Hong Kong’s Star Ferry History brought to life via The Sandbox: SCMP

• The South China Morning Post (SCMP) announces the launch of Star Ferry Pier in the significant Metaverse The Sandbox.

• This acts as a bridge to connect with a new generation of readers and digital natives, says Gary Liu, CEO of SCMP. 

• The newspaper is quite involved with the virtual world and has its collection of NFTs too, which is all set to roll out this year itself. 

The Hong-Kong based newspaper, The South China Morning Post (SCMP), has recently announced the launch of Hong Kong’s landmark Star Ferry pier in the virtual world, The Sandbox. 

The Sandbox is one of the significant virtual world projects. It is a play-to-earn game based on the Ethereum blockchain utilizing Decentralised Finance (DeFi) and Non-Fungible Tokens(NFTs) in a three-dimensional Metaverse. It provides a fascinating experience as the players and users can create their Avatars to access the various environments, hubs, and games in the Metaverse. 

What does this Launch by SCMP offer?

The users can experience historic moments through this launch via the in-game quests. This Star Ferry Pier in THe Sandbox presents Hong Kong’s history that dates back to the 1980s.that is based on SCMP’s coverage and reporting. 

According to the CEO of SCMP, Gary Liu, SCMP’s 118 years of reporting and an extensive library of photographs provided them with the opportunity to breathe new life into historical locations in the Metaverse. And that this facilitates a bridge to connect with a new generation of readers and digital natives, and they look forward to working with their partners to continue serving their audience. 

The Sandbox recently released it’s Alpha Season 2, and this Star Ferry’s virtual recreation is a part of this version. It offers over 35 new and varied experiences throughout the month and is open to the public for free. 

The Sandbox Metaverse is backed by Animoca brands, Hong Kong-based blockchain unicorn. It enhances the city’s presence in the virtual world via a number of additions, for instance, the construction of Mega-City, a virtual hub for the city’s history and culture. 

Earlier in July, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) launched Artifact, a blockchain metadata standard for historical Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), the newspaper’s first collection of historical NFTs is by the title Artifact by SCMP, which is all set for its first drop in Q1 this year, it will be the first use case of Artifact standard. And it further plans the launch of Artifact Marketplace in Q2 for minting, selling, trading, and showcasing the historical NFTs. 

Whereas Ocean Park, Hong Kong’s second-largest theme park, also announced last month to create virtual attractions in the Sandbox.   

More and more entities are getting involved in concepts like Metaverse and NFTs, and they are not only limited to fun and exciting experiences but are much more than that. This launch signifies how it is innovatively being used by the entities providing a whole new level of experiences for the audience.