Tag: arabian nights

Arabian Nights Island, Pop Places IRL

Pop Places IRL: Arabian Nights 🐪

Spotted Dragon
Pop Places IRL Header

Welcome back to “Pop Places IRL,” Poptropicans! Miss the series? I know I did! This time around, we’ll be traveling to Arabian Nights Island! Like this series? Be sure to check out other Pop Places IRL posts.

As you might already know, Arabian Nights was the winning idea from Poptropica’s “Create Your Dream Island” contest back in 2013. The pitch? “On Arabian Nights Island, Poptropicans go on a quest across the desert to rescue a sultan’s genie from the Forty Thieves.” And it turned out to be quite the tale!

The adventure, like Disney’s “Aladdin,” takes place in Arabia (hence the name). This Middle Eastern peninsula is certainly a distinct location, and it definitely shines through in the island! Don’t believe me? Let’s take a closer look.

Right away on our Poptropicans’ adventure, we are greeted with “Episode 1: How Bazaar.” The title itself is a pun, playing off the term “bazaar” to sound like “how bizarre.” A bazaar, if you were unaware, is a type of Middle Eastern marketplace, which (not coincidentally) is a prominent location on the island.

  • photo: The Souk – A Middle Eastern Bazaar (zoharproductions)

Pretty cool, right? The colorful fabrics, clothing, and items for sale certainly catch the eye. But perhaps even more impressive, we have the palace to visit!

  • photo: Arabian Palace (werxj’s flickr)

I personally find the architecture of the Middle East to be a particularly remarkable characteristic of the area, but maybe that’s just my inner art history nerd coming out? Either way, the design in Poptropica seems to match up pretty well to its inspiration, so let’s take a look on the inside as well!

  • photo: Middle Eastern Palace (worldarchitecturenews)

Poptropica’s palace atrium (left) is busier than our reference photo (right), but it sure does add interest to the adventure! I think that the game really did stay true to its inspiration, even with their color/detail additions. What do you think?

Stepping further away from the bustling market, however, we could also take a look at the less populated areas of the island. Even if a huge Lair of Thieves is tough to find IRL, there are definitely still cave systems we could investigate. And, like in Poptropica, maybe we can find some salt and other minerals to trade!

  • photo: Caving Vacations in Africa & the Middle East (iexplore)

Why don’t we take a camel and keep traveling away from the market, further into the desert next? And now we happen upon an oasis!

  • photo: Oasis (wikipedia)

Even in this largely desert landscape, it’s cool to see the pops of color that show up. The Poptropica Creators really took advantage of their inspiration when designing this island, huh?

But what do you guys think? Have you ever been to the Middle East? Does the comparison match up to your expectations? What other islands do you want to see in this series? Be sure to leave a comment with your thoughts below!

Farewell, fellow travelers, and good night!

~SD

Arabian Nights Island, Graphic Novels, Sneak Peeks, Social Media

Release dates, mysterious islands, and BTS images

Spotted Dragon

Hey guys! Lots of stuff on Twitter, as usual. I asked the Creators about release dates for islands, and they weren’t too specific, but we now have a general idea of when new islands are coming out! Knowing the Poptropica Creators though, the dates below could change.

At least it’s something, right? 😛 Just to recap: Mystery of the Map Island is planned for May for members, and June for everyone. Arabian Nights Ep. 3 comes out around July.

Now, the islands in the tweets above aren’t the only ones in our future. The Creators want your opinion on some mysterious new designs for a mysterious new island. Remember, nothing is official yet, so the island might not even come out!

Seems like their idea somehow relates to jail, judging by the police officers, inmates, and canines (“K9”, heh) above. Hopefully we will have more info on the island soon!

Moving on to different islands, we also have two other behind the scenes images from Twitter.

The first image shows a, uh, man-baby of sorts… *cough* and the other shows on old fort on a tropical island. These pictures are most likely for Arabian Nights Island and Mystery of the Map Island respectively. Post any ideas you have about how the man-baby relates to the island below! 🙂

Last, but not least, we have PopStorms 24 & 25! #24 is basically the creativity of a Poptropica Creator, and #25 was posted with the caption: “This character has Poptropica eyes and loves ding dongs.” 😛

That’s all for now!

~SD

Arabian Nights Island, Galactic Hot Dogs Island, Sneak Peeks, Social Media

Office supplies: books, concept art, & toys – check!

Spotted Dragon

Okay, let’s go over my check list… behind the scenes books? Check! Concept art? Check! An office filled with toys? Triple check!

Now, at this point, you may be super confused, but that’s perfectly fine because it will all soon be clear!

*cough* Aaaaannnyway… you may have noticed how the Creators have taken a bit of a break from posting behind the scenes awesomeness on Twitter. But just recently, the Creators have returned with some more great concept art! The first piece of behind the scenes awesomeness is some early concept art for Galactic Hot Dogs Island.

ghd concept art

The second image we have shows a bookshelf, most likely for Arabian Nights Island.

arabian nights concept art

A lot of these books seem like they would come in handy! These BTS pictures are also found on Poptropica as Daily Pops.

Last, but not least, we get a glimpse at life in a Poptropica Creator’s office.

So. Many. Collectibles. Creators, if you’re reading this, I wouldn’t mind taking a few toys off your hands. 😉 Looking around, we can see t-shirts of Poptropica’s greatest super villains, a cylindrical object beside it (a Poptropica pencil case? Hard to tell!) and a Mystery of the Map poster drawn in the style of the Poptropica book covers.

Well, that’s it for now guys! Anything on the checklist that I missed? Don’t worry, check back into the PHB soon for more updates! 🙂

~SD

Arabian Nights Island

No more episodes & Arabian Nights launch dates

Slanted Fish

Happy new year, Poptropicans! Hope you’re enjoying the fresh new PHB header with my Poptropican’s new look (plus, I drew a new avatar for it too)! 😀

Anyway, 2015 has only just begun, but already there’s Poptropica news to talk about. After a year of episodic islands, it looks like Poptropica will be reverting back to stand-alone full islands after wrapping up PoptropiCon and Arabian Nights around March! (thanks to Samwow5 for the pic)

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Speaking of Arabian Nights, the Creators originally tweeted that Episode 2: Lair of Thieves (see our preview here) would be coming out to non-members on Dec 30th (that’s if you ignore their even earlier tweet), but it turns out they’ve rescheduled the public launch to Jan 8th:

Meanwhile, members can look forward to Episode 3 of Arabian Nights (title yet to be determined) around Feb 26th. That is, if Zeus here can still be trusted. 😉

And lastly, perhaps as a follow-up to her totally snazzy PHB tribute, Poptropica Creator Dr. Lange also drew a little something for the team at Poptropican Awesomeness, where two of our PHB authors (Blake & Slippery Raptor) also blog. Check it out:

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Anyway, that’s all for now! Poptropica’s had a great 2014, which you can read all about in Slippery’s 2014 rewind post here. Hope everyone’s having a wonderful new year so far! 😀