Slow Internet Access? You're Not Alone... by fyrato |  |
A while back, my computer went berserk, crashed, died, and came back to life
(a somewhat interesting story best saved for later). Ever since then, I've only
been able to run this cursed piece of metal and plastic on 16 colours... I don't
know if you've tried it, but playing NeoPets on 16 is not the best visual sensation
in the world, but I got used to it quick.
Oops, way off target, anyway, what I came here to say is, you know how NeoPets
is supposed to be all nice and fair for everyone on? Well, no world is perfect.
Even in these virtual communities, where everyone supposedly starts out equal,
some still have a definite advantage. I'm talking about those lucky ducks who
have a cable modem, or at least something better than this chunky dial-up service
of mine. If you have slow access too, then you should know what I mean. Not
only do they get to play those high-paying, Dubloon earning Flash games, they
have an almost unbeatable edge over us when it comes to grappling for freebies
at the Money Tree or snatching up deals in the shops. No wonder most (all?)
of the richest people on here have cable or DSL.
Well, there are things you can do to improve your life here. One of the cheats
I do is playing on two browser windows at a time, when one loads, I simply hop
on to another. The only disadvantage about this is that you can sometimes get
confused over what in the world were you doing on one window before you crossed
over to the other and head in an entirely different direction than first intended,
but like I said, I get used to things quick, and hopefully, you too ^_~
Although earning Dubloons are out of the question as both Deckswabber and
Deckball are Flash games, Poogle Solitaire, Faerie Crosswords and Mia's Makeover
will give you a reasonable amount of NP in a relatively short time. You can
only play them once a day though. Another good game (a favourite) is Neggsweeper.
I usually loll around the easy level, where it's less likely that I'll trip
over a bad Negg and lose my jackpot. But if tiptoeing your way around explosive
Neggs (0_0) is not really your thing, then try Pyramids! It's nearly impossible
to lose NP in that game, and as a side bonus, it requires very little brain,
just mostly luck. I'd include a full-fledged tip/strategy sheet for both, but
I'm sure if you dig in deep enough into those yellowed copies of past Neopian
Times, you'll come across an article sooner or later about them.
If you really want to try your luck, then go to the stocks. Things were a
lot easier back before NeoPets installed the 15-and-over rule (and I was just
beginning to earn some money too...), but even with that annoying rule in place,
the Neopian Stock Market still has potential. It's easy, buy low, sell high
(ignore what that Scorchio salesman says, he'll just lead you to bankruptcy).
Since you can't buy anything that's under 15 NP a share, it would make the most
sense to buy a stock that's right on 15. I usually go for 1,000 shares (the
maximum you can buy in a day) at a time, so that means each time my stock goes
up by 1, I can earn an additional 1,000 NP when I sell. If your stock dips below
the price you bought them for, don't worry. Just hang on to them until they
rise again. There's no rule carved in stone that says you HAVE to sell your
stocks 5 days after you buy them or anything, so take your time. Don't get too
greedy! Stocks can fall sharply without any warning, so when you can make a
good profit, sell! Set a limit for yourself and follow that. It can be +3, +4,
whatever you want. Just remember that the higher you set it, the riskier it
is.
And finally, there's a little pet peeve of mine... some people cram their
shops/guilds/sites so full of HTML that by the time it's done loading, all your
hair has turned grey and you feel a sudden urge to play bingo. I visit the smallest
shop if the prices on the Wiz are the same, since bigger shops usually mean
that the owners are show-offs (no offence to gallery owners), and therefore,
more HTML. As for sites, I wait for around 1 or 2 minutes, and if it's not done
by then, I just leave. For those of you who want to make your sites more friendly
to us poor inchworms, here are a few hints: it's still okay to put HTML in your
shop, I have it too. Just not that much. Animated images take at least twice
as long as regular images to load. You can still have them though, provided
they're small and you don't put 854,975,419 of them on one page. Music... I
dunno... I surf with my speakers off ^_~ Backgrounds are good, but animated
ones? *puts hand over forehead and faints* You get the idea.
So that's basically all I can think of right now. There's nothing else to
do than hope against all odds that NeoPets will come out with a Dubloon earning
game that can be played with slow access, that the faster people will be nice
and trim their HTML a bit, and, oh yeah, keep your fingers crossed that, someday,
you'll get cable or DSL. |
