The creator of Club Penguin is making Mini Bash - a new social party world
When I was a child, I spent countless hours on Club Penguin. I had puffles that I loved, a house I enjoyed partying at, and I found myself often cooking up pizzas at the pizza parlour. Of course, the cookie ones, through the secret to unlock them! I think the internet and my world at the time were a much smaller, safer place. Having somewhere like Club Penguin to explore was such a pivotal part of the way that I used the internet, and it seems like there just aren't places like that anymore. I think that's, in part, why Lance Priebe is creating Mini Bash, which says that it has been created with safety at the forefront of development, so that younger audiences can feel safe while interacting within this world.
"Games are where many kids learn to be part of a community, make friends, and express themselves. That’s a big responsibility. With Club Penguin, we saw how much kids loved having a place to gather, and how much it mattered to parents that they could trust it. Today’s kids are always connected, and the online world they’re growing up in is more complicated than it used to be. So with Mini Bash, safety is a design principle from day one. But I don’t think safety and fun have to be at odds. Kids can explore, be creative, and be a little chaotic with their friends, and parents can see we’re taking it seriously." Lance explained.
Mini Bash is meant to be an open world party game where you can explore, collect, play a bunch of mini-games, customise your character, and find people to hang out with in a safe way. Currently, they've announced four games: one where you compete against others to destroy smaller enemies, another where you need to catch tacos as they rain from the sky, freeze tag, and one where you need to find and collect cookies on the map. It's got a lot of the charm that I think multiplayer online games, sort of like Toontown, had in the early 2000s era, but the graphics and gameplay do look far more updated!
"Mini Bash, though built for today’s players, is its own game. It was created as the next evolution of what I hoped Club Penguin would eventually become. But specifically, Mini Bash has borrowed three major elements that made Club Penguin a success: 1) A shared space where everyone can gather and find community, which we so desperately need. 2) Events that show up, then disappear, so later you can say 'I was there' with a sense of pride. And 3) Frequent fun in the form of mini-games taking place inside the world to help satisfy our need for entertainment and engagement. But there is a major difference: in Club Penguin, the games pulled you away from community interactions. In Mini Bash, you not only stay engaged, but your friends can both participate with you or cheer you on from the sidelines."
When developing a game with mental health and younger generations at the forefront of the conversation, there are a lot of considerations to make sure that you are taking care of your players.
"We’re realistic that, despite our best efforts, online communities can surface things like bullying, loneliness, and emotional distress. So we’ve brought advisors in childhood development and mental health to the table. They’re helping us think through how to recognise and respond to those situations and shape our policies around them. As the game is in Beta, we’re exploring potential features like parental notifications for inappropriate behaviour and excessive playtime, to encourage balanced play. These ideas are still in development, and we plan to keep learning and improving as we see how real players behave.
Communication in Mini Bash is intentionally controlled. Players chat through a predefined, approved system of phrases and expressions. There’s no private messaging, no built-in voice chat, and no connections to outside forums like Discord. That means players can’t share their names, locations, or any personal information. The focus is on shared play. We think users connect best around the games, and if they want to chat with their friends, we encourage them to do that in real life."
One of the big things within early 2000s games was time-limited events that feel like something we all HAD to be there for. I think of times when there were in-game events; the first Holiday party or when popcorn exploded everywhere. There was a sort of 'in' club it felt like, for people that played within these communities.
"Back then, kids came home from school and scheduled a time to play. That was the appointment. Now they're always connected, phone in the pocket, no appointment. You don't design for 'come back Friday at four.' You design for 'I'm bored, I'll turn it on.' That makes shared moments harder. In Club Penguin, a party showed up, then it was gone. You went back to class and asked, 'Were you there?' Today, an event gets consumed worldwide in two or three hours, and it's on YouTube before it ends. So how do you make something feel like a moment again? That's the question we’re building around."
Mini Bash does look like a game that will help bring together the next generation of gamers. Currently, it's seeking funding on Kickstarter.
