Neopets (originally NeoPets ) is a virtual pet website launched by Adam Powell and Donna Williams on 15 November 1999. Two years after the web site was launched, Adam Powell and Donna Williams sold a majority share to a consortium of investors led by Doug Dohring. On 20 June 2005, Viacom bought Neopets, Inc. for US$160 million.
Neopets is based around the virtual pets that inhabit the virtual world of Neopia. Visitors can create an account and take care of up to four virtual pets, buying them food, toys, clothes, and other accessories using a virtual currency called Neopoints. Neopoints can be earned through playing games, investing in the game's stock market, trading, and winning contests. Users can explore the world of Neopia with their Neopets and interact with each other through the Neoboards, NeoMail, guilds, and Key Quest.
Neopets also operates a pay-to-play version known as Neopets Premium , which offers additional features and benefits for a monthly fee of US$7.99. Neopets, Inc. produces and sells a wide variety of Neopets merchandise, such as plushies, stickers, notebooks, three video games and a trading card game.
History
See also: Neopets, Inc.Neopets was conceived in 1997 by Adam Powell while he was studying at the University of Nottingham. Powell had started UK-based advertising company Shout! Advertising in 1996, which grew to be the third largest click-through program on the Internet by 1999. He also co-founded Netmagic, an online banner advertising design and sales firm and Powlex Ltd., a web site design firm. Donna Williams was a marketing manager for Shout! Advertising from September 1997 to July 1999 responsible for internet advertising, sales and services, graphic and web design. He and Williams started creating the site in September 1999 and launched it two months later on 15 November 1999. Powell was responsible for the programming and database, and Williams the web design and art. The site grew by word of mouth and by Christmas of 1999, they received 600,000 page views daily and sought investment to cover the high cost of running the site. The same month, Doug Dohring was introduced to the creators of the site and, along with other investors, bought a majority share in January of the following year. Neopets, Inc. was created in February 2000 and began business in April. The website made profit from the first paying customers for an advertising method trademarked as "immersive advertising", touted as "an evolutionary step forward in the traditional marketing practice of product placement" in television and film.
Media conglomerate Viacom purchased Neopets, Inc. on 20 June 2005 for $160 million and announced plans to focus more on the use of banner ads over the site's existing immersive advertising. On the first day of the 2006 FIFA World Cup, the Altador Cup started as an annual international online gaming event and had 10.4 million participants the first year. The entire Neopets site was redesigned on 27 April 2007. On 17 July 2007, a new section of the site, the NC Mall, was launched in a partnership with Korean gaming company Nexon Corporation. The next day, Viacom announced that by the end of 2008, Neopets, Inc would be renamed to NeoStudios, "which will focus on developing new virtual world gaming experiences online, while continuing to grow and evolve the existing ones." On June 17, 2008, Viacom formed the Nickelodeon Kids & Family Virtual Worlds Group to "encompass all paid and subscription gaming initiatives across all relevant platforms", including Neopets.
To date, since August 2003, the site has been translated into ten other written languages: Japanese, Traditional and Simplified Chinese, Spanish, German, Italian, Korean, Portuguese, Dutch and French. However, Neopets announced on 1 January 2009 that the Italian, Japanese, and Korean areas of the site would no longer be updated.
In July 2009, the Neopets site was the target of an identity theft hacking scheme that attempted to trick users into clicking a link that would allow them to gain items or neopoints. Upon doing so, malware is installed on the user's computer. According to reports, the hack is aiming not at child player's Neopets accounts, but at using the malware to steal the financial data and identities of their parents. Viacom stated that it was investigating the issue, and that the hack was a version of social engineering rather than an "indictment of Neopets security practices". In an on-site newsletter for players, Neopets denied the report and claimed that the site's security measures prevented the posting of such links.
Gameplay
Neopets is set in the themed lands of the fictional world of Neopia, which has its own calendar and timezone running concurrent with the real-world Pacific Time. It also has its own economy and stock market based around the Neopoint. Players earn Neopoints through various means including playing games and selling items. Once earned, they can be invested or used to buy various goods and services.
Users are free to choose their own path in the world of Neopia, from collecting things to battling against other users. Visitors can create a free account. A user then creates a Neopet and chooses its unique name, physical characteristics, and personality and may own up to four per account. Users may create up to five accounts but can only use one to earn Neopoints; that account is referred to as a "main" and the rest as "sides". A newly created pet comes with randomly rolled stats used for battling in the Battledome. Users may ask to re-roll the statistics if they are particularly weak. Players are expected to feed and care for their Neopets when they grow hungry or ill, although they will not die if they are neglected. New users start out with a newbie pack of various items that introduce basic features of the site, such as food for feeding a pet. They can buy more items for their Neopets by earning Neopoints, the site's currency, through various activities including playing games and selling items. Some items will change the appearance, species, stats, or gender of a Neopet.
Users can interact with their Neopets by reading books to them, caring for them, and playing with them. They can train their Neopets to be fighters in the Battledome against other player's Neopets or non-player characters. Wearable items, such as certain clothing, can be used to customize a Neopet. Players can build a customisable Neohome for their Neopets and furnish it with furniture, wallpaper, and flooring.
Users found breaking the rules set in the Terms and Conditions may be sent a warning, have their account suspended, be temporarily blocked, or have their account permanently deactivated ("frozen"). If the owner of a "frozen" account finds the reason for deactivation invalid, they may email the Neopets support team and possibly regain access of their account, although such cases are rare.
Site content
The content of the site is updated almost on a daily basis with the addition of new games and items and weekly content. In addition to the site content updated by Neopets, players also contribute user-generated content to the site. Player contributions come in the form of prescreened submissions and readily editable content that is automatically filtered, such as the site's weekly electronic newspaper "The Neopian Times".
Games
There are many active games from which users can earn Neopoints and awards. Before 22 November 2006 the games were divided into three categories: Puzzle, Action, and Luck/Chance. After that date the Games Room was reconfigured and now games are divided into many more categories. Various games and activities include Flash and Shockwave games, PHP games, 3D Life Player games, contests and spotlights, and quests to retrieve items.
Neopoints can be earned from playing games, most of which have a set maximum of earnings or playtime. Players may also earn trophies for their trophy cabinet from games if they score high enough for the Hi-Score Tables, which are reset on the first day of each month. Challenges may be made against other players or random players in a "World Challenge" for a prize piece for certain Flash games. A monthly competition also exists for multiplayer PHP games with four week-long elimination rounds.
Neopets offers several different contests and spotlights, where winners are chosen by judges on the Neopets staff or voted on by members of the Neopets community. Contests include several formats, such as writing a story, making a short animated film or drawing a picture of their Neopet. Spotlights showcase what users have done with customizable content. Winners also receive a trophy and a reward, which varies with the contest or spotlight.
In Australia, a cross-promotion with McDonald's where McDonald's promoted Neopets plushies in their Happy Meals and Neopets featured McDonald's-related content led to a controversy with Neopets' luck/chance games in October 2004. A story on the Australian tabloid television show Today Tonight featured a nine-year-old boy who claimed that the site requires one to gamble in order to receive enough Neopoints to feed one's Neopet or else it would be sent to the Pound. While this is factually incorrect (gambling is not required, nor are pets ever sent to an orphanage if they are not fed), it is true that the website has a number of games of chance that are directly based on real-life games such as blackjack and lottery scratchcards. In 2004, Neopets prohibited users under the age of 13 from playing
Neopets - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Neopets (originally NeoPets) is a virtual pet website launched by Adam Powell and Donna Williams on 15 November 1999. [1] Two years after the web site was launched, Adam Powell and ...
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