Tag: poptropica

Pop 5

5 reasons Poptropica is the best virtual world for kids

Slanted Fish

While surfing through the waves of the web, I came across an article called “Five things learned from five years of Poptropica“, which you can click to read if you’re interested. It’s written by Director D – I mean James Lema, the director of product development at Poptropica.

DubitHeader

Anyway, onto the good part! Here were 5 reasons James cited as what makes Poptropica a better kids’ virtual world than any other game:

  1. We are not building a game. Let’s create a collection of narrative driven quests.

  2. Ask for age and gender. If they want to register, ask them after they have played around for a while.

  3. 2D is faster, cheaper… and none of us know 3D.

  4. We will use pre-scripted / random chat.

  5. We are NOT Facebook for kids.

Interestingly, Poptropica started out with a staff of just two artists, one of them being Lema, and Poptropicans spend an average of 30 minutes per session on the site! If you’d like to read more, check out Lema’s Poptropica article on Dubit, which explains the 5 things more in-depth.

Want to know what we at the PHB think about Poptropica? Check out our Poptropica: Game Review article in the Cool Stuff section!

Now the question is, why do YOU think Poptropica is awesome? Let us know in the comments! 😀

Uncategorized

Mother knows best

elmopwns

Every once in awhile I keep getting this little feeling in the back of my head like I forgot something…yeah, well maybe that sort of feeling was right and should’ve reminded me more than ever once in awhile despite whatever troubles I still have to be concerned about xD. Ladies, gentleman, err, and whatever you are in the crowd over there since I can’t tell, thank you for putting up with me for the last period of time! I had some personal adventures to deal with…ahem, digging deep into the boughs of the earth to discover a rare mineral that would one day secretly save humanity…no xD.

What day is today? If you’re past the International Date Line, maybe this is a bit late for you…I’m talking to you, Australia! Just kidding. It’s Mother’s Day! Say thanks to your parent or guardian or your ma! And what better way than sending her a big hug rather than another “Just five more minutes before I get up, mom.” Poptropica decided to kindly remind us with a few mothers from some old and new islands:

Some mom this was! As the creators stated, the queen didn’t even know of her child’s missing state.

Hey, my son too is reliving Jaws on a deserted island whilst I wait around with my purse doing nothing! 😀 What a great mother.

It seems to me that I’m seeing a trend her; this mom never knew her child was the size of a hair or a pea. “Hey look, I just stepped on an ant…wait a minute…”

Katya’s mom sure had some common sense. But according to the story, did the person ever listen? Nopa. Obey your parents, kids. You won’t earn 200k a year flipping burgers as a runaway xD.

Who forgot about Greg and his silly adventures? I read in a Chinese translation by an editor that claimed even the boy in the series was more clever and funnier than his parents. Unfortunately, his adventures were often ruined by his mom. At least that was the funny part.

Happy Mother’s Day!

Oh, mom, if you’re reading this: sorry I didn’t get those chocolates the day before xD.

Back Lot Island, Sneak Peeks

Kirk Strayer in 3-D!

Brave Tomato

Hey guys, BT here. Now should I start with the joking or non-joking part? I’ll start with the (possibly joking) part.

Captain Crawfish has announced Poptropica 3D HD. Or is it HD 3D? Whatever.

And 3D images from Skullduggery Island are there.

And low-priced $999.95 3D glasses. (Shipping and handling not included; available 1/01/14)

And suppossedly Jeff Kinney “approves” in a fake-looking quote.

Now, before you break your piggy banks, I’m pleased to remind you of today’s date: April 1st. There. Put the hammers down. Good. Besides, I have a pair of 3-D glasses stashed in a DVD that works with that image and for only $20 something dollars.

But like the nose thing last year, I don’t think this is really happening. I think this is the Creators way of mocking technology with its HD and 3D yakkity yak these days. XD

Now, not everything is a joke today. I actually found a promotion for Back Lot Island in the weirdest spot.

So I was wandering around on Night Watch Island when I encountered an ad.

No. It wasn’t an ordinary ad, though.

So… this is new. The Creators using the advertising spot to take a picture with Back Lot Island’s Kirk Strayer: well-known actor since 2 weeks ago. If you talk to him, he’ll say:

So you enter…

Those seem like epic images. And you click take photo… and a new photo is added to your album!

Now, I think there are a bunch of possibilities for your picture. Here they are:

…

…

Well…

…on second thought, I think this is the only result you get. I laughed at this, considering the epic preview images in the first screen when you first enter XD.

Oh well. At least we finally know who Kirk Strayer is. But what will go on with him in Back Lot Island? Only time will tell.

BT out!

Merchandise

Poptropica Books Updates (Island Creator Kit cover and Poptopics)

Brave Tomato
Island creator kit
*click for full-sized image*

Hey guys, BT here with a couple of new updates regarding 2013 Poptropica books.

First of all, the book Island Creator Kit by Mitch Krpata (aka Hades) now has a cover! You can see the image to the right.

Secondly, I found out about some more books on the Barnes and Noble website (I’m unsure if anybody saw this before me, sorry!), part of a series called Poptopics. They don’t have covers yet, by the way:

Poptopics #1- Mythology:

Introducing an exciting new line of nonfiction titles inspired by the world of Poptropica.

Many of the Poptropica islands feature stories based around different Mythologies, but what’s presented on the screen is far from the whole story. This 64-page nonfiction book introduces kids to the bigger world of Mythology in a fun and engaging way.

Poptopics #2- Space Travel:

Introducing an exciting new line of nonfiction titles inspired by the world of Poptropica.

The Poptropica island Lunar Colony presents a fun, but fictional view of space travel—however, the origins of that story are based in fact. This 64-page nonfiction book introduces kids to the history and current advancements of space travel in a fun and engaging way.

These two new books are probably going to be like the Magic Tree House Fact Tracker series, with that it gives background information on what is presented in Poptropica. For the Mythology one, they’ll probably talk about the mythologies some Poptropica islands are based around on, such as the Scandinavian woodland creatures of Twisted Thicket, and of course, the Grecian gods and monsters of Mythology Island. And for the space travel one, they’ll probably talk about how space travel works in real life, and how some things compare to our adventures in Lunar Colony.

Unlike the other 2013 books (Lunar Colony, Cryptids Island, Island Creator Kit, and Friend Handbook) , the Poptopic books are schedualed to be released October 17, 2013.

So what do you guys think?

BT out!

Back Lot Island, Sneak Peeks

It disappeared as quickly as it came. (Back Lot Island!)

Brave Tomato

If you’d go to the Creator’s Blog right now, you’d see a post that looks like this:

Picture yourself on Poptropica

When you travel somewhere, the best way to remember your trip is by taking photos. The same is true when you journey into Poptropica.

Ever since we launched the Photo Album feature last year as part of Poptropica Friends, we’ve been adding four new photos to every Island. At this point, there are 133 unique photos that you can collect, simply by playing through each Island!

But Poptropica photos are even better than the ones you take on vacation, because you can actually costumize off of what you were wearing in each one. The same is true when you look through your friends’ photo albums!

If you haven’t opened your photo album for awhile, take look — you might be surprised at what you find.

However… that wasn’t the post it was at first.

*cue DUN DUN DUNNN*

When this was first posted, it was talking about something else… here’s what it said:

Sneaky. Very Sneaky.

“What’s the next Island going to be?” That’s the question we hear over and over when we talk to our fans. Well, if you want a hint as to what we’re working on next, the best thing to do is visit Sneak Peeks in the Daily Pop!

In Sneak Peeks, we post concept art and other work in development for unannounced Islands. If you’d been checking Sneak Peeks through January and February and seen images like the one posted above, you probably would have surmised that we were working on a movie-themed Island… long before we announced Back Lot Island!

Sneak Peeks is updated five days a week. All you need to do to check it out is to visit Poptropica and click on the “Daily Pop” icon to see the latest.

We’re usually working on more than one Island at a time. Can you guess what we might be working on next?

If you peruse that post a little bit, you’ll see this set of words: Back Lot Island.  I tested to see if the Creators bought that domain name and sure enough….

http://www.backlotisland.com/

They did. So I guess we have our island name now! You think you could let that one disappear like you did with Cryptids Island, didn’t ya? Well, you were caught. 😛

BT out!