Crayta, a platform that enables users to develop, share, and play games with their friends, will soon be available through the cloud-streaming service that Facebook Gaming offers. The platform for cooperatively creating video games is based on Unreal Engine 4, and it includes a library of thousands of user-created games that users may browse through or contribute to with their own original works.
Crayta is similar to Roblox in that it allows users to create their own games, but it also borrows elements from Fortnite, the most evident of which is the style of its artwork, which is colourful and whimsical. In addition to that, it features ever-changing seasons, provides a combat pass, and enables players to personalise their own avatars. However, one of the greatest and most distinctive aspects of Crayta is that it enables you to share a game with a friend by simply sending them a link to that game. This makes it possible for your friend to begin playing the game directly from their web browser.
It is very evident that Meta, the parent company of Facebook, recognised some sort of potential with Crayta, since the business went all-in with its acquisition of Unit 2, the UK-based studio that was responsible for creating Crayta last year. Crayta was initially released in 2020 as a launch exclusive for Google Stadia, but the following year it was made available on PC via the Epic Games Store. It will no longer be necessary for players to play Crayta through Stadia or download the game to their personal computers now that it is available on Facebook Gaming. Facebook will serve as the hosting platform for the free-to-play game, but you will need an account to get started.
In a video showcasing Crayta’s addition to its cloud gaming platform, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said, “A lot of the time today, people think about the metaverse as 3D experiences you can have in virtual and augmented reality. But I think what Crayta shows is that you can both build and enjoy these kind of experiences really easily on all kinds of 2D environments including just within the Facebook App on phones and on computers.”
As if its new name couldn’t make it any more evident, Meta truly desires to be in the middle of everything that happens in the metaverse. I mean, it was terrible. Although the company has already acquired the virtual reality company Oculus and has since rebranded its products under the name Meta, the acquisition of Crayta represents a smaller but still significant investment meant to further establish Meta as a metaverse company. Crayta is a 3D scanning and printing company that specialises in the creation of holograms (whatever that really means). Horizon Worlds, Meta’s social virtual reality network, surpassed 300,000 users earlier this year, while the companion software to Meta’s Oculus Quest 2 headgear racked up over 2 million downloads during the course of the holiday shopping season.