Pet Spotlight Information!

October 6, 2020 3:49 pm

You may have noticed that the Pet Spotlight has been stopped for about a month and a half. While we've tried to keep an open stream of communication between users and staff about problems regarding site functions, we held back on this particular function until we had some solid information to provide.

The Pet Spotlight in August was having some issues running every night, this was a combination of code not doing the news post/awarding the spotlight but also in our winners queue there are a lot of pets from the same few users. As those familiar with the pet spotlight know, "after a pet wins, there is a two (2) week cool-down period before another one of their pets can win".

So, we pondered as a team how to address this. The code issue was taken care of, but what about the few users?

Starting October 7, the pet spotlight will be awarded every Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday. We thought about doing just weekdays as we have in the past, but that wasn't really cutting down the days enough. We thought about doing every other day, but we wanted concrete days y'all could expect a spotlight to happen.

We will be doing news posts this week to catch up on the last few spotlight winners from August that didn't get news posts and then it'll be back to new spotlight winners!

We love that so many of you care about your pets. We're looking for more ways to encourage users to apply for spotlight for their pet.

We know a lot of users are worried about the planned changes to how pet profiles work. We want to assure you that any coding done before the change can be kept as legacy coding. Furthermore, we are not planning to do such a big change before the end of the year so you still have time to create!

October 10, 2020, 12:43 am by

I appreciate the update and I do feel for those who are disgruntled insinuating you have to spend real life funds to win. Never the less I look forward to the spotlight days ahead.

October 9, 2020, 9:41 pm by

Not worth doing the spotlight. It would take IRL money to get anywhere near winning and I don't want to do that. My pets are fine as they are, no rewards needed.

October 8, 2020, 2:30 am by

I have pets I've been working on for ages with hopes of winning Spotlight but it's super discouraging to see people win just because they can afford the spare money to pay an artist for a custom overlay. Frankly, it felt like more of a challenge back when custom overlay pets weren't allowed, and it also felt fairer to the people who can't afford to just throw IRL money at a free game and instead worked hard to get the potion they needed.

October 7, 2020, 2:58 pm by

I don't understand how it works at all. So never thought about it, I don't know what code is or how or what do do with it 'shrugs' am an old lady that just loves October, Subeta, and Keith ( you have to be one of the most unusual teenage boys I have ever run across and I am quite proud of the way you have grown up to be such a good young man)

:) Silver

October 7, 2020, 12:34 pm by

I really wish I could get back into working towards the spotlight. I gave up because it took so freaking long to actually get a win. I totally forgot I posted on the linked suggestion thread (march 17 of last year) about my wait times. My friend encouraged and helped me so much when the spotlight started (I had it finished within a month or two of the spotlight starting) that we couldn't wait for my pet to win. My friend quit years ago and I gave up when that pet was kicked out with no reason. It survived so long in the queue that we had finally got rejection reasons.

I also don't like the begging-but-not-begging to nominate your pet(s). I actually do have a pet with the nominate active but I'm not going to go out of my way to subtle beg. I lucked out with my two nominations/wins because one I linked in the pet memorial thread and the other I was most likely posting in tribute threads.

October 7, 2020, 7:03 am by

I gave up on the spotlight because Appel (now Apple) didn't win in years. :( I cleaned up a few of my pets their profiles again but eh, I hold no hope to win again.

October 7, 2020, 1:37 am by

I feel like I would try and participate in the pet spotlight if there was an easier way to get finished pets nominated without having to rely on other people randomly stumbling on your pets and nominating them there, considering you’re not allowed to ask for nominations. I’m sure I’m not the only person with this issue as well.

October 7, 2020, 12:54 am by

One reason I've never tried for pet spotlight is because one of the requirements to be "finished" is a background/coding and I don't like how those look most of the time. I have pets with stories and minions/treasures that reflect their stories but I have no coding so I don't count or qualify.

October 7, 2020, 12:33 am by

- Hm, that makes more sense, but should be clarified in that thread's opening then as all it says is "Human characters being allowed back" under the list of what won't happen. That doesn't read as simply meaning overlays so I took it as they just weren't allowed anymore. I'd be wary of whether I can put up the humanoid art at all (though again, I don't really do much).

- I have a ping from you to this news post, but I don't see it here, so I assume that's the cache or something.

October 6, 2020, 11:14 pm by

Just for the record, human pets aren't banned from winning spotlight; many of the winners are human characters represented by Subeta pets. You just also have to include some sort of Subeta pet representation on the pet's profile (like an overlay and the pet color/species info). Human custom overlays are what isn't allowed. Like, you can't submit a custom overlay to the site of a human character; that part has to be quad or anthro.

October 6, 2020, 10:13 pm by

okay I did not know sorry. Thanks Can a admin delete my previous comment please, again I'm sorry.

October 6, 2020, 9:12 pm by

Well, I didn't even know that human pets were banned from winning. That's pretty much everything I own (I transitioned from anthros to humans over a decade ago because I couldn't find RP partners, haha). Though I was probably never going to work on my profiles anyway, that just solidifies my not really needing to try for it. For my one pet that was mostly complete and still a "pet" (because "pet" spotlight, not character spotlight, I guess? That's the reasoning, right?), it's profile broke ages ago and I can't be bothered to fix it. That's on no one but me, though. I saw some folks on the thread mention themes for certain times. That seemed pretty interesting. While it won't motivate me personally to work on a pet, it would make me want to look at whoever won if the theme sounded interesting. As it is, I almost never look at the winners unless a name, color/species combination, or overlay catch my eye. Then again, I'm just a chronic lurker these days and my posts should really be taken with a grain of salt (I'm more of a site plot fan these days, though I don't think we've had one for a while).

October 6, 2020, 8:43 pm by

For some reason I thought you couldn't nominate yourself! I haven't done any profile coding on any site in... about a decade, but maybe I'll make a project of it sometime. Thanks for the update!

October 6, 2020, 8:29 pm by

Wouldn't it be easier to make it so multiple pets from 1 user can't be nominated?

I'm just curious about that.

October 6, 2020, 8:21 pm by

First, to , this change was first announced in 2018 here: The Future of Pet Profiles It's possible you missed the news because it was so long ago, and very few updates have been posted about it since then. But there has been a heads-up for like 2 years now, and we have mentioned it here and there. There was a second major update given in 2019 here: Pet Profiles v2.0: Update + Q&A I took and answered questions on both topics, so feel free to give them a read if you're curious about anything.

Anyway - When changes broke profiles a few years ago, I took tickets and personally fixed hundreds of pet profiles, manually and individually, because I felt the burden shouldn't be on players to fix them. I also posted a guide to making the fixes yourself (here: Broken profiles: Fixes and tips masterlist!) for those who preferred that. The 1st code snippet under "If the layout is broken or misaligned" truly does fix 99% of the profiles broken by that update. To (and anyone else with this issue), I'd recommend trying the fixes on that topic, or if not you could still write a ticket; I'm still willing to try and fix them for you!

We also promised at the time that no more changes would be made to the site layout and we have kept that promise. We've actually been REALLY careful about making changes that might affect pet profiles, to the point where even adding the legacy name was an entire discussion behind-the-scenes because we wanted to make sure it wouldn't break custom code more than absolutely necessary. So you can keep working on your profiles now without worrying about them breaking for that reason!

That incident is what made us realize the need for a new pet profile system that doesn't have this problem; in order to prevent this, the new profiles would need to be separate from the site layout, so we can change the site layout without worrying about breaking profile code.

My point is, the entire point of writing a new system is because we don't want to break older profiles with new changes - so it would be pretty ironic if this new, major change broke older profiles! Please trust me that being able to convert older profiles accurately and safely is a priority on this project. In fact, when I began work on it, that's the first part I coded because I wanted to make sure that worked before everything else. I tested the script with several of my own pets who have complicated profile code, and will test it out with many more before release.

That said - this ended up being a huge project, and we still don't have a set ETA on it two years later. We would really like to encourage people to continue playing with the current system as it is still going to be around - and unchanged - for a while. I can continue to promise you that no site layout changes will be made that affects pet profile code you write today. And I will also make sure that any work you put into profiles today won't be wasted once the new system comes out.

October 6, 2020, 8:03 pm by

I only have one completed pet in my list, and it's been so long I thought it had been rejected. As someone who has never done that before, the whole process sounds so secretive, like I don't know what to expect, and even how long to expect any sort of feedback to happen.... it's kind of disencouraging for newcomings, not gonna lie. Or maybe that's just me, but I never found the interest to work on other pets since I have no clue how the process goes.

October 6, 2020, 7:06 pm by

Aw man I only recently started entering my pets and one has been submitted a few months. At least I got one Spotlight, but this will diminish my chances :(

October 6, 2020, 6:23 pm by

Last one I had nominated got denied for "not enough writing" when there's absolutely nothing in the rules that sets a minimum requirement on the amount of writing you have to include beyond "at least 200 characters of text/coding" so I didn't bother editing/re-enabling and went off to focus on toyhouse instead. I'll still finish my pets when I'm less sick but tbh it feels like you might need to update the rules and make them clearer if you want to encourage people to apply.

October 6, 2020, 6:10 pm by

Quote

"First it would have been nice to be informed earlier about a big change to the pet profiles."</p>
<p>We...have been told about this, years ago, weren&;t we? It&;s a nice reminder about the fact that it wasn&;t forgotten, or left behind. But yeah, unless I&;m a victim of the Berenstain Effect, it has been talked about already,

Indeed. The Future of Pet Profiles

October 6, 2020, 6:00 pm by

BEST NEWS EVER. We should celebrate this! With some more CSC pet slots, so that we can enter even more pets in the spotlight! More CSC pet slots is always a good thing, but with all of these new Qrykees release, it would be the best timing!

Okay, who am I kidding. It's ALWAYS the best timing for more CSC pet slots.

"First it would have been nice to be informed earlier about a big change to the pet profiles."

We...have been told about this, years ago, weren't we? It's a nice reminder about the fact that it wasn't forgotten, or left behind. But yeah, unless I'm a victim of the Berenstain Effect, it has been talked about already,

October 6, 2020, 5:46 pm by

Not to be that bitch, but I'm gonna be for just a hot second. First it would have been nice to be informed earlier about a big change to the pet profiles. Second I like the promise of "We want to assure you that any coding done before the change can be kept as legacy coding." BUT I worry that will only be for a short window, due to it causing a kink in the code or whatever or lag, aka like the old user shops. And users will have to try and fix their broken code. So third if people wanna try and fix their broken code to fit this new style or whatever it's gonna be, will there be like a post from staff with idk tips on how too??

Sorry to be that asshole and sound like a total bitch but I just have concerns is all. I know users put A LOT of work into their pets and their profiles like so yeah, but is i'am grateful that Subeta is trying, and I still love the site. I'm just worried.

Glad the spotlight is going away completely btw lol

October 6, 2020, 5:06 pm by

Thanks for the update!

October 6, 2020, 5:06 pm by

Thanks for the update. I would like to one day participate in the Pet Spotlight.

October 6, 2020, 5:05 pm by

I’m suddenly paranoid about having too many pets in the queue, ahhhh

October 6, 2020, 5:03 pm by

Thanks for the update! Looking forward to seeing this again. I love it when one of my pets win! It's a main reason I work so hard on my pet profiles. :)

October 6, 2020, 4:58 pm by

The coding change is exactly why I haven't done anything with my pets. A lot of their profiles are still broken from the last change. :C

October 6, 2020, 4:23 pm by

This is so cool, especially after spending 1500 CSC on my dead pet to make it a memorial, talk about my luck, with an F...

October 6, 2020, 4:17 pm by

Huh, I actually didn’t know there were pet profile changes coming! I look forward to hearing more about that as y’all iron out the details. Thanks for the updates.

October 6, 2020, 4:16 pm by

Thank you for the update! :)

October 6, 2020, 4:07 pm by

Thanks for letting us know. It was strange that we went so long without it, but I guess that's because of too many real life issues getting in the way. I didn't know that the Spotlight worked like that, with the 2 week thing.

It will be good to see the posts again, but them not being every single day might take some getting used to.

October 6, 2020, 3:58 pm by

I don't mind, as long as they come back. It was always fun to see what won!

October 6, 2020, 3:50 pm by

Thanks for the update

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