Site News

As some of you may know, we took a soft break month for January 2024! We hope you enjoyed the Orin Holidays that Shmoo so graciously hosted! 

End of year survey

We have a survey open for the next 2 weeks (until februrary 15th) going over all things Orin in 2023 and we would love to hear your feedback! Users who submit a response shall receive 25DS as thanks for filling it out. :)

Click here for the Survey!

Monthly prompt

There is a new Monthly Prompt!
Draw or Write about your Orin with flowers, while utilizing flower language!

Guest Artist applications

It is time to open up Guest Artist slots once again for another 2 month term, spanning from Februrary 11th to April 11th. Further information and details may be found within the form itself, but do reach out if you have any questions at all! Whether you are a returning applicant or a newcomer, we welcome you to reapply! 

The form will be only be open until the 7th, so apply while you can!

APPLY HERE!

gallery revamp!

Some of you may be aware that we have not been on top of the sub-folders for our Gallery, which has been locking users out of using it to submit their prompts. We have fixed this issue by changing the Gallery formatting entirely! Users may now submit directly to the big galleries without worrying about the accessibility or clutter of Sub-Galleries.

In addition to making this change, we have added a Gallery for General Orin Art, where you may share any Orin-related art that it is not related to an Event or Prompt.

We have also utilized the Gallery feature to create an Archive of artwork and dialogue from previous Orin events, so that you may peruse them even well after they have ended. This can be found at the bottom of the Gallery List.

Open Adopts

Our Open Adopts folder on Toyhouse still has many lovely Orin designs to peruse! 

Bits and bobs

1. Strabi has designed us some currency icons! Don't they just look so snazzy?  

2. Fixed all image sizing across the site, including masterlist and currency sizing!

Hello, Orination! Thank you for putting up with our sporadic newsletters, we promise to make it up to you by this one being super cool! 

Lore Update

Our Lore Page is now fully up-to-date! As well as touting some updated visuals and more in-depth explanations of Orin physiology, Hollow & Corrupt Lore is now available for reading!

Monthly Prompt

There is still plenty of time to check out this month's prompt, Draw/Write about your Orin interacting with a bug!

As well as the prompt, there are also some new bug-themed pets! You may be able to try your luck at Cozy Critters for some, but others are best “caught” by doing the monthly prompt!

Guest Artist Applications

Have you ever wanted to design Orin adoptables? This is the application for you! If we accept your application, you will be granted a Temporary, 2 month long Guest Artist position, wherein you may make and adopt out your own Orin designs! Please keep in mind you must be 16+ to apply, and 18+ to accept real-world currency. :) 

TO READ MORE OR FILL OUT THE APPLICATION, CLICK HERE!

We will be accepting applications until Saturday the 23rd at 12PM EST. (That's about one week from now!) 

Bits and bobs

You made it through the exciting parts, congratulations! Here is everything else that has been going on rapid fire style...

1. We still have some open adopts available here!

2. Our volunteer coder, Iza, now has a tip box! While it's not necessary at all, any support for her is greatly appreciated as we couldn't do it without her. Thanks Iza!

3. One of our mods is getting married this weekend! Why am I telling you this? Because we're bound to host a little raffle to celebrate in our Discord Server!

4. We are hard at work behind the scenes to bring you more fun stuff and bug fixes!

5. A shiver runs through your back... Certainly it must just be the wind, right?

Happy Easter! Did you know that the Orin discord has reached almost 200 members? The website is super close to 150, too! That's so crazy! :D There's some super fun stuff to talk about this month...

Orins! ..centaurs? Centorins?!

Oh my gosh, we are SO excited to announce this one! As of now, Centorins are a valid canon form!! This means you can use them for prompts and official art, so long as they abide by the guidelines. :3 To celebrate, we've also got a super fun flash prompt for you! 

Egg hunt

There are eggs scattered all around the realm, if you find one, shoot us a monthly prompt submission! :D if you've already been participating in the egg hunt, you'll be pleased to know that new eggs have been hidden... for those in need of even more enrichment, we have a first-come-first-serve egg hunt on our discord server as well!

SPECIAL MYO TURN-IN EVENT

For the entire month of April, you can join our Special MYO event to get a free time-limited Uncommon MYO! Further instructions on how to get in on the action can by found on the Toyhouse Bulletin!

Shops!

There is currently an Event Shop open for our Easter Egg Hunt! Additionally, there are some new pets for adoption in Cal's Cozy Critters. :D

technical stuff

1. The Mod Directory is CURRENTLY* being updated!

2. Added trait clarification to specify that particularly long feathers applied with Avian (COSM) will also need to use Angora (COSM) if they appear longer than the average Angora length.

3. Removed Tupperbot from discord server due to safety concerns.

Sorry for the delay for this month's news, we got super duper busy towards the end of this month! With that out of the way, we're proud about the progress we've got done this month. >:)

Cozy Critters

So this actually happened last month, but it happened RIGHT after our last newsletter went up.. whoops! The Orin Realm now has a pet shop, and a new NPC to boot! The stock will change out from time to time, so be sure to check back often! We'll also announce shop updates in our discord.

the Gifting corner

The realm is long overdue for a permanent on-site activity (not that we don't love you, Draw-The-Orin-Above!) and with the gifting corner, you can earn dreamshards twice per month just by drawing someone else gift art! 

technical stuff

Behind the scenes, we've been pretty responsible for once! 

Fun info

1. There's 5 days left for this month's prompt, draw or write about your Orin's favorite dreamscape!

2. We've got some adopts that are still open!

3. A brand new special item, the Iridophos Potion released this month! This item allows for a canon color alt. :D

4. We can't share details yet, but we've been having some discussions pertaining species lore lately, and we're super excited to get that ready for release!

Technical info

5. We have updated the rules on our discord!

6. We have updated our Toyhou.se World!

7. We have consolidated Draw-The-Orin-Above to 1 channel!

8. Mods and Permanent Artists can now collect a little monthly reward, as thanks for the work they've done. :)  The RNG is subject to change and adjustments, but will remain publicly viewable for anyone to see!

This month is so fleetingly short! We've got some more behind the scenes work done, as well as some other fun stuff to share!

Last month's prompt

As you may recall, last month users could design a new Sprite Pet for the Orin Realm, and 3 winners would be randomly picked! We've since completed these pets, and we've provided some visuals on what these fun friends look like below! Be sure to check out their page links to read about them, and give a big thanks to the winners for these amazing designs!

Sacklet by plumfumble

Crechair by maxdragonxx

Serafin by Heidmaan

Word on the street is, one of our mods also got excited about a different pet entry, and has since asked permission to make it official too... I suppose we'll have to wait and see what this means! 

Valentine's adopt

We still have a sweet Valentine-themed adopt made by our wonderful mod RealEmnyah! You can find out how to adopt this cutie by going over here. We also have some older adopts still up for grabs in this folder!

Staff changes

Last month we mentioned that we were doing some infrastructure changes, and this month we're ready to announce it!
Most importantly, our dear species Owner Raijin will be stepping back into a "Founder" role.  On the outside not much is changing, but rather than Raijin needing to oversee the moderation group, the staff is now running the species and coming to agreements as a collective. Raijin will still have authority over the direction of traits and lore, but we'll be able to get new content out for everyone swifter this way, and take some of the pressure off them. :)

Additionally, Nat is switching from a Moderator to an Artist! 
Do be sure to wish them luck on their artsy endeavors. :D

We still need to update these changes publicly on the Mod Directory (please bear with us until that's finished,) but rest assured we've already made all the internal preparations, and things have been smooth sailing.

Bits and bobs

We have some assorted small announcements that weren't quite large enough for their own category, so we're putting them here because we still want you guys to know what's going on! 

Fun info

1. There's still about a week left for this month's prompt! The prompt is sweet and simple, "Draw or Write what 'Love' looks like for your Orin!"

2. Updated NPC descriptions. Both on Toyhouse, and on the site, our NPCs now have descriptions with some spoiler-free tidbits to give you a better idea of their personalities and dynamics. :)

3. The donation box is almost full... Only needing 100 more dreamshards now, who knows what will happen when this donation box fills! 

Technical info

4. Trade feature does not work with "pets." What we mean is, you can't currently use the site's trade feature to trade pets. Until we find a workaround, you can transfer pets directly with someone you trust, or contact a staff member to have us safely and manually handle the trade for you.

5. Added way to remove Draw-The-Orin-Above strikes. For those of you in our Discord server, you may recall that failing to complete a DTOA claim or back out on time results in a strike, and with 3 strikes you would be banned from playing DTOA. Now, you may have 1 strike lifted for every 3 completed claims!

6. Users can now switch between Orin subtypes when submitting a MYO for approval. We noticed that users were stuck submitting "Illusionists" despite "Technicians" being free, so our coder Iza went ahead and fixed that. Thank you Iza! Please note that anything above Technician is still not free, you will need the appropriate MYO slot or item to allow it. :)

Hope everyone's been enjoying the new year, happy 2023! This Newsletter is coming a bit later in the month, but I promise for good reason! Let's see what's been going on...

Monthly prompt

This monthly prompt is to... Design a new Sprite pet for the Orin Realm?! It seems that entries will be picked by RNG to be made into real, functional pets for the website, and winners get x01 of their own pet design free! You can find more information on the Prompts page, as always. :D

Something new in the cat's eye...?

It seems the Cat's Eye has a donation box up? Oh, no, not for Ingo and Yinka, they've simply agreed to help this mysterious third party with a new business endeavor... Seems there's no reward for donating, but upon reaching the donation goal of 1500 DS, something new and exciting will come to the Orin Realm...!

technical stuff

We've been hard at work doing a ton of behind-the-scenes infrastructure adjustments, bug patches, and revamping the Moderator roles and tasks! There will be some mild Moderator team role changes incoming, but nothing major! We'll let you know when this fully goes into effect, and go more in depth as to what's changing within the team when everything is sorted. :) You will also notice that the roles in our discord server are FINALLY out of Halloween mode, and back to normal. So sorry we took so long on that! 

Hello, Everyone! I hope you're having a wonderful winter wherever you are. We have some fun stuff to share for this month! 

EVENT SHOP

Moon seems to have opened up a little temporary booth, which seems to have a combination of free goodies, and some stuff you can purchase by participating in this month's event! New items will be periodically added, so check back often! We'll also probably let you know when this happens, and it'll probably be about midway through the month. :-) 

MONTHLY EVENT

Hmm, where is Mimmy…? You can’t seem to find her in the town plaza. For that matter, it also seems to have become quite cold near the forest… You go off in search of her.

This monthly prompt is a DTE Event with a chilling twist! Submitting at least one drawing enters you into a raffle for the event Orin, Snow Fairy! But on top of that, each entry gets you some sweet event points to be used in the event shop, and helps purify a corrupt Orin...

Hello Orination! 
As you may have noticed, we have our own website now! woohoo!
I'm first going to take some time to go over how the site works. If you already know, that's cool too. You can skip ahead to the big letters that say "PROMPT" down below. 

Site INFO

Here is our site directory!
The on-site directory linked above should help you find whatever you're looking for, (lore, traits, FAQ, ToS, all that good stuff.) You may notice this site includes the shop and the masterlist, This is because both of those are being moved solely to the site, meaning our previous masterlist doc is now no longer of use, and buying items will now be hosted on the site rather than a discord channel! Please keep in mind all items will be moved to your account manually, meaning it may take some time, and we would very much appreciate cooperation on your end as well to make sure things are done swiftly and efficiently, with not a single shard out of place.

Our T.O.S have been updated!
We've updated our Terms-of-Service and rules to go alongside the new site, please read through and acknowledge them, as you must comply with both in order to continue your participation in the Orin species. 
T.O.S
SPECIES RULES

Free MYO with registration!
As promised, upon registration everyone will receive one free MYO slot, and some items too! You can "purchase" them from the shop once you've registered an account.

Missing currency, Orins, or items from your account?
Not to worry! We can easily get stuff transferred to your account here. All you need to do is send us a Report Ticket! We are also fulfilling these transfers through our Discord, and our Toyhouse.
-For currency and items, we'll need to know your old bank username!
-For Orins, we'll need proof of ownership and their masterlist number if you have it on hand. :)

PROMPT

Happy October, everyone! As it's a new spooky month, we have a new spooky prompt for you!
The Writing prompt is "Write about your Orin's Halloween Adventure!"
The Drawing prompt is "Draw your Orin in their Halloween costume!"
You can learn more by clicking "Show details..." on the prompt. :) 
Keep in mind, you do not need an Orin of your own to participate!
The event lasts until the end of October, so have fun, don't stress it, and get your spook on!

Secret Santa

Our lovely mod Shmoo is putting together a super fun Secret Santa event. :D
You can sign up for it, as well as learn all about it in the Google Form.
You have until November 1st to sign up!