Neopets Mall Beta

[Danish]

This is so strange. I'm afraid that you'll get people boasting on the boards about there neopet's fancy new items while others can't buy them because they're not rich enough in real life.

Like me. I'm too young to have a credit card and my mother doesn't have one so it's impossible for me to buy anything, aside from the fact that we don't have enought money anyway to spend on virtual items.

Thos items look nice too.

[dandelions]

Paypal doesn't just use a credit card- I have no idea what Neopets meant about needing to be eighteen to have a Paypal account, because I first got mine when I was fifteen or sixteen using my debit card. Unless things have changed since then?

[Iggy]

I don't care, really.

Being one of the few who a minimal number of pets were destroyed (Three of them were changed, and the changes were all minimal)...

I'm just sad the three food items are NFT/NFS

Paypal doesn't just use a credit card- I have no idea what Neopets meant about needing to be eighteen to have a Paypal account, because I first got mine when I was fifteen or sixteen using my debit card. Unless things have changed since then?

Pretty sure they did change, though.

I forgot my Paypal account PW, yay =(

[phoebemittens]

However, knowing about the Neocash thing does make a number of things about the way the customization system was implemented make sense.

Thank you Wingsrising, that was like a lightbulb going off above my head. You are completely right and I'm even crosser than I was before. Of course, if older players could keep their Neopets, owning them would have a kudos that discouraged people to switch to the "Custopets"... and made TNT less money. I think it might even be why all faerie pets were changed - because faerie pet owners have a lot invested in their pets and are presumably judged to have more of an interest in the shiny, sparkly extras.

It's not part of Custopets... it's why they were introduced. I can't believe I had to have it pointed out.

[Huggles]

Well, I'm somewhat glad it ended up this way. I have zero doubt now that I wouldn't have stayed even if my pets remained unchanged. The shift in symbiotic greed to parasitic greed is the last nail in the coffin for me. I'll have to bitch just one last time about the pound not being fixed. My pets want out.

[zebru]

This also explains new lay out - getting out of '90s and "you asked for it!" my arse! The sole purpose of it was to allow new look ups and pet look ups. Pet images on look ups had to be bigger so you could be flashed with tiny neocash items on pets immediately upon entering.

[Aaron]

..and the new pet at the side thing is more of an incentive - the old layout you didnt really even see your pets that much, but now you'll be able to see them all tarted up 24/7. Although I can imagine having about 50 animated items constantly going on in that box becoming extremely irritating pretty damn fast.

Basically, ditto all the cynical / bitchy posts. I'm not paying money, end of.

[EofS]

..and the new pet at the side thing is more of an incentive - the old layout you didnt really even see your pets that much, but now you'll be able to see them all tarted up 24/7. Although I can imagine having about 50 animated items constantly going on in that box becoming extremely irritating pretty damn fast.

The quickref module at the side displays a png, not flash, so it won't be animated.

[Aaron]

Ah, I stand corrected

EDIT: but does that mean that stuff you add to your pet doesn't show up there? Or anything animated just wont move?

[EofS]

It does show up (I now get to see my lupe in her blechy hat wherever I go, which is nice, because I never used to see my pets at all) but I would presume anything animated comes up as a still version. But I wouldn't know as I lack anything animated.

[Illuen]

This is what you get when you have animated pieces, so you don't have to worry.

[Bif]

*sigh* The whole customisation thing does make sense now. As well as why they released it almost as soon as Beta was over without fixing anything - the TV shows were soon to come out and it all had to be up and running before then.

But I do wonder how they think that having 'shows' *cough*long ads*cough* will increase their profit margin when it's airing on Nickelodeon. I mean, aren't the older generation the ones who are going to be buying things from the Mall, not the younger? Seeing as the younger can't have PayPal and (most probably) have parents who aren't going to want to pay for pixels?

All in all though, I still love Neopets, I've only really gotten back into it this year, and I'm loving it. They can change what my pets look like (they didn't suffer too badly) and they can have an influx of younger noobs, they can change the layout and they can start the mall - I'll cope. I love the game no matter what form it comes in. I wonder though, there has to be at least one staff member somewhere who feels as betrayed as we do. Perhaps some of them quit, hence the delays in fixing glitches?

Anyway, keep the updates on this coming - and if anyone can show of those sparkly red shoes I'd LOVE to see them - Wizard of Oz anyone?

I too love the module that let's me see my pet everywhere I go - it reminds me of why I love the site and helps me achieve my goals because each time I look over I think "That's why I'm playing Hasee Bounce, to get NP to buy that paintbrush!" - it's incentive. But I wish they showed petpets there as well - my pets love their petpets, they don't want them left at home when we go out!

[Wingsrising]

I also like seeing my pet on every page. I just wish they were bigger.

[reissue]

Here is what I have a problem with reading boards like this here and all over the net.

Obviously Neopets wants to make money, that goes without saying and shouldn't be a negative thing. They have an immense workload to take on with servers and employees and users trying to break apart the site or take advantage of eachother day and night. Neopets.com takes allot of money to operate, therein they need to make money to do so. We all understand that, I don't think anyone is in argument there.

Now when they released Premium Neopets I remember allot of the same opinions being expressed. That Neopets was an evil money hungry corporation, that it was no longer free to play (even though it is and was) and that it isn't fair to those who don't choose to spend money on a virtual game for whatever reason.

Now, while Neo is motivated to make money, they are equally motivated to make users happy. You cannot please everyone all of the time, obviously, but they implement features that they hope we will like and that will encourage us to continue to use the site. They don't spend hours programming and drawing and making decisions just to piss people off.

In my experience dealing with members of the Neopets team, they really DO care about the users who love this site. They aren't trying to alienate anyone they are trying to give us things that mass numbers of us have requested time and time again.

IMO, the NC Mall accomplishes a few things.

1) Raises money for the site which I am 100% ok with seeing as how they definantly need it and certainly aren't putting it to waste. I would be very upset if this site went under, and voluntary monetary contributions help keep that from happening.

2) Helps users customize their pets better. Since the NC Mall will be costing money, Neo will be more motivated to dedicate artists to creating clothes and backgrounds and trinkets for pets and the more different items there are the better we can personalize our pets to our liking, not just what little we have to work with.

3) Gives us OPTIONS! I am of the belief that the more options we have in life (or in a fun game that occupies much of it) the better. This is still a choice, remember, and I know that myself and many of my neofriends are really happy for the opportunity to support the site while embarrassing our pets.

Not everyone will be able to buy neo merch, not everyone will want to. Not everyone will be able to dedicate the time needed to build a spotlight winning neohome. Not everyone will be able to have access to a computer or the internet to even play the site.

I am really happy that these items are NFS/NFT because they will not give users a means to earn neopoints through their paypal accounts. They customizations do not affect gameplay or give anyone an unfair advantage because they chose to purchase them.

Neopets is not the first site to implement something like this and if you compare it to the dozens of other sites that have it is doing a very good job of keeping the game itself free and fair.

That is my little rant, thanks for your time

[Officer 1BDI]

Just to caution: I'm not really in the best of moods and most of my efforts at thinking logically are going into my finals studying, but this particular bit caught my eye. So, I apologize if come off as snappish, but I wanted to explain myself in light of this:

3) Gives us OPTIONS! I am of the belief that the more options we have in life (or in a fun game that occupies much of it) the better. This is still a choice, remember, and I know that myself and many of my neofriends are really happy for the opportunity to support the site while embarrassing our pets.

While I agree with the concept in general, I don't believe I was given any option. TNT didn't give me the choice to subject any of my 11 pets to this customization crap, they forced it on them. I'm fairly sure you mean the option to give our neopets clothes and such, but I'm not really interested in that. Save for the occasional hat, none of my neopets wear clothes; I'd certainly sacrifice the hat to get my pets back to their former glory.

If I wanted to customize my pets, I would have drawn them and slapped the pictures on their lookups.

I understand that Neopets has to make money to maintain the site, and I understand that from a business standpoint, most of what they've done makes sense. I just think that they're going about it in a less-than-stellar manner.