VPet General Thread

[skinstealer]

[DIGITAL_HORROR]:

you've probably seen my sales thread by now considering it's getting a lot more attention than i expected...so i figured now that i know there's people here with similar interests, we should have a discussion thread for virtual pet toys of all kinds. feel free to share what you're raising, models you've found, your personal collection, maybe we could even organize some group hatches? i don't know, i'm down for anything.

[sarcovyn]

[3D]:

Wild that people get seriously upset over things like rng manip as if VPets are some kind of competitive sport. Imo if you can pull off a successful rng manip you deserve whatever reward you get out of it. Shit's difficult

[sarcovyn]

[3D]:

I was really tired when I wrote that but now Im going to elaborate

RNG cant be truly random so there is some aspect of physical control to it. Also since VPets are very simple machines they have simple means of calculating RNG. In MP from "Classic" up until "Cheesecake" e.g its synced to the clock and randomized by each animation cycle. But if you know the math behind the RNG then you can predict the numbers output by each cycle. Match these numbers to internal variables and you can control it

Ofc the clock is synced BY THE MILLISECOND and only the hours/minutes/seconds are shown so you cant know how your clock is synced exactly w/o cracking it open (super risky), having a ms type around (only your first hatch is synced to your clock all else is based on input), or using a port mod. And ofc you cant do that on versions before "Collision" bc they dont have pairing ports

In Classic only its impossible to manipulate a fresh pix because the egg form doesnt have the "rocking" animation before it hatches so theres no refreshing. But if you hatch a pix and buy the Happy Plant Pot for example you can use it to re-cycle on your next pix. You can also use the Desk Fan which is cheaper but the animation cycle is so seamless its nigh impossible to figure out when a cycle starts. You can also rng cycle on each evolution but bc you have your pet animation + your needs UI animating + the clock starts moving if you have a live pet theres a lot more entropy so its way harder to fuck w/

Like I said:

Shit's difficult

[skinstealer]

[DIGITAL_HORROR]: 

@[3D] oh i think modding is sick, especially using debug stuff...there's actually a lot of unused characters on classic minipix that are still in the actual toy itself, just hidden behind weird menus...and RNG manipulation is really cool too. i never really delved deep into it though because i don't have tech-y brain at all, so i'm really curious about hearing more.

ok, gonna start logging stuff for real now that i've gotten a lot of packages from people here on the forums- thanks to everybody who started doing stuff in my buy and sell thread, i'm really excited to start this stuff up. i'm going to start slow though, and not burn myself out running everything at once. this'll give me more time to try and bond with the toys that i got, no matter how simple or complex they are. 


first off, i'm starting my favorite classic minipix up- i know all the characters by now, but i keep coming back to it, and considering i'm selling a lot of these right now, it's a good opportunity to show people what the toy is like and what to expect


i rolled a lilmin to start, out of the three randomized options- get used to hearing "min" a lot, all of the classic minipix character names end with that. they didn't make pronoun generation a thing yet in the classics, so i just decided i'd roll with she/her for this one, just felt like the right vibe. the classics don't have a proper name input either, so i just decided to go with "sweetie"...i wasn't feeling really creative, unfortunately. 

i keep spending all of my camera battery taking product pictures for the buy/sell thread, so i'm just going to draw whatever characters i get and you'll deal with the terrible quality, i guess. maybe it'll be cute?

anyway...lilmin is basically a blob with a single eye, and it's pretty nondescript. some people say that they're based kind of on how concept kids look, which is kind of a neat factoid for you? in this baby stage, they're really needy...they beep a lot for food and attention, and you have to give them baths regularly because they love to roll around on the...i guess the floor must be really dusty or something, because the screen backdrop is just a little room. after about an hour or two (it depends on the classic generation), they'll go to sleep, and you'll get another hour of reprieve before they wake up and pester you a bit more before evolving into the child stage. i'm writing this in the middle of sweetie's nap, so...not much to report on yet. i swear though, i feel like she's more needy than these usually are- though it's probably just the fact that i haven't messed with a classic in a bit. no weirdness aside from that though, which is...unusual for this toy in specific. part of why i play with it so much is because of just how haunted it is. keeps the gameplay fresh, i guess? so...i dunno, maybe it’s worn off because i haven’t played with it in a bit. i’ll be damned if i know how this thing works.


i also popped some batteries in my favorite invaderz toy- i figure it'll be a nice desk pet while i handle the others, and will give me a chance to show off some gameplay of that, too. the first wave of invaderz all had the same creature inside, but subsequent waves varied it up a bit...we'll start at well, the start, for now. early on there isn’t a whole lot to do with these...more interactions open up as they get used to you.

...i may have forgotten how haunted this one is, though. the songs it keeps singing for me are way too slowed down, which shouldn’t even happen on this toy. you get used to it, but it’s still super creepy. 


finally, i'm starting up the basic bone buddy i got from [INK_AND_PLUSH]...it was really hard selecting which pet to start with out of all my new acquisitions, and i’m definitely going to get to all of them, but this one intrigues me so much with the whole double pet mechanic. i’m going to be kind of a weenie and start with trying to get a nice duo of pets, just so that i can see the “ideal” gameplay first. 


similar to the minipix, these have pretty simple baby forms...but they’re just skulls, which is super weird and kind of creepy. at first i thought it might be my ability acting up, because you never know, but after a deep dive online (and i mean deep, these knockoffs are not well documented) i found out that this is totally normal. i guess i’ve finally found a vpet that matches my typing?

that’s all for now, i hope this is somewhat entertaining, at least...i hope we get more people talking here soon what with all the trading going on!

[sarcovyn]

[3D]:

In Classic it's like. Okay imagine that you have a number between 1 and 10. And every time it "cycles" (when an animation plays or loops) it generates a new number
So it could be like. 1. 9. 4. 2. 7. 3. 6. 3. 8. 1. 5. 4. Not exactly though, it's random. But not really

There's math involved. A shit ton of it. It's like - you're looking at a graph right, and there's a line going left to right down to up. By visuals alone all you can do is estimate. But if you figure out the formula for the line then you know exactly where the points are for any "time" value. It's like that, but it's an arbitrary sequence of numbers from 1 to 10

Now let's say the numbers are pets, like when you hatch it, 1 is Lilmin, 2 is Panmin, 3 is Seramin, and so on and there might be repeating values, like 6 is also Seramin or whatever. Now imagine "x" is the variable representing number of cycles, or time. And the whole line is shifted horizontally based off of clock sync (in milliseconds)

It's very complicated. Just bc I'm an Equation type doesn't mean I'm some kind of superhuman mathematician because that's just about what it takes. That's why you use external software. Also you know how I said the numbers are 1 to 10? That was just an example. It's actually between 0 and 255

[skinstealer]

[DIGITAL_HORROR]:

okay, was able to dig up some really wild stuff...my collection of minipix dreamy stars, a special edition minipix that only got a super limited release. 



it's part of a pair with the minipix dreamy forest, both of which being fantasy themed, and a little bit spooky. they both take inspiration from fantasy creatures, though the stars are more nighttime and darkness driven. they're pretty cool, and it's hard to find a favorite..gonna have to find my forests, though. planning on selling my extras because i have bills to pay, but i might have to play through one once i'm done with my current runs. (currently paused the pets i have going rn, some stuff came up irl and it's making it hard to manage vpets...)





here's a scan of the included growth chart from the official guidebook it came with- these books are pretty rare, and it's impossible to find high quality scans unless you really dig for it! so...if anyone has any questions about the characters here, i can share names and facts. just point 'em out.

@[3D] that's fascinating...totally goes over my head, but i'm curious as to what you can actually do with the manipulation.

[victorianflorist]

[DAMASK_LAMENT]:

That small devil-looking one towards the center, what is its name?

[skinstealer]

[DIGITAL_HORROR]:


that's sinimin, a teen stage minipix. the guidebook says: "Sinimin is a rowdy teen stage with polarizing upbringings- you either did great raising a Monmin, or did poorly raising a Tetramin...its personality is just as divisive, with some days being easy going, and other days prone to bouts of snack theft!" 

it's a cute one, kind of a fan favorite for people. of course, the personality doesn't really play into any gameplay until you get to the adult stage...but it's still fun to read about.

anybody else got any they want me to go into? i should be able to start my playthroughs back up soon...but i'm also interested in seeing if anyone else wants to start a hatch with me!

[sarcovyn]

[3D]:

Now let's say the numbers are pets, like when you hatch it, 1 is Lilmin, 2 is Panmin, 3 is Seramin, and so on and there might be repeating values, like 6 is also Seramin or whatever. Now imagine "x" is the variable representing number of cycles, or time. And the whole line is shifted horizontally based off of clock sync (in milliseconds)

Weeks later and none of you guys corrected me that half of these are modded. I haven't played vanilla Classic in so long. Fuck