Penguin-keeper's Zoo

[Jhud]

Interesting, I haven't noticed the gnawing animation on my 20th ann. Digimon. So now I'm even more excited to get my old digimon in the mail! I'm a sucker for animations, especially since I assume that the screen doesn't dim on the old ones? The 20th ann. dims after a while what I'm not a fan of (like you mentioned about one of your odd pets), I also love the shell of your digimon!

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Interesting, I haven't noticed the gnawing animation on my 20th ann. Digimon. So now I'm even more excited to get my old digimon in the mail! I'm a sucker for animations, especially since I assume that the screen doesn't dim on the old ones? The 20th ann. dims after a while what I'm not a fan of (like you mentioned about one of your odd pets), I also love the shell of your digimon!

Yeah, the screen doesn't dim or go to sleep on the originals - it's always on, the same as with the vintage Tamagotchis.

Ugh, I really do hate that "feature" - it completely defeats the point of a virtual pet. I mean, a real pet doesn't blink out of existence when you're not looking at it, so it makes no sense for a virtual pet to do so!

Thanks for the compliment on the shell, too! I initially had my eye on a dark-blue one, but then the yellow one came up for a bit cheaper, and I liked it a lot more, so I went for it.

And thankyou so much for reading my log, too - it's really nice to get a comment on it!

 

[Hoky]

I don't mind the dimming feature so much in the 20th Anniversary since it pops back up fast enough with a button press. The nigh-imperceptible delay on Morinos coming out of Screen Saver mode is kind of annoying, though, especially since the thing can get stomped on so often and it's hard to just glance over and see if it's sick or not. With the Digimon, I'm generally only looking at it (at work) when I'm gonna play w/it for a bit.
That said, I'd RATHER not have any screen saver. Watch batteries aren't too spendy. XD

Glad you're liking your digimon! They're so much fun, just like Tamas.

 

[Penguin-keeper]

That said, I'd RATHER not have any screen saver. Watch batteries aren't too spendy. XD

Yeah, that's my take on it, too.

Glad you're liking your digimon! They're so much fun, just like Tamas.

Thanks!

I knew people who had Digimon back in the day, but I just never got around to getting one of my own - much like the Toy Story Virtual Friends Space Explorer that I'm currently waiting on, come to think of it. Of course, I've rectified that in both cases, now, and I'm having a whale of a time!

And now, it's time for a small log-update!

Super Gyaoppi: The penguin has evolved again, and for the first time, it actually resembles a penguin* - and it finally has the shading that I said would be a big help in my previous log-entry.

*And now that I say this, I realise that the earlier phases are plain because they're meant to look like they're covered in down. How stupid of me not to notice that before now!

I'm now taking care of this adorable, punky-looking little bird.

Now that he's actually looking like a penguin, I can't wait to see how he'll change as he gets older. I'm finding this one really fun, as it's completely unknown territory for me. Moreover, the Super Gyaoppi seems to evolve quite often, on a schedule that's not like any of my other virtual pets, which is keeping me on my toes.

When this one leaves me, it's going to be a tough decision as to whether to do another run with the penguin to try to get a different outcome, or to try raising one of the other available animals. But the time for that decision is a ways off, yet!

 

[Penguin-keeper]

20th Anniversary Tamagotchi Mini: I may be mistaken, but it seems like Bill is getting a little bit more needy, now. This makes sense, since he's been around for quite a while, at this point!

Super Gyaoppi: The Super Gyaoppi penguin evolved again today. When I heard the evolution sound, I picked up the virtual pet to check, and then laughed.

He'd evolved into this comically fat penguin, who bounces around the screen shaking his flippers around like he owns the place (in motion, it looks like he's beating his chest like a gorilla). Look at how huge he is!

I absolutely love this - it was completely unexpected and it amused me quite a bit.

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Digimon: I became very busy yesterday, and found myself unable to tend to Agumon.

This was the unfortunate result.

Because I'm running too many virtual pets right now, and because Digimon are not as pause-friendly as the original Tamagotchis are (with a Digimon, you have to plan pausing ahead of time, as you need to put the clock into set-mode once the Digimon has fallen asleep - and even then, if they evolve, things will start progressing again), I'm going to take the Digimon out of the rotation for the time being. I'll run it again as a solo virtual pet some other time!

With today's update over with, I'd also like to talk a bit about a new addition to my collection that I'm currently waiting on!

As I mentioned in a previous post, I purchased a Toy Story Virtual Friends Space Explorer virtual pet recently, but that's not all - yesterday, I was able to purchase a 101 Dalmatians Giga Pet online.

Now, back in the day, I wasn't a fan of the Giga Pets (I never owned one, but I knew people who had them and experienced them via that - and those people never liked them, either). Tiger Electronics seemingly rushed them to market after not paying much heed to what Bandai was doing, and I never liked the way that they play - and they were far too unreasonable and too demanding, too.

However, my return to the virtual pets hobby has made me want to experience numerous different virtual pets, and if nothing else I think that I ought to have a Giga Pet in my collection, since I did get started back when they were a part of the virtual pet landscape.

After reading up on it (mainly on TamaTalk), I learned that the Giga Pets that featured licensed characters were less of a nuisance, and that the 101 Dalmatians one seems to be particularly well-liked (along with the Star Wars Rancor ). Accordingly, I've kept an eye out for one, and I'm actually really looking forward to receiving it. It's also very helpful that Hasbro has kept the instructions for them easily accessible online, too - I've already read them, so I'll be ready to go once I receive the 101 Dalmatians Giga Pet.

I don't usually lean towards virtual pets featuring licensed characters, but I think that the Toy Story and 101 Dalmatians ones are worthy exceptions, since the Toy Story one feels like something that would be sold in-universe by Pizza Planet (much like the KFC-exclusive Giga Pets from the US!), and there sure are a lot of dalmatians that need taking care of in 101 Dalmatians!

I hope that it goes well. It certainly can't be any worse than Penguin Watch, at least!

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Today, I received my Toy Story Virtual Friends Space Explorer. It has this weird issue where there are grayscale lines and blocks on the screen when a lot is being displayed on it, but I've opened it up and I can't see anything wrong. It works fine, though, and aside from a button that's been partially clawed or scraped off, it's in really nice shape.

Anyway, there were a few events with my virtual pets, today, so on with the log...

20th Anniversary Tamagotchi Mini: This morning, the old-age sickness beeps issued forth, and I checked the screen to see an ailing Bill.

He remained this way for an hour...

... But eventually he passed on.

Goodbye, Bill.

With Bill now gone, I'm going to take the 20th Anniversary Mini out of the rotation for a while. I've got a lot of virtual pets running, and more still on the way, and I want to eventually whittle it down to the point of only ever running two at the most - it's just that I can't resist starting up the new additions to the zoo as I get them!

It's taken time for the Mini to grow on me. I really didn't like its extremely simplified nature at first, and it drove me to pick up an old P1 on eBay and put the Mini down, but there's still something inviting about running it, and I'm glad that I gave it another chance.

That said, I do still have my gripes with it - particularly with the fact that not all of the original Tamagotchi characters are represented, and with the fact that every single one who is present has had one of the weird human-heads-on-legs evolutions forced on them (Oyajitchi for most, and Bill for Mametchi), regardless of how you raise them. It not only ends up looking really weird that these cute little creatures all ultimately evolve into disembodied old-man faces, but it also takes a bit away from the secret, hidden nature of Oyajitchi and Bill as they were in the originals.

Still, after this run, I have a new-found appreciation for the Mini - it's brought and is bringing a lot of people back to the hobby, it fits into people's busy lives, it's a good introduction to virtual pets for those who are unfamiliar with them, and it's fun to run one alongside other standard virtual pets.

If they issued a version featuring shells and species from the P2, I would buy one without hesitation.

Super Gyaoppi: A little while after Bill passed on, I heard the evolution sound from my Super Gyaoppi penguin.

He'd turned into this wild-eyed penguin who spins around the screen!

As he spins, he bounces off of all of the edges of the screen - it's great!

This was another fantastic and unexpected evolution, and the more of these I see, the more I love the Super Gyaoppi. This one's quickly becoming one of my favourite virtual pets.

Moreover, as I'm finishing up this entry, he's just turned the lights off on his own and has gone to sleep without any prompting from me! That's pretty neat!

Toy Story Virtual Friends Space Explorer: Toy Story is one of my favourite films of all time, and part of the appeal of this virtual pet for me is that it feels rather like something that would be sold in-universe, rather than merely feeling like a virtual pet with a Toy Story-related casing and graphics. I could imagine Andy having bought one of these during the heyday of the classic virtual pets!

When you start this one up, you're presented with an alien, an alien dog, and an alien bird, and The Claw will take away two of them, leaving the "Lucky Winner" for you to take care of.

I got the regular alien.

I was hoping to get the bird, but to be honest I like all three of them, so I was going to be happy with whichever one I ended up with!

The animations on this one are really nice - they have a lot of frames, and there are close-up shots for things like feeding. The alien eats pizza, of course.

As I'm finishing up writing this, the alien has fallen asleep. He looks very cosy tucked into his bed, which is nicely-detailed, since it takes up almost all of the screen.

 

[Jhud]

Since the Mini was originally a 2005 release, I suppose that the characters turning into Oyajitchi are a nod to the "Oldie" feature from the Connections.

Man, your log has made me really want to get a Gyaoppi- it seems like a pretty unique and well made virtual pet. I don't have a lot of odd pets but I'm super tempted by this one!

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Since the Mini was originally a 2005 release, I suppose that the characters turning into Oyajitchi are a nod to the "Oldie" feature from the Connections.

Ah! Even though I knew of the original Mini (although we never got them in the UK, as far as I know), I never thought of that!

It makes more sense, now. Though I still don't like it, because I still think that it's weird for it to be applied to something that's meant to harken back to the originals.

Man, your log has made me really want to get a Gyaoppi- it seems like a pretty unique and well made virtual pet. I don't have a lot of odd pets but I'm super tempted by this one!

The experience is a bit different to a Tamagotchi or a Digimon, in that the games are different and you have to put it to bed at a certain time (it won't fall asleep and let you know that you need to turn the lights off) before it eventually learns to do so on its own, but it's definitely great. It's the sort of different experience that I want out of my collection. It's the good kind, unlike the likes of Penguin Watch.

There are a lot of Gyaoppi variants - the ones that were simply called Gyaoppi and Gyaoppi II are dedicated pets featuring dinosaurs. Then there are birds - both ducks and chickens. Then there's Chuppi, which I don't recommend because the programming is super-wonky (and the chicken from it is featured on the Super Gyaoppi anyway - I'll have to run that one at some point). And then there's the Super Gyaoppi 9 in 1, which Tamenagerie quite rightly describes as "the king of multi-pets" - I wholeheartedly agree with that claim.

An 8-in-1 variant of the Super Gyaoppi was marketed as Octo-Pets, and I believe that that one lacks the duck. There's also a 10-in-1 Super Gyaoppi variant out there (there's one on eBay right now, even, under the name of "Micro Pet Multi Play") that's almost the same but also has a horse as part of the selection of pets!

Numerous other pets use the Gyaoppi programming, or are derived from it (Penpy is an example of this, but there seem to be plenty of others).

The Super Gyaoppi and its variants also offer a legitimate pause function (it was one of the earliest virtual pets to do so), and the option to speed up growth, so that hours pass as minutes, though I haven't used the latter.

The only gotcha is that they can freeze up on the second game (a card guessing game), but they usually unfreeze quickly. That game's not as good as the dodging game, anyway, though!

If you do get one (there often seem to be a few on eBay), I'd love to hear what you think of it.

 

[Hoky]

Just getting caught up... I'm with Jhud. The Gyaoppis and their variants seem pretty cool now that you've done some great explaining! The 9-in-1 Penguin one especially. I dig the designs.

With Digimon, yeah, the lack of pause feature kinda bugs me. On the 20th Anniversary ones, you can pause them by putting them to bed in the middle of the day, but they only sleep for 3 hours (actually, Jhud told me that, now that I say it XD). I guess I never realized tamas and Digimon could be paused back when I was kid, so I never really bothered. Now, though, it's so clutch, especially when I don't wanna wait until I get home to start a new baby on my V3.

As for the Gigapets... I have the Rancor sitting on my counter right now. I haven't run it in 20 years because even though it's a lot of fun, I remember it being a PAIN at points. Basically, at certain points it (and other gigapets I've raised, including the dog, the baby, and the dinosaur) would just get sick and start to die. I remember when that happened it was basically just you pouring ALL your time into it for like a day to keep it from just dropping dead then and there. Made it hard to get the later evolutions.

Here's a page that looks like it was made in the super early days of the internet to sorta explain: https://www.virtualpet.com/vp/farm/gigapet/gphealth/gphealth.htm

That said, I really like my Rancor, and maybe I'll boot it up one of these days when I'm looking for a change of pace.

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Log-updates first, and then a reply for Hoky!

Super Gyaoppi: I forgot to mention this before, but when you start out, the eating animation shows a small, Babytchi-like blob. However, once your chosen animal reaches a certain age, these animations will change to actually reflect the animal that you chose. My penguin now dips his beak down to drink the glasses of water that I give him, and to peck at the fish and ice cream that he's fed! This is so cute. I absolutely love it.

I've also forgotten to mention thus far that, occasionally, you'll be alerted to a weather-event!

When this happens, you'll see an animation depicting rain or sun (the sunny one is shown above - I'll try to remember to get a picture of the rainy one the next time that it occurs, as it's my favourite of the two), and you have to pick a menu option that will allow you to give your pet either an umbrella or a baseball cap, in order to appropriately deal with the weather that has occurred. I like this feature - it shakes things up a bit, and provides additional meaningful interaction with your pet (in contrast to, say, the petting feature on the Dinkie Penguin, which, though cute, does nothing and unfortunately has no lasting effect on the growth of your pet).

Toy Story Virtual Friends Space Explorer: Oh dear. This virtual pet, though lovely, has a critical flaw. It was originally promoted as having a pause function - that pause function also pauses the clock, and when you unpause it, the time remains at the point where you last paused it, with seemingly no way to adjust the clock afterwards! Ironically, the packaging actually called this feature "parent-friendly", but I don't think that a pause feature that stops the clock like that is friendly to anyone!

Unfortunately, this makes the pause feature unusable, and it means that this virtual pet can't fit into my schedule at the moment. I'll have to run it some other time.

Just getting caught up... I'm with Jhud. The Gyaoppis and their variants seem pretty cool now that you've done some great explaining! The 9-in-1 Penguin one especially. I dig the designs.

Thanks very much!

I've quickly grown to be very fond of the Gyaoppi line, I must admit - the Super Gyaoppi in particular.

Make no mistake, though - there certainly are some bad Gyaoppi variants: Chuppi is one of them. But it seems like a lot of the companies who used this particular programming didn't mess with it too much, and if they did change things, it usually wasn't in a negative way (which is my understanding of Penpy, which I've finally been able to request shipping for, from the warehouse of the proxy-service that I use to buy goods from Japan).

Incidentally, speaking of both the Super Gyaoppi 9 in 1 and Chuppi, I think that I might run the chicken on the Super Gyaoppi next time. It's the same chicken that Chuppi ostensibly features, but on the Super Gyaoppi it will run properly, because the programming isn't wonky there. Having already gotten such a great impression of the Super Gyaoppi from the penguin, I'd like to see how the Gyaoppi chicken actually turns out!

I do highly recommend the Super Gyaoppi. It really is a fantastic vintage virtual pet - it's exactly the sort of thing that I wanted to find when I got back into this hobby.

With Digimon, yeah, the lack of pause feature kinda bugs me. On the 20th Anniversary ones, you can pause them by putting them to bed in the middle of the day, but they only sleep for 3 hours (actually, Jhud told me that, now that I say it XD). I guess I never realized tamas and Digimon could be paused back when I was kid, so I never really bothered. Now, though, it's so clutch, especially when I don't wanna wait until I get home to start a new baby on my V3.

I knew that you could pause Tamagotchis back in the day, but I didn't know that you could pause Digimon - I suppose because you need to give special consideration to it on the originals, and most kids wouldn't've figured that out until later.

As for the Gigapets... I have the Rancor sitting on my counter right now. I haven't run it in 20 years because even though it's a lot of fun, I remember it being a PAIN at points. Basically, at certain points it (and other gigapets I've raised, including the dog, the baby, and the dinosaur) would just get sick and start to die. I remember when that happened it was basically just you pouring ALL your time into it for like a day to keep it from just dropping dead then and there. Made it hard to get the later evolutions.

Here's a page that looks like it was made in the super early days of the internet to sorta explain: https://www.virtualpet.com/vp/farm/gigapet/gphealth/gphealth.htm

That said, I really like my Rancor, and maybe I'll boot it up one of these days when I'm looking for a change of pace.

Oh man, that page, and the "letters" page that's linked to from it, were some really nostalgic reading! They remind me exactly of the general feeling that everyone had about the Giga Pets line back then - they really weren't anywhere near as well-regarded as the Tamagotchis and Nano Pals were (my first virtual pet was a Tamagotchi P1, but my first non-Tamagotchi virtual pet was a Nano Puppy; Incidentally, I always misremembered this line as being called Nano Pets, but I saw some pictures of the original packaging recently, and it very clearly calls the line Nano Pals).

It didn't help that, in the UK, Giga Pets cost about the same as a Tamagotchi did, if memory serves, so people were getting a pretty problematic product for the same price as the originator of the virtual pet toy-category.

I'm under no delusions that the 101 Dalmatians Giga Pet will be in my rotation for an especially long time, believe me! But it's just one of those virtual pets that I really wanted to have in my collection and give a fair try to, since, for better or worse, I do have memories of other people's Giga Pets from back in the day. It'll be fun to have a different experience, either way, I think.

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Shuku 20 Shunen Tamagotchi P2: A little while after I'd posted yesterday's log-update, Tongaritchi evolved into...

Mimitchi! :mimitchi:

This didn't surprise me - I've kept a close eye on his care throughout, after all.

Super Gyaoppi: There is one potential negative about the Super Gyaoppi which I keep forgetting to mention, because to me it's not a negative, it's just an entertaining absurdity.

However, I should make a note about it, here: The poop-clearing process is ridiculously long. It's also very noisy, because it shows an animation of a specialised poop-clearing vehicle which drives in with its sirens blaring in order to clear up a giant poop - and you can only clean up one poop at a time, so if there's more than one, you'll have to go through this process multiple times.

//www.tamatalk.com/IB/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png video shows what I mean - it covers the poop-clearing animation at around 1:39.

WOO-OO WOO-OO WOO-OO! POOP-ALERT!

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Super Gyaoppi: Last night, a little while before bedtime, my penguin found himself having to deal with the rain.

Sure, penguins have waterproof feathers, but he wanted an umbrella nonetheless, so I gave him one.

Today, his day was disrupted by him becoming sick - something which hasn't happened to him before. In fact, he pooped, became sick, and made an unnecessary call all at once.

So, after his sickness was treated using a huge syringe, I unfortunately had to discipline him before I could clean up the poop, which I felt a little bit bad about!

Aside from that, and aside from pooping more than usual, his day's been uneventful.

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Because they're both adults now (at least, I think that the Super Gyaoppi penguin's an adult, now), it's been a very uneventful couple of days for my currently-running virtual pets. Still, I do have a thought to share about one of them.

Super Gyaoppi: I accidentally missed cleaning up a poop before the penguin turned off his light and went to sleep last night. With most virtual pets, this would be a problem, as you then wouldn't be able to clean it up until the morning, and you would risk your pet becoming unwell the next day. However, with the Super Gyaoppi, you can actually turn the light back on, clean up the poop, and then turn it back off again so that they can go back to sleep. I found this to be pretty handy!

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Super Gyaoppi: To my surprise, when the penguin woke up this morning he had changed forms again...

... And he'd gone back to the chest-beating fat penguin form from before!

I understand from having watched

//www.tamatalk.com/IB/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png video about the Super Gyaoppi's history feature that these guys go through a lot of forms in one run, so I can't wait to see what he changes into next!

 

[Hoky]

I'm glad you always provide links to stuff. Makes it super easy to learn more without extra effort. XD

The penguin is rad!

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Today has once again been super-uneventful for the Shuku 20 Shunen Tamagotchi P2 and the Super Gyaoppi, so I just figured that I'd share a random thought.

I'm going to wager that most folks don't know how to pronounce "Gyaoppi", and since the Super Gyaoppi is one of the most frequently-mentioned virtual pets in this log, I just wanted to talk about that for a moment. I've heard some amusing pronunciations of Gyaoppi out there (with the very awkward "Guy-ah-opp-pee" seemingly being the most common), so I just figured that I'd share some insight into it.

The original Gyaoppi was a dinosaur virtual pet. The first part of the name is, as far as I know, an onomatopoeia for a dinosaur's roar or call. It's pronounced like "gyow" - just like "yow" but with a hard "G" added at the start.

So the correct pronunciation of Gyaoppi is basically the two-syllable "Gyow-pee".

I'm glad you always provide links to stuff. Makes it super easy to learn more without extra effort. XD

The penguin is rad!

Hey, no problem - for me, sharing the links is part of the fun of what I'm logging!

After all, I know that my focus is on stuff that's more obscure than what most other folks are covering, and I think that it's fun to give a bit more spotlight to virtual pets other than Bandai's iconic originators of the category. Moreover, I hope that some of my observations in this log might help to provide information that others might be looking for about these virtual pets!

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Super Gyaoppi: Late last night, some time after I had posted yesterday's log-entry, the penguin changed again. I didn't take a photo, however, as he simply changed back into the wild-eyed spinning form!

I was slightly disappointed, but I presume that this is because I keep a close eye on the little guy's care, which might have ruled out a change to a different form.

 

[Penguin-keeper]

The Shuku 20 Shunen Tamagotchi P2 and Super Gyaoppi are such easy-going virtual pets that I've really got nothing to report on at the moment!

I will say, though, that it's worth pointing out that the Happy meter on the Super Gyaoppi decreases more quickly than the Hungry meter, and it takes more successfully-completed games in order to fill it than it takes food to fill the Hungry meter, too - and you can't use snacks to quickly fill the Happy meter if you're in a hurry, either. It's not a big problem, since the Happy meter still lasts for a long time even if you can only fill it a little bit, but it is worth pointing out just in case anybody else is considering picking one up.

It's still one of my favourite virtual pets of all time, even so, and I really like the fact that it differentiates itself from Bandai's iconic virtual pets in pretty sensible ways.

 

[Penguin-keeper]

My Penpy arrived today!

Penpy is a Gyaoppi-based dedicated penguin virtual pet, though it's not the same as the penguin that appears on the Super Gyaoppi 9 in 1, as it has completely different games (one of which can't be played until he's a little bit older) and graphics, as well as treating the "drink" feeding option differently (you can't give him a drink at first, he'll only eat).

My only gripe with it is that the buttons are a bit difficult to push. I've opened it up, and I can see that this is unfortunately due to somewhat poor design, rather than any problems.

Still, it's a Gyaoppi-based penguin pet, so there's really not a lot that can go wrong here - and I was able to get it in a nice colour, too! (I think that the green one is the best-looking of the colours that Penpy was released in.)

Penpy: Upon starting up this virtual pet...

... I was greeted by an egg that was covered in "P".

While I waited for the penguin chick to hatch, I took a look at the clock. It's the typical clock that you get on Gyaoppi-based virtual pets - it has a cute little face depicting the animal, which bounces around in time with the seconds-counter.

Soon enough, the little penguin hatched, and immediately started looking adorable.

Right now, he's just a little penguin-face, who's bouncing around in a manner similar to Babytchi. He's really cute, and I can't wait to see what he grows into.

He also doesn't seem to be very needy, at least so far. With any luck, this means that Penpy will be out of the typical good Gyaoppi mould (that is, not like Chuppi), and will be quite easy-going and fun to take care of, with lots of interesting transformations along the way.