PHB Series, Surveys, Web Development

PHB survey analysis: what do you readers say?

PHB survey results

Hello PHB! Remember the readers’ survey I posted about a week ago as part of the PHB’s 13 million hits festivities? Well, in this post, I’ll be unveiling the results – although I should mention that the survey service used only showed the first 100 responses (for free), so accuracy only goes so far. Also, the “Poptropica population” represented are all PHB readers. Still, let’s take a look. 😀

1) What is your gender?

A pretty straightforward question – and results reveal that it’s pretty even, with slightly more Poptropica-playing (or at least PHB-reading) girls at 59%, and boys at 41%.

survey1

2) What is your age?

This one may be more surprising – while Poptropica’s target audience is ages 6 to 15, it seems the PHB’s audience comprises of the older half of that and even beyond. The most popular age group was 12 to 14 at 46% (almost half), followed by 9 to 11 at 35%, and then 15 to 17 at 15%4% claimed to be 18 or older, while on the other end of the spectrum, none who were 8 or younger responded.

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3) Are you a member on Poptropica?

According to survey results, 50% (half) of you guys are paying members on Poptropica – and a further 14% say you used to be or will be. In contrast, just 36% have never been members and have no intention to be. Good thing the PHB covers member releases in a timely manner! 😛

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4) When did you first start following (viewing) the PHB?

There’s a little bit of each in this one – with more recent years getting more votes, the most being 2013 (the year Poptropica got sound) at 25.51%, and 2014 (this year) at 20.41%. Then 2012 (when the Friends feature came along) follows with 19.39%, then 2011 (when Poptropica released their guide book) with 15.31%.

After that, 11.22% say they’ve been following since 2008 (the beginning)! Lastly, 2009 (the year of the PHF & PHC’s beginnings) and 2010 (when membership was introduced) are both tied at 4.08%.

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5) What PHB features do you regularly use or browse? (Check all that apply.)

On this question, those who answered could check as many options as they deemed appropriate – and here we see that the news & sneak peeks we show here on the blog are the most popular, at 79%! Island walkthroughs and Cool Stuff pages (cheats, costumes, & more) are tied at 73%.

50% (half) of those polled say they read the PHB magazines (The POPCORN, formerly known as The Poptropican’s 911). Lastly, just 30% regularly use the PHC – our hangout spot for Poptropicans to chat (about anything!), party in Multiverse rooms, and have fun.

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6) How often do you play Poptropica?

About once or twice a day and a few times in a week have tied here at 27.55%, while several times a day takes up 20.41% of votes. That’s about 75% (a vast majority) who do log in often; a good sign for Poptropica of course. 😀 In the minority, once every couple of weeks received 10.20% of votes, followed by once a week at 7.4%, then once a month at 3.06%. Finally, once every couple of months and even less than the options listed tied at 2.04%. Not bad!

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7) How often do you visit the PHB?

Now for the PHB itself – most (42%) say they visit about once or twice a day, while several times a day and a few times in a week are both tied at 20.41%. Once a week took up only 9.18% of votes, once every couple of weeks even less at 4.08%, and no one voted once a month.

Also on the low side were once every couple of months at 2.04% and even less than the options listed at just 1.02%. All that being said, the PHB is grateful to have so many avid readers! 🙂

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8) How likely is it that you would recommend the PHB to a friend or colleague?

This question was apparently “standardized” by the survey service, but colleagues aside, it allowed voters to rate us between 1 (lowest) and 10 (highest). 52% rated us either 9 or 10, 25% picked between 7 or 8, leaving just 23% choosing a 6 or lower. I’m not quite sure what the “net promoter score” means, but it’s 29. All in all, pretty good. 🙂

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9) How did you find the PHB?

Not surprisingly, most people (83.84%) found us by searching the web for some form of Poptropica help. 14.14% say they found the PHB through another website, while the remaining 6.06% came here at someone’s recommendation. Well, that’s the breakdown.

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10) Leave us any other feedback – complaints, praise, criticisms, thanks, etc.

This was a comment box where people could say whatever they wanted. Lots of responses came through, some anonymous and others signed, but here’s a sample of them:

So basically this is how I learned about the PHB. I was known as the Poptropica Master of my class. Everybody would ask me how I defeated the islands, and I actually had no idea. My cousins were actually the ones who taught me about the game, and beat all the islands for me. I was embarrassed at how I didn’t know what to do, even though I did very much enjoy the popularity, I kinda hated how whenever somebody asked me something about Poptropica, I would just say, “I don’t remember.” So, one day I asked my cousins how they found out about Poptropica. They mostly shrugged, and explained how one of my cousins was struggling in school, and often used the Funbrain website. Then eventually discovered Poptropica, and, well, fell in love. I also asked them, “Well, how did you become so good at it?” Then my oldest cousin smiled, and said, “The Poptropica Help Blog of course.” And when I got home, I decided to check the website out, and discovered how to actually learn to become the Poptropica Master all of my friends thought I was. And now, I’ve beaten almost all of the islands with only The PHB’s help. So you guys are doing a great job! Thanks for helping me out! -Random PHB reader

Many of you talked about how the PHB has helped you with Poptropica, blogging, and even making you the “Poptropica master” among your friends and classmates, which is pretty awesome! 😀

I love the PHB. I recently started following it, but I have been viewing it for much, much longer. I think you have gotten much better over the years and I am going to keep viewing your blog for years to come. Keep up the awesome job! I think you should add more things to the POPcorn magazine and that’s all.

Some things people have asked for include: more costumes, more costume contests, more things added to our fan magazine The POPCORN, a feature for introducing our unique Poptropican characters and writing their backstories, and more. We appreciate the feedback, and we’ll see what we can do! 🙂

If you ask me, this is the best fansite poptropica can have. I love your costume page, but it would be nice if you could update it more often. I found the PHB when I was looking for help on Vampire’s Curse, and have been there ever since. I love the POPCORN, it just blows my mind, every issue is different. In conclusion, this is the best fansite around, and i hope to continue reading it!!! Signed, Quick Fang

Also, someone asked about how the PHB background was made – so here’s the secret. Some time ago, before one of YouTube’s many layout changes, the Poptropica Creators had this image (I call it the “Poptropica bits and pieces”) tiled as the background of their channel.

However, it was pretty dark – so after saving it, I went through the hue changer and adjusted brightness/contrast on an image editor (I used Pixlr, but there are plenty of options out there, such as Photoshop). After several adjustments, I decided a lighter shade worked best with the PHB’s layout. (By the way, if you’d like to use any of these, please credit the PHB!)

This image works because it can be tiled, as in repeated next to each other continuously with no break in the pattern. You can also see it used in the Poptropica Crowd wallpaper and also this older wallpaper, but it’s harder to extract it to have it be able to tile just right.

Anyway, hope you enjoyed this insight into your fellow PHB readers/fans – about 100 of them, anyway. Despite that limitation, at least the survey results came with some cool bar graphs with a nice color scheme! 😛 Result-gathering is now over, so thanks to all of you who took the time to answer! 🙂

Uncategorized

PHB’s Poptropica Land (alpha v2) Construction Contest!

What’s popping, Poptropicans? Blake here. In correlation with the earlier festivities for the PHB’s 13 million, I decided to create a little contest of my own: a Poptropica Land Construction Contest!

Land contest

We promised a community event involving Land, and this is it! Now, Poptropica has already featured some creations on their Twitter, and for inspiration, here are some more from the Creators’ Blog:

They’re great and all, but they haven’t entered this competition, and besides, we believe you guys can do better… so, onto the contest! 😀 Poptropica Land is now in alpha version 2, and you’ll need to be a member to get the Poptropica Labs card in the Store that will allow you to play “Poptropica Minecraft”. For a guide on how to get started with building, check out the PHB’s Poptropica Labs page!

the rules:

  1. You must use Poptropica Lands for this contest. That’s the point! This means no other programs (Minecraft, Unturned, Sir Buildsalot’s Buildatron *that last one is fake, don’t go looking for it*)
  2. Build anything you want! That’s the purpose of Poptropica Lands, after all! Build watchtowers, treehouses, statues of yours truly, anything, really! Just be sure that what you make is original.
  3. When you’re ready, download a POP file of the world you created.
  4. You can send in more than one design, but keep in mind that for those who win, only one design max will be chosen per person to give others a fairer chance.
  5. You have until September 5th to email your POP file (or screenshots, if you prefer) to me at vampirelord108(at)gmail(dot)com (I’ll be judging, of course.)

Well, that’s pretty much it for the rules. Now, for the moment you’ve all been waiting for, prizes!

  • 1st prize is a feature in the winners’ post, plus a rare account from my arsenal.
  • 10 runners-up will receive a mention in the winners’ post.
  • Sadly, the files cannot be shared via WordPress, but featured winners will get screenshots of their Land shown on the PHB. Exciting, isn’t it?

Alright, get building! Stay popping, Poptropicans.

Uncategorized

My farewell post – not exactly!

tl;dr: Changes to my schooling means I’ll be a lot less active, but I’ll still be around.

Samwow5Hey everyone, this is hard for me to say. There are no words to describe what I’m feeling, this year, school will be getting so much harder. I won’t have a lot of time to post, but I would have time on the weekends if life gives me a break. If you’re confused, I’m not leaving, but I am not going to be as active as I used to be.

I won’t be doing island guides as often as I used to (will do Survival Ep. 5 hopefully), I also won’t be at some of the parties, and I won’t be at a lot of stuff in the future. I have a chance to learn so much this year, and prepare myself for life in the future. To me, this blog has done so much for me. I’ve met so many people that have helped me in the blogging world. Here are some important people I want to thank:

I’d like to thank Slanted Fish (Fishy) for all that’s she’s done for me; she helped me when my blog started out. She linked me on the sidebar on the PHB; she used my guides when I started out, when she could have used way better guides than mine. I’d like thank to thank her for hiring me as an author on the PHB, when to tell the truth, I wasn’t that good of a writer (gotten better, but not the best ;p) she’s helped me and edited posts and showed me great writing techniques. I really appreciate all she has done. I’m proud to call her a friend <3.

I’d like to thank all my TIB staff for all the help starting my blog (Silver Wolf, SL, Spotted Dragon, Tough Raptor and a lot of others.) I will always love that blog and post as often as I can when I can.

I’d like to thank all the authors on the PHB that has helped me and has accepted me here, especially, Brave Tomato and Fuzzy-B. I’d also like to thank Obi, Pixel, and so many more on thephc for being friendly to me and teaching me the ropes as owner. Even though there was a lot of conflict on thephc at times, I forgive those who I may not have gotten along with and want to have a clean slate when I’m less active.

I’d like to thank all the viewers on the PHB & TIB that has liked me posts and enjoyed reading them. This was my goal to get on the PHB and it was more fun than I ever thought it could be. I will miss this place dearly and all the people that are here when I’m not going to be as active anymore.

samwowMost of all I’d like to thank HPuterpop for he dealing with all my shenanigans, he’s been there through the thick and thin for me. He’s been my best friend for months; I had so much fun with him, the livestreams, the guide writing, the facecams, and so much more. He’s irreplaceable, even though this isn’t IRL, I will miss him dearly. HP, if you see this, never quit because I leave, I want you to continue even though you’re lonely. I will try to come here on the weekends and maybe during the week if I have any free time. (OMG when I was writing this paragraph Michael Jackson & Justin Timberlake’s song: Love never felt so good played on my local radio station xD)

There are not feelings to describe what I’m feeling right now. I love the PHB and don’t want to stop. But school is important; I’ve got to think of my future. My future hasn’t come yet, so I’m going to continue on the weekends. From this post I have 8-9 days to live out my summer (going on vacation next week for 2-3 days) I love you all! If any one of you want to email me personally, email me at: toughicicle(at)gmail(dot)com

I’ll leave you all with a few quotes:

  •  “We all take different paths in life, but no matter where we go, we take a little of each other everywhere.”  -Tim McGraw
  • “Everything is all right, When you’re here, When you’re right next to me, When my hand is in yours, Don’t leave me, Don’t leave me empty handed.” ― Elizabeth Brooks
  • “If I look back when I begin to leave, will they remember me?” ― Owl City

~SW5~

Labs (Land), Shark Boy Mystery

Shark shoutout & a closer look at Land

Hey Poptropicans! So apparently it’s “Shark Week” on Discovery Channel, but of course when the Creators bring that up on their blog, what they’re really trying to do is shamelessly promote one of their islands. 😉 However, this note may be of interest for those who remember the Shark Boy scandal:

The second Island we ever released, way back in 2007, was Shark Tooth Island, which featured the massive Booga Shark, a helpful medicine man, and one very special boy whose name we no longer recall.

At least good old Captain Crawfish, Shark Boy’s successor, afforded him one last shoutout… 😦 #momentofsilence (and if you have no idea what I’m talking about, these posts should catch you up) Shark Boy was truly an icon of Poptropica’s earlier days, a name we won’t so easily forget!

sharkWithShark

(this and more awesome art can be found in the PHB magazine, POPCORN.)

Moving on to newer things, the second evolution of Poptropica Land was recently released to members, and as promised, the PHB’s Poptropica Labs page has been updated to give you guys a more in-depth look at this cool new feature. Click here to view our Land walkthrough, which speaks of how to get the Svadilfari, materials you can unlock, and more! Here’s the Land trailer:

Poptropica’s official Twitter has already gotten right into it by showcasing some of their favorite creations so far! Here’s a look at a treehouse (made by Spotted Dragon of the ATP), submarine, and garden. Pretty creative stuff! 😀

If that’s not enough of a look at Land alpha version 2, check out this review by Spotted Dragon on her blog, or this video tour from Captain Spencer (below) — plus, stay tuned for HP’s video walkthrough!

Lastly, some Poptropicans have noticed that the World Cup costumes are no longer to be found in the inventory. Brave Dolphin recently investigated this and got the following reply from Poptropica:

These are limited time expired items which are no longer available in the store or in the player inventory.

While the Creators did say the costumes wouldn’t be around forever, what’s weird is that they usually never take away Store-obtained item cards from players’ inventories (they only do it for ads, which this wasn’t). Strange, isn’t it? Share your thoughts in the comments! 😛

Bonus Items, Labs (Land), Mission Atlantis Island, Store, Survival Island

Atlantis Captain, Survival’s Max McGullicutty, & Land

Ahoy, Poptropicans! Members who have played the final chapter of Mission Atlantis may have picked up the Atlantis Captain costume towards the end — but everyone can get it from the Store for free! When you press space bar, the helmet will either reveal or hide your face.

atl capt

In addition to recently being released to everyone online, Survival 4 (Cabin Fever) is also now on the Poptropica iOS app! Click here for the PHB’s Survival walkthrough. Tally ho!

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Meanwhile on Poptropica’s Tips & Tricks app, they’ve added guides for Survival 2 through 4, and it’s 99 cents for each episode. If it’s a walkthrough you need, though, I’d advise saving your money and using the PHB’s free Survival Island Guide instead! Sure, we’re not official, but we’re still here to help. 😛

Speaking of Survival, there’s just one more episode left, and from what we know, you’re on the run from MVB, but you have a friend waiting for you in the woods. He’s the mysterious character who left you notes on the tapestry in Episode 4 (allowing your escape), and signed it “M.M.” So who is M.M.?

Remember the Manifest from the plane in Episode 3? There was a name for the coin-collecting passenger: Max McGullicutty… M.M.! And this Daily Pop sneak peek might just be giving us a look at him, disheveled from life in the woods, and more importantly, with an “M” on his belt buckle:

MaxM

If you remember from one of HP’s Survival Files on the PHB, there’s some dialogue with what appears to be a superstitious fisherman… and as we haven’t encountered this character yet, perhaps it’s Max.

Also, we haven’t forgotten about Poptropica Land, now in alpha version 2 and still only available to members (get the Labs card from the Store). It’s a big step up from the first prototype of Poptropica Labs, and new features include: the magical blue hammer of creation and destruction (Svadilfari), “Poptanium” mining instead of coins, the ability to save, and more!

pop land

Stay tuned to the PHB for a more in-depth look as well as a community event coming soon, involving this updated feature! In the meantime, don’t forget to be awesome. 🙂