MHWiki:Current events

Let's Put Dev Updates and Everything Else Here (up to one month, archive anything older). We'll include the newest update into the main page, and we can exclude the others using the NOINCLUDE Tag.

For older updates, visit the Archive.

Notes for Editors

• Please always put the newest news post first (if there are two from the same day, use the timestamp).
• Keep dates in DD Month YYYY format; this is an internationally recognized date format.
• The MHP Template is god-like.
• Use Template:Date so that if we ever change the date format, it'll auto-update.

Template

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News

Mermaid mouse painting video!

29 April 2010

Hello MouseHunters!

Jacob Johnson here.
It has been some time since I've uploaded a painting video, unfortunately, the last time I attempted to render out one of these videos my computer actually caught on fire, no jokes.

My computer is much healthier and I am only struggling with trying to find some good open source music to use for the videos. I should be getting these videos out much more frequently if I can find some good music, so look forward to them!

You can check out the mermaid painting video HERE

as well, if you haven't seen them yet, check out these other MouseHunt painting videos:

Harpy mouse
Centaur mouse
Keeper's Assistant mouse
Keeper mouse
Golem mouse

Take care and enjoy!

-- Jacob Johnson

Updated - Now 8 T-Shirt Design winners

2 April 2010

Hello MH Communitaaaaay,

The response to our competition was overwhelming and we got way more designs than anticipated. We thought it impossible to just choose 3 designs and after much debate the team here settled on 6 designs. I then pulled rank and added two more I thought had to be included. It is obviously not easy choosing the eventual winners as it meant 8 winners but over 1700 people who lost out.

In no particular order, the following designs were selected;

Winning Entry 962
Winning Entry 694
Winning Entry 723
Winning Entry 689
Winning Entry 117
Winning Entry 227
Winning Entry 1603
Winning Entry 1706

Congratulations to our winners! The T-Shirts with these designs will be available for purchase through our Cafe Press store early next week.

We ran the competition through 99designs and they will have to do something on their side to formally set the winners and pay the prize money, we expect that to be resolved early next week as well.

All the best to you and yours this weekend,

-- Bryan Freeman

What's Coming this Month

1 April 2010

Hey there, MouseHunters!

New stuff will be coming your way soon, and so we wanted to share some of the awesome new features that you can expect this month!

Today, we have a sneak peek at two new areas that will be coming out shortly. Each area will have tons of mice, and lots of new things to do!

First, get your horse and plow and mosey on down to Gnawville, the King's own farming grounds, full of beloved vegetable mice such as the Carrot mouse, Cabbage mouse, the Spud mouse and of course, our old friend Cow, who will frequently get lost and moo for help from your friends page. While hunting in this area, the Hunter's Horn will be replaced by the Harvester Horn, for extra farm-time fun!

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Some (very) observant MouseHunters might have noticed that our second new area has been visible on the map for a few months now. Just northwest of the Lagoon lies the Albino Plains, an area with very unique properties. This area will be filled with all new mice and traps, and the mysterious new power type: Invisible.

Here are some spoiler images!

Invis-o-trap of DOOOOM:
Invis-o-trap of DOOOOM
Stealth Mouse:
Stealth Mouse

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Along with all of the cool new areas we’re adding to MouseHunt, this month will also introduce handy new features such as the Omni-trap tool. If you’re tired of switching between different power types in order to catch mice, this tool is for you. With the Omni-trap, there will be no more need to switch between traps for the correct power type. You can simply combine all of your owned traps into one super powerful trap, and keep hunting! With the Omni-trap tool at your side, you’ll never miss a mouse again!

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But wait. . . there’s more. This month, we will introduce a new way to create unlimited MouseHunt content while negating any need for the art department! Along with the Omni-trap, we will be releasing another new feature: the random mouse generator. Taking hundreds of individual drawings of mouse parts, the system will be able to generate several thousand new unique mice for you all to explore and capture!

Here are some examples of our favorites

Example 1
Example 2

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Well, that’s enough spoilers for today. If we give out all the sweetness now, we’ll spoil your dinner! Stay tuned, though, MouseHunters, because we’ve got a lots more exciting stuff coming your way!

-- Dave Vanderburg

New Stock at the Harbour General Store

31 March 2010

Thanks to the efforts of hunters armed with Nannybots, those pesky Terrible Twos mice have ceased their troublemaking and been pushed out of the Kingdom! Their companions; The Rockstar, Present and Birthday mice have also quieted their party and retreated back into seclusion.

With the Terrible Twos mice now gone, Digby has recovered all the stolen Chrome Nannybot parts which they are now selling in the Harbour general store for a limited time only. The parts do not come cheap, but allow hunters who have a Nannybot to upgrade it into a medium-strength shadow trap.

If you were lucky enough to collect the parts as loot this month and do not want to add the Limited Edition Chrome Nannybot to your collection of traps you may sell the parts to the general store. If you have already assembled your Chrome Nannybot and wish to sell the parts, you can disassemble it using your Hunter's Hammer.

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The March SUPER|brie+ giveaway has come to an end! Congratulations to the winning brave birthday hunters who will receive SUPER|brie+ from Larry's own personal stash!

Dojo Sensei Mice
1st: David Watson
2nd: Yannick Vankerkhove
3rd: Andrew Van Horn

Silth Mice
1st: Wayne Teo
2nd: Will Moeller
3rd: Ricky Chang

Big Bad Burroughs Mice
1st: Patrick O'Reilly
2nd: Andy Tsui
3rd: Chris Gilroy

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With so many new things added in the month of March we hope that everyone found a new challenge they enjoy. Just a reminder that the updates to Digby, The Lagoon and Furoma are all permanent editions to the game. This includes the Onyx Mallet Blueprints and Monolith base as loot drops.

Until next time, happy hunting and good luck sounding your horn!

-- Dave Vanderburg

Dr. F. Romage Living Shards

24 March 2010

The Town of Digby keeps on expanding by drilling deeper into soil, making room for more of the King's finest scientists. Recent drilling has uncovered a network of underground streams where small glowing crystals have washed up.

These crystals were soon found to be the Living Shards, used by Dr. F. Romage in his experiments to bring the Monster mice to life. After some careful experimentation a second, more cheesy use has been uncovered.

Adding Radioactive Sludge and Living Shards to Curds and Whey causes an instant reaction, which results in a lime-scented, green glowing cheese that quickly earned the name Limelight Cheese. The small shards vibrate within the curd, making high-pitched noises that draws out mice that dwell deep below the soil at Digby.

To accommodate hunters in making Limelight Cheese the Town of Digby has opened a general store selling both Curds and Whey, as well as Living Shards. The shards are quite rare and hard to find, making them a tad on the expensive side. If you're gold coffers are running low, don't fret! Hunting Monster mice is a sure-way to find a shard or two for free!

Hunting the subterranean mice of Digby should not be taken lightly! What dwells deep below can be a frightening sight. The subtle vibration of Limelight Cheese can attract the massive Big Bad Burroughs mouse, whose multiple jaws yield thousands of teeth just waiting to snack on some cheese.

Living Shards were not the only discovery made deep below Digby... An extremely rare element named Ohnoesium (which coincidentally makes a nice base for many traps) was found in the tunnels left by Big Bad Burroughs mice. If you're looking to acquire this base, then hunt for the Big Bad Burroughs mouse.

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With this, the final update of March has come - the last piece of the Nannybot upgrade, originally designed by Digby! Smashing a standard Nannybot and crafting it together with a Time Out Upgrade, Chrome Nanite Coating and Superstar Nanny Glasses creates a medium-strength shadow trap to calm the shenanigans of rambunctious zombies.

If you're looking to get your hands on the three upgrade pieces but are not sure you want to find them on your own, the good people at Digby have your needs in mind! Digby has been seen across the Kingdom setting traps and stockpiling loot. They plan on selling the three upgrade pieces at the Harbour within a few days.

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If you have ever been to our online store at Cafe Press you would have probably noticed out T-shirt designs are way out of date. We would like to add some more designs and thought it would be cool to run a T-shirt design contest. Besides the honor of having the winning design, you could also win one of three $295 prizes. The contest will be run and managed on the 99designs site, you have just shy of 7 days to get your entries in.

Full details can be found here:

http://99designs.com/t-shirt-design/contests/social-game-facebook-mousehunt-design-winners-40731/brief

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Happy hunting and good luck if you're headed to the Town of Digby!

-- Dave Vanderburg

A Curious Little Chemist Brews Up Trouble!

16 March 2010

It all started when a Terrible Twos mouse invited a friend to the party -- A curious little chemist mouse who began to experiment with Gnarled Cheese while exploring The Great Gnarled Tree. A dash of this and a hint of that later the novice scientist created a new potion! If you manage to catch a Curious Chemist mouse they're sure to be carrying one of these new potions, but be warned that the little chemists are a bit picky about their cheese and seem to only enjoy the crisp flavour of Gnarled Cheese.

When used with brie or SUPER|brie+ (along with a little bit of the magic contained within every Gnawnian gold coin) these new potions make Wicked Gnarly Cheese. Woah, totally awesome dude! Wicked Gnarly Cheese is a much more pungent version of Gnarled Cheese and seems to attract the very strongest mice of the Lagoon, including a new powerful mouse that had long been hiding in caverns located below the water's surface.

The powerful mouse known as a Silth mouse is indeed a worthy adversary for any hunter. The intimidating stare of its beady red eyes can cripple your courage, setting you back points. While its menacing claws like to reach into your pack and steal a few shiny gold coins. Hunting this new adversary is for the most experienced of hunters -- it will test your patience along with your resource collecting skills. It will be a challenging hunt, but is sure to come with bragging rights!

If you're looking for a more tangible reward than bragging rights, rest assured the King is offering a handsome reward of more than 15,000 gold coins per capture. The Silth mouse also seems to enjoy hoarding the gold it steals from hunters, you may also be lucky enough to collect a gold satchel upon catching this watery beast.

The Terrible Twos mouse has brought the party to Whisker Woods and in the process somehow surrendered a piece of Digby technology to the Silth mouse! If you catch a Silth this month you'll find yourself in possession of Chrome Nanite Coating which is sure to come in handy if you're looking to upgrade your Nannybot at the end of March. If you don't catch a Silth the Chrome Nanite will be available from the Harbour general store for a limited time in the future.

Meanwhile, the always enthusiastic Larry has updated his competition scoreboard to include the Silth. You can check out his scoreboard here, or by clicking of the links circulating in the news ticker at the top of every page.

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The King Looks towards the Future

The King is certain that the depths of the Lagoon are a mysterious place where there is more to find. Hunters currently lack the ability to plunge beneath its surface to explore the strange caverns below, but the King has the scientists of Digby to work on the problem! Although not too optimistic about this exploration, the King expects a breakthrough to be made over the course of the next few months that may reveal hunting grounds below, or beyond the Lagoon. When and if that time comes, the King may need you hunters to hunt the Silth to aid the efforts of Digby's explorations. If you're the type of hunter that likes to always be prepared (even months in advance), perhaps save a small stash of Wicked Gnarled.... just incase.

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Larry's Quick-Reference Guide to the Silth Mouse Larry is still getting his feet with in the Lagoon -- Check back here in a day or two if you're looking for a point-form guide to what's new. In the meantime, get out there on the discussion boards, talk with your fellow hunters and good luck!

-- Dave Vanderburg

The Dojo Sensei Awakens!

9 March 2010

It is now week two of the MouseHunt Birthday Celebration!

For the remaining weeks in March we'll be releasing new, challenging mice in existing areas. These mice are meant to be the most powerful mice of their respective regions and act as an accomplishment for hunters looking to prove themselves to be the best of the best!

This week the Terrible Twos mouse has brought the party to Furoma where their antics and noise have awoken an ancient mouse of great power. The party is really heating up -- Keep an eye open for an increased population of Terrible Twos, Present, Birthday and Rockstar mice in both Gnawnia and Furoma.

The Dojo Sensei can be found roaming the Pinnacle Chamber. Be warned -- Hunting the Dojo Sensei is not for the faint of heart! Their swift attacks can come with a penalty of crippled courage, setting back a hunter's points, but their capture is the most lucrative of the Furoma region. The Dojo Sensei mice drop a variety of loot including a set of blueprints for a new physical weapon made of platinum and onyx which is more powerful than the Digby Drillbot!

Attracting a powerful adversary such as the Dojo Sensei is a major part of the challenge of capturing one. Their preference in bait is a strange form of Onyx Marbled Gorgonzola (O.M.G.) made by fusing together Curds and Whey with Onyx Stones using Ionized Salt.

It seems the mysteries of Furoma Onyx are slowly being revealed... who knows what other uses it may have!

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Meanwhile, deep in the labs of Digby...

Upon finishing the design of the Nannybot, the good people at Digby decided she could use a new chassis, one with a little more style and "bling". Unfortunately, the three vital components needed to upgrade the Nannybot were scattered all over the Kingdom by mischievous Terrible Twos mice. This week the first piece of the upgrade appears to have surfaced -- a "Timeout Upgrade" clock. Somehow this upgrade piece has gotten into the hands of the Dojo Sensei!

If you should happen to catch a Dojo Sensei this month then you may be lucky enough to loot a Timeout Upgrade. Digby has also sent their finest hunters to Furoma to collect a stock of parts which they plan to sell at the Harbour General store later this month (when they have collected enough to stock the shelves). These parts don't come cheap, so if you're up for a challenge and want to save a few gold coins, try testing your hunting vigor and catch a Dojo Sensei to obtain a Timeout Upgrade for free!

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Valentines from a Glitchpaw

The Nannybot seemed to attract a few Glitchpaw mice to the party causing a few hunters to be given a "Valentine from the Devs" upon constructing their Nannybots. Unfortunately, these valentines were printed on a strange, extremely bio-degradable paper and have now crumbled to dust. If you had a valentine courtesy of a Glitchpaw, it has been removed from your inventory. Don't worry though, we devs still love you! <3

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This week's release in a nutshell: - The party is heating up -- more Terrible Twos, Present, Birthday and Rockstar mice are out in Gnawnia and Furoma - The powerful Dojo Sensei mouse released in Furoma carrying a variety of loot including a new set of blueprints - A new cheese made from Onyx, Ionized Salt and Curds and Whey - The arrival of the Dojo Sensei seems to have activated the random power of Furoma Onyx... a curious hunter may just find another use for the precious stone - Digby reveals their upgrade for the Nannybot which requires three parts. The first part, a "Timeout Upgrade", is currently available as loot from the Dojo Sensei until the end of this month. This item will also be for sale at the Harbour General store (for a decent amount of coin) later in the month

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SUPER|brie+ Giveaway Competition!

The Dojo Sensei is the first of three new, very powerful mice that will be released this month. These mice pose a serious threat to the Kingdom and has the King worried! To encourage his brave hunters, the King is giving away SUPER|brie+ to whomever catches the most of these mice!

The King will be giving away SUPER|brie+ in the following amounts: 1st Place: $50 of SUPER|brie+ (3,500 pieces) 2nd Place: $25 of SUPER|brie+ (1,600 pieces) 3rd Place: $10 of SUPER|brie+ (500 pieces)

These amounts will be given out not just to hunters who catch the most Dojo Sensei mice, but also to hunters who catch the most of two more new mice that will be released later this month. That's nine winners in total!

The giveaway will end on the last day of March. We'll give more details regarding an exact time as the deadline approaches.

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That's it for this week, MouseHunters! Have fun putting those extra Onyx stones to use and good luck against the Dojo Sensei!

-- Dave Vanderburg

The King's shipment of gifts have arrived but...

7 March 2010

The Terrible Twos mice have stolen them all!

Currently these Terrible twos mice are wreaking havoc all over Gnawnia and now they have been seen spreading the Kings gifts all throughout the kingdom!

Help catch the mice holding out on the goods and put them back into Hunters hands everywhere!

Added Bulletin:

- Rockstar mice have now been spotted in Digby, the training grounds and around Cape Clawed!

- A new special plush has been introduced into the game to commemorate MouseHunts second birthday!

Hurry up and grab these new, remarkable, MUST HAVE items while supplies last!

Happy hunting!

-- Franco D'Auria

Happy Birthday MouseHunt!

7 March 2010

Can you believe we released MouseHunt 2 years ago.

It has been such a journey for us here at HitGrab. We opened the game to all of facebook 2 years ago with what people thought was a silly idea. The first year was such an incredible journey, our team slept very little as we dealt with all the challenges that came with keeping the servers running and adding content.

2 years later we have almost 500 000 people joining us every month with around 175 000 coming back each day. We are blessed to be doing this still and I am blown away by how fast time flies when you are having fun. We here at HitGrab have been lucky in that you, our audience has actively engaged with us and helped us build this game.

We are extremely grateful for your support and will do our best to build the best game and community on facebook. Thanks for playing and being part of our journey.

Happy Birthday MouseHunt!

-- Bryan Freeman

Feedback Friday Recap

5 March 2010

Happy Birthday, MouseHunters!

It was a blast hanging out with hunters in a party-like atmosphere this week during Feedback Friday! We shared some digital cake, did some dancing and answered questions! Many hunters requested a quick summary like the one we posted last week. I'll break down the details below.

What's coming this month:

Gifts! The King is expecting a shipment of gifts and cake to arrive soon for the birthday party! The Terrible Twos mice are sure to have a love for presents and cake... I have a feeling the King may require his hunters to keep Terrible Twos mice under control.

There have been a few rare reports of Terrible Twos mice lurking around the Training Grounds. Larry has knowledge of a very old mouse, rumored to be more powerful than the Master of the Dojo, and is scared that the antics of the Terrible Twos mouse may awaken it. If you're in the Furoma region, have your traps ready!

If the Terrible Twos mouse continues to travel, who knows what powerful, sleeping mice he may awaken... Hope you're up for a challenge, hunters! These new mice will be permanent additions to the game, so if you're not quite ready to take them on they'll still be around when you are!

Player frustrations about releases:

Feedback Friday opened with Bryan addressing some points of frustration regarding the lack of new releases to expand the plot of the game. As the game has continued to grow for two years, adding new mouse areas and other content, and as more and more players joined, the hunt has become more cumbersome. It was clear that some major architecture changes needed to happen to accommodate the game’s growth. For the past six months, we have been focused on "Longtail" - a major rewrite of the entire game, from scratch. As you can imagine, rebuilding something that has been developed for two years, from scratch, is a very large project.

During the development of Longtail, adding content and features to the existing game became a challenge -- new content and features now needed to be added to two versions of the game, doubling the work. This is how much of the content and story being prepared came to be dependent on the release of Longtail.

We're excited to release Longtail and get back to expanding the story line of MouseHunt and adding new areas, mice, traps, etc. Once Longtail is out, we are planning to have a regularly scheduled day for content updates. The number of veteran players in the game has grown in the past six months, and we absolutely plan on releasing more areas for Knights, Barons, Counts, etc.

Longtail:

Longtail is getting closer and closer to being complete and we're getting very excited! Many of our plans for new mice, areas, traps, etc. are dependent on the release of Longtail. We asked hunters what sort of info they would like to see in progress updates. The consensus seemed to be mechanics information but no plot information.

We realise that we have not discussed too many details about the progress of Longtail, which has no doubt bred frustrations from players wondering what's happening behind the scenes and why there was a sudden slow down in the frequency of updates. We knew Longtail would be in development for months and wanted to avoid building too much hype too early on and stretch the patience of hunters. Now that we are close to a Longtail release we are more comfortable sharing progress updates and will strive to keep everyone in the loop as we work on Longtail.

We'll be keeping everyone in the loop about how Longtail is progressing, to hopefully ease frustrations about the lack of new areas recently. We have several new areas and mice (over 50 mice are ready to go!) that we're excited to put out after the release of Longtail.

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We ended the feedback session with some rapid-fire question-and-answer covering a variety of topics.

You can watch the recorded version of Feedback Friday here: ustream.tv/recorded/5204827

-- Dave Vanderburg

MouseHunt Celebrates its Second Birthday!

2 March 2010

Greetings, MouseHunters!

It's that time of year again, when spring is just around the corner, and MouseHunt celebrates another birthday! That's right: the magical world of Gnawnia is celebrating its second birthday, and to celebrate, there will be special content releases, one each week for the next four weeks. The first release will be a birthday event that lasts for a limited time, and the other three releases will stay on as permanent additions to the game.

This week, the Terrible Twos Mouse is wreaking havoc, trashing the town of Gnawnia and creating mayhem wherever it goes. Upon discovering this threat, the King immediately sent word to Digby, telling them to send a fleet of Nannybots, the only weapon known to be able to subdue a rampaging Terrible Twos Mouse. Unfortunately, a group of mice ambushed the Nannybot shipment on their way to Gnawnia! Rumor has it that Nannybot parts have been seen on various mice in the back alleys of the city.

Once you have collected all three parts of the Nannybot you may assemble them here: apps.facebook.com/mousehunt/nannybot.php

The King's guards managed to push the Terrible Twos Mice out onto the Meadow, but the King needs all the help he can get from skilled hunters to keep the little terrors at bay. The Terrible Twos Mouse is in the Meadow for now, but the guards think that if it can't go back into the city, it may well decide to do some traveling. This could mean serious trouble for the rest of the Kingdom!

Well, that's all the news for now. Until next time, Happy Hunting!

-- Dave Vanderburg

MouseHunt's Birthday Celebration Starts Soon!

1 March 2010

Hey, MouseHunters!

It has almost been two years since the battle against mice began and we're getting ready to celebrate the occasion!

MouseHunt turns two years old on March 7th. As the date approaches, there have been a few rumours floating around Gnawnia about a mischievous Terrible Twos mouse that is on the loose, causing trouble across the kingdom! Although the king's guards have not yet seen these little terrors, we'll be sure to inform you the minute they are spotted so that you can help capture them and restore the peace.

Though the festivities have not officially started, a few of the mice are already in the mood to celebrate. See if you can spot a which mice are dressed up and ready to party.

The celebration will officially start when the Terrible Twos mice arrive sometime Tuesday, March 2nd (EST). The official time is unknown, but we'll be sure to announce their arrival via the news section.

Get ready to party MouseHunt! We're turning two years old soon! YEAH!

-- Dave Vanderburg