A new Seattle startup called Polyarc is announcing today that it raised a $3.5 million seed round of investment from several overseas backers.
The round was led by the Chinese investment firm UCCVR. The follow-on investments were provided by Colopl‘s VR Fund and Vulcan Capital.
Polyarc is the creation of three veteran game designers who previously spent their time and talents developing the massive online hit, Destiny. Bungie is also the studio known for creating the original Halo trilogy before being bought out in a three-way deal between Microsoft, Bungie and Take-Two Interactive.
Polyarc will focus primarily on virtual reality gaming content but as of this writing specifics on its first title are still shrouded in mystery. What we do know is that in March the fledgling studio received an Epic Games Unreal Developer grant. The funds were awarded for a game known only as “Moss.”
What exactly Moss is, or if it is serving as precursor to Polyarc’s eventual first VR release remains unclear.
Polyarc’s three co-founders are Tam Armstrong, Danny Bulla and Chris Alderson.
Armstrong worked at Bungie for six years. In this time he ended up running an animation and engineering team for Destiny. Before Destiny, Armstrong also worked on Halo: Reach.
Bulla spent nearly four years at Bungie as a senior gameplay designer. Before Bungie, his resume also includes stints at Rockstar Games and Midway. Bulla and Armstrong began Polyarc in 2015.
The third co-founder, Alderson, was then brought into the fold after ending his own seven year term at Bungie working as a character art lead for both Destiny and Halo related projects. In a statement concerning the new company on his LinkedIn page, Alderson wrote that at Polyarc, “Our immediate goal is to make full use of the immersion and physical interaction made possible only with VR to create thoughtfully designed, appealing, and accessible games with high player value.”
With the addition of Polyarc, Seattle is further cementing its place as a growing hub of VR innovation. Polyarc currently has six employees in total.
