Thank you to our readers

Since LucyLou and I started Ultimate Howrse in September 2009, it has gone from strength to strength. And we are delighted. We are especially pleased with all the comments and feedback we get. Not only that, it's great to see you all helping each other too.

We have always aimed to be the number one place for players to go when they want help, advice or news on Howrse. And with your help, we really are getting there. You, our readers, are part of a huge worldwide community of players who visit Ultimate Howrse in growing numbers.

And speaking of numbers, since we began we have had over 56,000 visits with more than 113,000 page views. And we now average over 300 visits every single day. And this is brilliant because the more people who visit, the more comments are left for you to read and enjoy. We try to answer every question you ask, but often other players provide their own answers too, which really helps us out. You are certainly a very helpful and supportive lot!

So we wanted to say a big 'thank you' to all our lovely readers who continue to use Ultimate Howrse as their first choice for Howrse help. And don't forget, you can post a comment or question on any of our articles or you can email us at: ultimatehowrse@me.com. You can also follow us by clicking on the 'Follow' button on the right hand side of the page. That way you can become part of the Ultimate Howrse family.

So let your friends know about Ultimate Howrse and then they too can join the biggest and friendliest Howrse community on the internet!

Happy Howrse-ing,

Patsy

Ruby - the new lottery Divine

Meet Ruby, the new Divine Horse who you can win in the latest Howrse Lottery.

Like most Divines, Ruby is male and cannot be bred or sold. You get him aged 83 years and 6 months. He has 1200 skills, is immortal and has a Water of Youth already on him.

Every time Ruby has a birthday he earns his owner 5 diamonds. Now diamonds can be traded to give Ruby more skills or to buy items in the Black Market. 1 pass is equivalent to 10 diamonds. Every other day that isn't his birthday Ruby gains a little in height. He starts at 22 hands so he's going to be a very tall horse!

Only 1 Ruby is won in each lottery draw so cross your fingers and good luck. (I do hope I'm lucky enough to win one as I think he's very pretty...!)

Lucy

Howrse Lottery June 2011

Well Howrse has bought back the ever popular lottery, where you can buy tickets and win some great prizes.

Until 27th June you can take part in the draws and win anything from apples to the new Divine Horse, Ruby. Every ticket you buy will win you something so its worth taking part.

Draws take place every day at 0:00 - 2:00 - 12:00 - 14:00 - 16:00 - 18:00 - 20:00 - 22:00 Game Time. For each one you can buy 2 tickets yourself at a price of 200 equus each. You can also send your friends tickets (although you can only send them one throughout the whole of the lottery) and they can send you tickets back. For each pass you spend you will receive 2 tickets for the next draw (although this doesn't include horse purchases. So basically you need to spend them in the Black Market). In addition, you also get one ticket per draw for winning a competition with any of your horses. This is a new way to get tickets which I think is great as it gives everyone more chances to win.

You can enter the lottery by going to your homepage (the page you get when you first log in) and clicking on the lottery banner.

Lucy

The Black Pearl

There have been a few changes to the Black Pearl and Golden Apple coats over the past week, including the introduction of some brand new items that you can submit illustrations for. Here's an overview of how the Black Pearl now works.

The Black Pearl now lets you submit illustrations for Golden Apple coats (as before), Helios's Ray (backgrounds for your horses' pages) and the Horn of Gold (coats for the companions).

The Black Pearl costs 2 passes and you need 5 karma points to be able to use it.

Creation of illustrations

To create a new illustration, you can use any computer graphics editing software such as Paint, Photoshop or Gimp. You're not allowed to just submit a photograph - it must be an illustration or drawing and it must be your own work - don't copy it from anywhere or you risk having your account suspended. Make your illustrations as life-like or imaginary as possible.

If you're not sure where to start, many Howrse players provide outlines of horses (line art) that they've given their permission for other people to use and submit as coats. Check out the Black Pearl - free line art forum post if you'd like to use one. So you could start with of these and just colour it in any way you like!

To send your illustrations, you must use the templates provided by Howrse:

• for the Golden Apple
• for Helios's Ray
  • A black frame marks the position of the horse to help you position your landscape properly
  • The frame and the horse it contains must be erased before you send your illustration
• for the Horn of Gold
  • The top frame is for the awake Companion
  • The bottom frame is for the sleeping Companion

Your image must be placed on the transparent space on the provided template. You must not change the size or format of this template.

Make sure you follow Howrse's instructions or your artwork may not be accepted. You must save your work as a .PNG file.

Publishing your illustration

Now, when you send in your illustration via the Black Pearl, it won't be published right away.

Firstly, Howrse will check it to see if it meets all the criteria for submission and then it will be sent to the Creation Space for other players to vote on it.

If your illustration wins the vote then it will be published on all versions of Howrse at the end of the month (including the different language versions). You will also earn passes as your illustration is used by players - see our post on the Creation Space to learn how much you can get.

If your illustration doesn't win the vote then it will appear again in the Creation Space the following month to allow players to vote for it again. If after 3 months, it still doesn't pass the vote, it will be removed.

If your illustration doesn't get voted on to the game then you will get back the passes you spent on the Black Pearl. However, if your coat isn't accepted because it doesn't fit Howrse's criteria - which can be found on the Black Pearl page you won't get your passes back - so be careful!

Good luck with your illustration submissions and let us know how you get on.

Lucy

The Creation Space

This week, Howrse have just introduced another new feature - The Creation Space.

The Creation Space is now the place where you submit illustrations for Golden Apple coats via the Black Pearl.

Howrse have also introduced two new items that you can submit illustrations for: the companions (bought with a Horn of Gold) or backgrounds for your horses' pages (bought with a Helios's Ray).

The Creation Space is for all languages (English, German, French etc...). That means if you propose an illustration and it wins the vote, it will be available in all languages and vice versa.

Yes, there is now a vote involved. When you submit an illustration to the Creation Space other players will be able to vote for their favourites. Your coat / background will only be accepted by Howrse if enough players vote for it!

The selection process takes place every month, and follows a specific procedure. This month:

• Proposing illustrations
  16 may 01:00 » 23 may 00:59
  Everyone can propose illustrations using the Black Pearl
  
  
• Validation
  The Howrse team removes any illustrations that don't comply with the rules
  
  
• Voting
  25 may 01:00 » 30 may 00:59
  Players of all languages vote on the illustrations once they have been validated
  
  
• Selection
  The most popular illustrations are selected and sorted by category
  
  
• Publishing
  31 may 11:00
  The selected illustrations are published online in each of the site's languages

Proposing illustrations gets the creator rewards. The day an illustration is published, each illustration earns its author:

• 10,000 equus
  
• Different numbers of passes for different types of illustration:
  • 50 passes For a Coat for the Golden Apple with no limitation on the number of uses or 25 passes for a coat with a limited number of uses
  • 25 passes for a Helios's Ray landscape
  • 15 passes for a Horn of Gold companion

Golden Apple coats have also been changed slightly. Old style coats can now be retired by their owners after 100 uses. Any Golden Apple coats created using the Creation Space will either be published as unlimited coats or as limited use coats (with a fixed number). However, Howrse will now make the decision on how many uses these coats have. The author no longer has any control.

So, get yourselves along to the Creation Space and start submitting your illustrations, voting and enjoying the new graphics that come along. Let us know what you think.

Lucy

Flash Sales May 2011

Today Howrse have announced the return of the ever popular flash sales. From today, Tuesday 17 until Monday 30 May at 12.00 game time you can use your equus to bid on gifts in the flash sales.

Among the gifts to be won are new companions not yet available on the game - the Squirrel, Turtle and Frog. Howrse introduced companions to the game last week and these three are currently only available via the flash sales, so they are bound to be popular items.

You can also bid on Nyx Packs, Poseidon's Packs, Fertility Wands, Passes, Pieces of Cloud, Ploutos' Parchments, Horns of Plenty, Made-to-measure tack and aging points.

There are two types of flash sale - the direct sales in which every item has a fixed price (but you have to be quick to get them) and the auctions in which you can bid any amount for the item you want. Remember though that you can only buy one item in each type of sale every 3 days - so make sure you pick your items carefully.

Right, time to save up your equus and get bidding on some great gifts!

Lucy

Howrse Companions

UPDATE: Howrse removed companions from the game in July 2012. They are now very rare and can fetch a lot of money in the sales. If you're looking to complete your trophy collections or want to know the value of the companions you already have, use the links below to find horses with companions for sale.

Very common

Goat companion

Currently the most common companion and cheapest to find in the sales

See all goat companion horses for sale

Rabbit companion

See all rabbit companion horses for sale

Zebra companion

See all zebra companion horses for sale

Swallow companion

See all swallow companion horses for sale

Monkey companion


See all monkey companion horses for sale

Squirrel companion


See all squirrel companion horses for sale








Common

Hen companion


See all hen companion horses for sale

Cat companion


See all cat companion horses for sale

Dog companion


See all dog companion horses for sale








Uncommon

Phoenix companion



See all phoenix companion horses for sale

Sheep companion



See all sheep companion horses for sale

Turtle companion



See all turtle companion horses for sale

Butterfly companion



See all butterfly companion horses for sale

Griffin companion



See all griffin companion horses for sale








Rare

Giraffe companion



See all giraffe companion horses for sale

Bear

See all bear companion horses for sale

Frog companion


See all frog companion horses for sale

Owl companion


See all owl companion horses for sale

Kangaroo companion


See all kangaroo companion horses for sale

Penguin companion


See all penguin companion horses for sale








Very rare

Ghost companion


There are 3 different types of ghost to collect - all pretty rare these days.

See all ghost companion horses for sale

Dragon companion


There are 4 types of dragon to collect.

See all dragon companion horses for sale

Camel companion


See all camel companion horses for sale










Extremely rare

Bee companion


Bee companions are extremely rare and hardly ever seen in the sales

See all bee companion horses for sale

Ladybug companion



Ladybug companions are also extremely rare and hardly ever seen in the sales

See all ladybug companion horses for sale











Original post below:

Howrse have just introduced companions to the game. Here's a quick guide to what they say about the companions and how they will affect the game:

Once your horse is 8 months old you can now assign him a companion. Once a companion has been assigned to your horse it can't be removed, so make sure you choose wisely. (Scroll down for a guide to what each companion offers your horse).

The companions act as a bonus for your horse giving skill gains and a dressage bonus.

MOST IMPORTANTLY: You now cannot play games with your foal unless your horse has a companion!

Each day when your horse wakes up, its companion is asleep. You can choose to wake up the companion by playing with it or leave it asleep. If you play with a companion the time you choose to play is taken out of your horse's day - just like lessons, rides, training etc.

If you buy a horse with a companion already in place you have 7 days to decide whether to keep the companion or change it to a different one. If you replace the current companion you do not get any compensation and the companion runs away.

When you play with your companion the following things happen:

From 8 months to 1 year 6 months
Your horse receives a gain in Genetic Potential for each hour of play, equaling a maximum gain of 1.2 (as previously). So, your old foal games will still work but you MUST now give your horse a companion to be able to see the foal games button.

From 1 year 8 months to 25 years
Your horse wins equus and/or skills depending on which companion it has. The maximum skills gained over your horse's lifetime is 60. These are spread evenly between all his skills (so 10 extra points per skill).

From 1 year 8 months
If you play with your horse's companion for at least 30 minutes it will give your horse a bonus in dressage for that day.

When you age your horse it's companion falls asleep again ready for the next day.

There are currently 7 companions available (Howrse say that there are more on the way)

Goat
Cost: 300e
Dressage bonus: +2
From 8 months to 1 year 6 months:
A gain in Genetic Potential for each hour of play
From 1 year 8 months to 25 years:4 equus for each hour of play







Monkey
Cost: 500e
Dressage bonus: +6
From 8 months to 1 year 6 months:A gain in Genetic Potential for each hour of play
From 1 year 8 months to 25 years:
4 equus for each hour of play



Rabbit
Cost: 1000e
Dressage bonus: +3
From 8 months to 1 year 6 months:A gain in Genetic Potential for each hour of play
From 1 year 8 months to 25 years
6 equus for each hour of play



Swallow
Cost: Variable
Dressage bonus: +5
From 8 months to 1 year 6 months:A gain in Genetic Potential for each hour of play
From 1 year 8 months to 25 years:0.06 skill gain for each hour of play





Cat
Cost: Variable
Dressage bonus: +9
From 8 months to 1 year 6 months:A gain in Genetic Potential for each hour of play
From 1 year 8 months to 25 years:0.09 skill gain for each hour of play





Phoenix
Cost: 1 pass
Dressage bonus: +12
From 8 months to 1 year 6 months:A gain in Genetic Potential for each hour of play
From 1 year 8 months to 25 years:0.12 skills gain and 25 equus for each hour of play





Griffin
Cost: 2 passes
Dressage bonus: +14
From 8 months to 1 year 6 months:A gain in Genetic Potential for each hour of play
From 1 year 8 months to 25 years:0.15 skill gain and 30 equus for each hour of play



Let us know if you've got any questions or opinions about the introduction of the Howrse companions.

Lucy