Virtual Magic Kingdom

Virtual Magic Kingdom
File:Vmk logo.gif
Developer(s)	Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Sulake Corporation
Publisher(s)	Walt Disney Parks and Resorts
Platform(s)	Cross-platform
Release	May 23, 2005 Closure: May 21, 2008
Genre(s)	Massively multiplayer online game
Mode(s)	Multiplayer

Disney's Virtual Magic Kingdom, also known simply as VMK, was a free massively multiplayer online game run by Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Online. It was a virtual representation of the Disneyland and Magic Kingdom theme parks, containing areas and minigames which were based on real park scenery and attractions. It was launched as part of the Happiest Celebration on Earth promotional campaign to commemorated fifty years of Disney theme parks.

The beta version opened publicly on May 23, 2005 with four virtual lands to explore: Main Street, Fantasyland, and Adventureland. This "beta" designation was removed on June 27. The Tomorrowland game area was made available on October 5, and Frontierland opened on December 12. The rest of Tomorrowland opened on April 4, 2006 with the final land to be added on January 8, 2007, which was New Orleans Square.

Central Plaza as of January 2008, there is an exit to tomorrowland on the left, adventureland to the right, and the magic shop with a player exiting from it.

The target audience of the game was for children between the ages of 8 and 14, although VMK was designed to be enjoyed by Guests of all ages. It is due to this that the game had to be patrolled by paid staff, watching out for inappropriate behaviour and language, keeping the virtual world safe. Because of this opening times had to be limited, it was open to the public daily between 7:00am-10:00pm PST (10:00am and 1:00am EST, 3:00pm-6:00am UTC).

The VMK game engine uses Adobe Shockwave, and was created by The Sulake Corporation, who also created the online multiplayer game Habbo Hotel. The two games developed by The Sulake Corporation bear a few similarities, although VMK is more limited.

Gameplay

The Virtual Magic Kingdom consists of "Disney Lands", each depicted in isometric projection, and each with a distinct theme. Each room has at least one exit which leads to another room.

No more than 15 characters can occupy a room at any one time. If a player tries to enter [someone's guest room which already contains fifteen characters, he will be put into a queue to wait to enter. (A player can request a free "VMK pass" if there are more than five people in the queue; this allows him or her to walk around freely in other rooms until it is their turn to enter.) The public rooms all have multiple "instances", named after compass directions (such as the "North-East-East" instance), and each instance can have up to fifteen characters in it. When moving around the public rooms, a character will be randomly placed in an instance of a room unless the player checks the "Advanced Mode" box, in which they can select an instance for his or her character to enter.

File:Princess Janay's character Yanaj.jpg

A VMK player in a character-customization mode, with the box for changing the character's signature below.

During October, all the rooms along Main Street are decorated for Halloween. In 2005, the decorations were left up until December; in 2006 and 2007, Christmas décor appeared immediately after Halloween.

Players whose characters meet in the same room at the same time can become "friends": one issues an invitation to the other, and if the other accepts, then each player will always be able to see if the other is online and in what game location, and will be able to jump instantly to the other character's location (unless blocked by a 'friends only' flag on the room or if the friend's character is within a game, or if it is a 'special entrance' room such as the exit from the Typhoon Lagoon to Waterpark Pool). Either player can remove someone from his friends list at any time.

Guest rooms and awards

A VMK player's High School Musical guest room, with the room's owner at the entrance

When a player first creates their character in the game, they are given one free "guest room", which they can name and decorate with items. If the player is creating their character in a park, then they are given another room (one of each available choice), as a bonus. Several other kinds of rooms are also available; a player can purchase/get them in the game.

The shops sell a wide variety of items, such as posters, couches, water fountains, and rugs, which can be used to decorate guest rooms. Some of these items are only sold for a limited time, and some can only be obtained as quest prizes. Pictures taken with the in-game camera can be hung on guest room walls, or put into a photo book for public view.

Players can also create games in their rooms (making sure to follow VMK guidelines of appropriateness), and award some of their own items to players. Among the most popular of these are, "Cute or Boot", best described as a beauty pageant/fashion contest, "Falling Chairs", a game where the owner of the room drops chairs while the players race to them, and the last one standing loses, and "Don't Hit the Floor!" in which a maximum of 6 contestants stand on boxes, a roulette displays a number, "Dress Like Me!", a game where you dress like the owner, "Wear that hat!", where you wear the same hat as the owner, and "Design a Room!", where the owner has a couple of rooms that are filled with items that you can move and the object is to design the best room.

Guest room owners have the ability to boot players from their room, if they are causing problems. This is done by opening the players' profile, and then selecting the red "boot" button. Players that are booted must wait a while before they can return to the room.

If a character is in his own room, then he can be found by the Guest Rooms "search" button (because it searches on the names of room owners as well as the names of rooms). Other than this, there is no way within the game to find out whether a particular other character not on a players friends list is online or the place they are located.

VMK Staff have also announced that along with the new New Orleans Square land, there is an exclusive room based on the VIP Exclusive Disney Club, located in the real New Orleans Square, "Club 33". This room is used for some staff events and for some guests who have earned the privilege. The only way someone can rent a Club 33 room, is if they win the best guest room award.

Every week VMK staff award a Best Guest Room Award, Best Game Room Award, and a Best Quest Award pin to the owner of a guest room chosen to be superlative in originality and creativity. Winners of Best Guest Room not only get the Best Guest Room Award, but they also get to "rent" Club 33 for a party, which a VMK host will help the winner organize. Recently, several players have earned the Best Guest Room, Best Game Room, or Best Quest award more than once; the VMK staff now awards the VIP pin to these outstanding players.

A player can set his/her guest rooms so that only people on his or her friends list may enter. On January 8, 2007, "tickets" were added; a room owner is now able to sell (for 10 credits), or trade tickets to allow entry to his rooms. The tickets appear as single-use pins.

As of April 3, 2007 players could set some of their items to be movable by their guests by clicking on an item, followed by clicking "Item Info", and checking "Let Guests Move this Item". At the same time as above, players could also clear their room of items completely, by hitting the "i" button on the tool bar, and then selecting "Clear Room".

As of March 2007, VMK Staff have begun "Room Makeovers", where VMK staff will randomly go into guest rooms, or ones submitted for one when the VMK player is online and in the room, and give their room a makeover if in need of one. Before and after pictures of the players' room are then posted each week on the VMK Newsletter. This concept is similar to Extreme Makeover Home Edition. If a player would like to have a room makeover, they are discouraged to make a room named anything along the lines of "I need a room makeover."

During the Month of April, VMK Staff Awarded a 'Best Pirate Room' award because April was 'Pirate Month.' The Prizes were Seagull Nest Hat, Crow Barstool and the seat that goes with it. A Flaming Ransacked Window and other stuff.

Some rooms are available in the Virtual Magic Kingdom from the shop button, others are available from quests, and some are no longer available at all. Players are encouraged to get guest rooms when quests come out, because that could be the only time they will ever be available. For example, the Tron Guest Room was from a quest that is no longer available, so players who did not finish the quest by a certain date, never received the Tron Guest Room. There are also codes for certain guest rooms.

As of June 2007, "pay-to-play" guest/game rooms are not allowed because it is considered scamming, though games like "Pirates of the Caribbean" are still allowed to ask for the minimum 21 credits.

In January 2008, three new guest rooms were added to Main Street: Main Street Magic Shop in Central Plaza, Main Street Magic Shop Checkers (a new game at the Magic Shop), and the Penny Arcade on Main Street.

Mini-games

The following minigames are available to play throughout the lands in the Virtual Magic Kingdom:

• Magic Checkers: As of January 2008 a new game was revealed to the VMK public. This game is basically the same thing as checkers and is only playable by two players at a time per room. This game like most other games in VMK offers a reward of credits and items. The amount of credits received by this game increases depending on the amounts won.
• Pirates of the Caribbean: Two to four player on two teams, must be equal on both teams, either play a game of "Ship Battle" where one team must sink the other or a game of "Capture the Flag" where one team must bring the opposing team's flag to their base before the other team. Once the game is over, both teams get rewards in credits for their efforts. After every three wins on one level, a player receive a treasure chest magic key that will open a chest corresponding to the level of which the player won the key for. The prizes the player are awarded are from a list randomly chosen pirate related prizes that correspond to the level the key was awarded in.
• Castle Fireworks Remixed: Fireworks are launched into the sky and the player must click on each one with the correct symbol to detonate it. Pins and credits are awarded based on a player's performance.
• Jungle Cruise Photo Safari: The player pilots a safari boat and takes photos of animals while avoiding obstacles. 20 credits are awarded per game, not depending on score.
• Street Party Music Game/Monorail Music Game: A player can sequence music loops into a song for characters to dance to. Credits are awarded for editing songs and for playing them.
• The Haunted Mansion Game: The Purple team and the Green team, with up to four players each, compete to capture ghosts in the Haunted Mansion. Best two out of three wins.
• The VMK Trading Card Game: The basic version of the VMK Trading Card Game TCG was released August 17, 2007. In this version, the player begins with a random deck of cards and play a computer opponent in a sort of Rock, Paper, Scissors type of game. Later versions including Power Play and an online versus mode are to be released later on in the year, along with customizable decks and winable rewards.

There are also several places in Tomorrowland where credits can be earned. In Natilus Grotto and Shipwreck Graveyard, a player can collect shells that randomly pop up under water and receive one credit for every pearl they find. This game requires the Diving Suit magic pin, which can be obtained from an in-game quest. Another place to earn credits is the Autopia Space Race and the Mars race tracks. In this game, a player will drive over trophies to collect them, while also driving over gas cans to keep from running out of gas. For every trophy collected, each player will receive one credit. This game requires one of the four available Autopia car magic pins, which can be obtained from an in-game quest. It also requires an Autopia Driver's License.

The following minigames were available to play in the Tomorrowland Arcade until waterpark overlay:

• Airlock Escape: A puzzle game with some similarity to ChuChu Rocket!; successful completion of all fifteen levels will award the player with Deep Sea Diving Boots, Deep Sea Diving Jacket, and Deep Sea Diving Trousers (Deep Sea Diving Helmet may be purchased in the Inner-Space store).
• Blast in Space: An action game similar to Asteroids; the player pilots a spaceship to shoot rocks, and then receives awards for passing all sixteen levels.
• Hyperspace Mountain: An action game where the player collects six "modules" throughout nine sectors. Obtaining all six modules wins rewards.

Events

Beta testing began with a selection of furniture that was only released during the beta period. Dancing Inferno Magic is first awarded on June 18, during the Parade Special Event. Day One badges were awarded to all players who joined during the beta period and to those who joined on the week of June 23.

The Virtual Magic Kingdom occasionally holds special events at which prizes are given out, this includes:

Parade and Scavenger Hunt: During VMK's public beta testing phase, an event was held where players were told to gather on Main Street and "parade" along its length. Some parade "leaders" were awarded the Dancing Inferno magic pin, now considered rare to other players. Then a few staff members "hid" themselves in some rooms in the game, and the first people to find each of them were awarded prizes.

Room Decorating Event: Players were told to decorate their rooms to be judged for prizes. For a Celebration theme, players commemorated Disneyland's 50th anniversary. For a Space theme, players offered an interpretation of what "space" meant to them. Prizes were also given for answering trivia questions.

Dreams Month: During September 2007 there was a dreams event. Hosts would be randomly walking around the parks including guest room and handing out prizes. Some of these prizes included the Dreams room, which looks like Sleeping Beauty's castle, dream ears, dream pin, and many other items. Hosts would randomly walk around and players waiting in one room all day had difficulty finding, therefore, players were encouraged to play vmk as they would normally to possibly win a prize.

Haunted Maze Event: During October 2005, an easy maze, a medium maze, and a difficult maze were available for players to find their way through. Successfully completing the maze would award a prize. However, the event was plagued by server problems, resulting in queues of half an hour or more to get into the mazes, and some players were not able to enter the mazes at all or were bumped offline in the middle of them.

Gift-Giving Event: In December 2005, a player could spend 500 credits to purchase a mystery gift which was given (in the game) to someone of his or her choosing on December 24. The gift turned out to be a green holiday wreath.

Yeti Quest: In February 2006, players could visit designated rooms to find photos; by stringing together the first letter of each pictured item, a player could spell the location where the Yeti was hiding, and submit his answer for prizes. The answer was "Injun Joe's Cave", and everyone who sent in a correct answer won a snow carpet.

Ride-A-Thons: VMK staff occasionally hosts "Ride-A-Thons", in which they prepare rides for players to enjoy. When a player reaches the end of a ride, he is given a ride piece with which to create his own ride. Several rides are usually running at the same time to handle capacity. The more a player rides the more of a single prize a player will receive, depending on the event.

Make-A-Room:VMK staff occasionally host "Make A Ride Rooms", which allow players to go into a certain teleporter and design a room. The player with the best design will get a prize, and soon many other players started the same game. Note: this happened on April 2007, when the players were now allowed to move furniture if the person goes to the "Item Info" button in the furniture toolbar and if he goes to item info, he must check the option that says let guests move this item

Gingerbread Room Competition: In December 2007 VMK launched the gingerbread room competition in which players constructed a room using furniture items released during the month of December. The rooms were judged and the winners were handed out prizes that include a new shirt and hat that are different on boys than on girls.

Captain Blackheart's Treasure Hunt Quest In March 2008, VMK created their biggest quest ever. The quest consisted of 67 different tasks, and required the player to navigate VMK, answer Disney Pirate's of the Caribbean-related questions, and play games. The prize awarded was 75,000 credits and some items that are not yet obtainable. Their was also a smaller version of the quest, called Captain Blackheart's Mini Treasure Hunt Quest. The smaller quest awarded 1000 credits. Both quest started on March 29th, and ended on April 1st.

Quests

In-game

In-game quests involve a series of tasks for a player, such as finding a specific room or an item in the room, changing one's outfit, saying a specific word, or winning a certain number of points in a minigame. There are two types of in-game quests. 'Q Button' quests, which players can start from anywhere in the game by pressing a button marked 'Q' on the game's taskbar, and kiosk quests, which are linked to a 'quest kiosk' item owned by a particular player or staff member. Successful completion of a quest will usually award a prize. Each character can only complete each quest once.

In-park

For the first two years of the game, there was an in-park quest program which permitted players to earn special in-game prizes at Disneyland and Walt Disney World resorts. These quests were mostly eliminated in mid-2007, with the exception of an activity sheet and quest which is handed out to guests waiting in line at the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage attraction at Disneyland. As of January 2008 the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage Quest is not being handed out any longer, making the In-Park Quest a thing of the past.

Hidden Mickeys

There are fifty Hidden Mickeys in the game, appearing as mouse-eared logos embossed onto scenery in rooms. Hunting for Hidden Mickeys can be a difficult task, as they are faint and rather difficult to see, and it can take time to earn enough credits to buy film. Almost every room has at least one, and some contain two.

Credits and pins are awarded after finding certain numbers of Hidden Mickeys (a Bronze Mickey pin for finding ten, a Silver Mortimer pin for finding thirty, and a Gold Oswald pin and 500 credits for finding all fifty). Completing this hunt used to award a printable PDF coupon with a code for the Gold Design set of items, which could be obtained by redeeming the coupon at Disneyland or the Magic Kingdom.

The locations of the Hidden Mickeys were changed on December 12, 2005. The new hunt is called "Hidden Mickey Quest Part II", and the new prize pins have "Part II" appended to their names.

Character profiles

A new player begins by registering an account at "http://www.vmk.com". The player then sets up a character (an avatar) and selects the character's gender and appearance (shirt, shoes, pants, hair, hat, face, and colors for skin and hair). The player will type in a name, but until the VMK staff approve the name they requested, their name will be Guest, followed by the number of player that they are (E.x. Guest7402548). If the name is not approved the VMK staff would let them create another name. The player also selects a "guest room", his or her own themed area which can be decorated with furniture, posters, a boat canal, train tracks, game items, or other material. One room is provided for free, and additional rooms can be purchased later with in-game credits. The player can enter a few lines of text, known as a "(signature)", which will be displayed in the character's publicly-visible profile. The character is then given a few tradeable items (mostly T-shirts), and is placed in the game.

A player can also choose from a list of randomly-selected adjective-adjective-noun names presented to him or her; if he chooses one of these names, it does not need to be approved.

Items

Badges

Badges are icons that appear at the top of a player's information window visible to other players. Badges cannot be traded.

• Born In Park: given to a character created at Disneyland or the Magic Kingdom.
• VIP: given via a prize card's code; the card is given after completing the in-park quests to become eligible for the special park tour. (Note that this is different from the VIP pin, which is given the second time a player wins a Best Guest Room or Best Game Room award.)
• Here from Day 1: given to a character created during the "beta" stage (prior to June 27, 2005).
• VMK Staff: paid employees who help safeguard players and/or host VMK games and events; see Staff above.
• Testers: VMK staff that test out items, and seen around with their name "QA_". Testers also hold the VMK Staff badge.
• Producers: These players hold the VMK Staff badge but they have no special prefix before their in game "title". For example, Yavn, one of the most common producers is not known as QA_Yavn nor VMK_Yavn.
• Community Leader: volunteers who help with the game; their names begin with "CL_" (Discontinued on October 24, 2007).

Pins

A character can "wear" up to fifteen pins so that other players can see them in his or her profile. Some pins can be purchased from shops in the game; others can only be obtained by completing in-park or in-game quests, by winning host games, a player may also get them from a Non-Playable Character (NPC) such as Esmeralda which is one of the many Non-Playable Characters found in the game.

Usually a new pin is released on weekends of a certain month in the Emporium for a limited time. These pins usually cost 500 credits and are often a part of a set, for example, during October 2006 a set of Halloween themed pins came out, and a new pin was released every weekend. However, by Monday the pin will no longer be available making it high in value. The next weekend however, a new pin will be released and it starts all over again.

"Magic pins" can also be worn. When activated (from the magic wand icon at the bottom of the screen, or by typing the pin's magic word), they display a visual effect, such as the character driving a car or turning into a snowman. Each effect has a duration of only a few seconds and must be allowed to "recharge" for a minute or so before another use. If a player has two or more of the same kind of magic pin, they can be combined for a longer effect and shorter delay between uses. There are also single-use magic pins which will disappear after being used once (or after a specific "expiration date"). Some magic pins are very expensive and only available for a short period of time; for example, the "Turn Into Bat Magic Pin" (only available in October) was priced at 10,000 credits. As of January 2008, several "magic tricks" have been moved to be sold in the Main Street Magic Shop along with some clothing and furniture items.

Some pins are not tradeable and can only be obtained by quests or host events these pins include all single use magic pins and all Tomorrowland quest pins. Any award pin such as the best guest room award and the VIP pin are also not tradeable. A player can check if a pin is not tradeable or tradeable by clicking the pin on a players profile which not only reveals whether a certain pin is available for trade or not, but also reveals what effects (if any) the pin may have and the player who owns it.

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The costume items can be mixed-and-matched. This character is wearing the Mission Space vest, pants, and shoes with the Native American headdress.

Clothing

When a player joins the kingdom, he or she receives a pack of clothing along with a room and some furniture. Players that sign up at a Disney park may receive extra rewards.

Occasionally, the VMK shops sell special clothing items (or entire costumes). Some of these are seasonal, and some can only be purchased during a specific weekend. These items are usually expensive; due to this and their limited availability, they soon become valuable items in trading.

Some clothing items are only available to one gender. For example, boys cannot have princess outfits (excluding the Princess Minnie hat), and girls cannot have the Wildcats outfit.

Full costumes have included spacesuits, princess outfits, Haunted Mansion dress clothes, an Expedition Everest hiking outfit, baseball uniforms, and football uniforms.

Costume items have included Mickey ears, and a variety of caps including baseball caps and a Sorcerer Mickey hat.

Credits

A player can earn credits by visiting the Disney Characters (see Disney Characters above), by playing the Castle Fireworks Remixed, Jungle Cruise, Pirates of the Caribbean, or Haunted Mansion games, and by remixing and playing songs in the Street Party Music Game, or in the newer Monorail Mix Game.

Another popular way to amass credits is called "Nedding". It consists of playing the Shrunken Ned's Jungle Cruise game but trying to end the game as quickly as possible by crashing repeatedly and running out of fuel. Each time the game is played it awards 20 credits, so the credits that can be gotten from this game are limited only by the length of time someone wants to put into it.

There are also several places in Tomorrowland where credits can be earned. In Nautilus Grotto and Shipwreck Graveyard, players can collect shells that randomly pop up under water and receive one credit for every pearl they find. This game also requires the Diving Suit magic pin, which can be obtained from an in-game quest. Another place to earn credits, is the Autopia Space Race and the Mars race tracks. In this game, each player will drive over trophies and collect them for one credit a piece, while also driving over gas cans to keep from running out of it. This game requires one of the four available Autopia car magic pins, which can be obtained from an in-game quest and may also require an Autopia driver's license.

Accounts used specifically for getting credits and items, known in other games as multis, are called "mules". Since the game lets a player create new accounts freely, players create mules (named after the beast of burden) to enter multi-use codes and collect credits by visiting Disney Characters. Players can buy items with a mule's credits, and then trade these items from the mules to their main characters. Players who use mules are said to be "muling", and in the game mules are called "done keys" (donkeys) due to the limited vocabulary. On the VMK web site, Yavn has expressed his dislike of mules and his intention to ban accounts of people with an "unbelievable" number of accounts (such as fifty for a single household) which could be mistaken as being mules. Some players use mules to take control of easy tasks, as finishing a quest and getting a Magic Pin, then trading it via another computer, to get an advantage in the game. Unfortunately, players use other quests like the Pirate Quests, where players can win a Treasure Detector Magic Pin, in which players walk around a certain area, and win some type of prize. The rarest prize of this event is the Dancing Inferno Pin.

Purchased items can be "sold back" for 20% of their purchase price, but some items are not able to be sold. For example, a quest kiosk cannot be sold back or traded.

Trading

Players can trade various items. Each player can put a maximum of fifteen items into a trade.

Clothing items that are only available for boys or girls cannot be traded to the other gender. For example, a girl can not trade her princess outfit to a boy.

Some players try to take advantage of the trading window to scam other players. Most of the trading window scams no longer work since the trading window now has several confirmation notices. VMK has stated that if a person agrees to all of these notices, any issues a player may have with the trade are due to their own fault.

A player can report a scammer with the "Report" button in the game, or by using the "Contact Us" link on the web site.

Safety

The game's rules are posted on the VMK web site as "VMK Values" which are intended to help the game to become "a safe, non-threatening environment" because many players are between the ages of eight and fourteen. The rules prohibit sexual or racist language, harassment, divulging personal information, and attempts to hack the system. Violations can result in a permanent ban, which prevent users from using VMK in the computer the violation occurred in. Despite this, attempted violations are quite common, and people attempt to get around the edited speech by formulating single words out of multiple words (ie: saying "I'm Tree Years Old"). Online dating also occurs, which is against the "VMK Values" as well.

Disney prohibits sharing personal information in the game (and its limited dictionary also adds a technical obstacle to this). Disney's stated intent is to protect the safety and privacy of its members, but this also prevents members from having a legitimate way of reaching each other outside the game. Members of some Disney internet discussion forums get around this by putting certain phrases in their public signatures, a short bit of text which is visible to any other player who clicks on the character, to indicate a discussion board through which they can be reached.

Closure of VMK

In the "Yavn Speaks" section of the April 7, 2008 VMK will be shortly closed for good. VMK will close on May 21, 2008, at 10:00pm PST, due to VMK being meant as a limited time promotion for the Disneyland 50th Anniversary Celebration. The website will be open for a limited time after closing to remind users that VMK will no longer be active. VMK has also stopped accepting the creation of any new accounts due to its forthcoming closer. This has sparked a fairly large amount of petitions to circle the Internet. The closure generated a new similar virtual world, created by former VMK fans called Virtual Family Kingdom.

External links

• Official website
  • FAQ page
• VMK at Disney's Online Worlds Wiki