Nike and Jordan Brand have revived a handful of legendary sneakers this year, to much fanfare. The return of the Wu-Tang Clan Dunks, Galaxy Foamposites, and Undefeated Air Jordan 4s all gave sneakerheads another chance to own grails they thought they might never see again. This month, another highly coveted shoe is making its comeback: the NikeCraft Mars Yard 3.0, the latest installment of the Mars Yard series pioneered by artist Tom Sachs.

The Mars Yard 1.0, which debuted back in 2012, was unlike anything the sneaker world had seen before—an unassuming tan-and-red shoe built from NASA-designed fabrics for exceptional durability—and as such, it took a beat to catch on. By the time the second version rolled around in 2017, with minor tweaks for even greater functionality, the Mars Yard was considered one of the most wildly desirable kicks on the planet. Even wrapping the sneaker in a hazmat-suit-esque bootie, as Sachs did with 2019’s Mars Yard Overshoe, couldn’t slow down the hype train.

Then, in early 2023, just months after Sachs and Nike had expanded their partnership with the new NikeCraft General Purpose Shoe, a New York magazine article citing several former employees described the artist as fostering a “destabilizing and scary” workplace. Nike moved quickly to put the collaboration on hiatus. Eighteen months later, however, the brand announced that Sachs had “demonstrated and recommitted to fostering a culture of respect and inclusivity” and restarted the project. That decision became the source of much debate in fashion, art, and sneaker circles.

In July, Sachs and Nike began the ambitious rollout for the Mars Yard 3.0 with a program dubbed the ISRU (In-Situ Resource Utilization) Summer Camp—a weekly series of creative and physical challenges, distributed via an app, that gave participants a chance at being selected to purchase the Mars Yards. “I can’t guarantee you will get the shoes,” Sachs said in a press release, “but I can promise your life will improve by participating in meaningful daily routines.”

In a different era, an immersive experience like this one would’ve been catnip to most sneakerheads. And while thousands of fans still signed up to participate in the ISRU, it’s unclear if the shoes are still connecting at the level they once did. On resale platforms like StockX, while the Mars Yard 1.0 and 2.0 are selling for anywhere between $5,000 to $10,000, the 3.0’s value is currently hovering around $1,000. That’s hardly a bargain rate for sneakers, but it’s still a very significant dropoff from previous markups. Is that an indication that the 3.0 has, at long last, oversaturated the Mars Yard project—or that the controversy has impacted the shoe’s desirability?

“I think the leftover aura that the Mars Yards have is still powerful enough to overcome the misgivings people may have about wearing a shoe associated with Sachs,” says Brendan Dunne, StockX’s senior director of customer community and engagement. “I don’t doubt that there are some who will make the moral decision to abstain from his sneakers based on what we’ve heard about Tom Sachs the person, but I also don’t think we’ll see a lack of demand from the wider sneaker community.” That said, Dunne didn’t see fit to sign up for the ISRU himself: “Personally, I didn’t try to buy the Mars Yard 3.0. The baggage around them now, coupled with my having already enjoyed previous iterations, is enough for me to skip this one.”