Neopets, the popular online game, is now independently owned once again for the first time since 2005. After being under the management of JumpStart Games for the past decade, the title is now operating under a brand new leadership team, freeing it from corporate shackles.
The new management is excited about the opportunity to breathe fresh life into Neopia, the virtual world of Neopets, by preserving the game’s history while innovating in new ways. During the last decade, Neopets faced challenges such as aging site features, a declining user base, and limited resources under JumpStart Games.
The new homepage for Neopets was launched with the goal of unifying the classic online game with recent developments. Dominic Law, who previously led the Neopets Metaverse NFT project at NetDragon, is now the CEO of Neopets.
The plans for the Neopets Metaverse game have been scrapped, and the resources will be redirected to the development of the upcoming World of Neopets mobile game, which will not feature NFTs and will not be built on a crypto model.
With the collapse of JumpStart Games, The Neopets Team and NetDragon reached an agreement for a buyout deal to become sole owners of the long-running online IP. Previously, Neopets had been bought by Viacom, the parent company of Nickelodeon, in 2005 for $160 million, and it was later sold to SuperJump Games in 2014.
With this new change, Neopets is now free of corporate involvement for the first time in 17 years, and fans are looking forward to seeing how the game will evolve under its new management.
