Changelog/2024/December 2

Thank you to everyone who gave suggestions/feedback regarding bingo. After reading all of the replies we've had an internal discussion to come up with a plan for where to go with bingo. Our current plan is as follows:

• Players will be given the option to select a bingo card with a list of pre-selected games, along with a difficulty of their choosing.
  • We'll likely have 3 "game categories" for players to choose from. These will contain different games, so players can pick the group they are most interested in playing.
  • Players can also choose which difficulty card they wish to complete, easy or hard. Players will still be able to complete both difficulties if they want to.
    • We have chosen to reduce the number of card options for difficulties to simplify the objectives as mentioned further down, as well as reduce the number of options with there also been 3 groups of objectives to pick from.
  • All players will be given the same card options and objectives, so if you wish to group up with a friend or even compete to complete a card that is still possible.
• Cards will be reduced from a 5x5 to a 4x4 grid, going from 25 objectives per card to 16 objectives.
• We'll be reviewing objectives and removing/simplifying some that are too difficult.
  • We've seen a lot of feedback that some objectives result in newer players having extreme difficulty completing them, while hard objectives should be more difficult, we don't want to make players spend hours trying to complete it and maybe even resort to boosting to be able to complete it.
  • We've also seen a good amount of feedback on making objectives more simple, this is something we'll do to some extent but we believe there is a happy middle ground. Some of the fun of bingo is completing specific objectives that may require you to go out of the norm in some cases, but we understand that these objectives shouldn't be too difficult as previously touched on.
• We'll be adding a new bingo shop along with a form of simple currency (bingo bucks anyone?)
  • Each card completion will reward the currency with more being granted based on the difficulty of the card.
  • This currency can then be used to purchase specific cosmetics that will be exclusive to this bingo shop.
  • We'll also aim to add at least 2 new cosmetics for each new bingo event, so players who have already completed previous events still have something to earn.
  • Completing rows of bingo objectives will still give other rewards as it does currently.
• Bingo will become a once-a-year event, being part of the Hypixel Anniversary that occurs in April every year. With this, the anniversary event will also be extended to last longer than a week, likely closer to the usual 1 month for most seasonal events.
  • This will allow us to free up time for other changes during the other seasonal events, as well as put a bit more focus on bingo and its rewards each year.
• We'll also be improving marketing for bingo and attempting to bring more attention to the event.
  • Many players have rightfully pointed out that bingo has been kinda hidden for the seasonal events, and not something really advertised anywhere. With this being a once-a-year event it'll be better to market it in the usual ways, like an NPC, and the lobby boss bar.
• With all of the above in mind, this means that for the Holidays event in December, there will not be a bingo event running. But as mentioned above this will allow us to put a bit more time into that event and make some other additions/improvements.
  • You'll see the next bingo event in April next year with the changes above hopefully implemented if all goes to plan.
  • We'll also keep players up to date with these plans if anything changes, likely as part of the minigame developer update posts.

For this plan, we have tried to take into account as many players' preferences and opinions as possible, but we have leaned towards what would be better for the casual player who doesn't currently play bingo, as our goal is to increase participation in the event overall but we still hope to create an event for all players to enjoy.