Guest Posts – Page 32 – 🏝 Poptropica Help Blog 🗺

Hey Poptropicans, we have a very special guest with us! Thirsty Flame (aka Blank Slayte, or BigMarioFan99 on DeviantArt) is one of the winners of Poptropica’s 2020 Design Your Dream Island Contest. In this post, he’ll be sharing about his winning idea, Goofball Island. Smile and wave!

The first glimpses of Goofball Island were revealed in September 2021.

Hello, this is Thirsty Flame, and I’m glad you asked me for an inside look about my island idea: “Goofball Island.”

I want to get this out of the way first, to those Poptropicans who are aged 13+ and seen some of the NSFW stuff I post on Twitter or DeviantArt, this island will have none of that. I mostly try to be safe for all ages, and most of the stuff I post is alright.

Crazy Club concept for Goofball Island from the Poptropica Creators

Now onto the island! To be honest, I haven’t really thought about how the island will be played, like levels and all that. All that I submitted was a visual (see below), and the basic plot of the island:

In a colorful and bizarre-looking town populated by joke-loving and silly citizens, the evil scientist, Dr. Blandston, has invented a device to take away the town’s color and goofiness. It’s up to you to defeat Dr. Blandston and destroy his machine before he can turn the entire island into a dull, gray, land.
Plot of Goofball Island by Thirsty Flame

Goofball Island concept art by Thirsty Flame

I would like to imagine the island would play similarly to something like 24 Carrot Island, Mythology Island, or Monster Carnival Island. But, considering how new island quests like Fairy Tale Island use “side missions,” I’m not sure how Goofball will play out.

Still, I can tell you how I came up with the idea for Goofball Island. It was around the time the first Dream Island contest was happening in 2013, and I had gotten the Poptropica Island Creator Kit book to help me draw and write ideas that I had. My only problem was that I didn’t know how to send it, so I never entered my original idea.

See what other books Poptropica has released in our Merchandise Guide.

My original island was called “Toon Island,” and the plot was mostly the same one I used for Goofball Island, except someone was stealing Poptropicans’ sense of humor and you would find who’s doing it and stop them. I came up with ideas for the visuals, such as what the island would look like on the map…

Concepts for Toon Island, which later evolved into Goofball Island.

…as well as the medallion, two versions of the villain, and how Poptropicans look before and after their sense of humor is taken. Basically, for Goofball Island, I reworked my “Toon Island” idea and renamed it to “Goofball Island,” since I doubt they would’ve accepted an island named “Toon Island.”

Shortly after it was announced that my island won, I came with ideas on what I thought the logo for island would look like and reworked the medallion idea as well. I hope I’m close to being right with what Poptropica ends up creating.

With the official sneak peek of the island that was shown recently (and at the top of this post), I can say that it was exactly what I was hoping for, and I’m excited to play it when it comes out.

I do want to point out something in that sneak peek, specifically the building labeled “Bosko’s Car Fixing & Embroidery.” Coincidentally, I have an original character named Bosko, who is a mechanic. I made this character well before the second contest was announced. I’m not sure if this was a coincidence, or if they found my DeviantArt page and are using some of my characters.

“Bosko is Toon City’s best toon auto mechanic and can fix any toon car that rolls into his garage. Sometimes he’ll have some strange cases, but he will always get the job done.”

Either way, thank you for your interest in how I came up with Goofball Island! I hope it will be one of Poptropica’s memorable islands.

Hope you enjoyed this guest post by Thirsty Flame/Blank Slayte. If you did, you might also enjoy other posts in our My Dream Island series, including an inside look at another Dream Island winner, Secret of the Jade Scarab.

The Poptropica Help Blog welcomes interesting Poptropica insights from anyone in the Poptropica community with thoughts to share. Interested in writing for the PHB? We’d love to hear from you! 📰✨

Fanfiction, Guest Posts

Fanfic: The Princess and the Raven, part 5 👸🐦

October 4, 2021June 15, 2022 Slanted Fish

Hey Poptropicans, this is a guest post by Shy Scorpion. Enjoy!

Hello Poptropicans, and welcome to the next part of my fanfiction! It’s Shy Scorpion and I know it’s been a while, but welcome to part 5. (Catch up on part 1, part 2, part 3, and part 4 if you missed any of them.)

Scene 4: Snow White is sitting in Red’s Pizza Basket with some very familiar faces: Red, Cinder, and Amelia. They are all eating pizza while Red bakes some more at the counter.

SNOW WHITE:

Wow! It was lucky to meet you here, Amelia. I’ve seen you once, after Rumpelstiltskin was defeated, but we never really got to talk.

CINDER:

Yeah, you’re a great storyteller too, I loved hearing about your race against the Baron!

AMELIA:

Thanks, but I am so glad to meet all of you! You’ve all really caused a buzz among people on home island. Speaking of which, how’s it going with these boyfriends of yours?

CINDER:

Great! The huntsman and I are actually really alike, and that helps a lot. We’ve had some great conversations over cups of coffee.

AMELIA:

Nice! I prefer tea myself, but never mind, how about your boyfriend, Snow White?

SNOW WHITE:

(silent for a second) It’s good, actually, it’s great! I guess I always thought villains were all horrible people. But I’m seeing now that actually some of them had good inside of them, they just needed the right person to bring it out.

AMELIA:

(smiles) I’m starting to see that. Speaking of villains, have you guys heard the news about Rumpelstiltskin?

SNOW WHITE, CINDER, and RED:

No!

AMELIA:

He recently sent my friend, the adventurer one, on a quest to find and free the king of Fairytale Island.

RED:

Why would he do that? I thought he was obsessed with taking away everyone’s happy endings? Won’t this make the prince happy?

AMELIA:

I’m just as confused as you are! Once they found the king, he started crying about a… queen or something? But I’m not sure why this is a big deal.

SNOW WHITE:

(going pale) If the king comes back, do you think everything on Fairytale Island will go back to normal?

AMELIA:

(happily) Of course! (sees her face) What’s wrong?

SNOW WHITE:

I think I know why Rumpelstiltskin did what he did. To ruin my happy ending!

AMELIA:

What? Why?

SNOW WHITE:

If the king comes back, then my postponed wedding to the prince is back on again!

A bell dings, and another familiar face walks in.

RUMPELSTILTSKIN:

(with a grin) Why, that’s precisely the point!

I hope you liked this next part of my fanfiction! I was basing a lot of this around the new Fairytale Island side-quest, so if you’re not a member (like me) and want to find out what happened, the PHB has a walkthrough for Rumpel’s Challenge.

Did you find any of my easter eggs? Tell me your thoughts on this next part and where it could go in the comments. Next time, Poptropicans!

Hope you enjoyed this guest post by Shy Scorpion. If you did, you might also enjoy The Villain Saga, which inspired this fanfic!

Guest Posts, My Place in Poptropica

My Place in Poptropica: Silver Shell

September 17, 2021September 18, 2021 Slanted Fish

This is a guest post from Silver Shell sharing her My Place in Poptropica story, which is all about one’s Poptropica journey. Enjoy!

Hi! I’m Silver Shell, and this is my first post on the PHB. I’m going to show you my MPIP, My Place in Poptropica.

The Great Discovery

The year was… actually, I don’t know when the year was. I must’ve forgotten. Huh. Sorry if any of you wanted the year.

It was the middle of summer. I had nothing else to do, so I was on my computer, playing a bunch of uncool math games on Cool Math Games. I was scrolling, and I saw a picture of some lady with aviator’s goggles, a hat, and a jacket. She looked kind of like Amelia Earhart, actually — just missing some key ingredients like, I don’t know, a nose and ears. Since I was fascinated by aviation back then, I thought the game looked cool.

The Flying Ace Race — scene from Monkey Wrench Island

Then there was the name. Poptropica. How do you pronounce it? I had no idea. For a few days, I walked around calling it “pop-TROPE-ee-kay”.

Anyway, I Googled the game to see if search engines thought it was any good. Fun? Okay. Communicating safely? Why not? Educational…Oh. No. That ain’t gonna work. See, I was kind of sick of games where they’re all like “What’s 5 times 5? Good job! You’ve unlocked a pet!” and stuff like that. Regardless of that, I was curious, so I clicked.

And behold, the beginning of an era.

Playing the Game

I was welcomed by some pink rabbit with goggles standing on a floating island (little did I know I would see stranger things than that!) with a bunch of stuff flying around in the background. After spending maybe twenty minutes just staring at the screen to see what would fly around in the background, I finally clicked “new player.”

After creating my avatar to look as much like me as possible, and talking to the girl in the goggles and jacket (who was actually named Amelia, after the aviator!), I went on my first quest, to a creepy-looking, kind of run-down island called 24 Carrot.

I’ll admit, back then I didn’t quite understand how the islands worked. I thought if I refused the quest, there would have to be something else to do. I thought I was really on a time limit.

*I thought hiding behind flowers would conceal me from Dr. Hare*.

After winning, I received something I would never forget. It was such an important symbol of my achievement and duty as a Poptropican…

My first medallion. *cue the hallelujah chorus*

The Old New Poptropica

I played Poptropica almost every day for a long time, but after a while, I realized that things weren’t changing. I wished for something new every day. I was coming to a scary suspicion that the creators were giving up on their own game. I checked the Pop Creators’ Blog nonstop, but nothing. I stopped playing for a while. I had to focus on school, anyway.

That all changed one day in 2020, when I decided to check the Creators’ Blog again for the first time in months, and I saw something amazing, something mysterious, something I had never seen before, and it was titled: Classic Islands are Baaaaaacccckkkk!

I immediately bought a membership, sailed through islands I had never before seen, met characters, defeated villains, saved innocents, and my medallions were piling up. I never felt happier!

Then I read the post again. They were here until the end of Flash. What? The end of Flash? Poptropica’s life force is shutting down?!

I Googled it to see if it was true. Sure enough, Flash was going away, but Poptropica’s here to stay! I played the old islands for as long as I could, as many times as I could, and tried to make the best of it while I had it. I was sad when the old islands left, but I was proud of myself for bringing peace to so many islands.

The Beginning of the End

At first, I thought it wasn’t too bad. Flash had just been taken away, and Poptropica wasn’t too different. In fact, some improvements even came out! I liked how NPCs walked across Home Island. The removal of the movie theater wasn’t a big deal. I thought it would be fine!

Later, a mini-quest of one of my favorite islands came out: the Zomberry Hero Special Event! For a while, there was peace in Poptropica.

And that became a problem. Sure, there was the occasional mini-quest, but without new islands, there wasn’t much left to do. Little did I know I would be wishing for things to stay the same in the future.

Home Island before (top pic) it was remodeled in 2021 (bottom pic)

It all kind of collapsed for me when Home Island was remade for Haxe. I loved it the way it was, but now too much is changing. Every single part of Poptropica I loved was either taken away or changed. The changes were always glitchy and annoying in my opinion. The characters became bouncy and peppy and unnatural. No matter how much I petitioned, the creators wouldn’t bring back what I had come to love: Old Poptropica. I couldn’t rely on anything.

Bunk: Perhaps you, too, will love the 90s.

Or so I thought.

Meeting the Community

I was searching “Poptropica Help” one day just because I was bored and I wanted to see what came up. A Poptropica Help Blog?! This was just what I needed to keep myself distracted!

Life Jackets On: The lucky few who made it to the lifeboats.

I found a huge blog with thousands of readers who love Poptropica as much as I do, a place that keeps me informed about new stuff, one where people all around the world can share their ideas.

That led me to even more fansites: the Poptropica Wiki, We-Love-Poptropica on DeviantArt, and so much more. I finally found a part of Poptropica I could rely on: the community! This was what I could trust!

Media Bias: Don’t trust what the robots say.

(You can guess how heartbroken I was when the PHB changed their entire blog as a prank on April Fool’s Day!)

Now, I’m a part of the community, and guest-writing here on this blog, too. So there you go! My Place in Poptropica!

I think all of you deserve a medallion for reading this entire thing. It’s pretty long. Thanks for reading!

Don’t stop popping,
Silver Shell

Hope you enjoyed this “My Place in Poptropica” story! If you did, you’ll probably enjoy our other MPIP stories here on the PHB.

If you haven’t already shared your story, we invite you to send in your own. Interested in writing for the PHB under a different Pop-topic? Take a look at our Write for the PHB page for ideas, guidelines, and more! 📰✨

Guest Posts, Popspiracy Theories

Popspiracy: The Magic Girl 🦄☔️

September 12, 2021September 8, 2021 Slanted Fish

Hey Poptropicans, this is a guest post by Incredible Fire. Enjoy!

Hello everyone! Over the pandemic, I’ve gotten really into gaming theorists, so while I was scouring the latest mini quest for a potential “Is Amelia a Villain?” theory, I stumbled onto something… interesting. It may just possibly change the way we think about Poptropica forever. So what is this game-changing theory?

In the top corner of Amelia’s house, we see that she’s been studying Rumplestiltskin. The lipstick flashes purple when you interact with it — and it’s the same purple flashes with white sparks seen in Fairy Tale Island when Rumplestiltskin uses magic.

Also in Amelia’s house, we can see photos of her with her friends. Most noticeably, the girl from the statue on Home Island. We can gather from her statue that she’s studious, and from the picture, can apparently do magic. And what color is her magic? Purple with white sparks.

And that’s not all, folks! If you look at the king in Fairy Tale Island, he doesn’t really resemble his son. That could be for any number of reasons, but guess who he does resemble? Our magic girl. They have the same skin tone and similar bouncy hair.

Perhaps Purple Girl is actually Rumplestiltskin in disguise, or vice-versa. It’s not too far-fetched for our shapeshifting trickster. That would explain her absence from the game and why Amelia is so intent on finding her.

But then again, maybe not. Rumplestiltskin presents as a male, and seems older than the girl in the image. It seems more likely that he’s an older relative. Or perhaps the girl is related to the king, and Rumplestiltskin is a mentor?

And what role does Amelia play in this? Who are the other people in the picture? What about Xavier and Red Baroness?

If I’m actually right, what does this mean for Poptropica? Is Poptropica actually building an extensive lore around the newer islands of the game? Are they being subtle and letting us pick up on the clues for ourselves? Are we getting a part 2 to Fairy Tale Island? And most importantly, is Poptropica gonna be able to pull it off? I don’t actually think I’m right, but I’m excited to find out!

Hope you enjoyed this guest post by Incredible Fire. If you did, you might also enjoy other posts from her, such as her My Place in Poptropica story.

Clubhouse, Guest Posts

Clubhouse Tour: Dangerous Shadow 🏡

September 6, 2021September 5, 2021 Slanted Fish

Hey Poptropicans, this is a guest post by Dangerous Shadow. Enjoy!

Hi! The name’s Dangerous Shadow, and imma show you my Poptropica clubhouse!

Let’s do the front entrance. So first, we have a totally awesome skateboard (though I fell and hurt my knee when it tipped over). There’s my diamond skull saying ”Hello” — it’s ever so kind!(lol) And then there’s my bag and cap on that smiley-face-whatever-thing.

Hm, next we have… Oh! The two parts of the living room! There’s the fireplace, which isn’t on right now because it’s summer. Then we have a really nice looking couch. They’re really fluffy, too! And there’s a little stool with a plant cat! Man, it’s cute.

On the other side, I also have a moon chair (I mean I think it’s a moon chair, it looks like one). There’s a very comfy hammock there, and a TV. And then there’s that unicorn thing… I’m pretty sure it’s a pillow, if not, let me know in the comments down below!

Now let’s go to my pets’ room — ugh, what is happening with my eyes there? So anyway, my kitten is named Toast! You can’t see it in the pic, but it’s just a cat with grey fur and a toast head.

My puppy, which you can see there, is named Dino. Here is my dog’s little house. He loves to play with the ball in there. There is some pet food in that bowl, which the pets share, and nearby is my cat’s little home-y kinda thing (I’m not doing well at remembering the names 😦 ). And there is her yarn, which she adores.

Let’s move onto the kitchen now… :OOO Someone hid my chocolate cake behind the bread basket, and I was trying to find it — I wanted my chocolate cake! *jumps up to get it* Almost there! Lol, to tell you the truth, I just never got a table, and I don’t know why! But I do have a fridge, drink machines, and food.

Let’s move onto my bedroom. It’s my favorite part of my whole clubhouse! Okay, I couldn’t get everything into one picture, so I took two. So I have my very comfy bed, with my penguin toy animal holding my phone—hey! What are you doing with it! *penguin just stares* Oh, wait. It’s a toy. Toys don’t talk.

I have a bookshelf. I love love love love to read! I have my grumpy-looking owl lamp there, with a chest full of more books and a couple more toys. I have more books on top of the bookshelf, as well as some lanterns — at least, I think they are lanterns. On the wall I have a pink moon decoration and some pictures of my friends. And I needed those beautiful light-up trees. Okay, onto the other part!

It’s my… gaming station! There’s a gaming chair. It’s pretty comfy. I have two speakers giving off some “Keeping It Loud” vibes. There’s my gaming computer, and you can see there’s that hanging chair with that orange pillow, and of course another one of those light-up trees.

Next we have what is kinda like my chillaxing/calm room. I have my (one) window in here, my music thingy majingy and a huge rainbow beanbag, plus my basketball stuff (okay, basketball isn’t really calming — I just put it there XD). I have my phoenix here too. Say hi, Feather! Oh, he’s in a calm/chillaxing mood. Better close our eyes with him — Dino, I said, “Close your eyes with him!” Hm, Dino ain’t listening to me today.

Well, that’s the end! Also, if you’d like to friend me, my username is: foxamazing1 (you don’t have to tell me, I know it sounds silly). Byeeeeee!

~Dangerous Shadow

Hope you enjoyed this guest post by Dangerous Shadow. If you did, you might also enjoy other clubhouse tours we’ve featured, such as this Hare-y home from Invisible Ring. Consider sharing yours, too!

The Poptropica Help Blog welcomes interesting Poptropica insights from anyone in the Poptropica community with thoughts to share. Interested in writing for the PHB? We’d love to hear from you!