avatars.
Philippe Koenig, Senior Director A&R, Operations and Strategy at Bravado Merchandize Germany, added that many fans of music were also gamers and conversely.
The executive added: “[It] feels obvious to make official merchandise available digitally to allow users to express themselves and show off their fandom just like in the real world.”
Comments from Partnership Executives
Timmu Tõke, Chief Executive and Co-Founder, Ready Player Me, said that his company aimed to “make it easy for every developer to add avatars to their games, just like big AAA studios can.”
He explained further,
“These same game studios, who produce mega-hits like Fortnite and Roblox, earn billions of dollars a year by selling premium branded skins and other assets to their players. Now, with the release of the Premium Skins Catalog, every Developer has the ability to sell skins featuring some of the biggest brands in the world with just a few clicks”
Additionally, Jillian Rothman, Vice President, New Business and Ventures, WMG, added that his company was “committed” to empowering songwriters and artists to “connect with their fans wherever they may be, and in the interactive formats they demand.”
Rothman continued,
“Through this partnership with Ready Player Me, we’re empowering thousands of developers to offer fans a way to express their unique identities in digital spaces. The creative possibilities are endless, and we look forward to seeing what they build”
Ready Player Me’s Avatars Traverse the Metaverse
The news comes after a series of upgrades and partnerships from the Estonian firm with Web3 company RLTY in March. The two firms struck a partnership to increase interoperability for wearable content and avatars.
Leveraging RLTY’s no-code, Unity-based experience creator, developers can integrate their Ready Player Me avatars across their immersive content. The enterprise-grade solution can also allow companies to integrate their avatars into virtual meetings.
Zack Sabban, Chief Executive, RLTY, said at the time that the collaboration would “allow users to create and customize their avatars quickly and easily for use in RLTY.”
He added that brands could “offer incredible metaverse experiences” to their customers with the new collection of wearables and skins.
Earlier in March, XR Today interviewed Tõke to discuss his company’s cross-platform partnership with Mini Royale: Nations as well as the future of interoperable creative content, avatars, and the Metaverse.
At the time, he explained how the company had expanded its developer base to over 6,000 people across its partner network, which included major platforms like VRChat, Spatial, and HiberWorld.
The firm’s recent partnership with Faraway created a massive upgrade for Mini Royale: Nations, marking the first integration of an avatar platform on a third-party game.
Also, the avatar company teamed up with Spatial again in September last year, along with 3D experience firm Polycount, to facilitate the Vogue New World metaverse fashion event. By combining XR technologies from the three firms, Vogue could host a global event for virtual attendees, including blockchain-based solutions and cross-platform access with Meta Quest headsets, tablets, and smartphones.
