Welcome to this little blog about Club Penguin history. I didn’t really have a place to ‘put’ various thoughts and posts about CP history, so this made sense as a place to do it.
Recently, I asked a bunch of former Club Penguin players to share their memories about the original CP world and experience through a survey.
When I say “original,” I mean the Flash-based virtual world of Club Penguin that ran from 2005-2017. I thought it would be interesting to hear what the community had to say about stuff like items, parties, rooms, and puffles.
Before I share the CP community’s votes, let’s take a look at some stats. All of these numbers are publicly-documented on fan wikis like the CP Wikia site on Fandom, of course. I just hadn’t seen anyone writing anything about this before, so thought it was worth sharing.
Parties
Believe it or not, there were 202 parties in Club Penguin’s history between 2005-2017.
Of course, this includes stuff like the Cove Opening in 2007, the green puffle mini-event during the CPIP, and the original party – the Beta Test Party. Parties were never part of the original plan – they were just a way for the team to stress-test the servers to make sure they could stay afloat!
There were 13 Christmas-themed parties (including the Holiday Parties), 12 Halloween parties, and 11 music parties. I was surprised to realize that so many of the parties ended up music-themed!
After that, there were 11 “pet”-themed parties (including Puffle Parties and the Zootopia takeover), 11 humor-themed parties, 11 birthday parties, 10 fireworks events, 8 pirate-themed events, and 9 fairs.
There was only 1 “romantic” themed event – the Valentine’s Day party of 2006, which was probably not the best idea in hindsight…
Best Parties
Here are the community’s votes for Best Party of all time:
#5 – Holiday Party 2012
#4 – 10th Anniversary Party
#3 – Marvel Superhero Takeover 2012
#2 – Halloween Party 2012
#1 – Operation: Blackout
It’s so great to see that the players agreed with us.
I’ve talked to so many different former CP Team members who all loved that party. You could just tell how excited everyone was to work on that one because everyone on the team brought their best into it – everything from art to music and games to videos. It’s one of my favorite sneak peek videos of all-time, too – I loved working on all of that with the team.
I also asked what people’s least-favorite parties were… Interestingly enough, the Marvel Superhero Takeover 2012 was also some people’s least-favorite party, amassing 12 “worst party ever votes,” even though it’s also on the “best party” list!
Least Favorite Parties
#5 – Zootopia Party
#4 – Frozen Party 2013
#3 – Descendants Party
#2 – Frozen Fever Party 2015
#1 – Frozen Fever Party 2016
This just goes to show that we’re talking to older players here, since the Frozen events were very popular, record-breaking parties in the CP world. Go figure!
Items
Clothing items were initially referred to as “paper” items, referring to the “paper doll”-like nature of the player card. There were 5,122 total items in Club Penguin between 2005-2017, not including the 118 additional test and mascot items (like Sensei’s unique gray penguin color.)
Of this, there were 1,614 body items (like shirts), 1,252 head items (like hats), but only 324 neck items (like scarves.)
Best Items
Out of all of those 5,122 items, here are the ones the community picked as their favorites:
#5 – 3D Glasses
#4 – Red Propeller Cap
#3 – Alumni Jacket
#2 – Blue Lei
#1 – Party Hat (the infamous “beta hat”)
Not a great surprise there. What I was surprised about is how the Herbert Disguise/Costume was #8, and the Boombox was #10. Nice picks!
Least Favorite Items
These were voted as people’s least-favorite items:
#5 – Green Lightbulb
#4 – 11th Anniversary Hat
#3 – Muppets World Tour Background
#2 – Klutzy Disguise from Operation: Blackout
#1 – Herbert Disguise
Interesting! Looks like not everyone agrees about the Herbert Costume…
What do you think of this post? Would you like to see the next post about furniture, rooms, and puffles? Let me know what you think in the comments below.
Until next time… Waddle on.