Illuvium's team has agreed to reduce its wages again to preserve the studio's runway, which co-founder Kieran Warwick now puts at more than 12 months, he said Friday.
The cut buys Illuvium past August 2027 on Warwick's own numbers, at a point when crypto gaming studios are closing. Proof of Play announced on Aug. 5 that it was ceasing operations and open-sourcing Pirate Nation's code and art under CC0. The games Illuvium has already shipped cover a fraction of its payroll: the protocol generated $9,781 in fees and revenue over the past 30 days, according to DefiLlama, which puts the trailing-year annualized rate at $123,194.
DefiLlama values Illuvium's treasury at $2.78 million against $60 million raised, and the ILV staked in its pools at $2.21 million, or 7.98% of market capitalization. ILV trades at $3.35, up 6.1% on the day and 17.9% over the week, per CoinGecko, for a market cap of $27.74 million. The token hit an all-time low of $2.69 on July 29 and sits 99.8% below its November 2021 high of $1,911.26.
The wider crypto market rose 18.6% over the same seven days. Warwick closed his post by saying his confidence had "nothing to do with the price of ETH."
Warwick said the studio has "heavily reduced costs" over six months and that the team "agreed to reduce their wages even further to preserve runway." He did not give the size of the cut, the number of staff remaining, or the studio's cash position.
