Free Social Gaming Platform Piepacker Enters Open Beta After $3 million Seed Funding and $220k Kickstarter Campaign

Tuesday 8 June – Piepacker, a brand-new multiplayer social gaming platform that allows users to play fully licensed retro games online and with friends, for free, is now available in open beta, following a $3 million seed funding round and $220,000 Kickstarter campaign.

Stream/embed the trailer here: https://youtu.be/iR5j4KxzWjU

With partnerships including Team 17 and Codemasters, Piepacker’s burgeoning library currently has over 60 retro games originally launched on the original PlayStation, Super Nintendo, GBA, SEGA Mega Drive, and many other iconic consoles. Not only does this include Sensible Soccer, Worms World Party, Glover, and Earthworm Jim, but also new, retro-style indie games including Piepacker exclusives like Xeno Crisis by Bitmap Bureau and Spacegulls by Morphcat Games.

Every title supports cloud saves and the revolutionary service works directly from a Google Chrome browser and comes with built-in video chat including augmented reality 3D masks. The open beta is available in Europe, North America, Australia first and will be optimized later this summer for new territories such as Latin America, Japan, Singapore, and the Middle East.

“Our goal with Piepacker has always been to build the platform fans of retro gaming have been dreaming of,” said Benjamin Devienne, co-founder and CEO of Piepacker. “This is a service like no other, which has been reflected in how significantly we’ve been backed during our latest funding round and by our fans on Kickstarter.”

The Kickstarter campaign for Piepacker met its $75,000 goal in just 20 hours, going on to secure $220,656 pledged by 1190 backers, including one backer who pledged $10,000. It is currently part of the top 1% most successful Kickstarter campaigns of all time.

Beyond the 60+ games included as part of the service at launch, additional upcoming features will include competitions and leaderboards, Twitch integration, as well as support for legally acquired ROMs, which are playable with friends in private rooms. Physical retro gaming cartridges also work through the PieReader – an official, one-time accessory that will be sent to Kickstarter backers in October.

Piepacker Studios will also be developing its own games exclusively for the service. The first of these titles, Arsène Lupin: Gentleman Bomber, was released on May 22^nd, the day when Kickstarter backers could redeem their early access to the platform. Watch the announcement trailer here.

Piepacker’s board of advisors includes former SEGA CEO Kenji Matsubara, Zynga co-founders Justin Waldron and Tom Bollich, Crunchyroll’s Kun Gao, and Humble Bundle’s Jeffrey Rosen.

The full list of 61 games available on Piepacker at launch is below:

1. 40 Winks
2. Addiction Pinball
3. Alligator Hunt
4. Alter Ego
5. Barkley Shut up and Jam 2
6. Blender Bros
7. Böbl
8. Brave Battle Saga
9. Brutal Sports Football (Beastball)
10. Descent Maximum
11. Dragon View
12. Earthworm Jim
13. Earthworm Jim 2
14. Evolution Soccer
15. Football Madness
16. FoxKids.com Micro Maniacs Racing
17. Gekido
18. Glover
19. Gluf
20. Haunted Halloween 86
21. Invasion from Beyond
22. Iron Commando
23. Legend
24. Legend (Reboot)
25. Loaded
26. Maniac Square
27. Micro Mages
28. Misplaced
29. Motor Mash
30. Nebs n Debs
31. Old Tower
32. Power Football,
33. O.D.T. - Escape or Die Trying
34. Psycho Pinball
35. Radical Rex
36. Rage of the Dragons
37. Rageball
38. Sensible Soccer '98: European Club Edition
39. Sensible Soccer: European Champions - 92/93 Edition
40. Soccer Kid
41. Spacegulls
42. Star Versus
43. Steel Force
44. Street Racer
45. Summer Challenge
46. Super Bat Puncher
47. Super Paw-N
48. The Gadget Twins
49. The Humans
50. Thunder Hoop 2
51. Top Racer
52. Twin Dragons
53. Ultimate Tennis
54. Water Margin
55. Winter Challenge
56. Worms Blast
57. Worms: World Party
58. X2: No Relief
59. Xeno Crisis
60. Yazzie
61. Zero Tolerance