The round also saw cricket players MS Dhoni, Jasprit Bumrah, Hardik Pandya along with Shreyas Iyer, Ravindra Jadeja, Tilak Varma and Sai Sudharsan, come on board as investors.

According to the company, the newly-raised capital will be used to complete game development and strengthen its live operation capabilities. This includes post-launch infrastructure content pipelines and systems as well as player experience.

Founded in 2024 by Karan Shroff, Anurag Banerjee, and Tina Balachandran, LightFury Games is building eCricket, a AAA title that is slated for release this year on mobile.

Ex-Unacademy CXO-founded gaming startup LightFury raises $8.5M

"We've backed LightFury from inception, in their mission to pioneer a new generation of Indian gaming studios, building IPs with global ambition. Building a AAA game is neither easy nor quick, it takes sustained creative excellence, deep technical expertise, and long-term discipline," said Karthik Reddy, Co-founder and Managing Partner, Blume Ventures.

"In LightFury, we've seen a team come together from different parts of the world, with a shared passion and incredible attention to detail, depth and creativity. Supercharged by natively built AI tools, we are excited for the world to experience eCricket very soon. We would like it to be the Dhurandhar of Indian gaming history," he added.

eCricket is built on Unreal Engine 5 and is designed for a mobile-first play with physics-led gameplay, which is combined with strategic batting and bowling systems that captures real-world styles and match dynamics, LightFury Games noted.

The company has also secured global player roster licence of over 600 professional cricketers including Chris Gayle, Ben Stokes, Pat Cummins, and more.

Edited by Megha Reddy