Summer on Haxe and Avatar Studio Hijacks

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Hey, Poptropicans! Today, we’re going to talk about a store rearrangement, a Home Island makeover, and the Avatar Studio. Why am I getting a strange case of déjà vu?

Anyway, let’s get started with this week’s store lineup!

This week, players can purchase trendy summer fashion and classic costumes. Although the Orange Julius is members-only, the other outfits are available to all players. These items are: Rainbow Storm, Rebel Beach, Spiff Boy, Soccer Player (boys and girls), Mythology Surfer (boys and girls), Pop Star, and Rock Star.

Over the past few weeks, the four items in the Powers section took turns being on sale one week at a time. First was the Bobblehead Power, then the Atom Power, and now players save big with the Binary Rain Power. Maybe the Flower Planting Power will be on sale next week? We’ll see.

Some other minor changes include some of the sections rearranging the order of their cards, as well as the Ice Blaster Pistol disappearing from the Pranks section.

Remember Home Island getting a summer makeover on Flash? The Haxe version of Home Island followed suit and welcomed summer in its own unique way. Bushels of apples can be found in the trees and on the ground. If you need a cool refreshing treat, head over to the ice cream stand next to the Blast-Off Arcade to get a free soft serve cone. Sweet! 😋

Need a place to get away from the heat? Players can now access their clubhouses in the Haxe Javascript build of Poptropica! Click the clubhouse icon in the menu to be transported to your virtual home away from home.

haxe clubhouse iconYou’re going to need some furniture to decorate your humble abode. Click the store button on the bottom left of the screen, and you’ll be transported to the clubhouse store. So far, twenty-three furniture items are available in the Haxe clubhouse store, with five being members-only.

Ah, the Avatar Studio. A simple application in which players can look up and share their avatars with others online. Former PHB author Purple Claw gave us a tip that something was amiss with the system. Players can still search for their avatars as normal. However, when you view the link to your avatar, you are suddenly greeted by this handsome fellow:

AvatarStudioVlad

Every Avatar Studio link now directs you to former Pop Creator Vlad the Viking’s avatar, regardless of the username you typed in. It’s a strange glitch, to be sure. Let’s hope this gets fixed soon.

That’s all for now. What do you think of this week’s store lineup? What items do you want to see return in the future?

Thank you for reading, and have a good day!

—Gentle Dolphin 🐬

Batter up! Summer’s here with paper cheer

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Hey, everyone, Gentle Dolphin here with a fresh batch of updates! Let’s take a look at what’s in store for Poptropica this week.

We have a new array of old costumes available to everyone! This week, we have: Baseball Fielder (boys and girls), Baseball Batter (boys and girls), Shady Pockets, Cool Green, Spring Fling, and Cheesy Slice.

Looks like the Bobblehead sale didn’t last long. The Bobblehead power went back to being a members-only item that costs 350 credits. On a lighter note, the Atom Power now costs an affordable 75 credits, so you can save money and show off your radiant looks (or is that just radiation?). 🤨

The Miscellaneous section still features the Cinnamon Fire PopGum and Balloons, but the Flash version of Poptropica added a printable Arabian Nights poster and the Avatar Studio. Interesting, they added the Avatar Studio though it won’t be functional after the Flash shutdown later this year. Are the Creators working on a way to port it to a new platform like Haxe Javascript? Only time will tell.

While the Haxe version of Home Island seems to be stuck in a perpetual autumn, the Flash version finally welcomed summer after a six-month long winter. The trees regrew their lush green leaves, barnacles made their homes on the rocks, and there seems to be a rise in seagull droppings. 🤢

On the platform where ads are typically present, you can see a billboard promoting the newest sponsor island— American Girl: Joss’s Island. Check out our post on Joss’s Island if you want a quick tour of this interesting little AD-venture.

HomeIsland_Summer2020_7

Looking at Home Island makes us long for the great outdoors. While we can’t leave home yet because of quarantine, the Creators have been giving us fun boredom busters to pass the time. They gave us coloring pages and word searches, and now they’re inviting us to get crafty with these Dr. Hare and Rabbot paper crafts!

These templates were originally released as rewards for the Dr. Hare’s Lair LEGO CUUSOO project, which was a pitch for a potential Poptropica LEGO set. Although the toy never came to be, we can still have fun and build with paper! All you have to do is print the templates then cut, fold, and paste as needed to build your own mini Dr. Hare and Rabbot!

That’s all for now, folks! What do you think of Home Island’s summer update? Will you take a crack at crafting a miniature mad scientist? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

Thank you for reading, and have a good day!

—Gentle Dolphin 🐬

Cobble up 75 credits, become a Bobblehead

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Hey Poptropicans! Another week of May has gone by, and surprisingly, there’s been a rotation of items in the store. Here’s what’s in:

Many of last week’s items are still around, but all the costumes have changed. In the costume department, we have: Cool for School, Baseball Uniform*, Orange Julius, Spiff Boy, Unicorn Girl*, Football Fever* (with a whopping 8 color options!), Prom Queen, and Swan Ballerina. (A * indicates members only.)

The Bobblehead power has been made available to all (it was members only last week) and dropped from 350 credits to a mere 75, so now’s a good time to snap up this wobbly-bobbly classic!

Modeling while bobbling.

In followers, the Dryad has replaced the Chick from last week, and in pranks, the Ice Blaster Pistol has joined the ranks. And finally, in miscellaneous, the Cinnamon Fire PopGum has risen to 300 credits, a drastic change from last week’s 75. (Thanks to Perfect Fish for the alerts!)

That’s all for this week’s news! In case you missed it, catch up on all the exciting stuff that came out in the past couple of weeks:

Stay healthy, Poptropicans! 🙌🧼

~/🐠

Get equipped with Quippy’s common room stores 👽

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Hey Poptropicans, have we got a lot to look at this time!

In addition to the monthly rotation of store items, four new shops have popped up around Poptropica, each with their own themed items. Plus, the game’s showing signs of progress on the friends feature, and for the first time in a long time, we even get to see some official concept art. Let’s explore!

First, let’s take a tour of the new shops, which are all located in various common rooms on different islands. These common room stores feature themed items for those islands—some new, some we’ve seen before. However, these stores are only available in Poptropica’s Haxe Javascript build, and are unlikely to be made for Flash, which will soon be obsolete.

These common room stores are available on four islands so far: 24 Carrot, PoptropiCon: Episode 1, Survival: Episode 1, and Timmy Failure.

Our first stop is the cinema on 24 Carrot Island. You will find Quippy hovering by the entrance. They’re offering Dr. Hare-themed goodies for sale: Hare Hotshot (which was the former BETA Carrotene bonus for members who helped beta-test the sound-updated 24 Carrot Island), Dr. Hare Plush Toy, Light & Shadow Hare*, and the Rabbit Ear Prank*. (* = members only)

While waiting in line to get into PoptropiCon (Episode 1), you can stop by the Facili-Tee store to buy cool costumes such as the Tinfoil Robot and the Supernova (basically recolored from a Tron ad). You can also show your love of Old School Islands by wearing the Lunar Colony Cosplay* and Game Show Cosplay*. Quippy is ready for the convention with their own adorable cardboard cosplay!

While traveling in our blimp, we get caught in a storm and become stranded in the snowy forest of Survival Island (Episode 1). Thankfully, we’re not alone. A wooden Quippy can be found at the frozen pond under the big tree to the right. They’ll offer feathery friends like the Blue Woodpecker follower and the Owl Head Rider, as well as a Ghillie Suit* and a Frozen Body power*.

Our final stop is Timmy Failure Island. The bad news is that Timmy Failure Island is only available to members. The worse news is that you need to have a membership on an account in Haxe Javascript, as Flash-made accounts are separate from ones made in the newer Haxe build.

If you have an active membership on a Haxe Javascript account, you can access the island and its common room. Though Quippy looks as if they came out of a garbage truck, the store items are anything but trash. We have a Total costume, a Señor Burrito follower, Timmy’s iconic red Scarf*, and a mighty “GREATNESS” banner*. (Strange to list some items as for non-members when the whole island and its store are for members only!)

You can do more than shop in common rooms, of course. The Creators are hard at work implementing the friends feature to the new Poptropica, and new Haxe players now have a fourth dialogue with Amelia when they first land on Home Island: to meet new friends!

In common rooms such as the Blast-off Arcade, you can befriend other players by selecting “Want to be friends?” from the chat menu. If they say yes, you’ll even get a pop-up message saying the friend was added successfully! (It might also say the user isn’t registered, if that’s the case.)

Despite this, the player profile and friends page aren’t ready just yet, so there’s no way to view your friends on Haxe at the moment. But the signs are there that this popular feature is being worked on!

Over on the Creators’ Blog, the Creators shared an inside look on how they created the adorable Quippy. Early concepts show the artists figuring out how to show players the common room stores — did they want a droid, a kiosk, or something else? Once they settled on a droid, they chose some of their favorite designs and explored them further…

All this hard work and creativity culminated into one of the most unique and adorable faces in Poptropica. A friendly droid equipped with a luminous smile and a keen fashion sense. The magnificent Quippy.

The Creators ended their post with a word of encouragement for budding artists and avid gamers:

If you love games and art, consider learning more about becoming a games artist! There are a lot of ways to get involved in the making of video games outside of coding, and game artists are a critical piece of the team. After all, what’s a game without the art!?

That wraps up this post! What do you think of Quippy and the presence of all these new stores? Thoughts on Poptropica’s Haxe build so far? Share in the comments, and if you haven’t yet, catch up to our other posts below!

Thank you for reading, and have a good day!

—Gentle Dolphin 🐬

May store arranges, 24 Carrot changes

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Hey Poptropicans! Store items for the month of May are here, and unlike last month, there’s no sign that they’ll change weekly this time.

The items are all ones we’ve seen before in Poptropica, though their availability on the Haxe Javascript build is a good sign of the Creators’ progress in porting over some of the older items to the game’s future.

For this month, the store costumes are: Soccer Player (boy and girl), Rainbow Storm, Rebel Beach, Mythology Surfer (boy and girl), Pop Star, and Rock Star. Miscellaneous brings us the Cinnamon Fire PopGum and Balloons, and in pranks we have Sticky Notes, Fart Gun, and the 8-Bit Birthday Pixel Pig Power.

As for the real powers, there’s Binary Rain, Bobblehead, Flower Planting Power, and Atom Power. Finally, in followers, we have the adorable Chick, Classic Pack, Charlie the Chocomonkey, and Atlantis Drone.

In other news, the Haxe Javascript version of 24 Carrot Island has had a few updates! (But not as drastic as the remastered version on Poptropica Worlds… Haxe hasn’t given us wild-haired Maynard or the Carrot Museum.)

You’ll see the first change right when you start the island, which now plays a short video showing a kid pulling carrots and getting whisked underground by a mechanical claw that drags him into the carrot factory, where Dr. Hare awaits. You can see this teaser video in our previous post.

The next change is a nostalgic one: you can mix a drink at the Carrot King Diner to change your hair color! This hidden trick was in the original 24 Carrot that released in 2008, but had disappeared when 24 Carrot was re-released in 2013 as a sound-updated island. Seven years later, it’s back!

Characters on this island also now come with small speech bubbles with just an ellipsis (the three dots) to indicate they have something to say. Perhaps this will extend to other islands in Haxe?

Speaking of, well, speaking, some of the dialogue on this flagship Poptropica island has been altered. Overall, the new lines flow well and give the player a better sense of what’s going on. Even the homeless man gets to explain his circumstances: the closure of the carrot cake factory has put him out of work.

And, at least one store in Poptropica still has toilet paper. 😉

Anyway, that’s all for this post, but these aren’t the only updates from Poptropica this week! Stay tuned for our next post, where we’ll talk more on the new common room stores and the funky little droid powering them…

Stay awesome, Poptropicans! 😄

From baby Dr. Hare to kidnapper: gifts of May

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Hello again, Poptropicans, it’s Lucky Joker here!

May has just begun and per usual, all paying members can expect to receive three free gifts upon first logging in at any time within the month. The exclusive items are an adorable Baby Dr. Hare Follower (a nod to the ever-so-popular Baby Yoda), a wacky Noodle Guy Costume, and a Sanitizer Super Soaker (good timing!). Fun gifts this time around, wouldn’t you agree?

In other news, the daily login bonus continues! We spotted this feature in HAXE a while back and it looks like the gift is here to keep giving.

For every day you log in, you’ll gain more credits, up to 625 credits if you keep up a streak of 5 days in a row. We love free money! 🤑

And lastly, Poptropica just dropped a new promotional teaser for the cherished classic, 24 Carrot Island. It’s a short, 12-second animation that depicts Magic Socks, one of the island’s missing kids, pulling carrots at the farm and getting whisked underground to the carrot factory, where Dr. Hare awaits. It’s a take we haven’t seen before, so that’s pretty neat.

You know what would be even cooler though? A trailer for the theoretically upcoming return of Zomberry Island — or any word on that at all, for that matter. You remember, right? The one set to release by the end of 2019… Looks like we’ll just have to keep waiting.

Thanks for reading! That’s all I’ve got for you today. Until next time, pop on!

– Lucky Joker 🍀

Community Creations: April 2020

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community-creations-logo

Hello once again everyone! Spotted Dragon here bringing you the April recap for Community Creations! April’s theme was Staying Home (and the featured work is not in any particular order). Be sure to check out all the featured artists!

No clue what’s going on? Go see our intro post.

Top 5 Picks

Bunch of Animals by T-ropicaNation

During this period of quarantine, I would be surprised if you haven’t heart of the popularity of Nintendo’s Animal Crossing. I know the game has certainly gotten me through some intense boredom lately. But if you aren’t familiar with the game, this is a fantastic introduction to it! The character designs are all super cute, and so it is wonderful to see some of our favorite Poptropica villains pictured in that style. According to the artist, “Rebel is a snooty deer, Copy is a peppy cat, Betty is a sisterly ostrich, Ratman is a smug rat, Crusher is a bear jock, and Speedy is a lazy hamster.” I absolutely love the colors and personality in this composition. Excellent design! Find their DeviantArt here.

Staying Home by Midnightoilstudios

Another subtle nod to Animal Crossing, I see! With a Nintendo Switch in hand, this character is certainly doing what most of us have been doing lately: sitting in bed playing video games. Nothing wrong with that! I love the little details in the composition, such as the photos on the bulletin board and items on the nightstand. They tie into Poptropica excellently, and really add more atmosphere to the scene. The blanket and Switch even match the colors of Binary Bard! Fantastic ideas. Find her DeviantArt here.

Studying BY AdventurersNHunters

Oooh, another cool bedroom scene. Inspired by Studio Ghibli’s “Whisper of the Heart,” this composition gives me real lofi vibes. It captures what it’s like to be a student during this odd time, as we attend online classes and try to gather motivation to actually study. Yes, Animal Crossing has been distracting me from school work. I love the dramatic lighting and the little details all around the desk. Just look at that Dr. Hare keychain! A fantastic CJ feature. Find her DeviantArt here.

Staying Home by Quick Fang

Aw, what a cute piece! A simple, straight-forward design, but a perfect representation of our theme nonetheless. We all may be stuck inside, which certainly hinders a lot of our routines, but that doesn’t mean we can’t stay positive. I love that we get to feature some animation, and the plain, blocked off colors really remind me of my childhood. Maybe I should use this time at home to learn some animation? Never too late to get into some new hobbies after all. Find the artist in the comment section or on Discord!

Super Hotdog Boy by ray-of-flight

Ah, I love this piece! Made for the Creators’ “Draw This In Your Style” Challenge of Ned Noodlehead, this work definitely reflects one of the art trends that has resurfaced during quarantine. Whether it be a DTIYS, a SixFanArts Tag, or some other trend, artists around the world have found ways to connect with people online. In this work in particular, I love the comic book vibe that the background gives off. The plain colors and lineart are super smooth, allowing the figure to really pop off the page in a graphic way. Wonderful work all around! Find his DeviantArt here.

Honorable Mentions

  • Six Fanarts by ANNE14TCO
  • Poptropica DnD Shenanigans by BlazingAngel123
  • regret by Magniventris
  • Actual Schedule During Quarantine by PegaKid2012
  • Easter Buns by WitchyArtistGal

Wow, so many great entries this month! Should I even be surprised?

May: How Do I Participate?

Community Creations is a cool series for anyone in the Poptropica community to join in on. To sum up what it’s about, it’s basically a chance to show off your artwork, creepy fan-fics, Pop clubhouses, costumes, and anything else that pops into your mind.

If we really like the piece you submit, we will feature it here on the PHB! As long as it relates to that month’s theme. So what is May’s theme? May’s theme is…

Wild West

If I were to describe the current state of the world right now, I think “wild” is a word that comes to mind. Times are kinda crazy and everyone is being affected in different ways. It’s important to remember that we are in this together and that so many people are working hard to improve this situation, but at times it really can feel like the wild west. Illnesses, supply shortages, and empty streets can be seen in every direction. But hey, just look at how well the environment is doing, right?

Anyway, it’s time for you to push away that boredom of being trapped in your house and show me your most creative Wild West creations! I’m talking cowboys, horses, desert scenes, you name it. So bring it on!

  • Comment below with a link to whatever you’ve created OR share it with me (SydVC aka Spotted Dragon) on DeviantArt, Twitter, or Discord.
  • Results: I will feature 5 of the submissions as well as 3 honorable mentions.
  • Limitations: Nothing NSFW, and make sure you relate to the theme.
  • Due Date: I will take any entries before the end of this month. Submit as many things as you’d like!

I will be sure to let you know I have seen your creation. While quality counts, I’m mainly looking for something to simply catch my eye, so don’t be afraid to join in!

So what are you waiting for? Go make something awesome!

~SD