Yuga Labs’ Bored Ape Yacht Club is entering into the metaverse with a project called the Otherside which will connect a multiplayer role-playing game with the NFT universe.
BAYC Otherside Metaverse Begins
What is Otherside?
At least one source describes Otherside as a project meant to create a “media empire” in the world of NFTs. It’s basically a 3D MMORPG or Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game.
Virtual worlds are nothing new. Remember Second Life? That was the MMORPG created a handful of years after the turn of the century (2003) by Linden Labs. When you joined Second Life, you had the run of the virtual world by way of an avatar you could design to your specifications.
BAYC Otherside could be compared to that, but the founders say other virtual worlds (they don’t reference Second Life by name) fall down on the job in crucial ways. Otherside is designed to address those complaints.
Bored Ape Yacht Club Metaverse Trailer
In March of 2022, a 90 second trailer dubbed “the otherside” was dropped by BAYC and got the attention of none other than the official Twitter account for 60s rock legends The Doors. The tweet is a nod to the use of the band’s song, Break On Through (To The Other Side) to announce the Otherside Metaverse.
The video begins with a widescreen animated image of the BAYC and then zooms in on an animated Curtis hanging out and fishing outside the club. Curtis then drinks from a bottle that is later revealed to say “Don’t Drink Me” that causes the primate to trip out. Curtis then begins to see volcanos, icebergs, and an interesting floating world. All of this as the song Break On Through (to the Other Side) plays in the background.
Curtis is then taken away by the same creature that is on the bottle of the potent concoction that he consumed. Many believe the creature is a Koda who was leaked from a Yuga Labs pitch deck. From the pitch deck the Kodas are a race of celestials “have discovered intelligent life on earth…biding their time and waiting for the right moment to reveal themselves.” The Kodas then birth a final microverse into our dimension called the MetaRPG.
Bored Ape co-founder Gargamel has stated the pitch deck is old, but the similarities in the video match up.
Also, the video goes on with the appearance of other bluechip NFT collections. Some of the collections include Mutant Ape Yacht Club, Cool Cats, World of Women, CryptoPunks, Meebits, and CrypToadz. Users on Twitter identified that the World of Women and Cool Cats NFTs in the video are owned by the same crypto wallet and Yuga Labs recently acquired CryptoPunks and Meebits rights.
See you on the Otherside in April. Powered by @apecoindao pic.twitter.com/gmrw7hvRc8
— The Doors (@TheDoors) March 22, 2022
A Welcoming Virtual World?
The goal is to make an “interoperable world” that is decentralized and would (best-case) allow those from other NFT projects to take part alongside BAYC members.
The idea of opening up the world to those who do not own Bored Apes, CryptoPunks, Meebits, or other BAYC NFTs or acquired NFTs is potentially revolutionary in terms of philosophy let alone practicality.
Otherside is powered by ApeCoin, but the idea that other platforms and projects are welcome in what might otherwise be described as a “walled garden” of a virtual world is potentially transformative.
But the real game changer could be in the approach taken to what populates Otherside.
Some speculation includes land sales, purchases with APEcoin and an “in-game app store” — that will allow players to create characters using NFTs they own or from scratch, outfit them (again with NFTs), and use them in games.
A BAYC founding member, Greg Solano (AKA Gargamel), is on record saying essentially that nobody wants a virtual world where nothing is actually happening. The Otherside approach to this dilemma? Creating situations in the virtual reality where users are required to act collaboratively.
The most detailed description as to what is currently happening with the project is limited to talk of how BAYC has partnered with more than one game design group (hint: 10KTFshop) to make Otherside happen.
Why we might have already had a glimpse of @BoredApeYC metaverse ‘The Otherside’? ????
Hint: it’s hidden in plain sight @10KTFshop
????Thread???? pic.twitter.com/ohO8fJYgZ5
— brandy ???? | vitabran.eth (@vitabran) April 2, 2022
Fast Company published a tantalizing report based on what was thought to be a leaked “deck” describing the Otherside project in terms of a near-future sci-fi scenario where, “all intelligent life on earth has been transported to a strange new world”. Some members of Yuga Labs pushed back against this saying the information contained in the deck was old and that many features had been revised.
Otherdeeds Airdrop & Mint
| Mint Date | Saturday, April 30, 2022 | ||||
| Mint Price | 305 APE Coin | ||||
| Available to Mint | 55,000 Otherdeeds | Rainbow Atmos, Cosmic Dream, Infinite Expanse Land | |||
| BAYC Airdrop | 10,000 (1 Otherdeed per BAYC NFT) | Biogenic Swamp Land | |||
| MAYC Airdrop | 20,000 (1 Otherdeed per MAYC NFT) | Chemical Goo Land | |||
| Yuga/Project Developers | 15,000 | Rainbow Atmos, Cosmic Dream, Infinite Expanse Land | |||
| Total Otherdeeds | 200,000 |
Otherdeeds are described as “dynamic NFTs” which contain Otherside game elements. These were launched in April 2022, and not without a bit of controversy over how it was done.
Otherside Land
There are five sediments that lands are built upon: Biogenic Swamp, Chemical Goo, Rainbow Atmos, Cosmic Dream, and Infinite Expanse. The Biogenic Swamp is BAYC land and the Chemical Goo is MAYC land.
Kodas
Kodas aren’t meant to be understood right away, learning why they exist and why “they brought us” to Otherside is part of the in-game experience.
Otherside Resources
Each parcel of land in the game requires “replenishing resources” including:
- Ore
- Shard
- Anima
- Root
Otherside Artifacts, Treasures, & Tools
Scattered throughout the lands of Otherside are rare objects, some of which cannot be crafted by any other means. If you find an artifact, know that it may hold secrets to this world as it expands.
What Makes Otherside Land Rare?
Much has yet-to-be-revealed but land tiers and land with Kodas, resources and artifacts appear to be the most valuable. So BAYC land located in the Biogenic Swamp with Kodas and Resources would have top tier value.
Where Otherside and Otherdeeds Fit Into The “Yugaverse”
With Otherside being described as a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game or MMORPG, how will this project fit in with the other Yuga Labs endeavors like Bored Apes Yacht Club? There is an ambition that NFTs from collections such as CrypToadz, World of Women, Cool Cats, and others may be playable as characters in the Otherside virtual world, with a capacity for as many as ten thousand active gamers at once.
The Otherside metaverse is intended to function like an open-world game experience complete with the ability to buy and own virtual land, accessories, and resources. Buying land seems to be a crucial part of the in-game experience; that’s where Otherdeeds comes in. These were created as a collection, each features certain resources needed to develop land within the game.
There are also land types to choose from, and when you buy a plot of land in Otherside, you should be prepared to deal with Kodas, creatures who are the original inhabitants of Otherside. Some resources you can purchase in-game may include Kodas, but these are said to be rare and you shouldn’t expect to “buy” one, but rather receive one as a bonus when purchasing other resources.
Otherside Pricing
Otherside NFTs were valued at around $6 thousand at launch time. When the sale was over Yuga Labs was sitting on some $300 million, with a single Otherside NFT costing around $11K in the secondary marketplace. You buy these NFTs using ApeCoin, which at press time was worth about $8 but has trended into the $20-$25 dollar range.
What’s Next?
On Saturday, July 16, 2022 Yuga Labs demo the game to the public with a virtual reality company called Improbable to give a demo of the game to the public.
Official Links
Website: https://otherside.xyz/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/OthersideMeta
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/othersidemeta/
Discord: https://discord.com/invite/the-otherside
Opensea: https://opensea.io/collection/otherdeed
Joe Wallace has covered real estate and financial topics, including crypto and NFTs since 1995. His work has appeared on Veteran.com, The Pentagon Channel, ABC and many print and online publications. Joe is a 13-year veteran of the United States Air Force and a former reporter for Air Force Television News.
