The Smurfs to enter NFT Market with official NFT collection

Belgian comic franchise The Smurfs has announced that it will launch an official NFT collection dubbed “The Smurfs’ Society Legendary Collection” on April 18.

Led by The Smurfs’ Society, a collective of entrepreneurs, artists and Web3 experts, the collection will feature 12,500 unique NFTs that show 3D-rendered Smurf characters and new characters.

The Smurfs’ Society Legendary Collection is an extensive collection of 250 Smurf characters. Each character has 50 variations and over 300 random traits, including skins, background effects, lighting and unique utilities that are exclusive to them.

These utilities provide various benefits to NFT holders, such as physical prints, raffle entries and access to artist and partner services, products, artwork, game tickets, wine bottles and other privileges.

The Smurfs’ Society has created a unique bucket auction, run through Rarible, to assess the value of its NFT collection. This innovative approach allows the community to establish a mint price for the entire collection rather than relying on a predetermined value.

By involving the community, The Smurfs’ Society aims to highlight the importance of community participation and set the mint price for the remaining NFTs in the collection based on their collective input. It also promotes positive initiatives by incorporating unique experiences, personal rewards and community benefits into Web3.

The team has been working with over 100 Web3 communities and many Web3 players to realize their vision and collaborating with a remarkable selection of artists, such as French Sculptor Richard Orlinski, Fafi Birtak, French comic creator Philippe Druillet, André Saraiva and international multidisciplinary artist Antonyo Marest.

The Smurfs’ foray into the digital world

This NFT collection is not The Smurfs’ first foray into the Web3 space.

The brand has already ventured into blockchain and cryptocurrencies through a long-term collaboration with ZenGo wallet for digital assets, which was announced in December. The two entities aim to bring the renowned brand to a worldwide Web3 community.

The Smurfs’ Society Team expressed excitement over partnering with ZenGo — the only self-custodial wallet with secure Multi-Party Computation (MPC).

ZenGo’s top-notch security also comes with features such as the lack of seed phrase vulnerability and the integration of a Web3 Firewall.

The developers explained that ZenGo’s unique characteristics made it an ideal partner for its Web3 debut. All the game’s assets will be tokenized and available as NFTs on third-party platforms like OpenSea and LooksRare, allowing players to sell them.

According to the ZenGo wallet team’s statement, the game was made available to ZenGo users in January, with email notifications sent out to prospective players during its mainnet launch. Players can now easily connect their wallets to the game.

The Smurfs had previously revealed in May last year the launch of the Smurfs village within the Sandbox’s metaverse.

Players can buy Smurfs avatars and complete missions to help the Smurfs in the game. Those who do not have Smurfs avatars can still participate in the game through the Sandbox. However, IMPS, the owner of The Smurfs’ intellectual property rights, encourages players to use Smurfs avatars for an enhanced gaming experience.

“The avatars are there to be played, not for reproduction and commercial use,” said Guillaume Boudol, the head of licensing at IMPS.

He also praised The Sandbox team’s creativity in rapidly developing the project. He said that the virtual world grew and flourished in an organic way as the team added new layers to it daily.