My Webkinz Story

 

Hey there Penguin and Parrot Pals! Today's post is going to be a bit different to normal, but I hope you all like it nonetheless. This blog, for the most part, has revolved around Club Penguin. My audience, for the most part, is comprised of Club Penguin lovers! That, or Party Parrot World lovers - but the audiences for those are pretty much merged. Today isn't about Club Penguin, or Party Parrot. Today is about Webkinz. This is my Webkinz story.

So first, let me set the scene for you.

It's 2013. This was a little bit before I was homeschooled, so I was still living my day-to-day school life. Now, for lack of better words, and to avoid getting into the sad details, that school life wasn't all that great. It was a horribly toxic environment all around, everything from the students to the staff themselves. I'll leave it at that. The weekends were the only time I remember feeling like myself. I'd spend all day on my computer on those days, because that was the only time of the week I'd have any free time.

Naturally, I'd treat this free time with care, since I didn't have very much of it. By that point, I was playing a virtual world called PetPet Park. It was a spinoff of Neopets - and despite never playing Neopets, I did play this game. The people on this game weren't so nice to me. I was picked on whenever I was around other people, and felt bored when I was in the isolated areas of the game. And, as time went by, I wasn't really comfortable with spending my precious weekend time on this game. I wanted to find an alternative! The internet was my sanctuary to talk to kids who would be kind to me, something I obviously wasn't going to get out of school, far from it.

So I went to thinking. I even did a little bit of "research" - which is just a fancy way of saying getting distracted and watching YouTube. However, this seemed to work in my favor, as I discovered a video of a site, a children's MMO, called Club Penguin.

I thought it was perfect! The game looked fun, and I was eager to sign up. However, things didn't go exactly to plan. For whatever reason, the site wasn't letting me sign up that day. It just wasn't sending a verification email, I can only assume. "Oh well," I thought to myself back then, "I'll just come back to it later." And I did. Three YEARS later. Thanks, young me, for being forgetful for so long!

After my defeat with Club Penguin, though, I still wanted to find an alternative. I don't remember the where, how, when, or why, but Webkinz came up. I don't know if I saw it in a video, or remember it being mentioned from long ago, but it came up in my mind as my last resort. I thought that I might as well give it a try.

I distinctly remember it took a while, though. Back then, my dad was the one who helped me sign up for these sites, and he's a pretty busy guy! It took a while - I'd say like a solid week or two (that wasn't short of begging for him to make time for it right this very second) - before he was able to sign me up for Webkinz, and I don't think I was even in the same room as him when he did it.

But after that, I was free to try out Webkinz for the first time! However, I don't remember what my first time playing was like. I'm not sure why, but my memories get really cloudy around the 2012-2014 years, and I can only remember distinct little flashes. But I do remember more about Webkinz than I do a lot of other things. It became really special to me, really fast.

I remember what I had my dad name my first pet. I wanted the default dog - and I wanted her to be a female, named Diamanda. This was a name that I had been carrying with me for a while, it originated from when I had a Leapster and named one of my pets on one of the games Diamanda. I was so young around that point in time, so that name was really just me making things up. However, it does seem to be the perfect mashup of the words "diamond" and "panda" so maybe it wasn't all "young me nonsense".

Diamanda was my only pet on Webkinz. I couldn't get any of the plushies, since we lived in Germany at the time, and they didn't sell them at the PX. (Public Xchange) I was pretty much out of luck if I wanted to expand my Webkinz family. But, honestly? One was enough for me back then.

I didn't really know how to take care of my one pet, either. I had a small computer - I believe it's called a netbook - and it's essentially it's a smaller laptop with far less power than a normal laptop would have. This meant, the screen was smaller! The entire Webkinz window couldn't fit onto my screen, so part of the bottom - which contained most of the UI - was cut off. I never knew how to feed my pets, since food is stored on the dock, which was just so conveniently where the screen cut off.

So Webkinz wasn't a game I was very active with. I'd still "play" it, for sure! But most of that time was spent walking around aimlessly in my empty house, because I couldn't place furniture. I was pretty content with it all, though. Even if I was by my lonesome - since I quickly realized that Webkinz isn't a very social game, especially back then - I still looked forward to logging in every day, because I never truly felt alone, for one particular reason...

You see, back in the day, Webkinz would get sick if you didn't take care of them. I, of course, couldn't do that, so Diamanda was perpetually sick. And, if your pet was sick, you would take them to the Clinic, run by none other than Dr. Quack. That's where the most vivid memories start for me.

Because I hadn't been there for the sign-up, I didn't actually know there was voice acted characters! Normally, people would first experience Webkinz voice acting when they meet Ms. Birdy. Well, instead, Dr. Quack was my first taste of that. The game was completely silent up until then, so suddenly hearing, "Welcome to the animal clinic! My name is Dr. Quack!" in the character's Scottish accent, it blew my tiny child mind!

The entire check-up sequence is something that's very special to me. It's something I would look forward to when I'd log in to Webkinz. In fact, that's all I wanted to do! I mean, I didn't really know what else the game had to offer, so this was just about as good as it got. I knew there were games, but I didn't know how to get to them. I'm pretty sure, by this point, that I would've just preferred going to see Dr. Quack anyways.

Naturally I ran out of KinzCash pretty fast - I wasn't earning any, because I wasn't playing any games. I can't remember for the life of me what happens if you don't have enough money to buy the medicine Dr. Quack gives you. I know that I saw it, but I just can't remember what happens.

Some days, after the check-up, I would just stand idly in the clinic. The game wouldn't automatically redirect you to a different screen, so I had the choice to just sit there. It was quite therapeutic for me, actually. The rest of the game felt really lonely, and seeing another character on the screen made me really happy.

It was like Dr. Quack was my best friend! Anything that I could get that would simulate friendship, I appreciated so much back then. I'd even wake up early on school days just so I could see him before I had to leave for school. It always brightened my day seeing and hearing him.

Eventually, I left Webkinz. After getting homeschooled, I diverted my focus elsewhere. I'd think about it every now and again, but it was never enough to convince me to log in again. My time with Webkinz had come to an end, at least for now.

I didn't find out that Dr. Quack's Clinic got removed until years down the line. And by years, I mean years - Club Penguin came and went, and Club Penguin Island was now my biggest obsession. I think I was playing Island when I remembered about Webkinz, and I wanted to revisit it again. I got so excited about it too! I wanted to see Dr. Quack again! Much to my surprise, I didn't find what I was looking for.

Was I extremely sad about this? Oh, yes! Absolutely. I still really am. It does make sense why they removed it, though. I can only imagine pet care becoming more and more tedious with the more pets you had, and sickness would've been so annoying to have to deal with. I still don't have to like it, though. I'm always going to wish that I had my one last trip to the doctor. The new clubhouse room... it just isn't the same. After all, the reason I got so attached to Dr. Quack was because of his voice! And guess what aspect of him has never made a return? You guessed it, his voice.

Nowadays, I continue to play Webkinz. It's become one of my favorite games, and I actually do know what I'm doing now. I mean, it would be a bit embarrassing at age 18 if I didn't know how to play Webkinz of all things. I've grown really attached to my pets and I'd even say I'm pretty good at some of the minigames in the arcade!

It doesn't feel like the same game that it used to, though. My experience was entirely different to what other people's would've been like. I feel like nothing could really emulate what I experienced, and the memories I have of what Webkinz was for me is something that I recognize is completely unique to me. My personal experience was crafted solely around Dr. Quack being my only friend. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

To think, if Club Penguin actually worked that day, I wouldn't have had this experience at all! So, in a way, I guess this post was Club Penguin related after all. It was just more of an undertone this time.

With that, I'd like to close out this post by saying thank you, to Webkinz. Thank you for creating a character that would end up being my play-pretend best friend that ended up helping me through rough times. I'll never forget the experience I had, and I'm glad that I have the ability to share it with the world.

Thank you all for reading.

- imabunny156, aka Nhexis