Sonic: A New Infrastructure Layer for Open Game Worlds

 

Sonic: A New Infrastructure Layer for Open Game Worlds

This week we discuss the new portfolio company Sonic — the first dedicated Layer 2 gaming chain built on Solana — and the growing demand for scalable, composable infrastructure to power the next generation of player-owned game economies.

The Solana-Powered Chain Redefining On-Chain Gaming

For years, the dream of Web3 gaming has been clear: real digital ownership, open economies, and interoperable game worlds.

But the infrastructure has struggled to deliver. Games need speed, cheap transactions, and seamless UX. Most blockchains can’t offer all three. The result has been a string of false starts, compromised designs, and underwhelming user experiences. Either the games were technically sound but inaccessible to mainstream audiences, or they had broad appeal but sacrificed the decentralization and ownership principles that define Web3.

Sonic changes that.

Sonic is a new blockchain network, designed specifically for games, that runs alongside Solana — one of the fastest and most efficient blockchains out there. Think of it like a high-speed express lane built just for gaming traffic. Developers can use Sonic to launch their own dedicated game networks, each with its own rules and economy, but still connected to Solana’s broader ecosystem.

We participated in Sonic’s token sale in Q3 2024 because we saw a breakout infrastructure play forming — one that finally connects speed, interoperability, and usability in a way no other gaming chain has. And since then, it has gone from a bold idea to a live, rapidly growing ecosystem with real users, real activity, and real traction among game developers.

Why Now: Gaming Needs a Backend Overhaul

Modern games are massive, social, and always online — yet their backends are still centralized. Players don’t really own their assets. Studios rebuild infrastructure for each title. Blockchains promised to fix this, but most are too slow, too expensive, or too hard to use.

Solana has helped solve some of these problems, offering fast and low-cost transactions. But even Solana could struggle to handle the workload of a large-scale, fully on-chain game. That’s where Sonic comes in. It allows each game to run on its own specialized version of Solana’s tech — sort of like spinning up a private game server — and then syncs all that back to the main Solana network.

This approach mirrors how modern cloud services scale — by spreading out workloads across different machines — while keeping everything connected.

But What Is Sonic, Really?

Sonic is a new type of blockchain network built using the same tech as Solana. More specifically, it’s what’s called a "rollup" — a chain that runs in parallel and periodically sends summaries of its activity back to Solana for final verification.

The innovation powering Sonic is called HyperGrid: a system that lets developers create custom mini-chains (called "grids") for each game. These chains are fast, flexible, and tailored for the unique demands of gaming. Yet they all connect back to Solana, so assets and data stay interoperable across the ecosystem.

What sets Sonic apart:

  • Seamless integration with Solana: Games on Sonic can use the same tokens, accounts, and tools as those built directly on Solana. There’s no need to create separate versions or duplicate code.

  • Game-specific chains: Each game can run on its own chain, optimizing performance and reducing congestion.

  • Solana-compatible development: Developers can build using familiar tools like Rust and Anchor.

And for users, Sonic feels just like using Solana — same wallets, same tokens, same experience — but with the speed and scale needed for real-time games.

Developer Tools & Rush Engine

Developing fully on-chain games has historically been tough — smart contract platforms weren’t built for fast-paced, interactive experiences. Sonic tackles that with Rush, a developer framework that uses an industry-standard game design model called ECS (Entity Component System).

Rush allows developers to define in-game objects (like players or weapons) and their properties (health, damage, inventory) in a simple config file. Sonic then auto-generates the blockchain code behind the scenes. This is a game-changer — no need to hand-code every function, and much easier for traditional game studios to get started.

Sonic also includes vital infrastructure: player logins, wallet creation, analytics, fiat payments, and SDKs for Unity and Unreal Engine. This full-stack offering dramatically reduces the time and cost to launch a Web3 game.

Early Growth & Ecosystem Traction

Sonic didn’t just build — they shipped. Fast. In less than a year, the team moved from concept to live mainnet.

Their testnet campaign brought in over 8 million users, including through viral experiments like SonicX — a TikTok-based tap-to-earn game that alone onboarded over 120,000 players, many of whom had never touched crypto before. These weren’t just crypto-native airdrop farmers — they were real players discovering blockchain gaming through familiar platforms.

When mainnet launched in early 2025 (called the Mobius release), Sonic also introduced its native token, $SONIC. The token is used across games for transactions, staking, and community rewards. It lives on Solana, so it’s easy to use with existing wallets and exchanges.

Sonic’s growing lineup includes:

  • Rage Effect: a competitive first-person shooter with on-chain assets

  • Delysium: an AI-powered, open-world MMO (which we are also invested in)

  • And other titles with large mobile followings

They’ve also integrated with key infrastructure players:

Sonic even includes an interpreter that lets developers write for Ethereum and run it on Solana’s engine — helping bridge the gap between the two largest ecosystems in crypto.

Here is a DefiLlama Snapshot of the Sonic Ecosystem today, in May 2025. There is currently over a billion dollars of TVL on the platform (TVL = Total Value Locked, akin to AUM)

Why We Invested

Among other things, we look for scalable infrastructure that enables new user experiences. Sonic does exactly that: it delivers fast, cheap, composable building blocks — tuned specifically for games.

The team, which we know well from prior investments in gaming/AI, also has a track record of execution and they grew virally on TikTok — further proving they understand distribution. And from the big picture, we believe their roadmap aligns with where gaming and crypto (and even AI) are now converging: modular tech, AI agents, and decentralized content economies.

Sonic isn’t trying to build games themselves — they’re building the platform that will power hundreds of games. And they’re doing it in a way that’s deeply aligned with what developers and players want.

The Bottom Line

The next generation of games won’t just be played — they’ll be owned, traded, upgraded, and even governed by the communities that love them.

Sonic is building the rails for that future: fast, scalable, flexible chains where games aren’t just apps — they’re entire economies. Assets can move freely, gameplay logic is transparent, and value flows to players and creators alike.

As game worlds become economies and players become owners, we believe Sonic is laying the groundwork for what comes next — and we’re thrilled to be part of that journey.

Want to Understand Tokens Better? You’re not Alone…

There are a lot of questions today about early stage blockchain investing, and even more misconceptions. Journalists often conflate crypto tokens, crypto companies and crypto assets of all types, referring to Bitcoin, Circle, Binance, USDT, and Ethereum in the same breath - when in fact, there are six distinct asset classes in blockchain, each with their own best practices and pitfalls to avoid. And among tokens, even, there are arguably 6-8 different classes or types.

We can help cut through the noise. Check out this webinar to learn the basics of early stage blockchain investing →

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Author

Christopher Nelson

Head of Digital Asset Research

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