Riverton, a nostalgic adoptables browser game

[xandra]

think neopets and flightrising, but with horses and 'real-life' animals that takes place in the american pacific northwest in the 1990s!

i made this game as a big project to learn PHP, and it's grown since then! there's quite a bit to do at the moment, and i have a whole roadmap planned. my favorite aspects right now are the avatar creator and boba cafe minigame! :) this has been such a fun way for me to learn. i actually get excited to code PHP. what?! hah!

wanted to share here in case interests overlap! :3

https://visitriverton.com

[Melooon]

Helooo  This is a wildly impressive first PHP project! And I do agree, once you get into the weeds with a good PHP site they can be very addictive!

If I had one bit of feedback for this, Id say it would be nice if I could do more without making an account. It's kinda hard to tell what you actually do on it, so it's hard to tell if Id enjoy it! I would like to trail run this cafe minigame!

[xandra]

thank you so much!!! for the kind words and the feedback!! <3

what would be the best way to do that, do you think? everything is dependent upon PHP so everything saved goes to the database, not in cookies. typically, adoptable sites like this do require signup, unfortunately! t-t

[Melooon]

what would be the best way to do that, do you think?

Hmmm, I thought about this and my suggestion is to make guest visitors a logged in account Instead of having a logged-out state, auto-login all guests to a special account, add a few safe guards for that account such as making name inputs come from auto generated lists instead of user input, and only lock out features that could do real harm, plus add a script that resets the variables of that account every 24 hours.

Not only do you give people a fully interactive demo, but you even create a weird sort of collective speed run account where people can do as much as possible in 24 hours

[xandra]

oooh! that's an idea!! i'll see if i can do something like that :)

[akhenaton]

I'm a big fan of virtual pet games so really excited to see this!

I haven't explored everything yet, but so far it seems like there's a ton of things to do around here, so many places and shops to visit (loving the Neopets vibes!), and there's a farming system too!? Wow!! It's really impressive how much you've added to the site :D

How long have you been working on this game?

[Slix]

I haven't signed up yet, but this is really ambitious and super cool! I love adoptable websites  and this seems really fleshed out already after less than a year! Best of luck continuing work on it! PHP is super fun!

[rolypolyphonic]

It is very cute and charming, I just signed up for an account but I haven't explored much yet. It looks like there's a lot to do 

[xandra]

How long have you been working on this game?

omg! thank you so much for your kind words!! i *just* passed the one-year mark of officially working on riverton. and you're so right, i can't believe how much stuff there is now compared to the beginning! you're so kind, thank you for checking it out. 

I haven't signed up yet, but this is really ambitious and super cool! I love adoptable websites  and this seems really fleshed out already after less than a year! Best of luck continuing work on it! PHP is super fun!

thank you so, so much!!! i am finding PHP is pretty fun to wheel and deal in. it does feel a bit retro but that's fine with me :)

It is very cute and charming, I just signed up for an account but I haven't explored much yet. It looks like there's a lot to do 

thank you so much for giving it a try!!! <3 this month (just a few days after your post), i've launched dress-up capabilities for all the horses, a sitewide music player system, and public pet profiles! you can even add custom CSS to your pet's public profile, just like neopets! :3c

i'm getting really excited as i begin to cross the threshold of the features typical of other virtual pet games. the walkman feature is something i really wanted to implement that i haven't seen other sites do, and i can't wait to do more stuff like that to make things more immersive and interactive!

[rolypolyphonic]

i'm getting really excited as i begin to cross the threshold of the features typical of other virtual pet games. the walkman feature is something i really wanted to implement that i haven't seen other sites do, and i can't wait to do more stuff like that to make things more immersive and interactive!

That sounds awesome! Admittedly shortly after I signed up I had trouble navigating the site (it was very slow), but I'm not sure if that was a server hiccup or just an issue with my personal connection. I finally got to at least giving all the towns a cursory glance and it's very charming, I look forward to see what other things you will add!