🏝️ Poptropica Help Blog 🗺️

Hey Poptropicans!

The #PoptropicaArt contest (details here!) continues on in full swing, and just recently on the Creators’ Blog, Skinny Moon posted the second round of finalists, this time pulling entries from Facebook. (The first round of finalists can be viewed here.)

Among the entries, we see works by Orange Monster, Mia G., Yuan V., Kayla V., three pieces by Maryann P., and three more by Tiger35767. Congratulations to the artists! Check out the art below!

By Orange Monster

By Mia G.

By Yuan V.

By Kayla V.

By Maryann P.

By Tiger35767

Don’t worry if your art hasn’t been featured yet – Poptropica promises to feature lots more art over the upcoming weeks. For the next round of finalists, they’ll be looking to Instagram!

There’s still plenty of time left to create something for the contest, which ends September 5th. To enter, just post your art on either Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram with the hashtag #PoptropicaArt (or ask an adult or another Poptropican if you don’t have access to any). Full contest rules are here.

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I’d also like to mention a quick site update – you may recall earlier when we implemented some fun updates to the PHB. Unfortunately, some of these have had to go – but perhaps not completely!

While the new features were generally well received, there were unfortunately a few technical difficulties regarding the change that have led to us recently switching back to WordPress.com, our original server. As a result, we’ve had to let go of a few features (such as the Art gallery and Forums) because they’re not supported on WP.com.

Although we’re sad to see them go, we hope you enjoyed them while they lasted. If you did, then we have a couple of recommendations for you: the We-Love-Poptropica DeviantArt group is where the art comes from, and it’s a community full of Poptropica fan artists, including many of the PHB staff!

Also, if you liked the forums, we hope you’ll check out and participate in our PoptropicaHelp subreddit, where you can submit all sorts of Poptropica things (art, theories, stories, the list goes on!) and share your thoughts on topics started by other Poptropicans. We even recently added flairs for you to show off your tribe allegiance! It’s quick and easy to get started with a Reddit account.

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Speaking of art, here at the PHB we’re also doing a little art contest of our own as part of the Tribal Tournament we have going on this month! Check out this post for more information about the Artistic Athletes round. There’s still time to enter (until August 21), so compete while you have the chance!

Plus, keep an eye out next week for our final Tribal Tournament challenge. 😉

Stay popping, Poptropicans!

Glitches, Guest Posts

Common Room Glitch: Forced Battles

August 11, 2016June 22, 2017 Slanted Fish

(Hey Poptropicans! This is a guest post written by Perfect Sky, a Poptropica player who’s also quite active in the community. She’s here to share a cool common room glitch – enjoy!)

forcedbattlepop

Hey everyone, it’s Perfect Sky! So as some of you may know, I’ve been an active Poptropica player since early 2008. And with all those years of playing, I’ve picked up on several different glitches.

But over time, most of the glitches I knew of were shared and became pretty well known in the community… besides one! The one I’m about to share with you a pretty cool battle glitch that I discovered back in 2011, and I’ve been using it all the time ever since! Very useful if you like hanging out in common rooms. So, let’s begin!

Have you ever seen someone in a common room that you just really want to battle? Whether it’s because they have a high rank, or maybe you just thought they looked familiar and wanted to battle them again. But when you ask them for the game, they say no. And after asking for every single battle on the list… rejected! Always rejected!

I can’t be the only one this happens to, right? And of course, there are the times where the Poptropican you want to battle is just “busy.” Well guess what? There’s actually an easy solution to this!

The steps are very simple. All you have to do is ask a different player for the battle, then immediately click on your desired opponent before the first player responds.

battles 1

And if the first player says yes, you’ll find yourself in the battle with the player you clicked on after!

battles 2

But this glitch only takes the other player to the instructions page, so they could just close the battle before starting. So you may be wondering, does this usually work? Well, let’s take a look at player two’s point of view! There are a couple main reasons why another Poptropican may not want to battle you:

Your rank is too high.
You just beat them in a previous battle.
They are “busy”.

Fortunately, with this glitch, the other player has no idea who’s on the other end of the battle when the start screen appears. So if a high rank or a previous defeat was causing them to turn down your battles, that won’t matter! The other player will have no idea who the opponent is until after clicking “start.”

And if they close out of the battle after starting and seeing who they’re up against, then who cares? You still get another win adding to your game stats while the other player gets a lose, so who’s the real winner here? However, if the other player is busy, don’t be surprised if there is no response. Sometimes when a player is busy, they’re AFK (away from keyboard) and totally ignoring the game.

Now remember, this could get a little suspicious if you use it a bunch of times to battle the same player. So I would recommend that you don’t try to force battles with the same person more than a few times. Also, try not to ask them a million times before using the glitch, because they might become suspicious of you when a random battle suddenly appears on their screen. But after years of using this glitch, I can tell you that most of the time, the other player will accept the battle.

So you may be wondering, “What if someone uses this glitch on me, and I don’t know who they are until after clicking start?” Just click the back arrow, and you can leave the page without gaining a lose to your stats.

Well, that’s all for my little glitch. I hope you all like it and find some opportunities to use it!

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Hope you enjoyed this guest post by Perfect Sky!

The PHB welcomes guest posting from anyone in our community if you have something to share, whether it be sneak peeks, My Place in Poptropica stories, or any other ideas you might have. We also encourage sharing on our subreddit and the PHC.

If you have an idea for a guest post, send it in to [email protected]!

Guest Posts, Popspiracy Theories

Popspiracy: The Origin of Poptropica

August 10, 2016June 22, 2017 Slanted Fish

(This is a guest post by Happy Lobster, Shaky Skunk, and Tall Cactus, PHB readers here to share some Poptropica thoughts. Keep in mind that what they present is only theory, not to be taken as fact. If you have a Popspiracy, see below for details on guest posting! Enjoy! –SlantedFish)

popspiracy

What’s popping, Poptropicans? Happy Lobster, Shaky Skunk and Tall Cactus here, and today we’re going to be sharing our mega theories about the origins of Poptropica. HL and Shaky were writing separate theories for the PHB, but since they were both similar, they decided to combine the posts together. Then Tall Cactus wanted to help, since she’s basically the queen of theories. Well, that being said, let’s get started!

The Realms Theory

Hey there, it’s HL here with an immense Popspiracy that I’m surprised no-one has brought up before. You may know me from Discord, the Forums, the comments of PHB posts and the blogs I work on, which includes my blog, HLPB, and the others I work on: PSB, ECC and Clawtropica. Usually, I’d save things like this just for the blogs I actually work on, but as I said before, it’s immense. Mind-blowing. Tremendous. Everyone should know about it. So, let’s get started! Just make sure that you ain’t feeling sleepy right now, because this Popspiracy has about 900 words.

To begin with, my Popspiracy is about… Poptropica. And not a particular concept in the game, but the concept of itself. It delves deeper and deeper into the roots of Poptropica, revealing its greatest secret. The true origin of Poptropica, whereas Shaky will describe each possible aspect of the beginning. This does follow the amazing theories of Poptropica by both Koi and Purple Claw. So just to sum things up, Koi’s theory was about the fact that Poptropicans are possibly descended from aliens, and Purple Claw’s theory was about the fact that Poptropica could possibly be one of the bubble-like orbs we see when we visit the realm of… well, Realms. Feel free to probe deeper into these theories via the links if you want to see the exact foundations of these theories.

So with that out of the way, my question is: Why, when a new Poptropican is born, is it that they enter a world that is exactly the equivalent of all other Poptropicans’ worlds, with the same characters, landscapes, and quests, and yet Poptropicans never encounter each other (apart from Multiverses) in the same world?

The answer isn’t simple. But let’s walk the road that’ll lead to the ultimate answer. Firstly, as PC says, the general world of Poptropica is a Realm. Poptropica isn’t endless, like the other Realms, but it is ever-expanding, and it’s probably as large – if not even larger – than the space in each Realm we’ve bothered to explore.

pop realms

So what if – there are multiple, individual Realms of Poptropica? Read on to hear our ideas!

Continue reading “Popspiracy: The Origin of Poptropica” →

Store

Unreleased Store Items: from Amazonian to White Out

August 9, 2016August 9, 2016 Spotted Dragon

Hello everyone! This post is proof that I am not dead, no matter how socially awkward I may be.

Anyway, today’s post features several unreleased items from Poptropica, that we may or may not be seeing in game. Thanks to idk for the pictures by the way.

As you can see, these items (costumes) consist of the Amazonian Woman,Loon’s Head Cane, Secret Society Trooper, Shakespear in Love, Stun Baton, Terror Captain, and White Out.

To me, these all seem like costumes that would be found as bronze cards in the Store, but we may not even end up having any of them. I say this because the “Stun Baton” reminds me of the ZMB Unit costume that was for members only when Zomberry Island was first released, since that costume includes a similar handheld item. It would seem repetitive to make such a similar item available.

Still, all these costumes and items seem pretty interesting! Tell us what you think of them in the comments below. 😛

~SD

Contests

PHB Tribal Tournament: Artistic Athletes!

August 8, 2016August 26, 2016 Slanted Fish

“Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art… It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things which give value to survival,” penned the writer C.S. Lewis. And indeed – for this next round in the PHB Tribal Tournament, we’re now calling on the artists to bring value to survive in these games. Read on for the details!

If you are new to the PHB Tribal Tournament, please read up on the event details here so that you’re all caught up. If you have questions, comment below!

This next round of the tourney is called Artistic Athletes, and we’re going to be looking for your best Poptropica art, which comes in several categories:

Visual art! Draw or paint your best Poptropica fan art.
Fan fiction! Write the next great Poptropica novel, tribe cheer, short story, poem, screenplay, or other written masterpieces!
Fashion! Put together a stunningly stylish summer outfit for the Games! Tell us the username and/or take a screenshot of the character.
Realms! Create your own games stadium or other work of athletic art with Poptropica Realms!

You may submit a creation you’ve made before, but extra consideration will be given to entries that are tribe-themed or related to the Poptropolis Games, so we recommend that you try to match that theme. You can enter as many times into as many categories as you like to increase your chances of being selected.

To enter your work, you can either post in your tribe’s channel on the PHC (as we have been doing with the other rounds of the tournament), tweet us on Twitter @Poptropica_Help with the tribe you’re representing, or email us at [email protected] (again, with the name of your tribe). You have until August 21 24 (extended time!) to enter!

Now about earning points! How this works is this:

The representative of each tribe (one of the eight PHB staff) will go through all the entries for their tribe and select what they feel is the top choice for each of the four categories.
The selections will then be brought up to all the PHB staff, who will each rank every selected entry – except from their own tribe, to eliminate bias – from what they feel is the strongest to least strong. If your tribe has no entries for any category, then sorry – you won’t earn points for that category, so your best bet is to enter something!
We’ll then count up the place numbers each selected entry has received and divide it by the number of placements given through votes to get an average for each. The smaller the score average, the higher it ranks (for example, if a piece wins multiple “1” (first) places, it has a smaller total score but has been voted higher). From there, the first place piece in each category will receive 80 points, second will receive 70 points, and so on down the line.

Also, here’s an animation I made (of the PHB tribe reps working out) to inspire you guys to participate in the Tribal Tournament, particularly for this creative round! Game on, Poptropicans!

tribepop

Don’t forget, you can still earn points for your tribe by joining in the Medal Marathon, all the way through August 24! Check out the original Tribal Tournament post for details.

We’ve been getting lots of enthusiasm on the PHC about the tribe tournament, which is awesome – keep it up, and join in if you haven’t already! We’re also excited to see your art, so get creative! 😀