Eccky

Eccky was presented to me as a virtual baby/pet/friend aimed at teen girls, so away I went to participate in the beta and see what this simulation would have to offer to young girl gamers everywhere.

Eccky is a web-browser flash game where you can create a character based on your own image. You don’t actually create the Eccky, you create a representation of yourself, physically and emotionally, by picking everything from hair styles and eye colors to personality traits.

You can make the Eccky on your own or with someone else (you can invite someone to make an Eccky with you), and in that case, you won’t have to take care of it all by yourself and both will share responsibility and tasks.

Upon creation, your Eccky will be added to your MSN contact list as well. This means that in time, you will actually have a few chats with it, once it learns how to speak.

Your Eccky begins as a baby, and for each 8 hours of the day, it will age one year. So yes, it keeps on living and growing even if you log off. At first, you won’t have much available in terms of explorations, but as the Eccky ages, you can visit more places and play more games.

You initially begin with 100 credits (the game’s currency) and you get an allowance of 20 credits per game day to spend as you see fit. You can also purchase more credits with real money.

There are plenty of places to spend your credits in. There is a clothing a store where you can purchase hair styles, clothes and accessories for your wardrobe, a supermarket where you can buy food and drink, a school where you can go at a certain age to play quizzes against your Eccky, your house and other places where there are some mini-games as well. Some of the games you will find include a little car racing track, mini-golf, memory card game, toy toss and quizzes about numerous subjects.

There is also a town square where you can meet other Eccky and chat with players from other cities and states.

What I liked the most about Eccky was the MSN chat feature. How original is that? Many times when I would turn it on, I’d receive a message from my John Eccky, and we’d talk about random things. Sure, the chat isn’t perfect and you can see it responds to certain key words – even smiley faces – but sometimes you can carry on a little and very funny conversation that actually makes sense. If you don’t use MSN, that’s okay too, since you can chat in-game as well.

You will also receive a couple of emails from your Eccky, I received two to be exact. One when John grew up to adulthood, containing his final stats, and another checking in a few days (Eccky-years) later to tell me he traveled around the world, got married and joined a cult (creepy!).

I thought I should share his last message:

Dear Didi,

John

The downside of Eccky is that it costs $3 to make one. That’s really not so bad, but the period of time where you can interact with your friend goes by way too fast, and it just seemed like I didn’t get enough out of it.

I think that instead of the 8 hours it should be a whole day for a year, so we could get more out of the experience and spend more time with the Eccky. Since no one can be on 24 hours a day to tend to the Eccky’s needs fully, they can come out with some pretty low stats in the end, which determines your final happiness score.

But I have to admit it, overall, Eccky is a pretty good virtual simulation, and October looks promising as far as updates, with an employment agency to earn you some credits, virtual pets for your Ecckies and even more locations to visit.

Girls everywhere should enjoy the feeding, playing and chatting process involved in raising their own virtual baby and friend.

Special thanks to Regina van Tongeren and Eccky Corp for providing access to the beta.