[NEW] a16z @speedrun request for startups: AI Companions in Cozy Simulations 🎣 AI companions have served as friends and therapists for millions of users already. however, the consumer app that truly unlocks companions for everyone will look more like a cozy game or simulation, rather than a chatbot cozy games like @animalcrossing and Stardew Valley have sold >120M units ww, providing community and emotional support for decades. Love and Deepspace, an otome game for character relationship building, grossed >$400M revenue just last year we want to see a cozy agentic simulation similar to Love & Deepspace where: - users start playing for fun, but stick around long-term for the real emotional relationships they develop with characters - combines deep game systems such as relationship progression, mini-games, crafting systems, with well-written characters and the dynamic conversations of a LLM for endless replayability - cross-platform so characters go wherever you are - keeping you company at work on your PC, on your phone while you commute, and at home on your living room TV after a long day - multi-modal interactions with text and voice depending on context - the way we naturally talk with another human being we believe a truly mass-market companion app has yet to be built and there will be many winners across different settings and use-cases speedrun has already invested in a few teams exploring the broader space: AI characters @hedra_labs @IllusionOfLife @Altera_AL @Genova_labs Cozy games @loftiadev @TorbieGames @simcluster Therapy @VoidpetGame @sunflowersober if this space is exciting to you, come talk to us about Speedrun!

"What is going on with the sUSD peg?" I hear you ask. Is Synthetix dying??? The short answer is no, but if you want the fun answer, let's take a trip down memory lane. 🧵