Contests

Announcing the 9th Sp00py Halloween Costume Contest Winners!

phb 9th hallo win

B O O, s p 0 0 p t r o p i c a n s !

It’s here:ย happyย Halloween!

You know what that means (at least, you should if you’ve been paying attention to the PHB in the past month)โ€”it’s time to unveil the winners of our 9th Annual Sp00py Halloween Costume Contest!

This time around, we had two categories you could enter in: Poptropica Original, and the newer Poptropica Worlds. We received tons of awesome entries (admittedly mostly for Poptropica Original, which still looks to be the more popular game).

But in the end, it came down to these sp00ptropicans… (hover over each costume to view their names and creators! note that untitled entries were assigned names):

๐ŸŽƒย Top 6 Poptropica Original Halloween Costumes! ๐ŸŽƒ

Now these are definitely trick-or-treaters you would not want to deny at your door! But that’s not all. Take a look at the customization capabilities these creatives have come up with over on Poptropica Worlds:

๐Ÿ‘ปย Top 6 Poptropica Worlds Halloween Costumes! ๐Ÿ‘ป

There were so many more amazing entries from Poptropica Original that we just had to feature a whole bunch more. So here are 9 honorable mentionsย of costumes we thought were pretty sp00py, too (click to view in full size):

๐Ÿญย Honorable Mentions ๐Ÿญ

As we announced in our post about the contest, in addition to being featured here, each of the winning costumes will also be immortalized on our Costumes page! The prize for our honorable mentions is simply the honor of being featured here.

ALSO! We recently reached out to the Poptropica Creators about our contest, and they agreed to sponsor it with one-month memberships for each winner. So, if you were a winner, look out for an email from us and let us know your username so we can pass it on to the Creators for your membership prize!

Thanks to everyone who participated in this year’s Halloween competition! We’re all sp00ped out from looking through your sp00py suit-ups, but we’re amazed by all of your creativity. Congrats to all the winners!ย If youโ€™d like to check out everyoneโ€™s entries,ย browseย the comments sectionย of the contest post now… beforeย itโ€™s too late.

๐Ÿ‘ป โ€  Happy Halloween from the PHB! โ€  ๐Ÿ‘ป
๐ŸŽƒโ˜ ๏ธ๐Ÿญ๐Ÿคก๐Ÿ˜ˆ๐Ÿ‘น๐Ÿ‘ฝ๐Ÿซ๐ŸŽƒ

Contests

PHB’s 9th Annual Sp00py Costume Contest!

phb 9th hallo

Hello, sp00ptropicans! October is here, Halloween is just around the corner, and that means itโ€™s time for the PHBโ€™s Annual Sp00pyย Halloween Costume Contest!

This is our ninth year doing this, and this time around, we’re going to have two categories:ย Poptropica Original and Poptropica Worlds!

Traditionally,ย Poptropicans submit their best Poptropica Halloween costumesย in the comments section byย giving an Avatar Studio linkย and/or posting their username. Since the Avatar Studio only works for accounts on Pop Original, the procedure for submitting a Worlds costume will be different โ€” details below.

Tips for a sp00py costume

As you put together your entry (or entries โ€” feel free to submit as many times as you like!), keep in mind the following:

  • ๐ŸŽƒย Be original!ย Instead of just using all the parts of one costume that already exists, mix and match to create your own unique costume.
  • ๐ŸŽƒย There are someย great Halloween costume partsย at the ghoul gathering from the end of theย Haunted Houseย quest from the Store, as well as the collection ofย free costumesย in the Store, but be creative and search in other places too! We have tools like the Avatar Studio Gift and iPop to help you find just the right parts you need.
  • ๐ŸŽƒย Keep your costume intactย until after the winners are announced on October 31 (Halloween). If you change your costume before then, we may not see it!ย If you donโ€™t want to keep the costume on your main account, you can create a new one and post the link to that instead. Or, send us a screenshot from the Avatar Studioย in the same way as you see cropped on our ASG page. (Entries for Worlds will require a screenshot โ€” don’t worry, it’s a simple process!)
  • ๐ŸŽƒย Optional: Give your costume a groovy name. It’ll help your costume stand out even more, and if it wins, we’ll refer to it by the name you’ve given it!

How to enter your costume

  • ๐Ÿญ To post your entry for Poptropica Original,ย go to theย Avatar Studio, type in your username, clickย Load, click on theย Linkย to highlight it, right-click and choose Copy. Then, go to the comments section onย this post, right-click and choose Paste, type in your comment (you can include your username if you’d like to) and submit it, so we can view your costume by clicking the link!
  • ๐Ÿญ To post your entry for Poptropica Worlds, go to your closet and take a screenshot (see instructions here for screenshotting on any computer or mobile device). Then, upload your screenshot on an image hosting website such as imgur or TinyPic, copy the link to your image, and insert the link into your comment so we see it!

For both games, you can submit as many entries as you like, but if you do, make sure to use multiple accounts so that you don’t overwrite the last costume you put on. Remember, though, you can only win a maximum of one time for each game.

The contest closes on Monday, October 30. Winners will be announced October 31.

Winners & Prizes

  • ๐Ÿ‘ปย On Halloween (October 31), weโ€™ll make a post featuring the winning costumes on the front page of the PHB for all to see, *PLUS* each winner will receive a one-month Poptropica membership, courtesy of the Poptropica Creators!
  • ๐Ÿ‘ป The winning costumes will also be immortalized on the PHBโ€™sย Costumes page, where you can see examples of past Halloween winners.
  • ๐Ÿ‘ป Weโ€™ll haveย 12 winners totalย โ€“ 6 costumes from each game โ€“ as well as some honorary mentions for just the post, but not the page.

๐Ÿญ๐Ÿ‘ป๐ŸŽƒย Happy Costumizing!ย ๐ŸŽƒ๐Ÿ‘ป๐Ÿญ

๐Ÿฆ‡ย P.S. If you’re feeling especially artistic in this spooky season,ย be sure to participate in this month’s Community Creations, which also has a Halloween theme!

Contests, Membership, Social Media

Parrotfish for Membership and Top 5 Fashion Tips

Hello, everyone!

Lucky Joker here with the results of Poptropica’s 10th Birthday Membership Contest, as well as a “Pop 5” of fashion tips from Poptropica! First, let’s hear from the winners…

On September 15th, Poptropica announced their membership contest, in celebration of Poptropica’s 10th birthday. The contest called for a submission of an original island idea including a birthday cake, a parrotfish, and the color green in the story.

The winners receive a free 1-month Poptropica membership (which works for Poptropica Original and Worlds). The ten lucky winners are listed below, where you can also read their winning submissions! Click to view the images in full size.

Gentle Singer (Alh1106)

pop10 gentlesinger

Hyper Gamer (17312043 โ€“ a VIP blogger at Poptropica Fun Zone!)

Fearless Lizard

Young Cloud (Brikris)

Maroon Jumper (LillySparkle$ โ€“ a VIP blogger at Pop Blog!)

Thirsty Seal (Peanutty333)

Friendly Grape (SimplyArtByAlly โ€“ a Poptropica VIP!)

Wild Bubbles (TheUnicorn09)

Striped Dolphin (warblaster414)

Jumpy Coyote (westpb) (aka Yujo โ€“ a guardian on the PHC!)

So creative, right? Congratulations to all of the winners, and good job to everyone who participated!


Moving along… Poptropica posted a new video on their YouTube channel yesterday! Stephanie, the newly introduced Creator, shares her fashion tips on how to make your Poptropican look its very best. Check it out!

In the video, Stephanie goofily dresses up in costume (in real life) to present her ideas. Here are the tips she gave in the video, summarized below:

  1. catshirt
    This cat shirt, shown in the video, is available on the girl with the pink jacket in the shop!

    Patterns are your friends: Patterns can amp up any style. Mixing in patterns can help give your avatar personality. Stripes, polka dots, checkers, flannels, floral – you name it! Pairing similar patterns in different colors, sizes, and tights is a great way to go.

  2. Don’t be afraid to accessorize: Accessories can help define your look and bring it together. They can be useful, like a hat and scarf, or ornamental, like a pair of earrings. There are tons of things you can choose from in the Poptropica Worlds shop, so don’t be shy, and accessorize!
  3. Layers upon layers: Layers in real life can keep you warm, which makes layers a flexible fashion tip. Layers aren’t just useful in the cold, however โ€” they also look cool! A sweater, a button-down, or a flannel could really change your style.
  4. Colors: Bold or Matchy-Matchy?:ย Colors have been shown to create different feelings. For instance, blue tends to calm you, and yellow makes you hungry. Additionally, colors can also convey your mood. So, wear what you’re feeling!
  5. Alter ego:ย Who inspires you? Maybe a celebrity? An athlete? A superhero? Whoever it might be, try recreating their style with a twist that represents you. Whatever your alter ego is, let it shine through. There’s nothing from stopping you be whoever you want to be!
  6. Bonus Tip: Look for sales! With a Poptropica membership (which, again, works for both games), you can get all items for 25% off, as well as exclusive member-only costumes. (Not sure when the percentage changed, but it looks like the Creators heard our comment about the upping the membership advantage for the shop!)

What do you think about the video? What contests would you like to see from Poptropica in the future? Let us know down in the comments! This is Lucky Joker signing off; we’ll talk soon…

Lucky Joker sign off

Bonus Items, Contests, Livestreams, Social Media

Contest-winning and 10th Birthday Costumes, plus a Pop Worlds Livestream!

Hey Poptropicans! Looks like things are popping on Pop again. ๐Ÿ˜‰

It may have taken a good seven months, but it looks like the Poptropica Creators are finally about to bring the winning designs of the #MyPoptropicaCostume contest to the game, with confirmation that that means both Poptropica Worlds and Original! Check out the awesome sneak peek, featuring mermaids and letterman jackets:

costumecontestpeek

They haven’t given an exact release date, only “soon,” but it’s a comfort to know they’re at least being worked on (it is rather long overdue). Maybe my earlier nudging helped โ€“ but in any case, it is nice to see a glimpse of what they’re working on (we’ve been pretty starved for regular sneak peeks lately!).

Here we see the grand prize winning designs, “Ocean Princess” designed by Creepy Peanut and “Hip Hop Boy” by Speedy Toes. The 6-month memberships they won have probably expired by now, but at least they’re finally going to see their costumes for real, and with designs for more than one gender, expanding upon their original entries! Hopefully, the top 10 runner-up costumes will soon follow.


Speaking of costumes, the 10th Birthday Costume has finally been added to Worlds, this time glitch-free! You can find it in the store for free. Get it while it’s here!

If you’re playing on mobile, be sure to update your app so you’ll see this costume in the store, along with the all-new Ye Olde Shop building!

worlds 10th bday
pic credit: Young Hippo & Yujo_Jacy_the_Jumpy_Coyotekans

(And it only took an extra weekย compared to Pop Original…)


In other news, Poptropica had their first ever livestream this weekend: specifically, this past Friday (Sept 22) at about 4:40 p.m. EST. It was completely out of the blue, not having been announced on any of Poptropica’s social media channels except YouTube. You can catch the entire 22 minutes of video here:

The livestream is hosted by one Creator, a young lady in the corner of the screen who introduces herself as Stephanie. Her game username is later revealed as PopTrop_Steph. A quick look-up in the Avatar Studio shows that she has never played Pop Original (at least not on her account), since Worlds accounts that have never played Original (like hers) will have the “Afro Guy” appearance (as she does โ€“ so it looks like she’s probably a new Creator). (Personally, I’d like to see some livestreams for Pop Original too, though I guess the closest we have are Captain Crawfish’s walkthroughs!)

Indeed, the whole video focuses on Poptropica Worlds, from creating an account to landing on Home Island to โ€“ well, that’s about it, really. What Stephanie goes through will probably be familiar if you’re not completely new, but if you want to watch a Poptropica Creator narrate an exploration of Worlds while eating a bunch of gummy bears, this is the video for you. Oh, and we’re promised there’s more to come in the future.

We’ve never met Steph before, but she seems pretty friendly and excitable. It looks like we’ll be seeing more of her on future YouTube livestreams โ€“ the next episode, she says, will be about what you can get with membership in the store. That might get some kids interested in membership, but we hope Poptropica will remember to keep up the love for the free players as well.

It’s not clear whether or not Steph is responsible for the rest of Pop’s social media these days, although I would guess not, since the mystery blogger on the Creators’ Blog has previously used a yellow-haired male character. Regardless, it’s nice to finally know at least one face and name โ€“ and if there are other social media staff working for Pop, we hope they’ll introduce themselves as well!

What did you think of the livestream video? What would you like to see in a future video from Poptropica? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

<ใƒป)))><<

Bonus Items, Contests

๐ŸŽˆPoptropica’s Poppin’ 10th Birthday Bash! ๐ŸŽˆ

Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday, dear Poptropica,
Happy birthday to you!

It’s official: Poptropica is 10 years old! It’s been a whole decade, and Poptropica is still, well, popping. That’s incredible. We said as much earlier this week, but today the Creators made it official with their big birthday bash, on and off Poptropica!

First, as promised earlier, the 10th Birthday Costumeย โ€“ grinning monkey and all โ€“ is here! You can get it for free on Poptropica Original by going to the store. It will also be on Worlds, but they’re still “getting the final birthday touches added,” so it’s not there yet.

cake10 2

On the Creators’ Blog, the Creators also shared a glimpse of the celebrations going on in real life at Poptropica HQ in Boston โ€“ featuring a sweet-looking birthday cake with the 10th birthday costume printed on it, and a happy birthday message, sitting among a bunch of Poptropica graphic novels, including the latest book, The End of Time!

The mystery blogger on the Creators’ Blog had this to say about the occasion:

ITโ€™S BIRTHDAY TIME! The big 1-0. 10 years of Poptropica awesomeness, time really does fly. Another year under our belt with a newly launched book AND game, the next upcoming year is sure going to be as exciting as the last. Here at Poptropica HQ, we love to celebrate with cake and fun (as I am sure you have seen in past years)

Well, it’s nice to see the festivities at Pop HQ!ย The post came out around 11 am EST today, with a promise at the end for “another gift we will open today for all of you, and this one is BIG!” So, what they brought up next, at around 2 pm EST, is most likely the rest of the “big release” they had planned for September:

A MEMBERSHIP CONTEST!!!

membership10

The full details and rules are available here, so be sure to check that out before you start dreaming up ways you’re going to win this thing! They’ll be giving out 10 one-month memberships, which are good for both Poptropica Original and Worlds.

The task is to come up with a completely unique island with 3 pre-determined ingredients: a birthday cake, a parrotfish (that’s a real fish, by the way), and the color green. You can present it in any way you want, whether that’s through prose, drawings, websites, or whatever else you can think of to show it to the Creators. They haven’t promised to actually make any winning island a reality, but it’ll still be a fun endeavour.

On the page with all the details, the benefits of membership are displayed to show you what to look forward to if you win, and interestingly, there are a couple of features on the Worlds chart we haven’t seen on Worlds before: an all museums access pass and early island access. So far on Worlds, these things have not been restricted to members, but this suggests that they very well could be in the future. (Thanks to idk for the tip.)

membership benefits

You’ll have 10 days to create and enter for this contest starting today. It ends September 25 (Monday) at 9 am EST. Be sure to read all the rules, and use the submission page to submit your one (and only one) entry!

Speaking of contests… I do believe many of us are still waiting for the winning costumes from the #MyPoptropicaCostume Contest of yesteryear to actually appear in the store. So… if the Creators are still able to pull off another costume and contest like they’re doing now,ย let’s hope they get on that old promise too. ๐Ÿ˜‰

By the way, don’t forget: the PHB is hosting a Poptropica party this weekend to celebrate the big entrance into double-digit years! Check out this post for more info, and be sure to come! It’s going to be a blast, and the PHB team hopes to see you there!

10years party

๐ŸŽˆ๐Ÿฐย ๐ŸŽ๐ŸŽ‰ย ๐ŸŽ‚ย Happy 10 years, Poptropica! ๐ŸŽˆ๐Ÿฐย ๐ŸŽ๐ŸŽ‰ย ๐ŸŽ‚

Here’s to many more.

pop chars

<ใƒป)))><<