I think I might have found a clue about Bored Ape Yacht Club’s Mutant announcement…

When I bought my first ape I had no idea that I’d be sitting here a few months later with apes, dogs, and an uncanny interest in learning everything I possibly can about a mythical Mutant Ape Yacht Club…but here we are. Like most people, I had no idea when I bought my first ape that I’d also end up with some dogs that I’d end up turning down offers on that were 4x what I paid for my first ape. What BAKC (Bored Ape Kennel Club – i.e. Bored Ape Yacht Club doggie companions) is that additional NFTs created by the BAYC crew, carry real value and themselves are valuable investments.

Fast forward to today, and many new NFT investors that can’t afford an ape, start with a dog, and they’re more than happy to spend $5,000+ of real money (converted to ETH) to get one. So, it shouldn’t be too surprising that when Bored Ape Yacht Club announced that “mutants” were coming, and then sent out the following tweet, the excitement reached a new fever pitch:

The tweet above went out on Saturday which made for an exciting weekend and has left us all wondering – is this the week? Oh and if it is the week, what the heck is the Mutant Ape Yacht Club?

Like most Bored Apes, I don’t know much about what’s coming outside of speculation, but I noticed something interesting that could be a clue around what might be coming. First – a few things that I’ve heard about the release that seem to be generally accepted by everyone:

1. You won’t have to burn your ape to participate
2. All signs seem to point towards some kind of either breeding or additional companion NFT

As for anything beyond that, well – your guess is as good as mine. All that being said, I do think I might have found a clue related to the mutant launch that’s interesting enough to share. Maybe it’s silly, maybe other people have already noticed it, but it’s new to me and I thought it could be a bit of a hint/easter egg. It has to do with the following image everyone has probably seen a million times by now:

For those wondering, yes – this is the mythical “inside” of the Bored Ape Yacht Club. If you notice towards the back there’s an arcade cabinet called “Mutant Ape” with a “Out of Order” sign posted on it. So…the week Bored Ape Yacht Club launched, I changed my desktop background to the inside of the Bored Ape Yacht Club and yesterday I was looking at it and I noticed, hmmmm – the arcade cabinet was originally different. Here’s the original image:

As you can see, originally there was no “Out of Order” sign, instead – there was a game on the screen. Here’s a closeup:

On the screen we can clearly see what looks like a 2D side scrolling video game like Mario, or let’s just say, Donkey Kong, and a big creature that looks a lot more like a Gorilla than the thin slender apes we’re all HOLDing now. This makes me think that maybe the original idea for mutants was a mutation of an existing ape into a bigger, gorilla-version of an ape, and maybe there’s a video game tie in as well?

Of course this is just a complete guess – I have no insider knowledge here. That being said, I do think it’s interesting that this video game console screen was changed, namely the screen blacked out an an “Out of Order” sign put in its place. Only time will tell if my guess here turns out to be true, and maybe I’m the 10,000th person to notice this making it a not-so-amazing discovery.

Still, this was a new discovery for me and I think could be a hint at what’s to come for the MAYC. What do you think?