Hey Poptropicans! Remember back in February when the Creators mentioned their Haxe Javascript project, which they’ve been working on since last year, and which would allow Poptropica to survive post-Flash?
So far, there hasn’t been much to see—but recent developments are showing signs of progress, or at least, experimentation. Let’s take a look!
For some time now, the Haxe build has been accessible at a link that’s not too hard to guess: poptropica.com/haxe. Now, clicking on the “Play For Free” link on Poptropica’s homepage goes directly to this link, and players have been reporting some interesting features they’ve seen.
For starters, here’s a screenshot from Perfect Fish, showing daily login rewards of credits that increase as you keep up your login streak.
There’s also a new character selection screen, with about seven pre-designed characters you can pick from to hop into the game right away — no customization of name or appearance. (Thanks to Quick Fang for the tip.)
This “Pick a Character” screen used to be more similar to the one we’ve had since late 2018, but with different (one might say less appealing) colors of bright orange and purple. (Thanks goes to Scrooge200 for these screenshots.)
As seen above in the Home Island screenshots, your player clubhouse is among the features not yet ready in Poptropica’s Haxe. Still, a new clubhouse icon has popped up in the menu, replacing the friends icon. It might be a while before the friends feature is ready in this new Poptropica… 😢
If you visit the Haxe build at the link above, you’ll find that the map is looking even more sparse than usual: there are literally only 6 islands so far. (But don’t panic just yet—you can still find a more populated map by logging into the regular Poptropica, at poptropica.com/game.)
Along with Home Island, Snagglemast and 24 Carrot are counted as beginner islands, while “Adventures of Mystery” offers Survival 1, PoptropiCon 1, and just recently added for members only, Timmy Failure. (This is probably why they used the phrase “early access” when you click into it.)
But there is still one more page: the “Adventures of Deception,” which shows (unlabeled) Escape From Pelican Rock as coming soon. Silhouettes of two more islands can be seen on this page: Mythology up top and Shrink Ray on the right, by the looks of it. All these missing islands seem to suggest the Creators still have a long way to go with rendering AS3 (newer) islands into Haxe.
Survival 1 had me stuck in a never-ending loading loop over my character as soon as I’d crash-landed onto the island, and with this being the early stages, these few Haxe islands may still be working out bugs. Proceed with caution!
Poptropica in Haxe also brings in a couple of subtle changes to the iconography of in-game movement. When hovering over an entrance, the text that tells you what room you’re entering is now wrapped in a white bar, as opposed to the white outline on the text as before. Also, the movement arrow loses part of its white outline on the side facing your character.
Entering a room in Haxe. 
Movement arrow in Haxe.
That about wraps up what’s up in Poptropica’s Haxe so far. Not much, but not nothing, and with new features on the way, it seems!
Have you noticed anything else new in Poptropica’s Haxe Javascript build? What islands do you hope will return next on the map? Share with us in the comments or contact us by email, Twitter, or Discord. Keep on popping on!
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🦄 Ponytropica 🦄 