Random Saturday Ep 05: AJ Fame

Hi guys, sorry there haven't been many scammer posts, I promise, more are coming soon.

Now, onto the post. It has been drawn to my attention that our blog has a pretty massive following and you could even say we are somewhat AJ famous. (I said somewhat, don't @ me) We definitely aren't as famous as GellyJones, Aparri or anyone else, though.

So, how do we do it? I find that most people whose lives take a large place in Animal Jam don't have much of a life outside of it. In this post, I'm gonna explore with you why that is.

Having an AJ blog, YouTube channel or anything else is a lot of hard work. That's part of the reason we have a team of people working on this one. It brings less work upon us. To split it evenly, you could say.

But having a life outside is hard to do when your life is so wrapped up in this community. Most of us on the SASS team have pretty crazy schedules. I, personally have a bunch of other things I have to do. I'd chalk it up to good time management and multitasking. For those of you who don't think it takes that much work to do this and other things, I've decided to do some calculations on a typical day for me if I were to do everything by itself and get healthy amounts of necessary things.

There are about 24 hours in a day
8 hours of sleep
7 hours of school
1.5 hours for any travel needed
1.5 hours for Society stuff
1 hour for food
1 hour for practicing my music
2 hours for DI practice
1.5 hours for health and cleaning
.5 hour for other chores
1 hour for homework
1 hour for socializing
1.5 hours for goofing off and recreation

I would need at least 3 and a half extra hours in the day to complete all of these tasks. Yikes. I'm a bit scared for my health now. Thanks a lot, mathy part of me. That's all for now.
-Is

Random Tuesday Ep 03: Safe Chat Plus for All Jammers!

Disclaimer: Random Tuesdays have been discontinued and merged with Random Saturdays.

Hello, it's me again, with a rather exciting Random Tuesday to share. Yes, the title says it all: Safe Chat Plus is now available for all Jammers on AJ!

So what is Safe Chat Plus, you may ask. Safe chat Plus was once known as Safe Chat in the olden days of AJ. Back in the day, non-members had to use either restricted chat, or bubble chat. Restricted chat was what it was called - restricted. It was very challenging chatting with buddies using restricted chat because there were so many words that were censored. Bubble chat was equally, if nor more, bad. Basically, Jammers using bubble chat can only choose phrases from a given list. In a previous Random Saturday, I talked about the member non-member divide. Well, these chat options was a driving force for that.

Now that I've gone through restricted and bubble chat, let me talk about safe chat. Once upon a time, members of AJ had safe chat instead of safe chat plus. Safe chat is still a litlle restrictive, but less than that of restricted chat. Basically, the chat tries to predict what you are trying to type, and suggests words from the approved safe chat dictionary for you. The main difference between safe and restricted chat was the range of approved words in their respective dictionaries.

Now, AJ began to respond to the calls of the non-members, and gave them safe chat. So what did they give members? Safe chat plus, an upgrade of safe chat. In safe chat plus, the chat does not refer to any dictionary at all. Jammers are allowed to type anything, but their messages get put through a filter before they get displayed. Pretty neat huh?

For a long time, safe chat plus was only available to members. However, AJHQ has finally released safe chat plus to everyone. Why? It's because AJHQ recently reported that 100,000,000 players have registered for AJ and PW combined!

Well, that's it from me now, until the next post.

-Dew

Random Tuesday Ep 02: Jambassadors

Disclaimer: Random Tuesdays have been discontinued and merged with Random Saturdays.

Hello, everyone! I was drafted for the excruciatingly difficult task of coming up with a random Tuesday post. Sorry in advance if this is boring, this is the kind of stuff that keeps me up at night.

So, Jambassadors, you either hate them or love them. No matter what, they're here and bigger than anything else in the AJ world so why not talk about them? Animal Jam has a list of requirements for Jambassadors to meet:

• You must have an interest in Animal Jam
• Be positive
• Be creative
• Be unique
• Be authentic
• Have a minimum of 10,000 subscribers
• Be at least 13 years old
• Follow Animal Jam's rules
• Consistently create content appropriate for kids 13 and younger

Then, it says "If you have the above and would like to apply, send an email to Jambassador@Wildworks.com with your AJ or Play Wild Username and a link to your Youtube Channel." With this explicit statement, it seems to rule out all other forms of internet media (Blogs, social media pages, ext.) in favor of YouTube, even though you can subscribe to/follow almost all (If not all) other things. 

That little tirade aside, what makes someone ineligible to be a Jambassador? Alistairz has 31k, lovesbetas has 20k and Artymis has 25k. (Pardon me if they were Jambassadors at one point, I don't follow AJ social media) Have they just not applied or is it something else? Eh, I'm not one for conspiracy so, let's leave it at that.

In total, if there was no mention of a YouTube channel, the SASS team would all be Jambassadors and I'm really just bitter about it, LOL. To be honest it's just a bit of an exclusive club that I don't really completely agree with. With that, Imma sign off.

-Is

Random Saturday Ep 04: AJ vs PW

Hello guys, and welcome to another episode of your Random Saturdays. Today, I'm going to be touching on the similarities and differences between AJ and PW. Without further ado, let's go.

To do this comparison, I will be listing a few categories, and comparing AJ and PW using the listed categories.

1. Age

AJ is definitely older than PW. AJ started in 2010, while PW started in 2015. This makes AJ older than PW by 5 years.

2. Membership Advantages
In both AJ and PW, members are able to do more and get more than non-members. In both AJ and PW, members get premium currency - diamonds in AJ and Sapphires in PW. In addition, in both games, there are member-only items that only members can purchase. However, there is a significant difference here. In AJ, many of the items sold in all stores are only purchasable by members. In PW, all items in all regular stores can be purchased by all members. The only member-only items can be found in packs (as weekly gifts), the weekly member gift and the travelling salesman, who carries both member and non-member items. However, although only members can purchase the items, it doesn't mean that only members can use them. That's right, non-members are also able to use and wear those items, provided they are able to trade for it. However, there is another difference. In AJ, all adventures (except for the forgotten desert) are available to all members. On the other hand, PW has a mechanic called Pack Runs that is only available to members. In this regard, both AJ and PW have membership advantages. However, the membership advantage in AJ is much more glaring that the one in PW.

3. Lands
Being older, AJ has many more lands that PW. Balloosh, Bahari Bay, Crystal Reef, Deep Blue and Kani Cove are the lands that exist in AJ but not in PW. (As of writing this post)

4. Animals
Being older, AJ also has more animals than PW. In fact, PW has no flying animals at all. While AJ is continually releasing new animals, the animals that we get in PW are animals that can already be found in AJ. However, in AJ, most animals are member-only. In PW, all animals are available to everyone for purchase.

5. Regular Games
Being older, AJ has many more games than PW does. Sky High, Mira Says and Swoopy Eagle for just a few examples of games that exist in AJ but not in PW. On the other hand, PW also has a few games that AJ doesn't. Jumbled Up, A Puppy's Tale and Block Break are a few examples. That being said, AJ still has a wider variety of regular games than PW does.

6. Buddy Games
While AJ may have more regular games than PW, PW actually has more buddy games than AJ. PW doesn't have Pairs, Rock Paper Scissors, The Shell Game and Tic Tac Toe, which AJ does. However, AJ doesn't have Checkers, Pop'n, Super Cube, Trivia, Jamaa Derby, Beachside Blitz, Stack Attack and Log Jammer, all of which PW does have. By a direct comparison, PW has a wider variety of buddy games than AJ does.

7. Freedom of Speech
AJ has 3 ways to chat. Safe chat, bubble chat and safe chat plus. Safe chat plus is the most unrestrictive of chats. However, it is members only. PW has 2 ways to chat. Bubble chat, and safe chat.

8. Music
Although both AJ amd PW have amazing soundtracks, I have to say that PW has an overall better soundtrack than AJ, from my point of view. This is because PW comes up with a new soundtrack for every new den that comes out in the game. Those soundtracks have very high atmospheric quality. They set the ambience of the paired den very, very well. Also, PW and AJ have the same land OSTs for the lands and parties they share, if I'm not mistaken. Thus, overall, I feel that PW has a better soundtrack.

9. Earning premium currency
The premium currency for AJ is diamonds, while that of PW is sapphires. I personally find it easier to collect sapphires in PW than diamonds on AJ, as a non-member. This is because the only way to get diamonds in AJ as a non-member is through the daily spin, amd chances are so low. In PW, they have a system I like to call the Games Rewards System because they reward you with sapphires when you hit certain milestones in PW games. For example, you can earn a total of 30 sapphires for completeing all the levels of gem breaker. Thus, it is generally easier to earn sapphires on PW than AJ.

10. Extra features
In this regard, I think AJ has more extra features than PW. AJ has the Jammer Wall, party hosting, and adventures which PW does not have. However, PW has packs, pack runs and levels which AJ does not have. However, from an overall standpoint, AJ still has more extra stuff to do than PW does.

11. Other thoughts
I personally feel that the overall atmosphere in AJ is slightly Darker than the atmosphere in PW. I think that this could be due to the fact that AJ has the adventure storyline going on, while PW does not. In AJ, the story about phantoms is all over the place, while phantoms in PW only make their appearance during the night of the phantoms.

Alright, that's all I can think of now. Stay tuned for your next random saturday coming next week!
-Dew

Random Tuesday Ep 01: Sol Arcade Den

Disclaimer: Random Tuesdays have been discontinued and merged with Random Saturdays.

Flint here with your first Random Tuesday! Today, we'll be talking about the Sol Arcade Den. 

The Sol Arcade Den is a small-ish den released in 2014. It’s nearly identical to the Sol Arcade structure, only lacking the machines/shops.

The ground is composed of blue platforms, including the platform you spawn on, connected by paths/floor on the rest of the ground. Next to the spawn platform is a rocket, identical to the Sol Arcade structure’s rocket except with wood filling in the doorway.

There are some rocks surrounding the rim of the den, as well as rocks surrounding certain platforms and a half circle of rocks in the middle of the den. On the bottom left of the den, there is a boarded-up light source carved into the rock. It is unknown what this is supposed to be.

The floor- and wallpapers in this den usually have special textures. Most of the wallpapers change into the surface of a planet or another space theme. The floors can be a variety of things, usually more abstract/loopy versions of the original carpet.

Time for my opinion!

I like the overall theme of the den, as a spaceship. The wallpaper patterns are also creative and pretty. The platforms are open, but still defined, so you can use them as rooms. The den is also small enough that you can easily see all of it, preventing you from getting lost as you do in bigger dens.

I dislike the amount of nooks in this den. There are multiple places where the area is too small to set up a room in, but too big to leave empty. There are also almost no walls aside from low rims around the platforms and the outer walls, which makes it hard to use wall decorations. The outer walls also appear to be perfectly smooth, while the trim is a polygon with corners, making most things placed on the wall look weird.

Overall, the design of the Sol Arcade Den is cool, but it also has a weird layout that makes it hard to set up things in it. That's all for today! Thanks for reading!

Random Saturday Ep 03: Den Mazes

Hello all, Jade here, with episode 3 of Random Saturdays. Today’s topic will be den mazes!

Den mazes are a connected series of dens, with options to both go to the next den or to go back to the original den. You aren't told which option is which. The goal is to pick the right portal and make it through the entire series of dens. If you're bored on Animal Jam or are having a hard time thinking of something to do, they're a great way to waste time!



You may or may not have heard of the user aflower, who has created one of the most famous mazes. The maze starts off in their den, which looks like this:

Their den contains a portal leading you to the den of themazeshop, whose den contains a masterpiece listing the rules of the game, as well as the next portal.

(Rules: Try to pick the right portal or you come back here. Make it through the correct portal to win! Good luck!)

From then on, all portals in the den will take you back to themazeshop, except for one, which will take you to the next den in the maze. This goes on for around 16 dens. I’ve listed the dens and the correct portals at the end of the post (click read more) if you would like the answers to the maze.

aflower’s den also has a portal leading to the den of windyartshop, which has a few other art shops connected to it. After around 3 dens, you are led to another series of “maze” dens, but without options to go back to the original den. Some of these dens are also pretty cool, so if you’re still bored after exploring the original maze, I suggest going through these as well!

That's all for now. Tune in next time for another episode of Random Saturdays!

> Jade <