virtual-pet
(3)
Joon Health
Joon Health is a San Francisco-based pediatric behavioral health company (YC W22) that turns real-life routines into a video game for kids with ADHD, autism, anxiety and depression. Children care for a virtual pet called a Doter, leveling it up by completing parent- and clinician-assigned tasks like chores, homework and hygiene. Founded in 2021 by three UC Berkeley grads, Joon has reached over 500,000 users and 18,000 paying subscribers, and raised $6.4M in 2023 to become a first-line digital treatment for pediatric behavior disorders.
Windup Minds
Windup Minds is a Seattle-based, remote-first independent game studio building the next generation of virtual pets for virtual and mixed reality. Founded in 2023 by a crew of veterans from Oculus, EA, Microsoft and Bungie, the studio's debut, Stay: Forever Home, drops a magical companion named Ember into your living room via Meta Quest passthrough - a pet you feed, play with, and grow attached to. The bet: VR and MR are the only mediums that can make a digital creature feel genuinely, instinctively real.
Bernard Yee
Bernard 'Bernie' Yee is the CEO and co-founder of Windup Minds, a Seattle-based independent VR/MR studio building 'Stay: Forever Home,' a mixed-reality virtual pet named Ember. A games-industry lifer who started as a journalist and trained as a lawyer, Yee has produced or shaped some of the most influential titles in gaming - Plants vs. Zombies 2 and Peggle 2 at PopCap, Destiny at Bungie, Rock Band at Harmonix, EverQuest at Sony Online - before spending nearly a decade at Oculus/Meta Reality Labs producing landmark VR experiences like Dreamdeck, Toybox, First Contact and First Steps. His thesis: XR is uniquely capable of making a digital creature feel real, and a game can make you feel loved.