The $APE experienced a sharp bearish movement on the 1st day of May even though the Yuga Labs’ Otherdeed land sale raised about $310 million. The Otherdeeds NFT drop quickly became one of the most anticipated in the NFT history, but the excitement quickly dissipated at the end of the sales as most orders weren’t filled, and the resulting gas wars cost buyers an estimated total of $160 million.

Yuga Labs, which is the company behind the famous Bored Apes Yacht Club collection of NFTs, wants to reimburse transaction costs to bidders who were unsuccessful in its auction of Otherdeed, the virtual property for its metaverse project, OthersideMeta.

Otherdeed is NFTs that symbolize plots of land in Yuga Labs’ future Metaverse, “Otherside,” where everyone may bring their own NFT avatars and develop in a single, united place, according to the company.

How Ethereum Reacted to the Drop

The Otherdeed NFT drop opened early Sunday morning, enabling individuals who have earlier completed KYC authentication to participate in the much-anticipated mint. 

Although there was a public supply of over 55,000 Otherdeed NFTs, demand for the drop considerably surpassed supply. The divide between supply and demand led to a huge spike in the ETHER gas fee as users had to pay higher gas fees to facilitate quick transactions.

The network’s base fee quickly increased as every Ethereum block mined reached its maximum capacity. All users of the Ethereum platform were affected, including existing blockchain apps and other smart contract transactors who weren’t part of the NFT minting. Eventually, the NFT sold out and the contracts for Otherdeed used more ETHER than many popular apps on the Ethereum platform have used in their lifetimes.

How Yuga Labs Responded to the NFT Mint Upset

The company apologized on their official Twitter account, with the handle @yugalabs, stating that they anticipated the frenzy that occurred due to high demand and limited supply, and therefore, put certain measures in place to assuage i., But the rush somehow exceeded their expectations. 

They claimed the measures they had put in place beforehand, which include strict KYC gating, max mint of 2 NFTs per KYC’d wallet, and a significant clearing price of 305 Apecoins per NFT, could not contain the rush and the effects.

The company also offered to refund gas fees to buyers who didn’t have their orders filled. This may not completely satisfy many unsuccessful buyers as they experienced further loss from the price drop, from $19.98 at the start of the day to $15.99 at the end, experienced on the Apecoin.

What was the Public’s Opinion?

Many who were affected by the impact of the Otherdeed mint did not respond favorably to Yuga Labs’ publication on their official Twitter account. Accusing the company of being irresponsible in blaming the Ethereum Blockchain for the collapse, and proposing to create their own Ape Blockchain to support such heavy transactions in the future.

One user, named GreengGeorge on Twitter, said “You failed to do your part to optimize gas and instead just blame The. Incredible.” This was in response to a tweet that claimed that there were various gas optimization blocks Yuga Labs would have employed to avoid the gas wastage that took place on the day.

The NFT community’s excitement for Yuga Labs Otherside Metaverse is still very high despite the events of Sunday. A couple of days after its mint, Otherdeed became the 8th most traded NFT collection. Its increasing liquidity in the secondary market may be a sign that the dip will not last long.

This is proof positive that despite the seemingly negative events of the day, Yuga Labs projects are likely to continue to command the respect and love of the entire NFT community, and the future Bored Ape Metaverse, a virtual reality to look forward to.