PapiChuloGrim - CMO, Yaku.ai

The Zeitgeist

The Yakuverse is one of the most anticipated cyberpunk metaverse games being built on Solana. PapiChuloGrim, Chief Marketing Officer at Yaku Corp joins Brian Friel to talk about their approach to building open world games that facilitate social interactions and e-commerce, and what the future holds for metaverse games being built in web3.

Show Notes:

00:06 - Intro

01:13 - PapiChuloGrim background

03:57 - Background on Yaku, an open world gaming experience

05:30 - Overview of Yaku API

08:55 - Overview of Yaku App

11:47 - Overview of Yakuverse game

17:49 - What the future looks like for blockchain Metaverse games

21:36 - A builder he admires in the ecosystem

Full Transcript:

Brian Friel (00:06):

Hey, everyone and welcome to The Zeitgeist, the show where we highlight the founders, developers, and designers who are pushing the Web3 space forward. I'm Brian Friel, developer relations at Phantom, and I'm super excited to introduce our guest, Papi, the chief marketing officer of Yaku Corp. Yaku Corp is developing one of the most anticipated cyberpunk metaverse games on Solana. Papi, welcome to the show.

Cole McMillian (00:29):

Glad to be here, Brian, thank you for having me. Excited to dive in a little bit to what we've got going on.

Brian Friel (00:34):

Yeah, likewise. I think you have one of the most unique names of any guest we've had on here on The Zeitgeist so far, so you're already winning an award for that.

Cole McMillian (00:42):

Anything is possible on Web3, right?

Brian Friel (00:45):

Yeah, exactly. You never know who you're talking to on some of these shows, but I'm really excited to talk to you guys. You guys are building a really ambitious game on Solana, which I think has a lot of promise in the gaming space on Solana, and some of the stuff you guys are doing, building foundational pieces of connecting gaming environments to Phantom and Solana wallets, so really excited to dive into all that today. But maybe before we do all that, I would love to learn a little bit about you. Who are you and how did you get involved with Solana and Yaku?

Cole McMillian (01:13):

Absolutely. My real name is Cole. We were actually joking a little before this, at the in-person events, I'll introduce myself as Cole because people feel strange calling me Papi in real life, but then ultimately, they just keep calling me Papi. My background is primarily digital marketing. Before making the dive full-time into Web3, the majority of my career, I was the head of digital strategy and on the side, I had a small digital consultancy that was primarily focused on media production and paid media. Then, I ultimately made a short transition into sales before diving headlong into Web3. The sales pivot really was actually what got me here. I moved from Kansas City, where I'm originally from, to the Oregon Coast and had a lot of free time on my hand making such a big move. During that time I just was able to dig a little deeper into the world of crypto, which had always intrigued me.

(02:13):

Naturally, got involved in Solana, based on some poor experiences on Ethereum and what I thought was not a conducive ecosystem, actually, on the crypto.com Cro coin ecosystem to the sort of things I was interested in and how I wanted to grow in my pursuits in this space. Ultimately, I joined Yaku just by organically finding the project. I was one of the first couple hundred people to join the Discord and when I saw the vision and the scope, I said, "This is awesome. Why is there not more attention on it yet?" Ultimately, I became very close friends with our CEO, Kevin, and we've had a really great rapport and he asked me to join the team in a larger capacity. A few months later, I said, "Web2, we're good for now. I'm going to go chase this Web3 thing full-time" I've been full-time coming up on, I believe, 10 months now. What a crazy time to go full-time, by the way.

Brian Friel (03:10):

Well, 10 months is ancient in crypto, as well. 10 months is about five years experience there in most jobs.

Cole McMillian (03:16):

It's fun to try to explain that to people. In my sales job, I had another regional manager who was a little further south of me down in the California area who said, "I think that guy, Cole, left to do Bitcoin," so we've still got some education to do, right?

Brian Friel (03:31):

Yeah, for sure. Well, let's dive into a little bit of what you were saying. You found this project early on, one of the first people in the Discord, and you were blown away by the scope and the ambition of this project. For those who aren't familiar with Yaku, what is Yaku, what is this concept of a Yakuverse? It sounds like there's more than just a game here, maybe just a whole ecosystem, but can you give us a little high-level understanding of everything that you guys are up to?

Cole McMillian (03:57):

Absolutely. The high-level overview, short pitch of Yaku is I like to refer to it as an interactive open world gaming experience, so a lot of people will sum this up as metaverse. I think that just the word metaverse has had a very strange connotation evolve over the last year or two, because people are confused as to what that really means. There's so many ways you can view a metaverse, there's so many different lenses through which people absorb it, and so to me, I've tried to get a little bit away from that terminology, but I definitely want to stick to the ethos of it.

(04:32):

We're very centered around gaming, online interactions, I'd say that it's, in some ways, the next evolution of social media. Instead of repping a profile picture, you're repping an avatar, you're having these live, in-person chats. I think that you will see a good evolution from things like Twitter spaces to more, quote unquote, in-person digital experiences like that via these virtual worlds. I think for us, the three main things, to sum it up, are we are centered on gaming, facilitating social experiences, and then the third key is we want to elevate the experience of online commerce, of e-commerce.

Brian Friel (05:08):

That's awesome. In addition to the game that you guys have, which I introed it saying that there's some cyberpunk elements to this, but I'll let you describe that in your own words, but you guys have really built out a whole infrastructure side of this, as well. You guys actually have what you call Yaku API. Can you talk a little bit about what is that and how do you envision developers working with this API?

Cole McMillian (05:30):

Absolutely. It's been something we've been working on for quite a while that we haven't really been publicly disclosing, not because it's anything to hide, but just because it's maybe getting a little into the weeds, but now that we're getting close to getting to a first version of these final product layers, as we call them, it's really good for people to, I guess, visualize how do these things all work together? The Yaku API is what we call layer one of our product layer. What we are doing is we are constantly listening to nodes, we're gathering transactions on the blockchain. We're doing that on both Solana and Ethereum, by the way, which we can dive a little bit more into that. We're very much built on Solana, but sticking to that metaverse ethos, we want to do our best to include some of these other communities, because ultimately, the ships will all rise with the tide and there's great communities everywhere. So, built on Solana and we're checking these nodes.

(06:29):

The second part of that is we're also continually scraping social media data. Not only do we have, through the second layer of our products, the capability in our Yaku app at Yaku.ai to connect your social accounts to the profile you build there, but on the API side of things, we're just continually gathering this data. This is data, everything from how many profile pictures are there being worn by users from a particular collection to the size and scope of the ecosystem as a whole, how many generally are there across the board and just trying to track those user data points. I think how we see people being able to use this in the future is being able to utilize it to create their own interactive experiences, because we are really trying to be focused on this gaming and social side of things. We're not necessarily positioning this, I think, as an opportunity to go out and create a DeFi application.

(07:29):

There's been some really cool innovations, actually, on this open API front right now. I believe it was Helios Labs rolled out some really cool innovations recently, as did Hello Moon shortly after. Data's really important. People need it as easy to read, as accessible as possible, for them to make the correct decisions to format it and ultimately, to springboard them to what it is they're trying to build long term. I think for us, the goal for this is to facilitate the gaming side of that thing. For us, what we are using it for, as it feeds into the funnel, is to help create a experience that aligns with users' interests and activities and what it is that they're doing from a day-to-day basis, whether that be the NFTs they are buying, how they are trading with their friends, how they are interacting and representing on social media. That's how we are using it internally and I assume that others will find the data the way that we've collected it and will be distributing it, good for similar use cases.

Brian Friel (08:30):

That's awesome. I like the analogy there of you saying that the API is the layer one and then you hinted at you have this app at Yaku.ai and then you have this game, as well. Maybe before we dive into the game, which is maybe what most people really want to know about, let's talk briefly about that app, as well. What is currently at Yaku.ai? I see you guys have a number of different widgets and applications there. Who's using this and what are they using it for?

Cole McMillian (08:55):

The Yaku.ai application is really viewed as the partner application to the Yakuverse. We're talking about layers, the third layer is the Yakuverse, so the API feeds into the app and the app feeds into the game. The app allows you to create your own profile, you can connect with Phantom and also MetaMask, which is hilarious because initially, when we talk about including these other communities, MetaMask was the one. We're very excited, because we work more frequently with Phantom, that you all have finally onboarded these other communities because it makes our lives a little easier. Not to shill for the audience out there, but I do think Phantom far exceeds the user experience on MetaMask. I'm just waiting for the day that Phantom takes that crown away.

Brian Friel (09:45):

Oh, love that, appreciate that. Hopefully, by the time this episode's out, we'll be very, very close to opening up our beta to the public, but that day is coming soon. I can't wait.

Cole McMillian (09:54):

Yes, absolutely. The app, generally, is a place where you can manage your entire Web3 life, both on the financial side and on the social side. On the social side, we've got Dialect Chat already pulled in there so you can communicate freely with people, we have some base functionality, where you could do things like earn social badges that display on your profile, you can connect with friends. In a soon-to-be-released update, so here's some alpha, I don't know exactly when this is going live, but my guess is it may beat this update, we are introducing communities, so you can actually see how many users there are within the application that also own the NFTs that you do, in hopes that we can facilitate some social congregation within that app amongst holders, in addition to a bunch of other stuff.

(10:42):

We have everything from burning multiple NFTs, multiple NFTs send. Probably the coolest on, I guess, the project management side of things is we've got an automated HR tool, so if you want to go in and set up automatic ACH-style payments for your moderators, alpha hunters, whatever it might be, you could just go in there, set the intervals, what the pay is, and you don't have to think about it, it just does it on its own.

Brian Friel (11:07):

I love that. The alpha drop on the podcast, that's great.

Cole McMillian (11:09):

Got to get it out there a little bit. I'm notorious for having loose lips, so if our community tunes in and they hear that I didn't drop any, I might get skewered in the general chat.

Brian Friel (11:20):

Oh, that's great. Well, that's a great picture you painted of the first layer of the API, the second layer, the app. Now, let's talk about the game. Ostensibly, this is what most people that I see on Twitter, whenever I tweet anything about Yaku, my notifications get flooded with your guys' user base. You've got a lot of rabid fans for this game. Can you talk a little bit about what this game is, how do I play this game, what's the story, and how do you see this game evolving?

Cole McMillian (11:47):

This is, for me, my favorite thing. I am also the marketing guy, so I am biased. The numbers side of things, sometimes, I won't lie, I gloss out just a little, so this for me is my favorite thing, especially being a longtime gamer. The general feel, I would say, for a traditional gamer that we are going for is a cyberpunk-themed futuristic, neon-lit world with a similar general play style to something like Grand Theft Auto. We actually are currently testing our alpha version of the open map internally with the community and letting them poke around and in a few weeks, we will have a much larger public launch, where we'll be able to go in and fix those bugs, as well as add in some added functionality.

(12:36):

On that first public version that we are really trying to get out there, what you'll be able to do is sign in using our Yaku Relay, which is our connection between Phantom and Unreal Engine. It essentially serves as a single signature to read all of your profile data on the app, on Yaku.ai. What that allows us to do is create token-gated experiences. Not only can anyone come in and drive a motorcycle around, race their motorcycle, use proximity chat to hang out with their friends, go hit the shooting range, there's some more fun information for you, we already started impslementing some PVP stuff, so they'll be able to go in and race and shoot and congregate and hang out and explore the open world, which is pretty large actually.

(13:20):

That's been the first feedback we've gotten from in this first alpha test is, "Wow, this is a lot bigger than I thought it would be." But additionally, through this API input through the Yaku Relay, we can do things like create a tower for Monkey Dow, which currently sits in the center of downtown, and create a token-gated experience, where only holders of that NFT can get into that area. That is really able to be extrapolated out to innumerable experiences. If you were interested, you could create a specific minigame that's only accessible to your holders. We could do a special short-time promotional event for Phantom, as an example, if you were wanting to have a virtual conference, to some degree. There's just a lot of ways that this can unfold and create these unique experiences. That's really what we're trying to facilitate, is an open world that's accessible to everyone and based on the communities you take part in and how you interact within that world, you'll be able to elevate the base experience.

Brian Friel (14:24):

That's super cool. This game, you mentioned it briefly, but it's currently in alpha, is that correct?

Cole McMillian (14:29):

It is, yes. It's the first alpha version of the full open map.

Brian Friel (14:33):

That's awesome. I think this is a great use case for crypto gaming. Like you said, you can build these expansive worlds for games we know and love, like Grand Theft Auto, I'm also thinking a World of Warcraft, you're exploring through this world, finding things.

Cole McMillian (14:46):

Absolutely.

Brian Friel (14:48):

But there's so much open public data on crypto already, you can just bring that in and enhance the experiences. I'm interested to hearing from you, too, you mentioned that it probably best resembles a metaverse, but maybe you don't like the term metaverse.

Cole McMillian (15:02):

Right.

Brian Friel (15:03):

Do you see a world where the Yaku universe in which you are is blending with other games that are on chain, as well, and you can bring other games' assets into Yaku, you could bring your Yaku character into other games? Do you guys think about that much and how do you see that unfolding?

Cole McMillian (15:18):

That's definitely something that we are using as a cornerstone of our general growth ideology, I would say. We already have, in this alpha version, avatars representing, I think, nine other communities currently live, and in the first public version that goes out, we'll probably have five more, if I had to guess. We'll be starting off with a pretty good representation of several different communities and for us, that serves many benefits. Number one, it really sticks with our company ethos of decentralization, number two, it enhances the experience, both for people who own those assets and are able to utilize them in more ways, but also for people who maybe don't and they are just looking for a broader experience generally. We're definitely going to continue to do that. We've talked to other collections above and beyond the avatars about things like vehicles.

(16:18):

We had a collection that we worked with closely leading up to their mint, we sort of incubated them, called Cha Cha Vans, that their branding is around the digital nomad lifestyle. They have these awesome 3D vans, so those will also be available in that first public version as a drivable vehicle. We don't want to really slow it down there. We've talked for a long time that if we can create something akin to a software platform for other creators to leverage, it will just make the experience that much more grand and ultimately, drive more users to the platforms. At the end of the day, we're a small team. I'm very proud of what we've made, but we are a big bottleneck. If we want to centralize all of it to ourselves, we're really doing the community and ourselves a bit of a disservice.

Brian Friel (17:00):

I totally agree. I love that thinking of it. It's funny, because most games today, the whole story of the game and what you decide to go out in the world to do is often set very top-down by whoever the game publisher is, then you get these MMOs and you can just go out in the world and do your own thing or get creative. It feels like this is the next evolution of that, you are basically giving everyone the tools to bring whatever assets they want into this sandbox world that you've created. Who knows, maybe one day someone else could even drive the storyline? Do you guys see that in the future, someone else coming in and almost co-owning development of this? Do you think that you guys will always be driving the vision of this? That's a pretty far-out there question, but I do wonder what the future for these metaverse game developments, where the vision for it goes.

Cole McMillian (17:49):

I think long term, again, it just makes sense, because when you're working with a world that is so large and so flexible and the attention economy is so fast, people are moving from place to place so quickly, especially in this world, it is lightning fast as compared to the traditional gaming world, I think providing more experiences, providing opportunities for people to build on what you have set out for them, is a win-win across the board. It's driving more traffic to us and ultimately, if they're driving traffic to their particular storyline, their particular experience within our world, we will benefit as a result, because they have to come to our world to experience it. I definitely see that in the future as being part of what we are implementing.

(18:37):

I know from our end, we are very excited to... You talk about, "Oh, I can see the ideas of questing and exploring in this sandbox feel." I think that that's something we've really embraced, because for me, personally, this is a personal opinion, I think, a lot of the, quote unquote, metaverse experiences that are out there now do not have player retention. You get in, there's an open map, there's things to look at, but there's not really much to do. I think that's why we're trying to hammer more on the gaming

side of things rather than just creating, necessarily, this open world, because that's what we want is people who come in and stay and as a result, have all of these benefits around them that they can leverage, in addition to whatever is the core driver for them.

(19:22):

We do have, coming out soon, a new GitBook, what we're calling the YakuWiki, and it includes general information about the project as it sits right now, things like our community. We always get the question what's with the lemons, because there's constantly lemons in our content, and so now, forever and always, I'll be able to send people there and go, "Hey, I, you check out the Wiki, it's in there. You get the full history of it." Part of the Wiki is also the future though, where are we headed? We're waiting to release that, but I will give you a snippet that part of that future is that we want to, I think, change what does a multiverse of game modes look like under a single umbrella and concept.

(20:02):

We're working on a point system that we can implement in the future that is basically as a result of all of these different inputs. It is based on your racing outcomes, when the racing game portion is live, it's based on your completion of quests, as there are quest lines that are created, it's based on your activity in the application, it's based on your activity on socials, all these data points feeding into what is one larger goal that everyone is achieving. I think that that is going to be a really good opportunity for what you're talking about, where you're not siloed to a single style or experience and you're also empowering other people to create their own that can feed into this larger concept.

Brian Friel (20:43):

That's really awesome. I love the vision you're laying out there, that's really cool. I also want to know what's up with the lemons, but we can save that little bit of alpha for the Wiki release. I don't want to steal too much.

Cole McMillian (20:53):

The really short version is we had one member early, early on in the Discord who reacted to every single announcement with a lemon emoji. It just slowly picked up steam until the point where it got to 1,200, 1,300 lemon reactions on a single post. We were like, "You know what? The community is making a stance on this emoji here, so we're just going to adopt it as one of our own."

Brian Friel (21:17):

I love it, that's the best. When stuff like that arises organically, that's 100% the best, one of the best parts of working in this space, as well. Well, Papi, this has been an awesome discussion. One question we ask all of our guests, and given the vision you just laid out, I'd love to hear this answer from you, is who is a builder that you admire in the Web3 ecosystem?

Cole McMillian (21:36):

This one is really easy for me, actually. I saw this question and I said, "I know exactly who it is." It's someone I talk to, I would say regularly, not super frequently, but regularly, we're doing some stuff together. They're, I think, a really good balance between someone who is a heads-down shipper and someone who is an active participant, as well, and is no bullshit, which is maybe my favorite thing, and it's got to be Foxy Dev from the Famous Foxes, man.

Brian Friel (22:05):

Love it.

Cole McMillian (22:05):

He always keeps it like it is, he is a straight shooter. What I think I appreciate most about him is one of the hangups I think we have in the space, in general, is because of that attention economy I was talking about earlier, the question when arises all the time. There's so much pressure, there's announcements for announcements for announcements because you've got to keep the attention here and there's always people moving to do things. He is very, very good at staying active, really reaching out to his community and getting their feedback, but shipping things when they're ready and not trying to play the it's coming, it's coming game. He is a guy who just builds relentlessly and when it's ready, it's ready and if you want it sooner, well, you'd better just chill out and wait for it.

Brian Friel (22:49):

I couldn't agree more. You're not the first to bring him up and we have had the Famous Foxes on the pod before. But I agree, when, when, when is we went mobile all the time back in the day. It's definitely part of the culture, but when you can back it up with shipping quality on your timeline, that's the best place to be.

Cole McMillian (23:06):

100%, man.

Brian Friel (23:07):

Well, Papi, this has been an awesome discussion. Thank you so much for coming on the show. Where can people go to learn more about Yaku?

Cole McMillian (23:13):

If you want to learn some more about Yaku, I would suggest jumping in the Discord, for sure. Custom URL, so just /YakuCorp, and go to the website, check out Yaku.ai. Make a profile, claim your name, and start checking out what's there, because it is about to have a pretty big facelift, as well, and I think that people will be excited for the direction that it's headed.

Brian Friel (23:36):

I love it. Bring your lemons to the Discord, too. Get them ready.

Cole McMillian (23:39):

Yes. We'll make fresh lemonade or limoncello, whatever you prefer.

Brian Friel (23:43):

Beautiful. Papi, the chief marketing officer of Yaku Corp. Thank you so much.
Cole McMillian:
I appreciate it Brian.