banshee

There are two programmers right now who may be interested in extra help. If you're interested in the project, feel free to DM me and I can set up an arrangement to join the developer discord group! I think it would be great to have additional hands, thank you guys for your interest

I apologize, I thought this topic would be interesting to programmers but didn't think it through. I should have known better than to post. You are welcome to lock the thread. I don't know why graphical chats and virtual pet sites never merged in media. It's unfortunate because graphical chatsites were so unique despite drama.

Thank you for your suggestions. I didn't have a very strong idea of how to approach this thread. I am apart of a project with a couple of programmers currently but there is something I'm curious of knowing. The programmer who created the project I started did something really interesting with the "bodyshop". For reference the bodyshop is where you are capable of adjusting your characters colors, species, etc. He took it the extra step and had it so you could upload a .psd and it would manually take from each layer. It was possible to change your colors via hex and it looked gorgeous compared to many bodyshops I've seen in the past. I'm curious if anyone knows how this is done and how it could be implemented. Another question I have is how could someone create the environment where the avatars move around? How do you manage updating everything in real time? I know minimal amount of coding so bare with me my specific questions, I know there are many ways it could possibly be done but I'm clueless and would appreciate a run down. I hope graphical chats don't live their short life. I know 3d games and technology like virtual reality makes this content seem obsolete, but there is an audience for graphical chats and I hope this inspires people to attempt to create their own.

Unfortunately they are shutting down due to the politics of the site, though the programmer is attempting to resolve the issues it is looking rather bleak right now. The website easily gathered funding back in 2020. I am inquiring about what programming languages could be used as well as hoping to give programmers ideas for their own virtual worlds Graphical chatsite are unique and could do well with healthier environments. Many people loved to use these sites up until the political systems failed. It's sad that they are successful until the system degrades.

Thats interesting though telling of how they never adapted for mainstream media in some ways. Club Penguin was one, The Palace, Habbo Hotel. "Virtual worlds" is another name people use for it but that has become more prevalent for virtual reality worlds rather than the original graphical chats. You enter a room with an avatar and you are able to interact with the room and poses as well as chat with others in the same location. Chatlands/wolfhome, worlize, wolfing all took it to another level where users could upload their own art as the avatar. This is what recently closed down and now I believe there is no standing graphical chatsite to show an example. You could easily see screenshots of chatlands on Google but it's really something to experience first hand. Thank you for your response

I was fortunate to find a programmer through here and though he was talented and got far, he dipped out of the project and got away with the money in 2020. Now that Chatlands / Wolfhome has closed indefinitely, I really want to bring up the discussion of graphical chatsites. For a long time graphical chats were sidelined in the virtual pet world regardless of how fourth wall breaking they are. The two could have a harmonious relationship if treated right. I would love to see a serious competitor arise as now CL has closed it's doors. The point of this topic is simply asking for suggestions, opinions and any other discussion concerning graphical chats. How can you create one and what steps can be done? Whether or not they are financially worth it is besides the point as there are ways to suitably fund these types of sites due to their cult following. At this point the problem doesn't seem monetary as much as it is based on commitment to such a project. I would love to create a chatsite but as an artist I can only do so much. But I'd love to see pet game programmers take the idea seriously and please entertain the idea for a second on how one might accomplish it. And if you are interested in creating a graphical chatsite, as any type of creator, pls feel free to contact me.

Hi! I'm interested in this kind of work. I can charge ~$15 per colored sketch. Payment accepted after completion and I track all my commission status via twitter Let me know: kobweb.deviantart.com

This is one of my game ideas. I like the name Wolfterra but I have yet to buy the domain. The idea behind this is a graphical chatsite game similar to Chatlands, Wolfing, Dreamshift, The Palace, Club Penguin, Animal Jam, Habbo Hotel, Pony.Town and more. The idea behind this is that people can visit locations and chat with one another using unique avatars. For this game, I have decided to carry on the long tradition of using wolves as a focus for the character concepts and lore. The reason why I choose to do this isn't simply habit but for several other reasons as well: wolves are social creatures as evident to our dog companions, and this is a platform that is meant to encourage social activity as a focus. Wolves also have well recorded behaviors that are so fun to translate into human concepts (profile -> sniff for example, or howl instead of message). Rich in lore, the possibilities for writing about wolves are fun and endless, with even the capability of making pop-culture references and more. They are also a prosecuted species, misunderstood but important ecosystem players -- and conservation and charity have all I've ever loved sporting for my entire art career. Other games, such as Animal Jam, allow for multiple animal species which is good for a catch-all. But if the catch-all is already there, why bother? I'd rather expand on customizable options for a single species and put a focus on creating art for events, achievements, treasures, whatever else instead of create 20+ elaborate species with minimal customizable options. I did this with Lupinar, a graphical chatsite I created with a focus on the Cenozoic and paleoart. You can see some of that artwork & screencaps here: Lupinar Artwork So this is "Wolfterra", a place where you're a wolf more than once a month! Heh. I am just going to dump some of my poor rough drafts first and expand on the various concepts behind them as I work to complete art aspects to it. I am the first to admit that some of these concepts probably don't make sense. BTW, these wolf avatars are stationary with minimal animation, if any. You move the avatar around using drag and drop. The environment should be able to change with the avatars to create a color palette affect and make the images appear involved in the atmospheres of the landscapes.

I am going to try and be more active in the community, hoping to meet new people and create cool stuff together. I am an artist who has tried to pick up programming before but have had little luck, so while I may try again in the near future, I am here to showcase artwork. I do not have a partner or a programmer to make these projects reality, however i will create artwork and try to design some components of the game for the future. whether this is working with a programmer to make this project happen or learning to do it on my own ^^; I will most likely post about projects later, but for now I will just dump some random stuff. i can illustrate anything but really enjoy drawing wildlife, fantasy, machinery and monsters

Hello everyone, I am a mostly self-taught artist with the "jack of all trades" disposition. I can illustrate anything from landscapes, architecture, cars, humanoids and other animals. I am also gaining traction in the animation department too. I use Photoshop and will provide a .psd with each purchase. You can see my art here: https://www.deviantart.com/kobweb/gallery/ I will illustrate anything for you but am looking for large jobs of $100+. Let me know! I have experience in creating game art as I once owned a graphical chat site called Lupinar . The art for said project can be viewed on my dA. I track my commissions via Trello and have more information pertaining to my work there as well! Please contact if interested! I'm very nice

You'll most likely want some sort of moderation tool that allows your staff to reject images that defy the rules you place. User submitted art is something that is best explored in the realm of such sites as Wolfhome, Wolfing and Worlize. TL;DR: Wolfhome's system forces their staff to review the user submitted work before it can be seen on the website. This allows for human intervention before a rule can be broken. Wolfing used a system that alerted staff to a new upload for review, but the user could use their artwork immediately after upload. I am unfamiliar with Worlize though I know they had a lot of trouble with art theft; they may have a good word or two on how to prevent art theft in a worst case scenario situation, lol. Both the Wolfhome and Wolfing systems break down this way: Wolfhome: User submits artwork and it is put into a "watch-tower" moderation tool. This application allows for a designated, trained staff member (ART or art review team) to review the image before it is submitted into the website. While a secure method to moderate any art traffic, the process can be daunting. I feel this system has a lot more cons than necessary, so unless you are well staffed or not trusting of your userbase, I don't recommend this method. A user can wait days before their submission is reviewed, and in the instance that it is rejected, they must repair the damages and then wait longer. Meanwhile, staff will feel pressured to work unnecessarily harder with a more difficult workload, which results in burnout for most. The long run of this system is that you develop a toxic working condition for both your staff and userbase; reviewing submissions becomes a methodology of power practiced by the staff (can be easily abused and will be), and in return it becomes one of the most complained aspect of their management organization. No one gets what they truly deserve of this system and it is complicated. Wolfing: Wolfing improves on the reviewer system by allowing users to immediately use their submitted image while it waits in the moderation tool. The moderator is then alerted to the upload and reviews the image; if the submitted image adheres to the aforementioned rules, the user doesn't notice a difference as it is accepted and out of the reviewer. If the submission is rejected, it is taken from public view and can be modified in a user-specified panel. This secondary review forces the once rejected submission to abide to a similar review system as Wolfhome's, securing that the rejected submission is properly edited. While this still requires human interaction with the submitted work, it decreases the stress and anxiety that the Wolfhome reviewer can induce in user populations. If that is limited then the staff output is better, burn out is less likely to occur, etc. Both of these systems require a user panel that allows for the upload and modification of those uploads and a moderation tool that reviews said submissions. It also requires for moderators to be able to push artwork back into the reviewer system to fix unwanted submissions that may have passed review. So, to make this fluent I feel like you would have to be able to search user submissions and other common, but modified, tools. For these methods to work, staff need to be properly trained and rules be set in place that protect the website and its userbase. You can increase your chances of better behavior by alerting to what art theft is frequently as a lot of art theft comes from a place of misunderstanding and not malice. I can always elaborate more but for now I think this post is pretty heavy ^^

Maps, shops, exploration, items, these are all the fundamentals << I could easily elaborate on each of these topics. Gating tasks in various ways: whether its to limit a purchase, a quest or so on is probably important to note. Loot boxes and gachas would allow for currency sinks but also adds to the instant-gratification so many seek in mobile games these days. Professions add flavor to some game concepts but require a lot of other things to take place (exploration, item drops, item combinations, timed events), so I can't imagine it being immediately important. I also love the concepts of incorporating more social networking styled profiles and character designs, I feel like this is the changing market to pet games. We could learn from Amino and other apps that are gaining favor and what they have to offer their userbase, while improving upon it. I feel like most of us want to feel like independent creators, but I also feel like often times a lot of the success in niche platforms rely on communities functioning in federation with one another. To maintain the independence of creators while still allowing for us to communicate and exchange, something like Mastodon's fediverse model could work.