The Spookiest Aspects Of Neopets!

That said, in honor of the holiday, I thought I'd write an article all about the spookiest aspects of Neopets! To compile this list, I scoured the Neoboards for the opinions of my fellow players. They had a lot of keen and insightful opinions about the spookiest parts of the site, and it was fun to talk to them!

So here's my list of the 20 spookiest aspects of Neopets! I hope you enjoy reading it!

1. Cannibalism

More than one player has noticed that cannibalism is rampant on this site. Spooky Food items such as Sun Dried Techo Claw and Meerca Pie can be eaten by ACTUAL Techos and Meercas. How macabre!

2. Winning Without Trying

Lots of players ironically posted that it's possible to get trophies on this site with zero effort. For instance, there's a Random Event involving taxes that takes away a huge chunk of your Neopoints on hand and gives you a trophy in return. There's also a Random Event that gives you a free Lottery ticket and might place you on the winners' list. (This happened to me! I placed bronze in the Lottery without even buying a ticket.) That's quite spooky, earning trophies and contests without even trying!

3. Desiring Sad Pets

Lots of players love the artwork for sad and melancholy pets, such as pets with low moods, or pets painted Grey. On any other site, having a sad pet would be a negative thing. On Neopets, it's actually something to be desired! Plenty of people let their pets' moods go down naturally, and never raise them with toys or grooming items. Or else, they make their pets deliberately sick by feeding them poisonous foods (such as Poisonous Jellies) because "sick" faces are so beautifully expressive. This is a spooky aspect of the site that the players adore!

4. Spooky Is Beautiful

There are plenty of players on this site who are severely allergic to everything pink, pretty and Faerie. These people are aficionados of Darigan, Magma, Halloween, Mutant, and other fierce pet colors. On other game sites, these pet colors would correlate with "the bad guys," but on Neopets, these colors are adored and cherished! They're full of attitude, spunk and verve. It's quite cool, and quite spooky, that the "dangerous" pets on this site are actually brave, heroic and fearless!

5. Pet Giveaways Are Mysterious

I once spent an entire month perfecting a petpage application for an unconverted Faerie Ixi that I absolutely adored. I crammed my app with poetry, stories, beautiful hand drawn pictures, and my future plans for the pet. Imagine my horror when the Faerie Ixi went to a newbie account with no accomplishments to speak of! I'll never understand why the Ixi's original owner decided to gift the Ixi to a newbie. I'm terrified that the newbie will get frozen because her account is only 5 months old, and she might not know all of the rules of the site yet. What a risky move, giving an unconverted pet to someone with almost no Neopets experience! I consider it quite spooky indeed!

6. Save NP, Spend NC

One player made an astute observation. He said that the players on this site are rabid about saving Neopoints, often saving 100+ million Neopoints in the bank. However, they're also rabid Neocash spenders! They parsimoniously scrimp and save every Neopoint, while spending thousands of real life dollars on Neocash. I thought this was a really funny -- and yes, spooky -- aspect of the site!

7. New Avatars

Nothing excites the players more than new avatars. Yet sadly, sometimes nothing depresses them more! For example, the Charity Corner event last year was quite mysterious, with a new avatar available for the getting, yet no one was 100% sure how to get it. Eventually we discovered that we had to donate items on 7 different days. People who'd donated all of their Safety Deposit Box items on the first 2 days were quite shocked when they learned the requirements of the new avatar, and I have to admit, I felt quite sorry for them. By the time we'd realized that 7 days' worth of donations were required, it was too late for some people to get the avatar. Avatars are the spookiest aspect of the site, and they make us both thrilled and devastated at the same time!

8. No Sent Box

We're all familiar with the Neomail system by now. There's an Inbox for the Neomails we receive, as well as a Send page that delivers messages to other players. However, everyone who has EVER used the Neomail system always wonders the same thing -- why isn't there a Sent Folder that records the messages we've sent? It's a spooky aspect of the site, especially since TNT has never addressed it in the Editorial. They must have received thousands of the same question by now!

9. The Editorial

And speaking of the Editorial, the players who submit questions to it are often flummoxed by the questions that TNT chooses to answer. There's always that one question with a really obvious answer, or one that can easily be answered by the players on the Help Neoboard. More than one exasperated player has seen her question bypassed in the Editorial in favor of other questions whose solutions are already widely known. The process by which TNT picks and chooses the Editorial question is a spooky mystery, and no one really knows what it is! (Sorry if I sound overly critical, TNT, but it had to be said!)

10. Twenty Isn't Enough

More than one player lamented that our extreme desire for pets is truly spooky. Only on Neopets is it possible to amass a whopping 20 pets, yet wish we could own 50 more! I myself recently downsized my accounts, going from 20 total pets to a mere 14, because I wanted space for pets that don't yet exist, like a Cherry Chia or Polka Dot Cybunny. I must admit, though, I have around 40 dream pets, most of them unconverted, and it's quite spooky that my love for pets surpasses the number 20! I am such an extreme hoarder, and all of my fellow players feel the same way!

11. Low Tech

Players have noticed the decidedly low tech approach that TNT uses in the world of Neopia. There are no planes, trains, buses, subways, or even space shuttles. There are no cell phones, no computers, and no televisions. Many people wonder why TNT has organized Neopia this way, and are quite spooked by the lack of reasons!

12. The Secret Laboratory Ray

I love the Secret Laboratory Ray! I've been zapping my battle pet for years, and its stats are pretty high by now. Other people love the Ray because it can turn their pets into new species and colors. Yet many people are spooked by the zapping page! Our pets cry and complain, pleading for us to stop. More than one person has hesitated before zapping their pet for the first time, unsure of why their pet is sobbing and protesting. Their pets' anguish is the spookiest part of using the Secret Laboratory Ray, although I hope it doesn't stop people from using it!

13. New Pet Colors

For some reason, TNT has been rolling out with lots and lots of new pet colors recently! We now have such amazing colors as Stealthy, Elderly, 8-Bit, Pastel, Magma, Polka Dot, Wraith, Dimensional, Eventide, Maractite, Relic, Swamp Gas, Transparent, Zombie, and Woodland. The players are thrilled, but also spooked, by the plethora of new colors that now grace the site. Why so many colors, and why now?

14. Pets Clashing With Petpets

One player made me nod with agreement. She noted that pets and Petpets with the same number of characters in their names can't bond. For instance, a pet named "ASDF7" can't bond with a Slorg, since both have five characters. I thought this was a spooky occurrence, and no one on the Neoboards could explain why this happens!

15. Contest Records

Why do some contests have records, while others do not? For instance, every game has its own high score list, where people can check out the top game scores. However, the Poetry Contest has no such record! You can't type in a username and read all of the entries by that person. One of the spooky aspects of Neopets is that some contests have records while others don't!

16. Ironic Clothes

The Koi Life Preserver always makes me chuckle. It's a red-and-white striped life preserver that keeps the Koi afloat. The weird part is, Kois are fish! They know how to swim, and certainly don't need this colorful item. The same goes for the Matador Kau outfit, which turns our Kaus into matadors. A Kau that controls the bullfighting, how odd! There are lots of other ironic clothes on this site, and I find their existence to be rather odd, incongruous and spooky!

17. The Altador Cup

More than one player humorously posted that the Altador Cup is the spookiest game/event on the site. In all of the years that the Cup has existed, no one has ever figured out how the scoring system works. We just manically toss our Yooyus into the other teams' nets and pray that our 400 wins will make a difference. I think this is hilarious, sad, and spooky all at the same time!

18. Stalkers

We all, no matter whether we're newbies or veterans, have our favorite players on the site! I think it's cute that we each stalk our favorite players because we're always thrilled by their achievements. My favorite player is a fellow poet who regularly contributes to the Poetry Contest, and I love to see her trophy count go up just as much as I do mine! Stalking her is a spooky habit of mine, but I'm not the only stalker on Neopets! All of my Neofriends have their own favorite players as well, who they emulate and try to copy as much as possible.

19. Unrewarded Ambitions

One player admitted that, although she'll never win any awards for doing so, she's dead-set on creating stories for each of her pets that are intertwined with each other. Another player admitted that she's obsessed with her original Neohome, even though only Neohome version 2 can enter the Neohome Spotlight. And yet another player said that she's trying to zap and give away 50 pets. We'll never be rewarded for such efforts, and yet, they're an integral part of the site! People like to come up with their own challenges and accomplishments, and I think this is charming and spooky at the same time!

20. Crazy Closets

I don't think I'm the only one with 14 basic Elephante hats in my closet from my many zaps! Many players bemoan the status of their closets as well, exasperated that they can't get rid of their 25 Aisha collars. I think it's rather spooky that it's been almost a decade since customization occurred, and TNT has yet to roll out with a solution for getting rid of our excess Paint Brush clothes. I myself hope that someday, I'll be able to get rid of, or give away, my Paint Brush clothes in a way that doesn't involve transferring pets around.

Conclusion:

So these were the top 20 spooky aspects of Neopets that my fellow players and I came up with! I must say, I adore this site like crazy, but I'm still spooked by the things listed in this article. From things that make no sense, to things that actually scare me, these spooky aspects of the site make me raise an eyebrow in confusion, and sometimes shudder with horror.

I hope this was a fitting article for Halloween, dear readers! I hope your Halloweens are fun so far! Stay tuned for future articles from yours truly, and have a terrific and spooky holiday!