Candy Crazed, Fairy Tale Island

Get sugary high with the Fairytale-twisting Candy Crazed Mini Quest 🍭🍬

Slanted Fish

Hey Poptropicans, get your flexing fingers ready — as promised, the Candy Crazed Mini Quest is here!

To get started, head on over to the candy palace on the map, or find the one-legged Master Huggles on Home Island.

Upon arriving at this sugary heaven (which is canonically part of Fairytale Island), you’ll find (as leaked earlier) the prologue comic showing Hansel and Gretel nomming on everything in sight. But unlike the original fairytale, some of these sweet treats are sentient, including the beloved blue gummy bear Master Huggles! Horrified by the hungry humans, a little witch orders Nanny to cage the children…

…and that’s where you come in! If you can follow the treat tower’s trail and grab all 100 gumdrops along the way, the witch says, the kids will be freed. So there you go — jump on gelatinous confections and bop your way to the top. With all the heights and slippery objects, it’s not as simple as it appears, but there’s no time limit!

When you’ve beat the game, you’ll get to see the end comic, in which the freed kiddos find Lady Licorice and begin eating her, too. You’ll earn 50 credits for each playthrough, so you can replay this to rack up credits!

You’ll also win a Little Witchy Follower. She sparkles!

  • pic: Silver Horse

Now that we’ve had a chance to digest this digital dessert, which comes at the heels of a similar Lost Cubs Mini Quest, let’s dish out some thoughts. This style of quick gameplay seems rather like the ad games of Poptropica’s somewhat distant past, but without the ads, although some players on the PHC reported seeing ads for Rugrats and other things. Ad-based mini-games are fine (and often fun), but they’ve never been the main highlight of Poptropica. Stories are.

And while there’s some story packed into this Candy Crazed mini quest, most of it takes place in the comics. We’re dropped right in the middle of the action to pick up a hundred gumdrops, and then we’re out again.

Still, the story itself is interesting — while inspired by the classic fairytale of Hansel and Gretel, it also brings the lively twist of new candy characters, like Master Huggles, Dot and Gummy. It’s too bad we don’t get to interact with them at all in the gameplay.

But perhaps that’s what separates an ad-like mini quest from a full-on island. Which is why, while mini quests might offer a fun distraction with cute new lovable critters, we’re going to keep saying it: Bring back the old islands (or make new ones that go beyond mini quests)!

That’s a wrap for this post. What did you think of this mini quest? Does it make you think Pop Rocks or it’s just worthy of Snickers? Was it a Milky Way (to go) or a Milk Dud? Pop on over to the comments and let us know!

~Slanted Swedish Fish 🐠

Candy Crazed, Merchandise

Treat yourself to new Pop merch & Candy Crazed sneak peeks 👓🍫

Sporty Boa

What’s up Poptropicans? Sporty Boa here to share some good news involving Poptropica’s official merchandise store and their upcoming Candy Crazed mini quest!

First things first, Poptropica has added brand new Fairy Tale Island-themed merch to their store!

New clothing, stickers, sunglasses, masks and more products featuring Poptropica’s newest characters have been added to the catalog! Also as shown in the images above, you can get 15% off your purchase by applying the promo code: ZAZZTHANKYOU. I myself plan to take advantage of this poptastic deal and finally order those adorable Hoptropica stickers I’ve been wanting!

#BringBackHoptropica

Speaking of treating yourself to sweet new stuff, Poptropica’s crazy cool Candy Crazed mini quest will be available for all players to enjoy tomorrow! Thanks to a leak from Silver Horse on the PHC, we get to sink our teeth into this pleasant prologue comic:

Poor Master Huggles… You were too delicious for this world 😥

This sweet sneak peek provides some insight as to the plot and characters within the mini quest. Plus, Poptropica’s latest blog post dished out some eye candy of their own by verifying that the two chomping chums in the comic are none other than the famous fairytale siblings, Hansel and Gretel!

Could this reveal give us some reason to suspect this quest takes place within the realm of Fairy Tale Island? All this candy craziness has me craving for more! Thankfully the wait is almost over…

Let me know in the comments what has you hyped for tomorrow’s mini quest release, as well as what new merch items caught your eye on Poptropica’s updated merch store!

Stay safe and stay awesome! ~SB🐍

Contests

PHB Special: Pop the Difference, Round 4

LJ

Howdy, Poptropican friends! It’s LJ here with another round Pop The Difference! Let’s pop right in, shall we?

Here’s how the game works: Down below are five pairs of Poptropica images, each containing five differences. Some differences are easy to spot while others may be tougher. Are you up for the challenge?

1) Shark Tooth Seek

2) Fairytale Fish-Around

3) Bazaar Bewilderment

4) Comb the Crowd

5) Scour the Staff

How many could you find? Send in your answers to [email protected].

The first person to correctly spot all 25 differences (5 in each) will receive a drawing of their Poptropican by me. (Check out my DeviantArt page to get a glimpse of what you’re in for. :P)

Answers and winners will be revealed at some point in the next coming weeks. That’s it for now and I’ll talk to you all in the next one. Pop on!

– LJ 🍀

Advertisements, Contests, Fan Art Features, Social Media

Monthly costume design contests, strange art shares, and… questionable ads?

Agent Bubbles

As we continue to wait on news for the porting of old islands and the imagined futures of Fairytale Island, the Pop Creators made an announcement regarding a new Costume Design Contest.

This event has been held a couple times in the past, but now, a new contest will be held every month! According to the Creators’ Blog, the contest will be open for two weeks each time, so the current one closes June 7 at 8 pm PST.

If this continues, plenty of fans should have the chance to see their designs become a virtual reality! Unlike past versions of this event, no prizes (such as membership) were mentioned, other than having winning costume designs implemented into the game. Good luck to all!

Continuing with the subject of fan art, Poptropica shared six new Instagram stories today. But there’s something a little odd…

Look closely and you’ll find that two of these pieces are not Poptropica related—with one being a non-Pop original character, and the other being fan art of a character from the game Resident Evil, which does not exactly share Poptropica’s demographic. They are done by arts.n.darts, the same artist who also recently made fan art of Betty Jetty that the Pop Creators did not recognize.

While it would be admirable if this is simply an effort to show more support towards artists who have previously made Poptropica fan art, the shares are nevertheless uncharacteristic, and also raises the question of whether Poptropica’s social media person (or people?) is once again unaware of Poptropica’s content. Sus?

On a final note, a couple changes appear to have happened to the ads that appear on the website and in-game.

From past observations, most ads on Poptropica are specifically targeted towards its younger audience, similar to how they are sponsored to make in-game advertisements that showcase books, toys, or movies and shows that its general demographic may enjoy.

However, lately the ads appear to be more random and not exactly geared for kids. PHB staffer Gentle Dolphin reported seeing ads for Honey, which is a browser extension for online shopping, as well as for Morgan & Morgan, an injury law firm.

It’s understandable that a game needs to make a profit to survive, but this does raise some suspicion towards Poptropica’s insistence that they are still getting a large amount (“over a million”) of players. Why would they need to accept more advertisements if that was the case? The COVID-19 pandemic has had an effect on businesses, but as an online game, has Poptropica been growing or shrinking in attention? The branching out on ads seems to suggest the latter.

As of now, fans have many questions, many of which we may not see answers to soon. Hopefully we can still have fun while we wait with contests, upcoming quests, and the next Dream Island!

Castori honorem ~ Maryann/Smart Bubbles

Free Membership Giveaways

PHB Membership Giveaway: May 2021

Slanted Fish

Hey Poptropicans, we’re approaching the end of the month, which means it’s time to announce another lucky Poptropican to win our monthly membership giveaway! 🎁

Congrats, Friendly Shell — we’ve enjoyed your friendly presence in the PHB comments and are pleased to give you this month’s membership prize. The availability of Poptropica islands today may be a shell of its former glory, but have fun revisiting Time Tangled and decking out your clubhouse with some new members only gear!

If you’re not a member, you still have the chance (or many chances, in fact): the PHB is hosting a giveaway every month, and it’s easy to enter! Just comment on the Free Poptropica Membership page and leave at least two other comments around the PHB within the month to be entered into that month’s giveaway.

We’ll announce a winner sometime in the final week of each month. If you don’t win, you can always try again for the next month! Full details »

Congrats again to Friendly Shell, and as always, keep on popping on! 🐚

~🐠