An Origins update from Macklebee

Hey hey Origins community 👋

Recently, Origins Product Lead Macklebee answered some questions from members of the community in our Discord server. 

We decided to use his comments to provide you with a transparent update on where we’ve come from, where we are now, and where we’re headed next with the game.

Where We Are: Player Activity & Engagement

We’ve noticed some questions about the game feeling a bit quieter, and we’d like to share some context. The initial surge in players was largely driven by hype and memories of the game from our (huge) inactive player base. As Macklebee explained: “We knew there’d be a drop off after the initial bout of nostalgia that drew the first hordes in.”

Right now, we acknowledge that there isn’t a core gameplay loop that’s sticky enough to keep all new players engaged long-term. However, we’re proud of the strong community that remains, and we’re really excited about what’s on the horizon. In the coming months, we want to introduce new features like Trax and SnowStorm (pending community votes, of course). These, along with other smaller quality of life updates, should help build a more engaging experience.

We’re also planning to introduce daily challenges, such as “Play 3 BattleBall games” or “Win 1 SnowStorm game”, giving players daily goals to work toward. Additionally, we’re exploring more customisation options for avatars, in ways that the community supports. As Macklebee put it, “We’ve got a good foundation, and I’m confident in our ability to grow in time as we add gameplay elements that are sticky for folks that didn’t play in 2005.”

In-Game Events: Building on Our Foundation

We’ve heard feedback that some of our in-game events have felt underwhelming, and we want to be open about why that happened. Origins started with a pretty small team. Also, at launch almost all of the members of that team were juggling multiple roles to make things happen – content drops, events, competitions, etc.

As Macklebee shared, “I would’ve loved to have been able to come at this with a full dedicated team, events planned months in advance… that’s not what we had, and we did the best with the tools and time we had available.”

Despite the challenges, we’re now in a place where we’re better able to provide more engaging and exciting events in the future.

Marketing: What We’ve Learned and What’s Next

We’ve invested quite a bit in marketing, especially on TikTok, to help bring new players into Origins. As Macklebee mentioned, “It’s really hard for us to track [TikTok’s] success there, we know there’s millions of impressions but the transition from mobile to desktop is hard.” We’ve definitely seen some success, as many players have mentioned finding the game through TikTok, but we’re still evaluating whether it’s the best advertising platform for us moving forward.

Our User Acquisition team will continue to analyse our marketing strategies and adjust as needed to ensure we’re reaching the right audience and bringing new players into the community.

The Launch Challenges: Technical Hurdles and Progress

We know the game’s launch wasn’t without its technical issues, and we understand the frustration many of you felt. As Macklebee explained, “If it helps, I was as upset at launch as I’m sure some of you were. Folks not being able to get their usernames because of issues with TOTP code delivery sucked.”

Habbo Hotel: Origins operates on modernised infrastructure that differs from other Habbo sites, which presented unique challenges at launch. We did our best to prepare but fell short in some areas. 

Then, with the early content releases we had to rely on furni that already supported on-the-fly recolouring because we didn’t have a dedicated artist at the time, and we hadn’t yet developed the pipelines needed to introduce new furni to the game easily. As Macklebee said, “The recolours started as we had no other means of getting new content into the game… we didn’t understand the build pipelines needed to add new furniture.”

However, we’re happy to report that we’ve since overcome these technical hurdles, and you’ve likely noticed the addition of entirely new furni lines. While recolours will still be part of our content releases from time to time, we’re now in a position to offer more original and exciting furni.