Wicked Saints Secures $3.5M to Gamify Social Activism

Mobile gaming is evolving into a tool for social transformation, at least according to the founders of Wicked Saints. The studio, which recently closed a $3.5 million seed round led by Riot Games and the Oregon Venture Fund, is developing a platform that bridges the gap between digital engagement and real-world advocacy.

The company, which has now secured a total of $4.6 million in funding, was born from a decade of experience in the nonprofit sector. Founder Jess Murrey, who spent years training young activists, partnered with behavioral change researcher Alicia Clifton to address a recurring problem: the lack of long-term connection with young leaders once training sessions conclude.

“When they leave the training, you don’t have this constant connection with them,” Murrey said. “The technology provides us a way to scale this incredible, transformational change that we were seeing, and also bring people into a community that we could keep and continue building.”

Gamifying Real-World Impact

The studio’s debut title, World Reborn, utilizes augmented reality (AR) and a graphic novel narrative to encourage positive behavior. The game is currently in beta in Canada and features a post-apocalyptic setting that tasks players with standing up for their beliefs.

The core mechanics are designed to incentivize real-world actions:

• Energy management: Choices within the game consume energy, which can only be replenished by performing positive actions in the physical world.
• Verified tasks: Players can demonstrate their real-world impact—such as cleaning a local park or sending an encouraging note to a friend—by uploading short videos to a community feed.
• Community feedback: Other players can interact with these submissions through an upvoting system.

“We’re giving you bite-sized ways to practice dealing with people and life,” Murrey explained. “As you get more comfortable and are joined by all these others within our community, we’re getting you farther into the real world where you can actually make change.”

Navigating the Venture Capital Landscape

Wicked Saints marks the first company to emerge from the Black Developers Initiative, an incubator program hosted by Niantic. The collaboration also brought in former Pokémon GO senior software engineer Daphne Larose-Molapo as CTO, providing the technical expertise required to manage the game’s AR features via Niantic’s Lightship developer kit.

Securing the funding proved to be a challenging endeavor for Murrey, who pointed to the stark reality of the current investment climate. “The gaming industry is only 2% Black. It made raising that much harder as well, because investors tend to invest in what they know,” she said, noting that Black founders received only 1% of total venture capital in 2022.

Unlike traditional mobile games, the studio plans to avoid intrusive advertising. Instead, World Reborn will follow a model similar to corporate partnerships seen in other AR titles, relying on nonprofits and corporations to sponsor specific in-game missions.

The studio is planning a teaser launch in the United States for next year, with a full release scheduled within the next 18 months. Reflecting on her transition from nonprofit work to game development, Murrey emphasized, “My background might not be in mobile games, but my background is in movement building. I’m not beholden to the old way of doing things.”

Wicked Saints continues to develop the project as they prepare to scale their impact-driven community.