Scores Galore! A Guide to Gaming Profit

So, who here likes money? Anyone? Anyone? Everyone? Well, as I'm sure you know, Neopoints are the standard currency in Neopia. Neopoints are required to buy things. Make all the sarcastic remarks you want; just keep them to yourself. Now, after spending a lot of time on the boards when I should be doing real work instead, I've found that most people say that the best ways to earn Neopoints, which I shall abbreviate as NP for convenience, are the Habitarium, the Neopian Stock Market, Key Quest, and Restocking at stores. Yeah, those methods are great and profitable and all that jazz, but they also take time. Time that you might not have. Habitarium really only makes a heavy profit after getting to level 50. Like in the global economy, Stocks can rise and fall, making them somewhat unreliable and a better long-term investment. Key Quest has problems, mainly in the forms of glitches and the fact that it favors better computers and internet connections. Restocking requires skill, patience, timing, and a lot of luck. Those four methods are good at making money, but mostly in the long run.

Now, what if you just need a quick handful of NP to, say, spin one of the wheels or get some food for your pets? I suppose you could do the dailies, but you can only do dailies daily. And they will not always give you NP or an item worth a lot to sell. When that time comes, it's time to head over to the Roo Island Game Room (also accessible from the Games dropdown menu). These games are where you can make some quick coinage. Now, I could try and explain why this would never become a successful economy, but let's forget about logic!

These games give you money for playing and sending your scores to... somewhere. I don't know what happens to the data. I do know that I get paid for doing this! Typically, you can send in scores three times every day. But with the Scores Galore event, happening on the weekends during the Month of Hunting of Y16, you can send in your scores for all games five times per day. Each game gives out a certain amount of NP according to the score you got. The maximum you can get is 1000 NP from a single submitted score, so usually up to 3000 NP per day. This is a Top 6, that's right, 6! list of games that is going to try to explain what I feel are the easiest and most profitable games. I'll mostly be judging these off of ratio of points scored to NP earned, time required to get the maximum amount of NP, and difficulty of the game.

This is for the record: When I say difficulty, I mean how easy it is to get the maximum amount of NP. This isn't for high scores, just easy money. Also, these are just my opinions. As someone who has spent far too many hours with real video games, I have experience with gaming, so what is easy for me might be as hard as getting the Lever of Doom avatar is for you. I'm also only covering flash games that you can win 1000 NP from on a single play.

Something I'd like to mention about the score ratios: In order to know exactly how many points you need to get the 1000 NP, multiply the ratio that is shown on the game by 1000. For example, if the ratio says 2 points = 1 NP, you would need 2000 points. Furthermore, if you can rack up score quickly, the ratio doesn't really matter. All ratios accurate as of the 4th of Hunting, Y16.

Top 6 games to make easy money from

6: Turmac Roll

Ratio: 1.09 points per NP

Required score for 1000 NP: 1090

Difficulty: 5/10

Rolling around at the speed of sound. Got places to go, got to follow my rainbow. Turmac Roll is usually one of the top three most popular games under the Popular section of the Games Room. You control a petpet and just roll and collect berries to increase your score. There is a good deal of luck involved since the berries you can get are random, with each different type giving a different point value. This is on the list only because of its simplicity in gameplay. You can literally just hold the Right Arrow Key and press up to get berries and to avoid tree stumps and vertical cliff faces. A good tip is to just play it on hard mode. Berries give out more points and you get more points the longer you survive. Again, hold the right arrow key and press up to jump and avoid hazards. It doesn't get much simpler than that.

5: Spellseeker

Ratio: 100 points per NP

Required score for 1000 NP: 100,000

Difficulty: 2/10

Do you believe in magic? Personally, I only believe in the magic of money, and man, can this game hosted by a wizard Gelert pay out. Now I know what you might be thinking: 100 points for a single Neopoint?! How in Fyora's name is that a profitable situation? Well, stop thinking that and start reading onwards. Something you should know: The easier it is to rack up points, the higher the score to payout ratio is. That means that even though it might look like a lot of points that'll take a long time to accumulate, it will not. The best thing to do on this game is to play the Numbers mode, where you have to connect adjacent tiles according to the requirements set for the level. Score enough points and make it to the next level. The only way to lose is if a green "cursed" tile makes it to the bottom of the screen, but they can be used as part of chains like any other tile. This game makes the list because it is so ridiculously simple to get 100,000 points within the first four or five levels, so before it gets challenging. What also makes this game so easy is the lack of a timer. You can take as long as you want between moves. Remember: The longer the chain you make according to the rules, the more points you get. I recommend the Numbers mode only because it is the easiest to make long, high-scoring chains in the first few levels.

4: MAGAX Destroyer II

Ratio: 1.15 points per NP

Required points for 1000 NP: 1150

Difficulty: 4/10

I'MMA SHOOT MAH LAZAH! OK, this game is so pathetically easy that I could get a high score if I actually wanted to spend the time to do it. You fly around a graveyard with the arrow keys and shoot ghosts with a laser using the space bar. The goal is to blast all the Ghost Scorchios in the level without losing all of your health. There are also Ghost Cybunnies that will occasionally become Hubrid Nox, who will throw a ball of fire at you that prevents you from firing your laser. No damage, you just can't attack for a short time. What makes this game so easy is that it's incredibly hard to lose. The ghosts can only do damage to you if you touch them, and since they almost never move in the horizontal direction, it is absurdly easy to avoid taking any damage. Even the fireball from Nox only takes away your ability to shoot. It took me five minutes to get 1150 points by level five. One thing to be wary about is your power meter, which is not your health bar. This shows how much energy you have left to fire the laser. If you run out, just avoid enemies for a while until it recharges automatically. If you get frozen by Nox or run out of power, which is likely to happen a few times, just turn around and go left. Enemies don't give chase, so you can fly left, recover your laser shots, and then fly back and continue busting those ghosts. The only thing that caused me any sort of problem was the fact that TNT actually tried to apply momentum physics. The faster you are going, the longer it will take for you to turn around, which is kind of annoying, but nothing that can't be adapted to. Although I have to wonder, you're using a jetpack with endless fuel and a laser weapon to shoot ghosts. Why would they even try to put in any sort of real science?

3: Ghost Bopper

Ratio: .31 points per NP

Required points for 1000 NP: 310

Difficulty: 4/10

Insert obligatory Ghostbusters joke here. There is a very good chance that you've never heard of of this game. I hadn't heard of it until about a month or two ago when it was the featured game. It's the same exact thing as Whack-a-Mole, except in a graveyard with the ghosts of petpets. Wait, ghosts of petpets or petpets painted ghost...? You see a ghost rise from the ground and press the corresponding number to hit the ghost petpet with the tombstone and send it back to the hole it came from. Some petpet ghosts require multiple hits, so be wary. This game is made of 30 second rounds in which you have to hit as many ghosts as possible without losing all your lives. If your computer has a number pad on the keyboard, it's pretty easy, but the game throws a Mynci wrench at you every three rounds. The buttons mapped to the different tombstones will rotate every three rounds, so don't get too comfortable in the beginning. However, the game has a list showing where each button is mapped to, so check that before each level. Each round is 30 seconds long and it takes until around round 6 or 7 to get the required points for the maximum payout. You can get 1000 NP from this game in about 3 minutes.

2: Faerie Caves II

Ratio: .66 points per NP

Points required for 1000 NP: 660

Difficulty: 3/10

I'm sure someone saw this game and thought that I was Korbat dung crazy. How can I give it only a 3 on the difficulty scale? Firstly, I've beaten most of the console 3D Legend of Zelda games without help for the most part (The Water Temple...*shudders*), so I'm somewhat decent with puzzles. Second, recall, if you will, that the difficulty ratings on this list are based on how easy it is to get the minimum number of points for the maximum payout. With that in mind, this game is easy. If you get all the available gems and treasure chests in the game, you can send your score and claim the 1000 NP after the 9th level. What really makes this game a piece of cake, and I'm not lying about that, is that it's consistent. The levels are always the same design and are in the same order every time you play. It gets a bit monotonous running through it each time. Since there is no randomness in the game, people have made many guides and walkthroughs of the game, showing the exact path to take to get the highest possible score. So my recommendation for this game: Load up a guide for the game, mute the actual game since the music is awful, put on something you want to listen to, and run through the levels as fast as that Quiggle can move.

1: Kass Basher

Ratio: .85 points per NP

Required points for 1000 NP: 850

Difficulty: 1/10

Come on, you really didn't see this coming? This is the easiest and fastest game on all of Neopets. With not even 10 seconds per game, you can get the 1000 NP in no time at all. It was actually kind of difficult to unlock the bat, but once you get it, it's over. Just wait for the wind to get strong enough, around 8 or 9, press spacebar to drop Kass, and press spacebar again when the time is right to send it flying. When is the time right? You'll know when it's time. A tip I only recently learned about: After hitting the Kass plushie, hold spacebar until it gets to the vertex (top) of the launch height. Then release it and press it every time it hits the ground to get some extra bounces and distance. If all goes well, you should get the bat and the maximum amount of NP in less time than it took to read this paragraph.

So those are what I feel are the six most profitable games that you can play on Neopets. If you don't agree with me, then so be it. I don't care. Make the most of the Scores Galore weekends. Don't forget about the Featured Game as well for double the money. What you learned here today will be remembered long after this sentence has ended. And with that, I'll end here, wishing you the best of luck in your gaming endeavors.