Getting kids addicted to gambling?

As most of you know Pico was down for a very long period of unscheduled maintenance yesterday. Today, there's a whole new layer to playing games. Nice of them to let us know that the big "lights out" was coming. There's a bug now that has the entire area closed for the time being.



The new function involves the gaming rooms - Match Card, Reversi, Pirates RPS and Math Battle. This does not apply to the casino.

Gummies gauge to enter game rooms
You must now gain 100 Gummies each day to get into the gaming area. The Gummies gauge has returned to the top right of your game screen. This let's you track your progress - gaining props, rings and food points. Once it's full (all pink) you can enter any of the four game rooms. Once you get there you can now wager with your opponent.

Is there anyone else who thinks that encouraging gambling in a social media community that is primarily used by girls aged 9-17 is ... just ... wrong? As if the casino wasn't enough.

Read more about it (ignore Ameba's obvious poor spelling):

• Ameba Pico FAQ: What is Gummie Gage?
• Ameba Pico blog: [New Function!] Bet Gummies in Mini Games!!!

New Gacha and GM Cashier bots
The game room layout is a little different.



Each room now has a new Gacha machine (3,000 Gummies/spin) and a GM Cashier robot. Yes, Ameba wants you to actually buy Gummies to gamble. In case your gambling addiction takes your balance to zero.

There are non-betting rooms within each game for people who still want to play for fun.

Do you think it's reasonable to charge several thousand Gummies for a spin at Gacha or to even charge AG to buy Gummies?





Wager display
With the news changes, when you play Match Card, Reversi, Janken or Math Battle the amount currently being bet shows at the bottom of the game station.



Game ranking
To add even more competition to the game, there's now a player ranking. You can see how your scores match up with your fellow Picos.



User agreement
With these changes, there are user terms that you must agree to in order to play. The first time you enter the GM Gacha area the information will pop up and you are given the option of agreeing. It requires players to be over 13 to enter the area. As we already know with the casino - which requires players to be 18 and older to play - this is not really much of a safeguard.



Silly little things
As well as promoting gambling habits to minors, there are a few little - pretty much completely unnecessary - changes to the game that I noticed.

• The 'Travel' button is now called 'Navi', short for navigation
• Pirates RPS (rock, paper, scissors) is now called 'Janken' - the Japanese word for the game. 

My thoughts
Personally, I think this is all a waste of time. Not to be an obviously shallow way to get players to spend AG money on free Gummies. I think Ameba could spend their time developing and adding more interesting things to Pico.

I'd rather have fishing. What about you?

Better info menu and more Gachas

Wednesday's epic server maintenance brings an epic to Pico.

Picos logging in today will find that, as we have come to expect, new things have been brewing during Pico's down time. Will you be excited about ...?

The Revamped Info Menu
You can now access the latest information posts in a more dynamic visual pop-up box. I'm sure this was developed to entice people to keep abreast of happenings in Pico.

The newly redesigned info box boasts eye-catching icons for each news item and stresses ease-of-use with the "Go To Area" button. As always, you can click the snippets of text to warp to the official Pico blog.

Did you tend to ignore the info box in the past ... and does this adjustment make you more likely to click and read on?

The Revitalization of the Chaulin Temple
New life is breathed into the Chaulin Temple with the introduction of  two new Gacha vendors - Premium Gacha for 50AG a spin and Gummie Gacha for 100 Gummies a spin.



Gummies Gacha contains those goodies from last springs Chinese Mystery Box campaign.

Premium Gacha is filled with wigs, costumes and props associated with characters from the Chinese classic story Journey to the West (西遊記 / Xī Yóu Jì), considered to be one of the four great novels in Chinese literature.

Journey to the West has a strong background in Chinese folk religion, Chinese mythology and value systems; the pantheon of Taoist immortals and Buddhist bodhisattvas is still reflective of some Chinese folk religious beliefs today. Enduringly popular, the tale is at once an adventure story, a spring of spiritual insight, and an extended allegory in which the group of pilgrims journeying toward India represents an individual journeying toward enlightenment. — Source: Wikipedia

Photo Credit: Pico Official blog

From left to right (pictured above) the characters are Sha Wujing, monk Xuánzàng, "Monkey King" Sūn Wùkōng, and Zhū Bājiè.

Was it all worth the lengthy wait? You be the judge.

Gobble Gobble

It's Thursday, and you know what that means. Not only are we one day closer to the weekend, but we also have a few new updates which hit Pico early this morning. Maybe they aren't the major updates we've been hoping for, but I think they are still interesting enough to talk about.



The first update, and probably my favorite of the three, is the addition of a restocked Daily Gacha. The theme this time around is Thanksgiving!



Complete with food like pumpkin pie and turkey, it's enough to make your Pico's mouth salivate. Usually I question eating food when it's randomly laying around, but it's hard to ignore chowing down on these meals whenever you spot them. 3 second rule? Never heard of it.





There's much more than food, though. Candles, bonfires and hand hold feathers are among the other items you'll find while playing. Take note, though, that the hand hold items will be changing every week until Thanksgiving. The Handhold Colorful Feathers are the first of four, so make sure you get them before they are gone!

ANIMALITY!

That picture pretty much sums up my feelings regarding the latest update to hit Pico. Last night I was speculating what the maintenance could possibly be for. Between the higher-ups at Pico finally taking our suggestions and the Halloween decorations finally being taken down, my mind was running wild as to what they had in store for us next. Would there be more fall clothing? More fall decorations for our rooms? Maybe some Thanksgiving-inspired objects for the upcoming holiday? Fishing? Adoptable PENGUINS?! Yes, Pigg now has adoptable penguins. I went to sleep with these thoughts in my mind. However, when I awoke...



I was greeted by that message. My hopes and dreams were shattered. Could this possibly be true? Was I still dreaming? No, no... this was all too real. I was already smelling the burning torches of angry P.E.T.A (Picos for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) members marching in unison to protest this update. But, anyways, if you are interested in these items there are two different ways to go about getting them:

1. Daily Gacha



There are a handful of animal pattern decorations to win, as well as a rare cow plush. I couldn't help myself but at least try to win some items out of curiosity. In the process, I won a Zebra Print Comfy Rug, Soft Dalmatian Print Cushion, Giraffe Print Tissue Box and a token. So, hey, at least I won a token!


2. Rinarina's Shop




She asked me if I could "feel the vibe of the city." The only thing I could feel was my heart breaking with what I was about to do next.

Men's:


Woman's (includes what is shown here, as well as everything the men have):


Now, because some of you may be curious as to what these items look like when being worn (or maybe you just needed a good laugh), I decided to throw away my dignity and try the clothing on via the preview function. What you are about to see may shock you:

Still there? Okay, good. Hopefully I will never have to model like that again. Before I go, today's update reminded me of a scathing yet hilarious update that Catero made nearly 6 months ago. Click here to read it.

"Funkadelic animal prints are an abomination against God's law." Amen.

I read the news today, oh boy...

Greetings, everyone. Pinkerton here on this cold (but sunny!) Thursday. My reference to The Beatles aside, there's a ton of Pico news to talk about. Instead of rambling on and on as per usual for me, I'm going to get right down to business. Oh, and by the way... keep a lookout for the return of my Celebrity Sightings feature later tonight. I know it's been a long time since I've updated with that, so hopefully you wont be disappointed.

The first order of business we have to talk about today:



A new premium gacha! Just when you thought Pico had enough things to take money away from us, they come out with yet another. The theme this time around is "Devilish Halloween Gacha." For a list of some items you can win from it, check out the official Pico blog. If you are feeling lucky and still have a bunch of gold stashed away, you can play it by visiting NYC Downtown.

This is Halloween, This is Halloween!

Hopefully from reading the title of this blog update, you sang along with me... although I'm sure there are a few of you who shouted "no, this is SPARTA" instead. If you don't know which song I'm referring to, please educate yourself and watch the movie it's from. I was originally going to title this Holy Updates, Batman! Pt. 2 since there are, yet again, a handful of things to talk about. In the end I decided to dedicate the majority of this to the new Halloween items, and afterwards I will talk briefly about the other features. Ready? Set? Read!

This morning I stumbled out of my bed, as usual, and over to the computer. I knew there would be a new update awaiting me on Pico, but I wasn't sure what it could possibly be. The official blog said maintenance was for a "new function," so I was expecting something small. When my room finally finished loading, I saw some surprising things.



Halloween balloons! I nearly jumped out of my chair to dance in joy, but then I remembered I cannot dance. At all. Two of my friends were kind enough to leave me these balloons, and they also added my room to their "favorites." I'll talk more about that later. Anyways, after seeing this, I was very excited. My eyes wandered around and noticed a few other things as well...

Ghost Hunting Gacha: Week 2

It's hard to believe that we are already two weeks into October! Halloween is creeping closer, and the excitement for it continues to grow. Just in time for the upcoming holiday, Pico changed the theme of its daily gacha last week to Ghost Hunting. If you were lucky enough to be around, you had the chance for an entire week to acquire your very own flashlight.



It would be nice if it actually lit up, but it's semi-free so what do you expect? I'll just use my imaginaaaaaaaaation and pretend the batteries are dead. Since this is a new week, Gacha has been stocked with a brand new item. Well, new to Pico anyways (yep, Pigg already has it). What is the item, you ask?



It's the Kidder Paper Umbrella Ghost which is held in your avatar's right hand. Sorry, lefties. You get your time to shine with next week's item. I think this umbrella goes well with my pixel ghost, because they both seem to have a thing for sticking their tongues out. You can all make your own jokes about that comment.

Wondering how to win this item? It's simple:

Click on "Gacha" at the bottom of your screen. Please note, the Daily Gacha items cannot be won through any of the themed Gachas (such as the Caribbean Gacha or Egypt Gacha)




After that, click "Play Gacha." Each spin costs 100 gummies. If you are lucky, you'll win the item in a couple tries. If you are like me, you will need to go through quite a few spins until you receive the umbrella.



Don't worry if you can't get it right away. Be persistent and keep trying! You have an entire week to win it before it vanishes. Get it? Like a ghost.

...

*crickets*

Oh, by the way... does anyone else wonder exactly how a ghost umbrella works? I mean, ghosts are transparent and things tend to go right through them. I wouldn't exactly want to use a ghost umbrella if there was a downpour outside.