Archive for December, 2017

Weekly Buzz 12/21/2017

Hello Collectors,

Christmas Crisis has just picked up the pace by a long shot. We hope that you’re managing your Pouch well during this time. Pro Tip: make sure you’re foraging between drops, to maximize your available honeycomb balance for more supplies. As the sets draw to a close, it’s going to be vital to have enough items around to complete all seven sets. There’s 112 items in total, and the completion bonus is well worth the effort. Stay with it!

Behind the Curtain

From December 22nd through January 1st, Team WallaBee will be out of the office, trying to spend time with family and friends. This means that we’ll be suspending Weekly Buzz posts until the first week of January. We’ll try and make up for the missed time where we can.

Item releases will still happen during this timeframe, with a drop-free guaranteed block of time beginning December 24th – December 26th UTC. This means that drops can happen any time before 23:59 December 23rd UTC, and any time after 00:01 December 27th UTC. This should allow some much-needed recuperation time after Christmas Crisis, am I right? Spend time away from your phone, enjoying the holiday season with those you love, or spend it foraging for some much needed honeycombs… your decision!

We’re really close to releasing update 2.2.2, which will feature some requested new elements, while we work on tackling the beast… erm, forums.

BeeKeeper applications are here! If you’re interested in being a BeeKeeper from January – March, please fill out the BeeKeeper Application before January 1st. All entries will be reviewed, with the first 2018 BK team announced the first or second week of January.

Should you have any questions, please let us know by emailing Support@WallaBeeGame.com

Player Unique History

With more and more Player Uniques coming out, we want to spend a respectable amount of time learning more about them.This week’s Player Unique Spotlight highlighted Light of Willpower. You can read more about this unique here.

Light of Willpower

This Week In WallaBee History

December 18th, 2014:  North Pole released, kicking off Robbie Smith’s Santa’s Workshop set. This icon was used again in a different way when we visited the workshop a second time in Christmas Crisis.

December 18th, 2015: This week two years ago, we opened up BeeKeeper applications for the first time in a long time. It would only seem fitting that we do the same again. In case you missed it above, here it is again: BeeKeeper Application.

December 19th, 2016: Players started getting nervous as we announced Cracking Under Pressure. This set highlighted the festive Christmas Cracker and all six colo(u)red Party Hats. That was definitely a day that no one participating will soon forget.

December 20th, 2012:  WallaBee’s First Christmas released with the first item: Bauble. Trivia Time: Although this set wasn’t the first to release, it is categorized as set #1. This was because WallaBee was planning to launch in 2011, but missed that date by two months, with the first official set (set #2: A Trip To The Circus) releasing along with the app in February.

Room For Growth

We have compiled a list of issues that we are currently working on. If you find something that doesn’t fit into this list, please reach out to us and let us know.

• Battery drains like crazy – We are currently testing an internal build of the app that handles the store differently. We hope that this change will drastically save battery when using the app like normal. This internal build has reduced battery consumption when not using the store, as it halts animations from processing until the store is brought back into focus. However, this is causing some strange loading with items, which sometimes appears as the wrong item in the store. This can be confusing during a drop, and we are looking into it.
• Forum Notifications/Count are missing – Coming in a future update.
• Performing an action that triggers a pop up sometimes ‘freezes,’ which needs a hard close to fix – There is a new version of React Native available which should have this fixed. We will be updating to the newer version of React in the near future to test whether the fix works. More information to come.
• Market Items sometimes not available – This deals with a very rare situation where an item is removed from the market, but the listing is not updated. We are researching what’s causing this.
• General slowness – Because the app runs completely off of an API, connection to WiFi or data is extremely important. If your coverage dips, your connection will also dip. This doesn’t explain every situation, but needs to be addressed. We are currently working on speeding the app up in various areas. You will notice that the forums perform MUCH faster than before. Our goal is to cut the slow, and speed it up, bro.
• Store Item and Icon don’t match – This is a known issue with how the phone holds store information. At the moment, there is a chance that the previous item image will linger, even though the item has updated to the next one in line (viewable by the honeycomb price and set icon). We’re investigating a fix for this.
• Delayed Mix on Wooden Plane and Wooden Yo-Yo releases. – Although these had the exact same drop time on the backend, there was a caching issue which delayed the process of these items to be spaced out a few seconds. We have adjusted this caching, seen in the Blue Paint and Wooden Train release, to which we haven’t seen that issue arise again.
• Crashing on store. Crashing randomly. – Under Investigation

Community Content

This is a section of the blog where we will highlight any funny images or videos from the community. These may appear through links in the forums, on Facebook, guides on YouTube, or other sites.

I’ll probably regret this, but there haven’t been many other options to choose from this week. -sigh- Here’s Mizak, proving that he deserves his top spot on the Naughty List.

If you think someone’s content (or your own) is worthy of being highlighted, you can suggest by emailing support or tagging it with #WallaCommunity.

Any additional questions, comments, concerns? Email: support@wallabeegame.com

Weekly Buzz 12/13/2017

Hello Collectors,

Out with the old, in with the new! Not with your sets… We’re referencing the in-game stores, of course! We have removed Taste Sensation and Ghosts & Ghouls from rotation and added Festive Friends for the next two months. As Christmas gets ever closer, and deadlines at the workshop draw near, we’re going to need all the help we can get! If you have been out of the Christmas Crisis loop, here’s how you can help: Get painting!

December Development

Gather up as many wooden toys, cans of paint, and -insert undiscovered item here- as you can! Players will need to mix one of each together to produce a painted toy. Since we’re in a rush to get toys ready for Santa, there’s no time to dally with the details. Paint the toys a solid color of paint and move onto the next one. Time is of the essence.

We read recently in the Morning News that there’s a cold front rolling into WallaVille. It should be here within the next few weeks. It’s sure to bring some snow, man. Get bundled up and ready for some outdoor fun… and that snow joke.

Six more Benson items have hit the map, bringing the total of Bensons to sixteen. While we’re on the topic of location-based play, we would like to address a potential situation that has come to our attention. Late last week, we created a probationary period with new users and their ability to trade lower numbered items. Effective now, new users must wait 7 days in order to send or receive an item under #1000 in a trade. This change was created to encourage our existing collectors to play within the spirit of a location-based game, without shortening a potential experience for someone else. While we encourage the community to recruit friends and family, sometimes this can be taken too far. We want to make sure that new players stick around and aren’t simply used. While no letter of the law has been broken since Benson hit the road, we believe this change will help the spirit of the law moving forward.

Behind the Curtain

Our goal is to create a game that appeals to new players just as much as our seasoned players. When discussing how to best do this, there are some… what we like to call… challenges. New players typically have a different goal from seasoned players, because seasoned players have already completed their sets and are onto their next goal. WallaBee presents players with one simple challenge: complete your sets. The endgame activity after that is completely open to interpretation. Some collectors decide to fill their sets with items with a number that means something to them. Other collectors try to lower their item numbers, in order to decrease their overall average. Both of these goals are great to reach toward, but WallaBee doesn’t have any definitive endgame challenge (outside of Achievements). When looking at how we can expand WallaBee’s gameplay, we consider those who have just begun playing, and those who have been playing for years. There’s something to be said about the dedication our more seasoned players have. They’ve seen the game morph and change over the years, and they’re still here supporting it. As we move forward with developing gameplay, we hope to keep the spirit of WallaBee untouched, as we add in new types of endgame content. However, before we can get to endgame, we have to start at the beginning.

We are beginning research on some UI enhancements for our newer players. We know that jumping into WallaBee can be a slow process (especially with over 2k items in the game). The community helps new collectors in more ways we can say, but there are many things we can do to make the learning curve easier. With the simple addition of visual cues, we can make certain aspects of the game much easier for newer players. This includes, but is not limited to, changing the appearance of Place Items when players don’t have one saved, highlighting possible ingredients, and showing which nearby locations have a Foraging Cooldown active.

There are also some gameplay elements that can be redefined to help both new and seasoned players. Why should Top 100 only refer to the First 100 to complete a set? Why not expand this in-game leaderboard to allow other types of Top 100 gameplay. Want recognition for getting Eggception sub1k? How about for filling Ain’t Nobody Got Time For This Set with all #1955 items? This allows collectors the ability to choose which leaderboard they want to work towards, per set.

Some of these things may happen, none of these things may happen, or all of these things may happen. These are just the types of conversations we’re currently having as a team, regardless of the limitations and timeline. #DreamBig

Should you have any questions, please let us know by emailing Support@WallaBeeGame.com

Recent Item Highlights

Invasion is coming to a close very soon. What do you think will happen next? There’s no rhyming hint, since there are two more items left. As you begin thinking about the end of this set, take a look at all of the previous items grouped in pairs. It should begin looking like a children’s book.

We’ve Got Company

A creaking was heard, like a hyena’s bite,
as the hatch popped open with a harsh green light.

Wooden Rocker

A simple unicorn rocker made of wood.

Wooden Duck

A simple duck made of wood.

Yellow Paint

What’s yellow and makes a buzzing sound? An electric lemon.

Player Unique History

With more and more Player Uniques coming out, we want to spend a respectable amount of time learning more about them. This week’s Player Unique Spotlight highlighted Willie Nelson. You can read more about this unique here.

Willie Nelson

This Week In WallaBee History

December 10th, 2013:  Bad Santa Yote steps onto the scene, thanks to DeCoyote. Word around town is that Bad Santa Yote isn’t giving out any cards this year, but you can get the Legacy version of this item in a WallaStore near you.

December 11th, 2014:  The WallaBee team began the holiday season by opening their email inboxes for player nominations. Players could nominate 3 players they believed should get special recognition. The 5 players with the most votes were announced the following week, with their usernames written on the Nice List for all to see. We’d like to point out there was also a Naughty List, that elf video makers can never get off of, no matter how hard they try.

December 12th, 2013: Ebenezer Dodson released, kicking off A WallaBee Carol with a most ‘bah humbug’ item. Outside of the founder’s name being hidden in the name, this item also makes reference to Evil Creation, which even to this day costs 9999hc when available in the store.

December 12th, 2016: On this day, the Twelve Days Of Wallamas began. Partridge In A Pear Tree was the first of twelve items, recreating the festive song we all know and love.

Room For Growth

We have compiled a list of issues that we are currently working on. If you find something that doesn’t fit into this list, please reach out to us and let us know.

• Battery drains like crazy – We are currently testing an internal build of the app that handles the store differently. We hope that this change will drastically save battery when using the app like normal. This internal build has reduced battery consumption when not using the store, as it halts animations from processing until the store is brought back into focus. However, this is causing some strange loading with items, which sometimes appears as the wrong item in the store. This can be confusing during a drop, and we are looking into it.
• Forum Notifications/Count are missing – Coming in a future update.
• Performing an action that triggers a pop up sometimes ‘freezes,’ which needs a hard close to fix – There is a new version of React Native available which should have this fixed. We will be updating to the newer version of React in the near future to test whether the fix works. More information to come.
• Market Items sometimes not available – This deals with a very rare situation where an item is removed from the market, but the listing is not updated. We are researching what’s causing this.
• General slowness – Because the app runs completely off of an API, connection to WiFi or data is extremely important. If your coverage dips, your connection will also dip. This doesn’t explain every situation, but needs to be addressed. We are currently working on speeding the app up in various areas. You will notice that the forums perform MUCH faster than before. Our goal is to cut the slow, and speed it up, bro.
• Store Item and Icon don’t match – This is a known issue with how the phone holds store information. At the moment, there is a chance that the previous item image will linger, even though the item has updated to the next one in line (viewable by the honeycomb price and set icon). We’re investigating a fix for this.

Community Content

This is a section of the blog where we will highlight any funny images or videos from the community. These may appear through links in the forums, on Facebook, guides on YouTube, or other sites.

This week’s mention comes to us from within WHQ. Andy has been getting into the holiday spirit, which starts with enjoying some delicious gingerbread men. It would seem that Goldie was innocent this whole time, as the real culprit has now been caught red-hatted.

If you think someone’s content (or your own) is worthy of being highlighted, you can suggest by emailing support or tagging it with #WallaCommunity.

Any additional questions, comments, concerns? Email: support@wallabeegame.com

Weekly Buzz 12/05/2017

Hello Collectors,

We have officially spent our first full week in December, which means that preparations are well under way for the holidays! Some of these holiday plans will be explained through this blog post, while others may surprise you later on in the month. We have a few winter sets planned for December, which are sure to keep you -clears throat- occupied…

December Development

With only one artist (Andy “All-Star” Cameron), WallaBee can only get so many items created. This has been ongoing since the beginning, which is why there have only been 139 sets within almost 6 years. In 2014, WallaBee brought on another talented graphic artist, Robbie Smith, to help bear the load. He began with sets like WallaBucks and ended with A Day In Singapore. After WallaBee came under the Munzee Inc umbrella, focus returned to having one artist.

Unique commissions reopened after the acquisition, to many players’ approval, which has been great for the community and game. We have grown the Unique commissioning process, but have not extended our team of artists. Andy still works tirelessly on both Set items and Uniques. The downside with splitting time is that fewer Set items are released, meaning fewer drops or mixes over a longer period of time. As you may have noticed with recent sets, there have not been many mixes. Lacking items in reserve made this difficult (as well as various high-detailed story-driven items).

One way to combat this issue is to clone Andy into a team of artists, allowing us to pick up production time much faster. Unfortunately, our resources do not cover experimental human genetics experiments (and Andy’s wife wouldn’t approve). So as you can see, our team only has a few options available, which we will share with you now.

• Option 1: We continue at the pace we’ve been going, with a few items released every week. Fewer mixes, more store/forage drops, space out as evenly as possible.
• Option 2: Bring on another artist to help with certain sets.
• Option 3: Force Andy to undergo cyber-enhancement surgery, making him both man and machine, allowing the mechanical portion of his body to draw while his human portion is sleeping.

With the options above, we believe that Option 2 is the best way to move forward. Many more WallaBee items can be made within a shorter period of time, which allows the community to collect, trade, mix, and sell even more items. We hope that you share our opinions on this, because it’s already been decided. John Rogeles (Graphic Artist for Munzee, and creator of V2 WallaBee Achievements) will join Andy in rotation with creating sets for WallaBee. Christmas Crisis will be the first of many sets from John, that we hope everyone will enjoy.

Begin making more room in your pouch, because we have a few winter sets releasing this month. December is the month of giving, and we’re going to be giving a lot! Festivities begin this weekend with the craziness that is Christmas Crisis. Many of Santa’s elves have gone missing, leaving many unfinished toys at the workshop. It’s up to YOU to help save Christmas! We hope you like mixing, because this month’s content will scratch your mixing itch… maybe even excessively.

Speaking of mixing, Christmas Mixers are coming to town! These special mixers have the same specifications with creating items as WallaBee Mixers, but with an added surprise. Christmas Mixers, when mixed together, have a chance of generating honeycombs or locks in addition to the item created. These bonuses will be found in your Transactions page when earned.

In other news, Benson has begun his mission to permanently visit other players. Since there was some confusion about what some of the specifics were, his goal is to make it onto your set of Uniques. He will show up at random Monuments/Sculptures within the game, whether they’ve been there for years or just added recently. However, you may want to make sure that sculptures near you are verified, as Benson only travels to these locations. If you have a monument near you that is not verified, please report it for review. Since most of these locations may not be visible from a street view on Google Maps, please help our BeeKeepers by supplying any necessary details to help determine the validity of the location(s). The next 5 Benson items have been released, so get your hunting hats on!

Special Events

WallaBee’s birthday is just around the corner, which means that the London event is that much closer to a reality. The two main brains behind this event (Cceasar and Stulimont) have been deviously planning some… rather interesting ‘games’ for attendees to partake in, as you can see below. If you’re interested in joining the festivities, you can gather more information in the forums or on Stulimont’s website. With 30 confirmed players for Saturday’s portion of the event, it should be a grand time for everyone participating.

Should you have any questions, please let us know by emailing Support@WallaBeeGame.com

Recent Item Highlights

Invasion has seen some crazy development within the past two weeks. What’s happening with the town’s cows? What is that green substance that Flo has found? Will Ray ever get that dumb look off his face? All we can do is hope we get answers soon.

Concerned Call

Once again mobile, Flo called her friend Ray,
“You’ll never believe what I saw today!”

Investigation

She showed him her findings, however cliché.
“A pile of green goo doesn’t mean it’s doomsday”

Crash Site

When out of thin air, it dove from great height.
They stood perplexed at the spaceship crash site.

Player Unique History

With more and more Player Uniques coming out, we want to spend a respectable amount of time learning more about them. This week’s Player Unique Spotlight highlighted Cooktown Orchid. You can read more about this unique here.

Cooktown Orchid

This Week In WallaBee History

December 4th, 2013: A Victim was found on this day. There were no clues as to what happened, so we asked the community to help interrogate some potential suspects. What was the victim’s name? We don’t know, but we know she wore some circus clothes…

December 5th, 2012: On this day, one of the first Player Uniques was released – Saint Nicholas. This Unique made a huge impact on the community, causing the WallaBee team to restrict the ability for players to send trades for Player Uniques. Luckily for everyone, this restriction was lifted as of Version 2, which allows players to easily trade any items in the game. Thanks for such a great item with a rich history, nicolasm06!

December 7th, 2015: Ms. December was released on this day, finishing the Women of WallaBee calendar set. Our favorite bearded lady has never looked so festive.

Room For Growth

We have compiled a list of issues that we are currently working on. If you find something that doesn’t fit into this list, please reach out to us and let us know.

• Battery drains like crazy – This is something I have personally been testing, and the cause is not the GPS like one might think. Yes, it’s a contributing factor, but it’s actually the store. Testing a version of the app without the store allowed me to keep my battery for MUCH longer than normal. We’re working out a proper fix for this. We are currently testing an internal build of the app that handles the store differently. We hope that this change will drastically save battery when using the app like normal.
• Forum Notifications/Count are missing – Coming in a future update.
• Performing an action that triggers a pop up sometimes ‘freezes,’ which needs a hard close to fix – There is a new version of React Native available which should have this fixed. We will be updating to the newer version of React in the near future to test whether the fix works. More information to come.
• Market Items sometimes not available – This deals with a very rare situation where an item is removed from the market, but the listing is not updated. We are researching what’s causing this.
• General slowness – Because the app runs completely off of an API, connection to WiFi or data is extremely important. If your coverage dips, your connection will also dip. This doesn’t explain every situation, but needs to be addressed. We are currently working on speeding the app up in various areas. You will notice that the forums perform MUCH faster than before. Our goal is to cut the slow, and speed it up, bro.
• Network Error when commenting – We have fixed a bug that threw an error when commenting on certain types of activity, sometimes resulting in a second iteration of a comment.
• Store Item and Icon don’t match – This is a known issue with how the phone holds store information. At the moment, there is a chance that the previous item image will linger, even though the item has updated to the next one in line (viewable by the honeycomb price and set icon). We’re investigating a fix for this.

Community Content

This is a section of the blog where we will highlight any funny images or videos from the community. These may appear through links in the forums, on Facebook, guides on YouTube, or other sites.

This week’s mention is of a video/project that one of our players created. We present to you an automatic mixing machine! Great idea, Violet. Sometimes mixing all of those mixers and eggs leaves your fingers sore. Such a creative idea!

If you think someone’s content (or your own) is worthy of being highlighted, you can suggest by emailing support or tagging it with #WallaCommunity.

Any additional questions, comments, concerns? Email: support@wallabeegame.com