Beaming Up My First NFT
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Sinking my teeth into the Sneaky Vampire Syndicate 🧛
Okay so I’ve always been hesitant about NFTs but with the recent explosion of the Bored Ape Yacht Club or BAYC (some of which fetched several million dollars at a Sotheby’s auction last week*) and even the likes of Visa getting in on the CryptoPunks craze (most of which sell for mid-six figures), etc… I’ve decided to dip a toe in and give it a try. The project I like is called Sneaky Vampire Syndicate.
*UPDATE 9/9/21: Set of “Bored Ape” NFTs sells for $24.4M in Sotheby’s online auction
Now a quick DISCLAIMER before I begin… I have ZERO affiliation with the SVS project. I stumbled upon it on the r/NFT subreddit. and really like the idea behind the project. Also, I’m currently in pre-production on a feature length horror movie about vampires so I figured this was a sign to get into the NFT game!
What is Sneaky Vampire Syndicate?
Sneaky Vampire Syndicate is an Ethereum-based NFT collection that is based on Vampire themes. The project will allow for the public to mint 8,888 NFTs for the cost of 0.08 ETH (around $300ish).
The actual NFT is made up of completely unique generative art, no two are alike, but there will also be 8 hand drawn by artist Migwashere. What’s exciting about the artwork is that Mig was also involved with the BAYC project.
There’s some 3rd Party tools you can use to see Stats and Rarity of individual NFTs that have been minted like https://rarity.tools/ and https://nftexp.io/
Migwashere told Decrypt that, unlike with The Bored Ape Yacht Club, where he was part of a team of artists, he feels like he’s in control this time around. “This one feels more like something I’ve created,” he said, though he said that he still bounced ideas off the team.
On top of the NFT collection, the team behind the project is developing a 2D side-scrolling fighting game that pits NFTs head to head with each other. The game is under development by indy game studio Static City Games and said that only the owners of the NFTs will be allowed to play.
This added gaming aspect of the project is what really grabbed my interest and sets this project apart from just plain old NFT art. The fact that the NFT is tied to a game that only NFT holder can access and that video games are a huge market gives this project the potential for HUGE demand. The game is going to be an old school style side scroller akin to Castlevania.
On top of that, there’s also plans for the NFT characters to allow owners to interact within the metaverse they’re creating for The Sandbox. The Sandbox reminds me of Roblox but maybe for an older or wider ranging audience. There’s some heavy hitters involved with it including The Walking Dead, Atari, and over 160 existing partnerships including Deadmau5, Richie Hawtin, The Smurfs, Care Bears, ZEPETO, and CryptoKitties. And on top of that, The Sandbox just spent $2.9M on a Bored Ape!
And I have to say, the SVS Discord is already a super fun community, so I’m very excited to see what their Sandbox metaverse will be like!
They also have lots of other fun stuff planned down the road, like giving NFT holder additional NFTs, such as bat companions.
The other promising aspect of this project is just how quickly they’ve got a solid following behind it. As of this writing the Discord group has over 32k members and they’re only releasing 8,888 NFTs so you do the math. The rate at which it has grown is what really impressive. I feel like it could really take off after launch. (Although it may take some time as some owners will probably hold on to their NFT in order to get the bat companion or play the game, which will likely increase the demand if owners are holding onto the supply).
I highly recommend you dive in and do some DD before the drop this weekend. I’ve included a few links to article and most importantly, a link to their Discord group.
Below are a few of the character designed that they’ve released:
How To Buy A Sneaky Vampire NFT
Today they announced their drop date. The public sale is this Saturday, Sept 11, 2021 at 1p.m. EST time:
****UPDATE: The drop date was changed to Sept 12th out of respect for 9/11, public sale start time remains the same.
To check what NFT releases are coming up, there’s a nifty calendar site you can browse through here: https://nftcalendar.io/
In order to buy one, you’ll need some Ethereum (ETH) and a wallet like MetaMask. You can purchase ETH using MetaMask but I prefer a different way, I use Coinbase and send my ETH to my MetaMask wallet.
Click here to sign up for Coinbase and we’ll both get $10 in Bitcoin
After you have both CB and MM setup you can easily transfer money from your bank into CB, buy ETH (using Coinbase Pro for lower fees) and then transfer it to MM (also lower fees in CB Pro).
New to NFTs? Here’s a free tutorial series that will get you started!
https://cryptodads-nft-toolbox.teachable.com/p/cryptodads-nft-toolbox
Don’t forget your gas money!
One thing to note is that buying NFTs requires “gas” which is an added fee for processing. The gas fee does not go to the person selling the NFT or the marketplace but instead to the people running crypto servers who process the data blocks. This fee varies based on how busy the network is, so it’s usually cheaper at night. (Read more about gas HERE and HERE or for a simple understanding, check out this fun real-time visualizer HERE)
A quick gas overview: Gas is in units called Gwei. Like regular gasoline, the price goes up and down. And depending on how big your blockchain data is, you need more or less gas — the same way a big rig truck needs more gas than a small Ford Focus does. When there’s a lot of network activity, such as an NFT drop, the price shoots up. When the network is calmer the price goes down. Classic supply and demand.
You can check current gas prices here: https://www.gasnow.org/
You’ll be able to mint (create upon purchase) the NFTs directly through their website. You can either connect your MetaMask wallet via your browser or if you use the MetaMask app you can use its built-in browser to navigate to their website. They are limiting each purchase to 5 NFTs per transactions to avoid bot abuse (like what happened with The Sevens for today’s drop). You can read more about that HERE.
That’s just a rough overview of the process, but there’s plenty of videos and article, and even stuff on the SVS Discord on how to get your wallets and such setup for purchase. Here’s a quick and direct tutorial:
News Articles
Sneak long and prosper!
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