Nifty News: The Walking Dead invades Sandbox, mining lease NFTs, CryptoPunk in art gallery

CryptoPunk 5293 is set to be displayed in a Miami-based art museum, Australian mining firms are tokenizing mining and exploration leases and Sandbox secures IP rights to The Walking Dead.

Tokenized Walking Dead

Ethereum-based NFT metaverse “The Sandbox” has partnered with Skybound Entertainment to incorporate a Walking Dead game in the virtual world.

The Walking Dead is famous thanks to the TV show, however, the story and characters are based on original comics from Skybound Entertainment.

The Sandbox is owned by NFT game and property developer Animoca brands, with the firm describing it as “part virtual real-estate, part amusement park.” It already has an impressive list of existing partnerships such as The Smurfs, Care Bears, Atari, Deadmau5 and CryptoKitties.

“The team will give users the possibility to get pieces of virtual real estate close to The Walking Dead’s spot in the metaverse, enabling fans and gamers alike to be as close as ever to their beloved brand,” the Thursday announcement read.

The Walking Dead game will provide users a chance to re-create playable stories and use characters from the series, such as Rick Grimes, build in-game assets and buy and sell the assets in the Sandbox marketplace.

The Sandbox metaverse is set for its Alpha public launch in the summer of 2021, and virtual land in the game has been highly sought after. In February, Sandbox generated $2.8 million worth of sales from two NFT land sale events.

Mining lease NFTs from Aussie companies

Three Australian companies have partnered to launch mining and exploration leases stored as NFTs on the Bitcoin SV (BSV) blockchain.

End-to-end technology solution provider Prime Technology Services will collaborate with Predict Ecology, an environmental and ecological consulting firm, to develop blockchain infrastructure for mining company Progressive Minerals.

The use of NFTs and blockchain tech will enable the firm to enhance its record keeping by storing accurate and transparent data that is verifiable on the blockchain.

“This has historically been an issue within the sector and the aim of Progressive Minerals is to change the way mining companies operate and provide a level of integrity & transparency of data for all stakeholders not previously realized,” said Progressive Minerals managing director Mathew Hancock.

ICA Miami acquires Crypto Punk NFT

The Institute of Contemporary Art Miami (ICA Miami) has acquired CryptoPunk 5293 and will go on display this summer.

The CryptoPunk NFT depicts a woman with purple lipstick and a mole, and was gifted to the art museum by trustee Eduardo Burillo.

ICA Miami is the first major art museum to acquire a #CryptoPunk #NFT, through a major gift from museum trustee Eduardo Burillo! @LarvaLabs

Read on to learn more about the work, CryptoPunk 5293, which will be on view at ICA Miami this summer.https://t.co/MZbl7ZlaUk

— ICA Miami (@icamiami) July 8, 2021

The announcement noted that the museum is committed to “advancing a wide understanding of contemporary art and fostering experimentation.” ICA Miami artistic director Alex Gartenfeld said Larva Labs had “revolutionized our understanding of the meaning of art objects and ownership” with the creation of CryptoPunks in 2017.

“In doing so, they helped to launch a ‘cryptoart’ movement that is emblematic of the ways that our digital and physical worlds are merging and becoming inextricably intertwined,” he added.

Related: NFTs make it possible for gamers to have digital property rights

Escape to Mars

A new Mars-themed NFT project dubbed “Mars Escape” is conducting its first NFT sale which concludes on July 26th.

The theme of Mars Escape is centered on “conceptual travel” to the planet, and the platform hopes to get users to think about the planet as a potential avenue for virtual “luxury travel.”

“We envision a world where luxury travel is not limited by geography, and people can access once-in-a-lifetime experiences from the comfort of home,” the website reads.

It teased that by using virtual reality, “the possibility of a luxury vacation in space suddenly gets a lot more real.”

The Mars Escape NFTs depict space-like bungalows, luxury resorts, Motocross events and holographic in-room butlers, to name a few.

The project hasn’t confirmed if it will expand out to a full-fledged metaverse at this stage.

Roundup

Despite a cool down in NFTs markets, Cointelegraph reported on Wednesday that NFT sales generated $2.5 billion in the first half of this year — a stark contrast to the $13.7 million worth of NFT in sales for the same period of 2020.

A growing trend this year appears to be TV and film content tied to NFTs, and a new NFT marketplace dubbed “Vuele” announced earlier this month that the platform will host the sale of a new tokenized feature-length film starring Oscar-winner Anthony Hopkins.

The film is called Zero Contact and the first NFT drop is set to be launched in late July or early August.