Gojira Labs turns static NFTs into playable game characters with “animatronic NFTs”

Game studio Gojira Labs has announced Animatronic non-fungible tokens (NFTs) allowing game companies to take static NFTs and turn them into 2D animated playable game characters. The technique will debut in Gojira’s Sprint racing game featuring characters from famous NFT collections.

The New York company hopes its aNFTs will disrupt the Web3 gaming market by bringing games to NFTs instead of bringing NFTs to games, Mark Soares, president of Gojira Labs, said in an interview with GamesBeat.

“We’ve seen a lot of people try to bring NFTs into games. It just doesn’t work. I’m sure you’ve seen how players have objected to it,” Soares said. And their arguments are perfectly logical, right? They objected against it because they are tired of making money. And NFTs seemed like just another way to make money for them. So if I were them, I’d be annoyed too. We don’t bring NFTs to games. We brings games to NFTs. And that’s an important difference because we’re trying to bring utility and entertainment to current or existing NFT collections, which have very large community bases.”

In my opinion, the game doesn’t look amazing right now. But it’s a work in progress, and it seems like the idea is innovative and easy to implement. As you can see from the GIF below, it doesn’t take much to bring some life to NFT collectibles.

Developed by Gojira Labs, aNFTs adds the ability to animate NFT collections as PFPs (profile pictures or “picture for proof”). The aNFTs are a new digital collectible format built for gaming.

For lack of a better word, it’s like creating a Frankenstein monster that moves. The arms and legs are animated and the character comes to life, with moving eyeballs and more. It’s kind of a new concept for NFTs, although others like Mystic Moose make 3D avatars from NFTs. For now, Soares is focused on the 2D animated characters, but he said the team will consider 3D. Others try to create dynamic NFTs, which can change over time.

So far, not many others are connecting the dots, Soares said.

“If you have all the components in essentially a spreadsheet, but it’s a character spreadsheet, of all the body components, the game engine can animate them,” he said. “And as long as you follow the same format, you’ll always be able to animate them. That’s the simplicity that attracts me so much to the concept.”

Sprint running game

And Gojira Labs will release the first aNFT-compatible game, Sprinft, a multi-chain running game for holders of supported NFT pools to compete against each other.

To capitalize on the opportunity, Gojira Labs formed a joint effort between Blokhaus, a Web3 brand incubator and product lab, and 100XP, a game studio that has made games like Pigs at War and Tezotopia. Together they have around 60 people.

Soares envisions aNFTs as a new format for digital collectibles that allow static NFTs to become playable, interactive characters. This format, which provides all the artwork components necessary to animate a full-body in-game character, was created to unlock instant playability for PFP NFT collections.

Many Web3 enthusiasts have paid a lot of money for NFTs for games, with characters like Bored Apes, DeGods, CryptoPunks and more. Players own the rights to the characters they have purchased, and the big appeal of owning them is that they can be used across games. In this case, by animating the static 2D characters so that they can become full 2D characters, Gojira adds new utility to the NFTs by enabling them to be used in multiple games.

The aNFT format, a new approach to NFTs built for gaming, provides an exploded view of full-body figures that can then be easily animated. The artwork components are designed to be mapped onto game animation rigs so they can be seamlessly deployed as a playable character.

Initially, aNFTs will be compatible with Gojira Labs’ proprietary flexible animation rig, codenamed ‘Gooji.’ This combination creates a powerful new animation workflow that promises to inspire a new wave of Web3 games.

Gojira Labs started this about seven months ago and was legally incorporated more recently. It started as a spirited discussion about why you couldn’t have a Bored Ape fight a CryptoPunk in a new type of game where it was OK to mix different franchises.

“And then from there we actually created this idea of ​​an animatronic NFT that could apply to a lot of different games,” Soares said. “As long as the game developer follows the framework, they should animate these Animatronic NFTs in their games.”

To demonstrate the potential of an NFT, Gojira Labs is also launching a beta version of Sprintt, a multi-chain, multiplayer game that will be the first to adopt this new format. The initial release of the game will provide a simulation of the aNFT experience, allowing holders of specific PFP collections to unlock a character to play.

Bigger plans

In the near future, Gojira Labs aims to work with PFP collections to adopt the aNFT format and enable PFP holders to spawn and collect a playable version of their NFT, Soares said. Collections currently being considered for support include Bored Ape Yacht Club, Sappy Seals, DeGods, CryptoPunks, Tezzardz, and Reddit Avatars.

“We believe that animatronic NFTs (aNFTs) can unlock new levels of entertainment and utility for avid NFT collectors and players,” said Soares. “With aNFTs, we’re bringing gaming to NFTs, not the other way around. Our mission is to leverage Web3 technology to bridge the gap between the world of NFTs and gaming, and we’re excited to see what new experiences our technology will enable.”

Not only do aNFTs represent a new way for the PFP community to engage with each other, but they also empower game developers to rethink Web3 games. The aNFT approach contrasts with traditional NFT gaming measures, such as play-to-earn and NFTs as in-game assets, which have drawn criticism from the gaming community.

Most of the work is converting an NFT image into a full body of a character and then figuring out the skeleton to animate it and bring it to life.

Over time, Soares thinks it would be great to create a standard way for game companies to do this and make their characters more interoperable.

“I can see an NFT format with different qualities and variables that are then honored by different games,” he said. “Standards are going to be critical.

The company hopes to launch a full game in the second quarter. And Gojira Labs hopes to collaborate with other companies on aNFTs.

So far, the company has a simple demo of the running game, where whoever finishes first wins. There are many other games that can be made, such as retro arcade games.

Gojira Labs is working on fully automating the Gooji animation framework, including exploring the use of AI, so that PFP collections with NFT compatibility can be instantly deployed as playable characters.

The aNFTs are currently supported on the Ethereum and Tezos blockchains, while other L1s and L2s are being considered for support.

Gojira comes from the Japanese name for creatures that combined whales and gorillas, as in the original Godzilla character.

“We like to think about things and combine them, like what we do with aNFTs, where we merge the skeleton and all the body components to animate these PFP assemblies,” Soares said.