We Interviewed ICSnakes, who are bringing the first interactive NFTs to the Internet Computer! Their NFTs are not just art to show off to other collectors and appreciate; they offer an interactive experience where you can play with and enjoy your NFT in a whole new way. Every NFT image will have a mini-game built-in. You will not just own a design; you'll also own the mini-game inside of it.
1. How would you describe your artistic style?
Modern razor-sharp and detailed vector art focused on consistency with simple bright popping colors and black outlines.
2. What drew you to NFT creation rather than traditional canvas-based art?
We wanted to make a snake game from the very beginning; NFTs make it possible for people to have a unique character nobody else has.
3. Are there any artists who have inspired you? What do you like about their work?
We're developers with a software engineer background; one of us also has a media design background.
Modern product design with colorful illustrations has been our primary source of inspiration; this is common nowadays in the design language of many brands. Regarding the NFT market, many projects inspired us. Here's a list of a few of them:
- Bored Ape Yacht Club, so much creativity is seen in the great variation in colors, patterns, and items.
- Cool Cats, we love the simplicity and colorfulness of these NFTs. They're adorable!
- Starverse, the drawing style is outstanding, with clear visuals with black outlines, attention to detail, and great use of color.
4. What made you create NFTs?
Developers are creators by heart and want to create new experiences for people to enjoy. The concept of an NFT made it possible to share and fund our project with a large group of people worldwide that share our vision and want to be part of our snake game community.
5. Can you tell us about your project?
We're bringing the first interactive NFTs to the Internet Computer! Our NFTs are not just art to show off to other collectors and appreciate; they offer an interactive experience where you can play with and enjoy your NFT in a whole new way. Every NFT image will have a mini-game built-in. You will not just own a design; you'll also own the mini-game inside of it.
6. How many NFTs will be minted? Can you talk us through the process of how you create the art?
We're minting 10.000 NFTs on November 22nd. All NFTs are vector art and created by hand in a vector editor. The most complicated part of our work was creating the patterns, and we wanted them to be repeatable and follow the curves of the snake, which was a big challenge.
The different elements of the snake will be combined in a single SVG. We're not just layering the elements. Parts like patterns and wings are dynamic and use coloring from the snake to make the final result cohesive.
7. Will Your NFT be able to breed, stake or ever be in a game?
Every single NFT will have a snake mini-game built-in on mint day! This was something we found very important since art is not just about visuals but about the experience. And our NFTs allow you to experience your NFT with game interaction like never seen before in an NFT on the Internet Computer.
This was not easy to realize, and we had to include the suitable game render engine, create the mini-game, and build the NFT so that the elements from the snake itself could be re-used to keep the file size to a minimum. The mini-game is not extra downloadable content but built inside each NFT image itself.
We're also developing a multiplayer game where the NFTs can be used as characters and players can play for rewards. We've made integrations with other NFTs in the mini-game and are looking into integrations in the multiplayer game.
8. What benefits do you think the Internet Computer has over other L1 blockchains when it comes to creating NFTs?
The Internet Computer allows us also to host the NFTs themselves, which is a game-changer since NFTs can now be interactive content and applications inside Internet Computer containers besides traditional static assets like images and videos.
9. What other art have you seen that excites you in the Internet Computer NFT ecosystem?
Seeing NFTs like Cronic Critters and ICmojis that have games available is impressive; people are no longer buying art because of its artistic value but also to represent their own digital personality in games.
Also, the launch of Poked Studio bots on the Internet Computer has been a great addition to the Internet Computer ecosystem. Their work speaks for itself. We're excited to see ahead for the Internet Computer ecosystem.
10. What excites you most about your launch?
Bringing the first interactive NFTs is exciting; we can't wait to see people's reactions when they first see and play with their NFTs. We've made sure that all NFTs are colorful. Of course, there will be fewer and more rare NFTs, but even the most common low rarity NFTs will be beautiful, bright, and unique.
11. What advice would you give to anyone trying to enter into the world of NFTs?
We're just at the beginning of NFTs on the Internet Computer, the future has many astounding projects ahead, and it's never too late to invest in projects or try to create your own project.
12. Do you have further plans to work with ICP Squad in the future after this initial sale?
We've had collaborations and made integrations with many different NFT projects, and we're always open to opportunities!
13. Can you envisage a future where the most valuable NFT space is on the Internet Computer?
That future is not far ahead; it's coming sooner than we think. The Internet Computer ecosystem gives artists so many new creative opportunities and at the same time offers investors low gas fees that it's just a matter of time before it's ahead of other NFT spaces.
The Internet Computer is also more than only NFTs, and it's a decentralized network that makes many decentralized projects possible for both artists and creators and can be seen as the next step in the future of the internet.
14. Why do you think NFTs have become so valuable in such a short space of time?
NFTs are more than traditional art; they're easier to maintain, store, and trade, resulting in a vibrant, active community of collectors who want to show their artistic taste with their collections.
It has never been easier for an artist to share his work with the world. Anyone and anywhere can look at and buy their work and share their collection with everyone in the world.
15. Tell us about your team?
We're a small team of experienced developers, of which one team member additionally has a media design background. This allows us to design our NFTs in-house and develop the built-in mini-game and multiplayer game in-house without any technical or design limitations commonly seen when development and/or design is outsourced to another 3rd party. We're able to iterate quickly back and forth between concepts and designs, resulting in beautiful interactive NFTs.
16. What advantages do you believe you have over other competitors?
Our NFTs are interactive; people aren't buying a promise but a fully working built-in mini-game inside their NFTs. Our team of experienced in-house developers allows us to iterate between concepts, designs, and interactive NFTs quickly. Also, it will enable us to make the NFTs with the development of the multiplayer game in mind, making sure all NFTs will be compatible and shown precisely the same in the game as shown in the NFT with no loss of detail.
17. Tell us about your partners?
We've collaborated with and built integrations for many NFT projects. We've worked together with, for example, Poked Studio bots, Dfinity Bulls, ICPuppies, and Internet Astronauts.
18. Tell us about the challenge you face while building your project?
The two main challenges were the design of the patterns and the development of the mini-game built-in inside the NFTs. The patterns had to be repeatable so they could be used in the game and also curved with the body shape of the snake.
Curving shapes in a vector image is no easy challenge; we had to transform each color element separately and ensure they were aligned correctly, resulting in a detailed pattern in the more complex patterns.
The built-in mini-game had to dynamically render these patterns on the curved snake while being small in bundle size to keep the NFT size to a minimum since the game is inside every NFT itself.
19. What are your short and long-term achievements and targets?
Short term, we hope to grow our community of NFT collectors, allowing them to share their collection and gameplay with their NFTs to other like-minded collectors. In the long term, we plan to release a multiplayer game where people can play to earn with their NFTs. We intend to keep our community up to date with regular development updates.
20. Give us little details about your roadmap?
At this moment, we're working on the final touches on our NFT designs and built-in mini-game.
On November 22nd, we'll mint 10.000 NFTs on Entrepot, and in the following months, we'll grow our community of collectors further and work on the development of the multiplayer game.
Thank you for taking the time to answer our questions 😊
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