Weekly News Thread: May 27 - June 2

[bettywales]

29th May

* Yurble Day has passed, but Yurble will get a charge from the latest Yurble Colours.


* Salads won't be the same after they are eaten with these new tasty dressings from the Healthy Food Shop.


* y0wl2 and Plavias have just nabbed the latest Site Spotlight award for NAG Guide to the Stock Market.

* This week's PPL award has been given to the Plathydon. Well done Albert, Squire Johann, spike, Grissom, and all the others.


* We have a new Better Than You challenger, can you beat Lumi's high score at The Usul Suspects?

* Yurbles can decide between fashion and fantasy with these fun new clothes from the Clothing Shop.





What should we do first?

* Some new Colouring Pages have been added to the Haunted Woods!


* There is a new Background featuring a shop.


* A new Lenny Conundrum competition has begun. The answer to last week's was 5816. 1167 people guessed the correct answer earning themselves 1714 NP each.

* You can now paint your Peadackle, Eizzil, Quintilc and Cadro more colours at the Petpet Puddle.


* If you want a chance to have your videos viewed by others on Neopets why not submit them?

* Yurbles might be angry if they have to stay in a Janitorial Closet.

Did you want something?

* Can you beat the latest Pirate Cave Of The Week - Labyrinthe created by lilartistgrrl?

* Remember that after you buy these new scissors from the School Supplies Shop not to run with them.

[Byakuya San]

The Yurble Janitor's legacy lives on!

[Pink]

I was pleased with the maid-looking yurble outfit...very clever.

[bettywales]

30th May

* Game 1000 is here! In celebration of this great event we will be giving out extra Neopoints for game 1000.
* GAME 1000 * GAME 1000 * GAME 1000 *

* And the super amazing game 1000 is: Techo Says! Woo Hoo! Aren't you excited?


* Stop by the Poetry Gallery when you get a chance and you will see some new poems.

* Mmmm... these cookies from the Bakery are quite tasty!


* There is a new Mystery Pic competition. The answer to the last one was Petpet Laboratory Avatar. 406 people guessed correctly, earning them 4,927 NP each.

* Techo Says definatly deserves these great new Fun Images.





* Can you think of something witty for our latest Caption Contest?


* This week's Neohome Spotlight award has been given to testybest for their House of Drawk located at 100005 Harbour Lane, Mystery Island.

* Fans of Techo Says will be thrilled to find these fun new School Supplies.


* A Yellow Navibot has just won this week's Petpet Spotlight award.

* Some new toys have shown up at the Toy Shop.


* Neocash Cards now available at select Wal-Mart stores in the US. [url]Click Here[/url]http://ncmall.neopets.com/mall/splash.phtml to find out more info!

* Make sure you stop by the Art Gallery today. There are oodles of new pictures!

[Matrinka]

This week's editorial:

Hi TNT! You must be bruised and overweight from all those rocks and cookies, so here's some bandages and celery! Anyway, I understand that faces aren't allowed on Neovision, but what about if someone put on a mask that completely obscured their face? Then they and their friends could act, but not risk being seen by internet creeps. Would this be okay, or is it one of those "spirit of the rules..." things? I'm asking because I don't want to look like a rule-bending New Member. Thanks! ~monkeygirl2063
Actually this is a valid question! We have had Random Contests in the past where players were asked to create masks and take pictures (while making sure their faces were hidden). We asked Lawyerbot his opinion on the matter and, after a few moments of computing noise, a thin strip of paper printed out of him that stated, "Masks would be okay as long as they completely obscure the people and all distinguishing characteristics."

Hey TNT! I was just snooping around the Trading Post/Auction Chat when I came across an item called Nomi the Grey Faerie. I was just wondering why it says Nomi is the Grey Faerie, since I thought her name was Baelia -- unless Nomi is a character that becomes a grey faerie in the book! :O The mysteries of Neopia.... ~rad1017
Nomi is a different grey faerie than Baelia. And yes, she's the main character of one of our recently released books. If you're curious, you can find out more in our merchandise section under the News link.

Yooo TNT! I have a question. Which quest is more expensive to do, Illusen's Quest or Jhudora's Cloud? ~bosniannerd
It really depends on what they ask for. Jhudora's quest is generally considered to be more difficult (and likely more expensive), as she starts asking for rarity 99 items about 10 levels sooner than Illusen.

I've been wondering for quite a while (as a matter of fact, for much of my time on neo), just how freezings are handled. By which I mean, is each individual freezing looked at by a staff member -- the account history reviewed and such? Or is it mostly automated, in which case I see a rather big problem. (Please leave out my username.) ~[username removed]
As you probably know, we have live monitors on the site 24/7. These monitors are assisted by a plethora of programs that review communications on the site by users, along with tracking suspicious behaviour and (of course) user abuse reports. The monitors review what the programs and users flag for investigation, and then take what they believe is the most appropriate action (disregard/warn/freeze/further investigate) based upon our rules. If the user believes they were unfairly frozen, they can write in. These "appeals" are reviewed by the support staff (as opposed to the monitoring staff) and, based on the totality of the circumstances, a determination is made whether the action taken by the monitor was appropriate. After this review by a support staff member, you will most likely get a pre-written response (after all, support answers thousands of similar questions a day) that most closely pertains to your email. This doesn't mean you'll never get a personal response; this is just a basic rundown of what generally happens. Think of monitors as being like the police (patrolling the site and trying to stop poor behaviour) and e-mail support as a judge/jury of sorts (double-checking the case). So, assuming that you write in, that's at least two human beings that are involved in making the call about your account.

And remember, if you know you really deserved that icing...
please save everyone's time and don't write in!

If you find a Neopet in the Pound and someone says that it is theirs, and they show proof that it was once theirs, do you need to give it back? ~poolparty_211
It'd be a very wonderful and kind act if you did, but you do not have to, unless you were engaged in a trade with that player with any of your accounts.

Hey people! Do you think we could get a new item, which people could buy inexpensively and then use to notify someone that their inbox was full? Like, for example, if you guys made an item like a birthday card, except instead of saying "Happy birthday!" it says "Your Neomail inbox is full!" or something like that? It would be really cool if you could. I get a ton of Neomails everyday, and sometimes I don't even realize that my inbox is full until someone sends me a rotten shoe or something, Even then, however, sometimes it takes me a while to understand why people are sending me all these rotten things. Thanks guys! ~food
While many of us do enjoy flinging soggy boxes at each other as a heads up, you do have a point. We'll think about it and perhaps create an item with a Neopian twist that can get the job done.

How come the newer versions of Neopets have their hands balled in fists? O.o ~graffiti_wuz_here
So they can hold items. Wow, we wish all Editorial questions were this easy to answer!

Hello, TNT. I have a short question about trading Neopets. My younger sister had set up a trade (orange Koi for ghost Lupe) and, after she successfully adopted the Koi, she put the ghost Lupe up for adoption. Afterwards, she noticed that it was still there, and that the other person's account was only 2 months old (therefore, she was unable to adopt the Neopet). Since the Koi was painted, my sister couldn't send back the Koi. My sister now feels guilty because she can't send the Neopet back, nor send the Lupe. Can she get reported for not sending it back? Should she wait until the account ages? Thanks. ~huggygirl123
Egads! Well, there's a disaster of a situation. :-/ Both parties should always check to make sure that the other person is eligible for the transfer, but for this case we'd have to say the younger account is at fault. We've requested that the following warning, which is on the abandon page, be placed on the transfer page as well: "Neopets that are higher than Level 2, Neopets that are limited-edition species, and Neopets that have been painted with certain rare or expensive paint brushes CANNOT be adopted from accounts that have been active for less than four months." Hopefully that will reduce the chances of something like this happening again. It'd be very sweet of your sister to hold on to the Lupe (if she still has it) until the account is old enough to accept the transfer, but your sister should not be reported as there is really nothing she can do.

Dear TNT, two whole questions! Wow! So anyway, first of all, what was the first ever plot? Second, where can I find the HATIC comic? Please answer me!!! Please leave out my name.~[username removed]
Waaaay back in August of 2000 Mystery Island was discovered, which led to the Space Plot, which went on during the same time as Sacrificers. Phew! That was hard to remember. Thankfully we still have staff that were already working here then, so they still kinda remember. *waves to Viola* The Hannah and the Ice Caves comic can be found here.

The other day I was browsing the Petpet species and noticed something quite odd: almost every Neopet has a Petpet counterpart. For example: Ixi and Hornsbies, or Cybunnies and Snowbunnies. In doing this, I also realized that some Neopets have similarities with more than one Petpet. I decided to specialize in finding the Xweetok counterpart, but couldn't. I searched for similarities and finally narrowed the possibilities down to three pets: Kepru, Mazzew, and Faellie. Which it really is remains, sadly, still undecided. That made me wonder: are these similarities, whether slight or severe, on purpose? And, if so, what are the real counterparts and which Neopets do not correspond to Petpets at all? ~thorn_of_nox
For the most part, Neopets and Petpets are not created with each other in mind. Usually Neopets and Petpets are based off some actual animal, so that's why there are often similarities. Off the top of our heads, Krawks and Baby Blus are the only Petpets we can think of that are purposely similar. Others are not intended.


I see no resemblance!

Will you ever bring back another time when we can play games 5 times instead of 3? This inflation is a killer. Thank you for your time. ~serena186
Alas, adding even more NP to the economy would only make the inflation worse.

Hey! I was just wondering... you see, I went back to an older Neopian Times issue and I noticed in the Editorial that no one said anything like, "Hey TNT!" or a simple hello. Is there a reason or was it something that kinda just caught on at one point? Thanks! ^_^ ~weasalpup
It just kinda caught on at some point, much like a virus. x_X

I was just reading the Lost Desert comic. I was also reading the plot solution and, while doing so, I thought about the fact that I would really like to go to the Temple of 1000 Tombs. I searched for it, but I couldn't find it. Can you guys make a way for Neopians to go there even if we can't work on the plot? Oh, here is a muffin. Cookies are good too, but you probably get sick of them. ~chocolate_cookie429
Those of us that had to work our way through there are all probably cringing at the thought of going back in, but for those of you who missed that amazing experience, you can reenact mapping and getting lost for hours/days/weeks in the temple by going here.

Last edited by Matrinka on Fri May 30, 2008 9:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[bettywales]

31st May and 1st June

* The newest issue of the Neopian Times has been released! Keep your eyes open for great stories and adventures like New Pet in the Family and The Truth About Scarblade's Socks.


* You may want to hunker down with a warm mug of hot chocolate for this epic Neoadventure Spotlight by prismfire.

"It's early morning at Happy Valley, and a very cold one at that. The sun shines down upon the misty landscape, burning your eyes. You shiver and pull your cloak closer. Hopefully you can get this done quickly and get out of here..."

* These new folding hair brushes from the Grooming Parlour are perfect for travel!


* A new Random Contest has begun! Good luck to all the entrants, and congratulations to last week's winners.

* The latest videos are out and ready for you to view on Neovision! Why not take a look at some of these great videos like Gen's Present or The Pound. Congratulations to the winners!



If you want a chance to have your videos viewed by others on Neopets why not submit them?

* There are four new rather disgusting Buddy Icons for you to use.


* The next round of the Beauty Contest is about to begin! Head on over and vote for your favourite.

* Why wrap up gifts for friends? These new carved boxes from the Gift Shop are perfect for holding a gift or as a gift themself.


* Jems or danger has just won marymymary their very own Faerie Caves Spotlight trophy!

* If you miss someone why not send them a Greeting to let them know?


* Neocash Cards now available at Shoppers Drug Mart in Canada! Click Here to find out more info!

* Refresh yourself with one of these new beverages from the Food Shop.

[Meer]

The robot Yurble is really cool! The way they did the hair reminds me of Predator.

[Unitylejean]

For a moment I was sure those were razors. Must be the influence of my Sweeney Todd-ish wallpaper