Tis the season for sugar sweet gumdrops and fields of delicious candy corn! The holidays have arrived and we are excited to celebrate them with the community to top off what’s been an amazing year in the Spiral. With many working or studying from home, including our team here at KingsIsle, the community ended up forging many more fellow Wizard ties than they had anticipated. We had already anticipated too that it was going to be a great year for Wizards with Karamelle’s release. We’re glad to have this time to be with you all in the Spiral.
Taking a quick look back, the year opened with our continued KI Live series of livestreams where we quickly started talking about what was coming in the Spring Update with the many changes to player pets. Test Realm soon after kicked off for the update and then we got to see what everyone thought of the changes on the Live Realms. The same occurred a few months later with the Summer Update that featured the long-anticipated character model changes. A few more months after that and the holidays are upon us with the introduction of the new world of Karamelle, introduced by none other than Nana on her very own Twitter account.
Dialed up to a sugar rush of 10 that Nana would be proud of (but perhaps still concerned about), we saw the community create even more amazing content and events this year. Dozens of gameplay guides, holiday themed contests, more ways to decorate one’s house than a Wizard could do in their lifetime, and so much more. There’s still a couple of more weeks of the year to go too with new holiday events kicking off in the days ahead, so be sure to keep watch on all areas of the community!
As we settle down for the holidays but keep our creativity ready to go for the new year, a quick review of what’s happened recently in the news:
NOV 9: Over $14,000 raised for Extra Life
NOV 18: Karamelle Now Live
NOV 19: New SweetCitrus Bear Pet
NOV 24: New Chocolate Moose Mount
DEC 1: It’s Time for Yuletide
DEC 1: Winter Scroll of Fortune begins
DEC 4: New Winter Pet Bundle
DEC 9: Happy Holidays on KI Live
DEC 9: 12 Days of the Spiral kicks off
DEC 9: New Charity Candied Ram Mount
DEC 12: Winter Wonderland Artwork Contest begins
Keep updated on the latest news for next month on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, including special announcements from community fansites! Read on for more fun happenings with the community and their Spiral activities.
12 DAYS OF THE SPIRAL
Happy Holidays, Wizards! Having started on December 9th and continuing through December 20th this weekend, KingsIsle is celebrating the 12 Days of the Spiral! Each day we have a different surprise in store for both your Wizard and Pirate! Some days will be free giveaways, while the others have great promotions or new items. Check back each of the remaining days for new surprises!
Don’t forget to participate in our artwork contest below, as well as Swordroll and others that are putting on festive events through the rest of the year!
PROFESSOR FALMEA'S PRODUCER'S LETTER
“My dear Wizards,
As it’s almost time for the holidays, and the twelve days of the Spiral are upon us, I’ll try to keep this short and sweet, but if you’ve been here for a while and know me, all you’re going to get is sweet…
BE THE NANA
Speaking of corn-spun candy-coated confections, our biggest news is that we’ve launched the first new world of the fourth arc – Karamelle! While I’d love to talk in depth about it, I will refrain from posting too many spoilers, and just share a few of my favorite things.
This scene in Von Trap Estate is breathtaking. When I first arrived in my early playthrough on our development servers, I had to pause for a few minutes to enjoy the view. I did the same when I quested there the weekend after Karamelle launched live. My group had to pull me away (yes, I’m *THAT* person that must take in all the sights and listen to all the dialogue the first time through a world…).” - Professor Falmea
Help make the holidays magical during this year’s 12 Days of the Spiral event! Today kicks off our annual winter artwork contest, but with a cool twist. For Wizard101 the theme is all about Karamelle and frosty treats. For Pirate101 we want to see what your favorite world scene or character looks like.
Tis the season for KI Live! We had a fun and festive show that capped out what has been an amazing year for the community. Since this was the last show until we return from holiday break, we stocking stuffed it full of answers to your questions, and of course gave out some gifts for all the nice Wizards and Pirates that watched the show.
If you missed the show, watch it now on YouTube:
Secret Reader Bonus - For those who didn't get a chance to redeem the KI Live giveaway code yet, we opened it up again (HOLIDAYGIFTS2020) for another 500 redemptions!
A great gameplay tip submitted to KI Live comes from Leo:
“If you need help with a quest that is difficult and you’re having trouble finding someone in team up que. A group of wizards with badge: “One in a Million” like to hangout in commons and crowded realms and help wizards in need!” - Leo
NEW CONCEPT ART FROM ADAM ROUSH
Adam has been busy recently creating even more cool new concept art! Check out his latest on Twitter:
“The Pet Trainer pack came out recently, so here's a wallpaper. Painting the dog was a lot of fun!” - Adam Roush
“Here's the Candied Ram. I really liked painting this one: exaggerating the horns and playing with the fluffiness of the cotton candy wool.” - Adam Roush
“Here's the Chocolate Moose mount. I always like to include a lot of different textures on these mounts, though the crinkled foil was pretty challenging.” - Adam Roush
“Here's the Sweet Ride mount from the new Candied Isles bundle. Inspired by '30s racecars but made of candy, which was pretty fun to design.” - Adam Roush
“Wallpaper versions of the Magical Adventure poster. Thanks to the way I set up the file, I made a couple variants of just the boy and girl characters.” - Adam Roush
NEW CONCEPT ART FROM MIA
We’ve added Mia to this segment of the newsletter ahead of community specific content because of her amazing artwork as a temp contractor for KingsIsle. Check out below what she’s posted on social media over the last few weeks!
“Painting of my w101 fan character Bolin! Needed to stop messing with it and just post it haha. Hope y'all like it!” - Mia
“Here's the Candymancer Gear concept. One of my personal favorites that I worked on!” - Mia
“Here is the Delightful Gear Concept I got to work on for Karamelle!” - Mia
WIZARD101 DOCUMENTARY SERIES
Do you remember the first time you set foot in the Spiral? Was it just yesterday, or have you quested with us since the very beginning? No matter how long you’ve played, everyone in our community continues to be the beating heart of Wizard101.
Need a guide for a quest, perhaps just a few tips on how to train your pets, or what spells to choose from in battle? The community’s got you covered! For this month’s community guide spotlight, Final Bastion checks out all the recent Castle Tour Improvements.
“The castle tours HQs has long been a staple of the Wizard City commons! Can you believe it’s already been 7 whole years since the feature first arrived in live realm? Yet despite being around for such a long time, there haven’t been that many castle tours improvements – in fact the only addition it’s ever received was Eliza Windspar joining the business to provide players with access to ongoing castle games being hosted in tour-able homes. However, much like castle games themselves, this feature lost most of its popularity over time and has become much less utilized than the touring feature.” - Final Bastion
For highlights of the hundreds of other community guides available across a range of topics, be sure to visit the official Community Guides page on the main website!
COMMUNITY ART SPOTLIGHT
For this month’s fan art spotlight, we are showcasing Emma’s cute version of Morganthe:
We would love to see more screenshots and art from the community for next month’s newsletter. Do you have something amazing to share? Send it to us in an email to community@kingsisle.com! We’re always interested in showing off more fan art, gameplay guides, videos, and other content.
Thanks, Wizards!
FANSITE FAVORITES OF 2020
Normally after a fan art spotlight or two we lead right into the latest news from around the community. This newsletter it’s going to be different! We’re jazzing up the space with a lookback of great 2020 content chosen by our official fansites and a few kind words. Several fansites even shared a story about how far they have come together in the community. Have a look!
From Stars of the Spiral
The top 2020 accomplishment from Stars of the Spiral was reaching out to congratulate the Class of 2020 for graduating! They even threw in a few prizes for a fun house decorating contest for the graduates. Congrats to the winners!
From Ravenwood Academy
We had some fun and useful articles this year, like the Skeleton Key Tour, the general PvP guide that sent a lot of our friends to the arena, or the interesting to read Wiz-theory at The Forgotten Lore of Celestia. Our fishing and crafting series took many of our friends to expert in easy bites this year.
However, I'd say what makes Ravenwood really special is our community contests and events. We had some interesting and heartwarming submissions for the contests in the Ravenwood Contest channel for Halloween and Thanksgiving. We have an incredible community and we love to get together with them. Like we did with the Graduation 2020 event, the summer Spiral of Gauntlets, the Halloween Party, and the soon to be announced Holiday Party. Many pictures were posted in the server and sent on social media during these events.
From Legends of the Spiral
“I really enjoyed writing this article because I am someone who has struggled to get energy gear drops for years. The Pet Trainer bundle offered a quick delivery of what I needed and design wise it’s great! My favorite part is definitely the prodigy pup who looks like Dug from one of my favorite films, Up. He’s definitely the perfect furry companion while traveling across the spiral. Coming from someone who’s a pet lover, this bundle was executed perfectly. I’m very curious to see what people come up with using the pet teleporters. I'm glad I got the chance to get a sneak peek and write about all the Pet Trainer bundle has to offer!” - Rylee Rosethorn
“I'm super proud of my ‘Competelying A Goal Post’. It's an article I've been working on for a while and it's challenging myself to get every house in the game. I managed to craft every house that are craftable which also includes you doing previous crafting quests. Some of the houses also made me become a farming bot lolz. I needed to defeat roughly 200 each of 5-6 different mobs in Mirage and sell a bunch of Antiques. The most challenging house to get was the Olde Town Apartment, it required me to gain 2000 Team Ups which took me a couple of weeks to get so to say I put a lot of time into this article is an understatement." - Michael Wildflame
From Swordroll
First, wizards can drop by the Lvl 140+ Gear Drop Guide, a guide for the top gear dropped in Karamelle! It's now over 90% complete with fewer than 20 pieces left to acquire.
Keep updated on what’s happening in the community right here in our Community News section! For every newsletter, we receive direct from the community links to new gameplay guides, exciting upcoming contests, and much more. Thanks to the following fansites and other community leaders for their contributions this month!
Annual 25 Days of the Spiral Advent Calendar Event
6th Annual Santa Run - this Saturday, December 19th!
"I hope you're all having a wonderful start to the Holiday Season. Last month I announced that we may be having a Santa Run, and today I'm happy to announce that we will have one. It'll be simple like the old days - by old days, I mean our very first Santa Run back in 2012. No activities, just celebrating the community and Christmas! Keep scrolling for more important information." - Edward Lifegem
Adventures of the Spiral
Want to be part of an Official Fansite? Adventures of the Spiral is currently looking for Content Creators and it could be you!"
You may collect quite a few artifacts along your journey, make new acquaintances in the way of pets, discover new mounts, swap out hats - you can imagine the possibilities! Time is valuable, so knowing the ins and outs of your inventory is crucial.
The unaffiliated-with-KingsIsle “Community Newsletter” had a great selection of Wizard101 links this month from around the web. NOTE: Follow their Twitter page for more information. To subscribe to their newsletter, send a DM to their Twitter asking to be added or email them at community.newsletter.101@gmail.com. You can unsubscribe at any time by sending them an email with the phrase “UNSUB”
FOLLOW WIZARD101
Question for our readers - is there a section we should add? Tweet your suggestion to @Wizard101 and we’ll select the top idea we can implement to win 5,000 Crowns!
Be sure to follow the game and its community on social media!
If you didn’t yet read our article on online safety, please take a moment to stop by our KingsIsle Blog and read the post titled Account Security Best Practices. There’s important information in the article to manage and protect your entire family’s accounts.
