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The Hyped Anime NFT Project of 2022
Valhalla is a collection of 10,000 anime-inspired NFT avatars. The collection is made by Stacked Studios and runs on the Ethereum blockchain. According to the official OpenSea site, “Valhalla represents more than a collection of digital avatars. It represents decades of gaming culture: clutch plays, ELO grinds, OT wins.” The Valhalla NFT project aims to redefine web3 gaming in a big way.There are five core character types in the collections namely – Human, Toxic, Mech, God and Demon.
8,510 NFTs are humans (the most common) in the collection. Furthermore, there are 645 Toxic and 647 Mech-type Valhalla NFTs. The collection is rounded out with 99 God-type and 99 Demon-type Valhalla NFTs. Valhalla holders get exclusive access to Stacked Studio offers. Valhalla is also a tool-enabled PFP project for gaming and streetwear enthusiasts. NFT holders have access to an exclusive community, events and digital drops.
What is Valhalla NFT?
Valhalla is a crypto-native brand for gamers. According to the project’s disclaimer, VALHALLA is “an NFT project that builds a community for players around the world.” They build a tailored experience for their members who are passionate about games and culture.
Over the past 30 days (at the time of writing), Valhalla has raised over $15 million in total volume. According to DappRadar, it is also the 6th best performing pool in the last month on the Ethereum network. With over 12,000 ETH total sales and 3,000 unique holders, the project is still operating with a floor price of 1.13 ETH. Valhalla has 38% unique owners with 17% of the collection re-owned.
Their official launch video follows two characters traversing a futuristic Cyberpunk meets The Matrix world. The pair navigate through multiple timelines and dimensions along the way. Some of these include Blade Runner-esque futuristic cities, to castle caves with a huge dragon. The video then ends with the two main characters in a snow-washed forest.
A new era will rise from the ashes.
Together we will build up to Valhalla. pic.twitter.com/WVmMNMIqa5
— VALHALLA (@valhalla) 14 November 2022
Who created Valhalla?
Valhalla is a top tier NFT game project founded by Alex Lin, who also founded Stacked Studios. Stacked Studios is a Los Angeles-based Web3 startup studio building a decentralized live-streaming platform. The NFT project is built by a team of 11 full-time employees at Stacked Studios. The group has vast web2 and web3 experience, from prestigious institutes including MIT. Some of the team also come from the world’s best companies – Microsoft, Uber and Goldman Sachs, etc.
The full team is as follows:
- Alex Lin – CEO
- Ryan Wen – Chief of Staff
- Victor Cheng – SR Software Engineer
- Samantha Chow – Product Manager
- Terry Kang – Software Engineer
- Roberto Berwa – Software Engineer
- Ding Zhang – Senior Software Engineer
- Matt Henderson – Software Engineer
Some of Valhalla’s gaming partners are as follows:
- Wardell – Pro Valorant player
- JD Gaming – #1 League of Legends team in China
- Talon esports – Premier Esports team in Asia-Pacific
- Sentinels – Esports team (Valorant, Fortnite, Halo, Wild Rift and Apex Legends
- T1 Esports – 3x World Champions (League of Legends)
The Valhalla NFT project is positioning itself to become the largest NFT gaming community in the world. Valhalla ran a unique application process for their mint. Existing members sent out referral codes to friends, so the application pool grew purely by word of mouth. This unique model saw the project generate over 11,000 applications, making it a huge web3 success story!
Currently, the project has over 24,000 members on their active Discord server. Valhalla NFT holders also gain access to certain Discord channels that non-holders cannot access. Users without Valhalla NFT can only access the basic Discord server.
Also, according to Valhalla’s official NFT Twitter, the project has over 48,000 followers as of May 2022. But beware, many fake accounts of the project are already on social media. Collectors must follow their official accounts to avoid fraud and scams.
Valhalla vs Azuki NFT: What Happened?
The Web3 brand has also faced its share of conspiracies. And this one is up against another well-known Anime themed project – none other than the best NFT compilation Azuki. It all started when crypto detectives NFT Ethics wrote a detailed paper on both of these projects. Apparently both projects have the same founders and Valhalla would be nothing more than a scam. Of course, both projects’ communities were drawn into this and created controversy.
For those unfamiliar, Azuki is a digital brand associated with 10,000 avatars. It is the first of its kind top Anime themed avatar collection ever. Since its release, the project has constantly innovated in the space, bringing new and improved technologies to further develop it into web3. Many consider Azuki to be at the forefront of web3 innovation still. The founder of Azuki is Zagabond together with co-founder HoshiBoy. And this, as NFT Ethics points out, is the source of the controversy.
Valhalla NFT founder Alex Lin also founded Stacked Studios. In its original thread, NFT Ethics claims that Alex Lin and HoshiBoy are the same person. This is because both have similar biographies on their official websites. The official Azuki website lists Hoshiboy as a design lead who “did the Y-Combinator twice”. While Alex Lin’s official Twitter says he is a 2x Y-Combinator founder. Alex Lin’s profile has previously also shown him as a design manager.
But things took a turn when society responded to NFT Ethics. In fact, they debunked this theory themselves in the next thread they posted. They state that Alex Lin and Hoshiboy are not the same people, but rather “long-term business partners”.
However, the response from various community members and the majority of people disagreed. They called out NFT Ethics and said that this is all a far-fetched conspiracy theory. Some even claim that NFT Ethics has a personal agenda against both collections. Moreover, they also said that someone paid NFT ethics to cause the drama to negatively affect both Valhalla and Azuki NFT collections.
Although it is undeniable that both collections share similarities in their art style. The characters in both collections are anime-themed avatars. Each NFT in both of their collections has only side profiles shown. In addition, both projects address web3 gaming as well. It wouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone to compare and contrast both of these projects. But there are no limits to web3 and having one Anime themed collection doesn’t mean someone can’t make another successful one here.
The future of Valhalla
Valhalla has built a tight-knit community on both Twitter and Discord since launch. With over 11,000 Early Access applications, the gaming partnerships they’ve already formed, the team’s background and the overall quality of the brand, it’s safe to say this is a long-term project. The NFT team is building for the distant future and targeting one of the most profitable sectors on the blockchain – web3 gaming.
Additionally, Valhalla is already funded with years of runway and will predictably integrate well into the Stacked Studios ecosystem. In September, Pantera Capital led a $12.9 million Series A financing for Stacked Studios. The innovations and future prospects of Valhalla are a promising path for the web3 community.
