Welcome to the first edition of Behind the Journey! This will be a series of blogs following each party, where we take you behind the scenes to showcase the creativity, hard work, and passion that goes into bringing parties & events to life on Club Penguin Journey. From concept art to design work, from brainstorming sessions to final touches, our team puts in countless hours to make sure every party is as fun and immersive as possible.
The Puffle Party was no exception! Our team worked together to create a celebration that truly captured the spirit of our fluffy friends. Today, we are excited to share some of that process with you.
Concept Art & Early Designs
Before the Puffle Party could come to life, our designers started by sketching out ideas and experimenting with different themes. We wanted to make sure every room felt unique, playful, and full of puffle vibez!
Here are a few sketches that our designers shared:
One of our designers shared their thought process behind some of these early concepts:
“For the Ski Lodge, I knew right away that I wanted to darken it and add fireflies. I knew it would sell the room, so all the Froggle decorations were thought up after. Originally, I had planned to replace the mullet with a frog, but when it came down to it, I thought that casting the lighting from the candle onto the mullet gave a much cozier atmosphere.”
“The concept for the Ninja Hideout was a little more ambitious than what ended up in-game, but I could not quite get the giant tree to look right. I loved the idea of petals scattered around in a kind of zen garden, and I wish I had let one of the grey puffles sleep! It slipped my mind as I was creating the final room.”
Here is how that room came to life after scrapping the original concept:
Bringing the Party to Life
Once the initial concepts were finalized, our artists and developers worked on refining the details. Every balloon, banner, and decoration was carefully placed to create a festive atmosphere that felt true to the world of puffles.
A key part of this year’s Puffle Party was the new Puffle UI system, which made interacting with puffles smoother and more intuitive. One of our designers shared a peek at how this feature came to life:
“Here are a couple of progress pictures for the new Puffle UI system. This is generally used as a layout for the developers to reference as they actually add in the features.”
Another major addition we were considering adding to the party was the introduction of the Magic O’Berry, which helps level up your puffles instantly. The concept was inspired by past iterations of O’Berries, with plenty of creative discussions around its final design.
“We knew that we wanted to add a new mechanic for leveling up puffles, and to aid in that we wanted to add a ‘Magic O’Berry’ that could instantly raise your Puffle’s Affection by one level. Taking cues from the O’Berry variants featured in the Puffle Wild mobile game, it went through some revisions before the version you see in-game today. We also ended up having plenty of variant names for it internally. Magic O’Berries, Star O’Berries, and Rainbow O’Berries (or, RainbO’Berries, if you prefer).”
Custom Animations & Technical Challenges
Some of the most exciting work for this year’s Puffle Party happened behind the scenes in animation. A major undertaking was the creation of brand-new Puffle Dig animations, which had to be made entirely from scratch.
Our AS2 Puffles did not have dedicated digging animations! This meant that when bringing puffle digging to the game, our team had to custom animate every single action to ensure that Puffles looked natural when searching for treasures.
“Here are all the Puffle Dig animations! These were custom made since AS2 did not have any built-in dig animations. We had to make sure each animation flowed naturally and looked just right for every Puffle.”
These animations help add personality to each Puffle and make treasure hunting feel even more rewarding!
Challenges & Triumphs
Of course, no party comes together without a few obstacles along the way! Whether it was adjusting color palettes, tweaking animations, or making sure every room transition felt smooth, our team worked tirelessly to perfect every detail.
One designer, who is newer to the team, took on a ambitious task for this party:
“As a somewhat new designer, the Puffle Party was the first party where I created a background! And I managed to choose one that required me to fit FIVE penguins in it! That ended up being a bit of a learning curve. At one point, while I was editing the finer details, Petey K just… disappeared on me. He almost got left out! Sorry, accordion fans! I am pretty happy with the end result, and I hope Cadence and Penguin Band fans enjoy it as well!”
Final Touches & Launch Day
After weeks of hard work, testing, and fine-tuning, the Puffle Party was finally ready to go live! Seeing the community enjoy the event, adopt puffles, and explore the decorated island made all the effort worth it.
We also wanted to include a few extra designs from the Puffle Party:
We hope you enjoyed this first edition of Behind the Journey! Our team loves bringing these parties to life, and we are excited to continue sharing more of our creative process with you.
Keep an eye out for the next Behind the Journey blog at the end of our April Fools Party!
Until next time…Waddle On!
– The Club Penguin Journey Team
