Godzilla is quite possibly the most popular kaiju (giant monster) in pop culture history. He’s made a tremendous impact in movies, TV, toys, and all kinds of miscellaneous tchotchke. It’s only natural his next earth-shaking step would be into the realm of Godzilla NFTs.
Inspired by a limited comic book series by IDW Publishing – Godzilla: Rage Across Time, Topps created an NFT collection focusing on the fifth issue of the comic, where archaeologists discover strange bones and begin imagining these epic encounters between the monsters of the Godzilla Universe. The collection features traditional Japanese art, original comic art, collages, and animated moments all inspired by what could have happened in these kaiju battles.
Kaiju Space Trip
Illustrator: Takeshi Murai | Animator: Justin Gammon
Topps’ New Marketplace
Rewarding Collectors and Early Adopters
Topps has fully embraced and has been at the forefront of collectible NFTs. In fact this is their second Godzilla NFT release. It’s a brand new collection of Godzilla NFTs that celebrate the iconic monsters on their new platform and marketplace ToppsNFTs.com, using the Avalanche powered blockchain platform.
The bringing over collectors from one platform to another can be challenging. Once way of enticing them is with an array of new artists, diverse selection of artwork, and more elaborate custom animations offered as limited NFTs. Based on success of the Garbage Pail Kids NFTs and the animated GIFs I helped Topps create for that release, I was called upon once again to create epic animated shorts to be used as Legendary NFTs. They were available in the original NFT pack releases and also offered in collector challenge which rewards collectors for a virtual scavenger hunt of NFTs. Those who complete specific collections win big with very limited and exclusive Godzilla NFTs
Custom Kaiju Battles
Lovely Loops from Distinct Designs
The Godzilla NFTs released by Topps are in partnership with Godzilla’s parents – Toho Co. Ltd. They provided a diverse collection of original artwork from Japanese artists featuring Godzilla, King Ghidorah, Mothra, Mechagodzilla and Rodan (and plenty of innocent bystanders) in various earth-shaking confrontations.
Each art style was quite distinct to the contributing artist, so I wanted the motion and animation of each piece to reflect the unique character of the original artist and his illustration. Whether it was a simplified, choppy animation for a “folk art” style or a more smooth and elaborate motion for a trippy, cartoony art style, I had to visualize each characters’ actions and environments, then dissect and rebuild each element (giving me full control of each monster’s motion), and then finally put together the entire scene resulting in a seamless, animated loop to bring these new, Legendary NFTs to life.
Camp Kaiju
Illustrator: Masahi Takeda | Animator: Justin Gammon
Kaiju Beach Party
Illustrator: Risa Ikami | Animator: Justin Gammon
Sold Out? So What!
Engaging Collectors with Godzilla NFTs
In the end, the release of Godzilla: Rage Across Time was immense. Collectors seemed more enthusiastic for the new set due to its variety of NFT types, quality and variety of art styles, and the inclusion of more animated collectibles. The NFTs packs are no longer available, but can still be found in the Topps Marketplace traded by collectors.
In early 2022, Topps incentivized more collector engagement by offering various tiers of collector challenges. Each challenge required you to have specific cards in your collection, and upon obtaining those cards by a certain date you are rewarded with exclusive NFTs available nowhere else. These are Legendary NFTs minted in low quantities and that’s where two of these Godzilla animations ended up.
Godzilla and friends will always have a place in our hearts, stomping on our heads, and now invading our crypto wallets. I hope I’m there again too to keep him in action.
