Fat Penguin, the NFT-related toy that lumbered into Walmart earlier this year, is venturing into a new industry: online gaming. This is an interactive digital playground exclusively open to PudgyPenguinsNFT holders, toy owners and novices. An early version of the platform will launch by April next year, offering players narrative-driven and open-ended gaming options, PudgyPenguins CEO Luca Netz said on Saturday at contemporary art fair Art Basel in Miami.
"Fans of Pudgy Penguin have been waiting for more ways to interact with the character," Netz said in a statement. "Having a place like Penguin World takes players to the next level of fandom."
Launched in July 2021, the NFT project for the plump, flightless Antarctic creature went through a period of internal wrangling involving management changes before reviving and finally announcing in September a line of tangible, real-life toys, including plush toys and figurines, to be sold in 2,000 Walmart supermarkets in the United States.
Netz expects sales of the toys to exceed $10 million in the second half of this year.
As more toy manufacturers launch physical toys alongside virtual games for a generation of digitally native consumers. Last summer, toy maker SpinMaster launched Bitzee, a jade rabbit-like virtual pet in a handheld box. Meanwhile, Hot Wheels earlier this year debuted RiftRallyGame, an immersive virtual world accessible to owners of toy car kits.
As previously reported by CoinDesk, each Little Penguin toy will come with a scannable code containing a digital "Forever Pudgy" or the birth certificate of a unique character living in the world of Forever Pudgy.
According to PudgyPenguins, players can explore PudgyWorld as their own customized character. The virtual world will also feature the brand's first "hero characters": "Pudgy" and "Peaches."
The PudgyPenguins NFT series was first launched in July 2021 and sold out within minutes. Since then, the series has grown to 8,888 NFTs, held by more than 4,000 people, OpenSea data shows. The collection's reserve price is about $27,000, up from $90 more than two years ago. CoinGecko data shows that the series has a market capitalization of nearly $250 million.