Just weeks after promising big changes, the Creators have surprised us with: a brand-new Island Map!
Poptropica has gone through a few revisions of the map over the years, but this one is important. First of all, it uses the same engine as the newer SUI islands! That means it loads faster, has sound, and you don't have to go through the classic engine if all you want to do is switch islands. In that way, it's now more similar to how it is on the mobile app. On top of that, there's a huge amount of new features...
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Originally, all islands were rendered in outline on the island map, which changed when the SUI islands were introduced. Now, they've changed it again, adding color to the icons of the classic islands. Even though not all of them have actually been updated yet, we've been suspecting that the Creators have plans to upgrade more classic islands. Could this be an indication that they are heading towards that?
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Personally, I think it looks great to have them all be in color! Also, the brighter colors all over the map looks cheerier, and it has a lot more appeal to newer/younger players. But I do have one gripe, something that's hard to see unless you look too closely: the artists who made the originals did not have color in mind, so they used a lot of small details that looked great in outline. But when color is added, it makes them look slightly... brittle. Take a look at the image above: the windows on the Super Villain island logo's tower look really thin and (unintentionally) shimmery, whereas the Mission Atlantis one has much better shapes and proportions. Also, the newer island logos just look too small; this may be out of necessity, but it kind of exacerbates the small-details issue. In general though, I think the actual choice of colors is done pretty well and looks awesome!
The next big change is the new island info screen that now appears when you click on an island. It shows you the level of difficulty for the island, how many times you've completed it before, the official description of the island from its Island Tour Page, and--the coolest part--a progress bar that shows you how close you are to finishing the island! (The progress bar for each island is also shown in front of it's icon from the map screen).
How the difficulty is calculated is a mystery to me (you can see my own ratings for all the islands on the Walkthroughs page), but I'm sure that the Creators have access to a lot more data about player behavior, and they probably based this on analysis of how much time it actually takes the average player to beat that island for the first time. (Also, older players will remember that on the even older Island map -- the one before 2012 -- the islands would show difficulty ratings when you moved your mouse over them). On a similar note, the new order/organization of the islands across the 8 pages of the new map may look completely random at first glance -- but according to the Creators, it's actually based on how popular each one actually is among players. Personally I feel that the order should be mixed up from time to time so that newer islands are still at the top, but the lesser-known ones still get cycled to the front occasionally, letting players rediscover them.
Image credit Poptropica Help Blog.
The progress bar is the most interesting addition -- there's never been anything on Poptropica like it. Or has there? A long time ago, classic islands on Poptropica all had a map (a map of all the rooms on the island itself). At first all of the rooms had question marks over them, but as you got through the island, they would be revealed and you could see the names of the scenes. Also, the map showed the links between the rooms, so you had a rough idea of how far you were. So the new progress bar is quite similar to that feature.
Behind the scenes, the gameplay of all islands is split up into things called "events." Basically, whenever anything changes in the state of the game, like collecting an item or getting past a certain point in the story, the game is automatically saved and an event is added. When all events are completed, you get the island medallion. So the new progress bar is probably visually showing you how many of the total number of events you have completed for that island or episode.
Wow, that's a huge amount of new changes! Another recent change that's related: now, when you log in, instead of going to the old Home screen (with the quizzes and the "Return to Game" button and the news slideshow), you go straight to Home Island. From there, you can click the "Return to Game" icon floating underneath the bridge.
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I think this change makes a lot of sense because, for one, most of the important features for the old Home screen were already obsoleted (the quizzes are also on the Friends page, you can see recent Poptropica news from the homepage now before you start playing, etc.) So it was just getting in the way. Also, with the new change, you go straight to the SUI engine when you log in. If all you want to do is play the recent islands, you never have to go through the classic engine.
So this appeals to newer players, and also brings Poptropica one step closer to phasing out the classic engine and moving towards the more modern one. But aside from that, the Creators recently told us that later this year there will be an even newer Poptropica engine -- and this time they'll be using Unity, not Flash!
@CDJAndybot The good news is with the new Poptropica, there will be zero Flash issues because we're building on Unity!
— Poptropica Creators (@Poptropica) May 21, 2016
In case you aren't familiar with Unity, it's a game development program that is mainly used to make 3D games. Unlike Flash, which creates a SWF file that your browser then runs, Unity can either create an app (for desktop or mobile), or a webpage with your game in it. This means that the new Poptropica, built in Unity, will still run in browsers and on mobile apps -- hooray! And since it'll be compiled, it'll run even faster. But all this Unity stuff raises an even more intriguing possibility: will the new Poptropica be in 3D?
A 3D game being developed in Unity
Although Unity can do 2D just fine, it's mainly used to create 3D games. Will the Creators basically be porting the old Poptropica to Unity, or will they actually be re-imagining it in 3D? I think now that they're making such a large shift, they have a perfect opportunity to redesign Poptropica from the ground-up. I'm not sure what sorts of features they're thinking of, but whatever it is, it's sure to be very new and different from anything we've seen so far!
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And finally, before I close off another mega-post (sorry :), it's time to announce the latest winner of Poptropica Hide & Seek! Congrats to Happy Lobster for correctly guessing the image below. Too easy, you say? Well, I've put up another one just now that should be just a tad harder, to say the least...
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