The Azuki: Digital Avatar (デジタル アバタ)

Azuki Elementals is the third NFT collection from Chiru Labs. Created in June 2023, the avatars are a series of 20,000 unique digital NFTs, which expanded the Azuki universe. The project also proved popular, selling out in just 16 minutes.

The collection features characters from the four domains of the Garden. These are Earth, Fire, Lightning, and Water.

The first 10,000 NFTs were airdropped to Azuki holders during a Vegas event for the project. The remaining 10,000 were sold at a public sale.

Beanz holders, a prerequisite for earlier minting access, minted before the public sale. Unfortunately, all 10,000 Elementals completely sold out for a sum of 20,000 ETH (Ethereum) during the Beanz mint window. This outcome had been predicted by many in the community. Much to the consternation of many prospective owners, this also meant that there would be no public sale.

The Elementals mint produced a variety of reactions. There were some who were elated about their successful minting experience. These were mostly holders of the Azuki collection. Then there were those who were deeply disappointed. Despite many being punctual, they were unable to secure a mint. One issue, was that no limits were imposed on the Elementals pre-sale. This lead to a situation where one particularly enthusiastic collector minted an eyebrow raising 332 Elementals. However, due to technical difficulties with the release of the collection, many Beanz holders were unable to mint.

Chiru Labs’ goal with the Elementals collection was to take an old school approach to character colours. Inspiration was drawn from iconic anime like the aforementioned Akira, and highly celebrated classics from Studio Ghibli. Chiru Labs stated that, “our goal was to create character palettes that seamlessly blended with their respective environments.”

Elementals was designed to be to Azuki what the Mutant Ape Yacht Club (MAYC) was to the BAYC collection. Namely, a new set of avatars inspired by the success of its parent project.

However, despite a generally successful and expensive sale, the Elementals collection wasn’t met with the same excitement similar projects had enjoyed for several reasons. The 20,000 strong NFT collection had striking similarities with its Azuki counterparts. The differences between the two collections was too slight for the tastes of the community. Further compounding the collection’s negative reception, were the technical issues experienced during the mint. As if that wasn’t enough, the launch was also tainted with questionable mint mechanisms.

The similarity of the Elementals artwork also had the effect of reducing the perceived value of the original Azuki collection.

I think it goes without saying that this was not a good look for Chiru Labs.

Unfortunately, all this drama resulted in many Azuki Elementals holders selling their NFTs. This resulted in the collection experiencing a significant drop in demand.

It should be noted that Azuki and Elemental owners had the ability to pair their Beanz to their collectible off-chain.