Hey Howdy Hey Tappers!
Well it’s not Valentine’s Day…but we did get ourselves a little in game update in preparation for the “Big Game” this weekend! Gil is back and he’s brought along some tailgate fun!
Oh and did I mention there’s a new quest involving donuts?!
Back with more in a bit as soon as I go through it . For now know that you’ll need Homer and Lisa free to kick things off for the donuts…. (Gil will just be hanging around Springfield as usual)
More details below the fold..
Ok so let’s start with a couple of the basics…you know the stuff on timers 😉
It’s Superbowl Weekend and TSTO decided to celebrate the Big Game by offering up a Gil Deal in addition to some items returning to the store. Let’s take a look…
Items in the store…
These appear after you start the dialogue for the Gil Deal…
ALL Football Related Items Leave Stores on February 9th.
American Flag- $5,600
Stadium Fence- $1,000
Single Bleachers- 5 Donuts
Double Bleachers- 10 Donuts
Triple Bleachers- 20 Donuts
Sportacus- 85 Donuts Should I Buy
Basketball Stadium- 90 Donuts Should I Buy
Football Tire Target- 35 Donuts
Football Uprights- 50 Donuts
No, we won’t be doing Should I Buys for the random stadium items in this update. They’re returning from Tap Ball and basically they’re a if you like it get it items.
And now onto our friend Gil..
You’ll find Gil wandering around the streets of Springfield with a deal for you! Here’s what you’ll see when you tap on him:
Gil: Who ya rooting for in the Big Game? Care to put some skin in the game? Because that’s all I’ve got to bet – my skin.
Homer: The Big wha?
Gil: Y’know, the Big Game! The Gridiron Championship! 22 men enter! 22 men leave! But only 11 as winners!
Homer: Ohhh, you mean the Superbo–
Gil: Whoa, buddy! Do you want Ol’ Gil to get sued? Although if I get sued one more time, I get my next trial free. Instead, keep me out of jail by buying my sweet tailgate party package with beers, burgers and babes for the Big Day!
And if you say no….
Gil: No sale!? Not even for the Big Game? Well, fine. I’ve got my own party to throw. And nooo, it’s not with imaginary friends. Because I’ve saved up enough money to buy the dolls.
And if you say yes….
Gil: Finally! A win! Much like one of those teams that will be playing on that day we mentioned. I won’t have to melt all my participation trophies down for scrap metal. Instead I’ll keep sleeping on them in my trunk. So pointy!
The tailgate itself is pretty massive at a whopping 11×17 in size. We’ll cover a lot of details on it in it’s own Should I Buy post, yes we’ll be doing one. But for now know that it can be upgraded and it comes with it’s own questline.
So now let’s talk about the other big thing with this update…daily challenges. First let me start by saying there’s a questline and a few other things associated with it. This post is just a general understanding. We’ll break EVERYTHING town in detailed posts, as we always do, coming up. So sit tight for more detailed info, as this is just a basic overview….
Homer kicks off the Daily Challenges quests and you’ll start by getting a series of short tasks…from 6s to 1m until you unlock the challenges.
You’ll also unlock a new building…Big Box:
Once you’ve unlocked the challenges you’ll see this popup:
You’ll now be able to complete challenges each day at a shot to win prizes, including donuts! Pretty sweet!
And they’ll work just like Daily Challenges from previous events. Log in each day to unlock a new Challenge. Complete the challenges each week to earn the prize! And because there are 5 challenges to a week, and today is Thursday EA’s unlocking the first 4 for you to complete today. So that by tomorrow (Friday) you’ll be able to unlock the 5th and final prize for the Bonus Prize! And the challenges will reset again Monday morning. Now that i’ve played through it I can tell you there’s a challenge every day, including weekends. And the number of challenges to complete to earn a prize will vary from 5 challenges to 20 challenges.
Now one thing to note. The arrival of the daily challenges means the removal of the Daily Play Combo…
Which means…no more free weekly Mystery Boxes! However, EA’s giving you 1 more free one to make up for it…
My box contained a News Van…
Note: Some of you are getting confused on this. This is not the end of Mystery Boxes. You’ll still be able to buy them in the store (for donuts), it’s just the end of the Daily Play Combo…meaning the end of the free mystery box on the 5th day.
There are a couple of questlines that come with this new update. We’ll cover those in our Turbo Tappin’ post…
However, one other thing to note is this update includes a new task for Springfield Heights. You’ll now be tasked to upgrade the Private Island to Level 5 via the Paradise Found questline.
Some of you are commenting that your Islands are all already at Level 5 and you can’t do anything to clear the task. If this is happening to you, and you don’t have an option to purchase another Island. Contact EA. Let them know what’s going on. It’s a programming glitch that needs to be fixed. They’ll have to release a patch to restore it. So contact EA and let them know. Once you’ve contacted them, sit tight and ignore the task for now. (You can contact EA here)
You’re also tasked with upgrading the Exclusive Resort to Level 5 via the When Four Stars Is Not Enough questline. Currently I have a bug on my Exclusive Resort where it says it’s an Elf Cannon and it won’t let me upgrade it. If that’s happening to you as well, contact EA.
And that’s it my friends. The basic rundown info on today’s little update. We’ll be back with more detailed posts in the coming days.
What are your thoughts on today’s update? Liking the Gil Deal and the return of the Tap Ball items? Thoughts on the Daily Challenges? Upset the Daily Prize Combo is gone? Sound off in the comments below, you know we love hearing from you!
what happens when you x our the daily challenges? does it add a new one or you skip that for the day?
Switches it out for a new one. But you can only do it once per day
Got Kearny n my mystery box 😀
I’m excited about the new daily challenge system to win donuts. Not too sad to see the mystery box disappear though on my last weekly one a few days ago I won 30 donuts!! Today another food stand, which I already have more than enough of.
On a separate note I know nothing about Football or the big game but I’m excited about the mini game event. Tailgating fun!!
Got 10 donuts in my last mystery box, happy days!
Slightly off topic, has anyone else heard of The Simpson search engine ‘Frinkiac’? Saw a news article about it today – http://www.digitalspy.com/tech/the-simpsons/news/a782324/woo-hoo-this-simpsons-search-engines-matches-quotes-to-screencaps/
Pity about the weekly free Bonus Box, but it looks like we’re getting something better to replace it. If I get nostalgic, I can just spend 6 of these sweet, sweet bonuts and buy one, then ragequit when I get a Khav Khalash stand!
Since I started right before Tap Ball dropped, and soooo much time was locked up with various events, I didn’t get all that many of them, but I did get what I wanted. I think my final tally is something like
3 Lard Lads
Lemon Tree
2 _ondas
2 Minnow Ponds
2 Khav Khalash stands
20 donuts
1 Bomb Shelter
1 News Van
2 I&S Movie Billboards
Blie-Haired Lawyer (just in time!)
and at the very end
1 bomb shelter.
I’m sure I’m forgetting something, but not too bad, all in all!
I sold my second billboard thinking it would pay me those 40 donuts it was worth. It didn’t. I don’t think you can even sell them anymore. Yes, I was a newb at one point. lol! Not to mention the bonus percentage…
I’m glad about the return of Tapball items. I’m really reluctant to spend THAT much money on the Danger Pool but a few bleachers, flags and stadium fencing might make it look pretty alright
Holey camoly! (See what I did there…”holey” instead of “holy”….like as in donut holes, huh? Get it? “I’m too clever for my socks, to clever for my shoes, to clever for this post…”) Free donuts just for doing little tasks every day?!? Sure does beat the Mystery Box for those of us who were fortunately to already get all of the premium characters and such!
Jealous of all the folks who posted saying they got 30 donuts in their final box…I got another news van, like Alissa, but, hey – at least that’s got a multiplier to it…better than another pond or bomb shelter!
Also, really looking forward to picking up some more stadium fences…those were only craftable before, right?
Getting back to the donut thing for a moment though…I must say that I thought Gil’s preamble to that was a signal that he was getting ready to offer us that donut discount deal I’ve been waiting for (and I was all ready to thank Dr. Tyler for that, since I think he/she said he/she had just given up waiting for that and purchased some donuts, which I figured might be just the martyr I’d been looking for to ensure that the deal would hit). Doesn’t EA want us to BUY donuts anymore? I mean, don’t get me wrong – I’m happy to keep receiving/earning free ones, but I still have that credit burning a (donut-sized) hole through my Amazon wallet…(and….we’re back to making donut hole jokes – see how it all came full circle?).
DrTyler is a she. 🙂
Right you are 🙂
And, while I did buy $10 worth of donuts for the space shuttle recently, what I really broke down on was activating my XP Collider. I’d been waiting for level 60, but I lost patience. I thought/joked that level 60 might arrive as a result, but we got this update instead.
Oh, yeah…I should just give up trying to remember anything at all. Just live in the moment, lol! (Actually, living in the moment really isn’t my strong suit….but I guess I could just stick to thinking ahead!)
I thought I remembered that that was the case, but I thought I’d err on the side of caution…. 😉
So, in my final box A game: bomb shelter, B game:minnow pond.
Your post made me laugh!
So apparently I am not the only one holding off on buying a 99€ donut pack because of expecting the annual special deal and becoming excited after seeing Gil, reading the dialog and then be disappointed for not getting the discount deal but rather an expensive decoration. Just for the frustration of this I’d refuse buying that thing.
I think a lot of folks have iffy memories. I don’t believe there was a deal last year either, because I was waiting for it since I missed out on the year before, and it just never happened. I think there was a “deal” to buy something, but not cheap donuts. So this would make it two years since that happened and no reason to think it ever will again.
There was a Gil Deal to purchase donuts last year. It was just around Christmas
http://tstoaddicts.com/2014/12/24/gils-christmas-donut-deal/
Huh. Wow….I don’t know how I ever missed it. Now I’m wondering if maybe when it did come around, I just couldn’t take the plunge and buy more (since I know I bought a boatload around September for Halloween and Christmas use – it was my first purchase). I take it back. 🙂
Human memories or search engines? Hmm.
I find “spite” comments like this kind of funny…it’s not like EA’s gonna know WHY someone didn’t buy something!
To my way of thinking, if you like something and think it’s worth the number of donuts required to get it, buy it. If you don’t, don’t. But using your purchase decision as a way to send EA a message is ineffective, at best, and could be a “cutting off your nose to spite your face” move, at worst.
My comment was not to be taken completely serious. If I wanted it badly, I would have puchased it. As I commented on the Tailgate’s own post, I think that it’s pretty overpriced in my eyes. I prefer to buy characters, premium outfits for characters that don’t have one yet or buildings unlocking specific jobs (like Shorty’s for Mrs. Lovejoy).
Fat Tony is mentioning laundering donuts. Would this mean we can change game cash for donuts???????
Just got my free Mystery Box. 30 donuts! WOOHOO!!!!!!
Wouldn’t that be great!
If you have enough cash saved up, you can already do that via the Collider!
That’s silly! Spending 5 donuts to have a chance to ear 3 donuts!
Huh? If you have a lot of cash (like $10M+) you can buy and sell rat trap trucks and refill your XP meter several times. For about $10-14M of cash, you can usually NET at least 20 donuts.
😮 I didn’t put that together but that is a great Theroy. I bet you’re right, dollars to donuts. 😛
(Well I hope so anyway)
The XP Collider is very effective at changing dollars to doughnuts, but it requires that you are at the max level to work. Something to look forward to if you’re not there yet. If you are at max level there are some pretty detailed posts in the last two week’s Open Threads for specifics.
I didn’t know you needed to be at max level for it to work….why is that? Is it because the game won’t let you buy it or run it until you are?
If you’re not at max level you don’t get bonut boxes. You just level up and get whatever the reward is (usually 1 or 2 donuts).
Even if you fill the XP meter again before finishing the questline for the previous level? I can’t remember the exact way it works anymore, because I’ve been at max level for too long now…
Your XP level will continue to increase, until you reach max level, no matter where you are in the questline/game play level.
You don’t. But if you want donuts, you do. I activated it when I was like level 52 or whatever, back in the day. It’s supposedly meant for people like that. But I didn’t get any donuts.
You mean that if a lower-level person fills their XP meter that the game will level them up, even if they haven’t done that levels questline yet? I thought you were stuck at a particular level until you finished the quest line AND filled the XP meter for that level, but, if you filled the meter before finishing the questline, it would still need to reward you with a trip to the bonut boxes. So, assuming you had the same millions of dollars to spend as a max level player with the same bonus multiplier as they have, I thought the donut yield from running the collider would be similar.
Of course, I could be completely misremembering how the whole leveling thing goes below max level….
I’m level 59 but only up to level 55 in game level. I have leveled up in XP maybe 4 or 5 times, winning up to 15 donuts (I’ve forgotten the exact details). Leveling up in game level is my choice. I’ve gotten Gina early (level 59 character) because there is no requirement to have completed a previous quest, just XP level. But I can’t get whoever is offered at level 58, since they have that requirement.
I can take advantage of the XP collider, but I only have about 8 mil in the bank. If I was level 55, for example, I’d only get to level up to 56, 57, et al., but no bonuts.
Any of that coherent and helpful?
Yes, but it leaves me confused, since I think this originally started because of a comment of not being able to use the collider if not at max level, everything you’ve just said confirms what I was saying, which is that, if you have enough money saved up, there’s no reason why it wouldn’t be possible for a lower-level person to use the collider to earn donuts!
I believe what the OP meant was that if you were on, say, level 30, then activating the collider will only level you up to a certain point. You would need who knows how many millions to get to max level and start earning donut boxes.
I think Davidbo33 gave a good reply, but here’s one using my words: Technically you do get donuts as you level up from a low XP level while using the collider but they’re donuts you were going to get anyways, they’re not bonus donuts (bonuts) and they’re not maximizable (usually you only get up to 2 donuts in early levels, whereas bonuts can be up to 3 donuts). It doesn’t really sound worth it for the actual getting of the donuts, but it is good for getting to the last level and now being able to reach bonut boxes. That’s pretty much what I did. Once I got there I just kept going and got a few rounds of bonuts in. (I had the free 24h that everyone did, but also the 10 days from the deal. I haven’t bought a 24h again.)
So, if you’re at, say, Level 45 and you haven’t finished the Level 45 questline yet and you max out your XP meter, you don’t get the bonus boxes? The game levels you up to Level 46 instead? I thought you can’t level up unless you finish the previous level’s questline…
First part correct.
The XP level is separate from the “game level”.
You’re now level 59 for XP, correct? But gameplay a few levels back? When you had the collider on and you leveled up, did you get a donut (or two, or three) that the game awards for new levels? Just not the donut boxes where you can pick and pay for more?
I, honestly, can’t remember that period well. It was hectic as it was, dropping during an event, and I just leveled up as I played, mostly not on purpose. So, whatever you normally get for going up a level. A quick peak at the level up images says I would have gotten approx. 2 donuts each level. No 3 box monty, right. I’m very sure about experiencing that only after getting to level 59.
Thanks. That’s how I remember it working.
I said no by mistake, can i buy it later?
Yes, it’ll be in your store for purchase. Just click on the Gil icon
Can I still keep the mystery box if it is already in my inventory?
If it’s in your inventory it’ll remain. Mystery Boxes aren’t disappearing, you can still buy them for donuts. Just the free one in the Daily Combo is leaving
Free sprinkles!!! I may be overly optimistic but this little update is awesome! Since I’m (mostly) freemium, I’ve only ever shelled out real dough a couple times, more opportunities to get free frosted pastry goodness is alright with me.
My last ever mystery box was a Lard Lad, that makes 3. I would love the option to gift it to a neighboureeno that doesn’t have one, but what can you do.
I’m not the doom & gloom type so I’m thinking this is just another way to get freemiums hooked on shopping premium. Whatever the motives, free donuts are appreciated!
Happy golden Super Bowl anniversary America! I don’t follow your game but I may buy the Gil deal anyway, we don’t have Tailgate parties in the UK but they sound a lot of fun. Maybe I could persuade my husband’s rugby team to start letting us do something similar!
hate football, so not really interested in any of this stuff, I got the other stuff anyway from last years event even though it was an annoying event. The Tailgate thing I guess is an okay thing to put in front a stadium we got….but which one? We got 3 stadiums….lol
Did you? I only have the Tap Ball stadium.
Got the Lard Lad donut stand in my last mystery box, can’t complain about that…
You can after you’ve received about 5!
I got Lard Lad #8 on Sunday. It starts to get old after #2. My last box was a Klav Klash Stand and I’m happier with that than if I’d got another – at least the stand can be repurposed into lawn furniture with the base hidden behind a house. But congrats on your first Lard Lad. That one was exciting to get 🙂
So two questions:
1. If I don’t get a task done before the day ends, do I have until Sunday when they reset to complete it like in events?
2. If one of my challenges is worth 1 donut is it beneficial to swap it out for the chance to get 2 or 3 donuts? Or can it be replaced by something worse? Such as cash?
1. I think so, but I won’t know for 100% sure until new ones hit. But it seems to be right since it’s 5 days of challenges and they won’t reset till Monday. (at least i think. I have to dig through the files now that the baby is asleep and not screaming for my attention lol)
2. If you get one that’s worth 1 donut I’d keep it. Cause you could end up with cash. But if you get one that’s for cash you can try swapping.
Thanks, good to know! All mine have been for donuts so far so I won’t be swapping any of those ones. I have a feeling the tasks will keep carrying over until Sunday too.
Nope I think i got it wrong. Looks like a new one unlocks each day, including weekends. Although again, won’t know for sure until Saturday. Gotta love it lol
I think it’s every day because I just started Friday’s and it says new one unlocks in 24 hours!?
Yea it’s every day. Lots of new clarifications on it after looking through the files and playing it this morning lol
This hasn’t updated for me, checked for updates but nothing…any advice?
It’s in game. Try hard closing and restarting TSTO. (in otherwords there’s nothing to download from the app store)
Wow, it is huge. But fits in great with my trash area.
Yippeee!!! I got 30 donuts from the mystery box.
Me too!! Thanks EA!!
And me! I thought it was everyone, so now I feel extremely lucky. That’s 34 bonuts earned already today!
I got a rock.
Aaaarrrrrrrgggggh!
Does it keep tigers away?
Same 😀
Messed up with Homer, instead of sending him to KwikEMart to start the task I sent Holiday Homer to go shoot arrows. So I gotta wait another hour.
On the fence right now about the Gil Deal. Will have to spring for some more donuts if I want it. Have been trying to save up for Valentines Day stuff. I missed Sportacus during Tap Ball so that’s a possibility for me. I still wish the Basketball Arena came with Muk Mu
Woo-hoo, free donuts!! There were some good prizes in the mystery box but I always seemed to get too many _ondas and Khlav stands. It’ll be interesting to see what happens with these new daily challenges.
It would be nice if we had a big football stadium to go with the tailgating thing. The Shelbyville Stadium from Season 5 in the show comes to mind as ideal. Joe
I got 30 donuts in my mystery box
Me too!
Ol Gil got me 🍩
🏈 🙂
I’ll just have to admire it in your town. 🏈🙂
My final mystery box had the Lard Lad doughnut shop. What did everyone else win? (now i have two of the lard lad’s)
30 donuts! I pulled blue haired lawyer and squeaky voiced teen in the past
I got a khlav kalash cart. That’s alright, though, I already got three Lard Lads, BHL, Kearney, five or six news vans, and eight or nine billboards from previous boxes. I’m glad the daily rewards are going to start letting me decide which random premium deco I want to buy.
I got a (add foul word) News Van :/
I got a (insert fouler word) minnow pond. 😶
That’s what I got too lol.
More news vans were fine with me. I have a very newsworthy town. 😉
The daily challenges are interesting, exciting, and a little bit confusing. I’ve got characters on tasks to earn doughnuts. Great! But there’s also this thing about changing the task/prize. I changed one from a dollar reward, to a three doughnut reward. Cool! But I also have Cletus on a one doughnut reward task. I have the apparent option of changing this task (?). I don’t want to give up a doughnut reward for an unknown reward. So I’m keeping this task. I’m not sure what the odds are of winning which prizes- keeping vs changing a task/reward, but I want doughnuts more than anything else (I think. I don’t know what the other possible rewards may be).
Thoughts?
So I assumed that switching out the task did only that: switch the task, not the prize. I also assumed that the prize for each daily task was always 1 donut, because that’s what it’s been for all the ones I’ve seen so far. Has anyone else seen other prizes for completing a daily task and if you switched it out did the prize change too?
My Where’s Maggie Game is stuck. Keeps showing I completed it 3 times, and won’t reward donuts. I cannot get through to EA chat. Any suggestions? Thank you
All i can say is you have to contact EA. You can try the basics, like uninstall/reinstall and see if that helps. Otherwise it’s a wait for EA kind of problem, unfortunately.
Maybe try storing the Play-dough factory in your inventory box then unstore it again.. Not sure if this will work and reward your donuts, (but that’s just an idea of what MIGHT help..)
I had a few times that Where’s Maggie countdown showed DONE but would not allow me to start mini-game. A quick flip over to a friend’s town and back corrected it each time. Maybe it could work for you!
So the ability to get free donuts: Levelling Up (Which seems set to die soon), Balloons in Krustyland, Daily Tasks, Friend Visits, Wheres Maggie, Cleaning up Debris, Making Monorail tracks. Can we expect that this is because the game is moving into its last days? Or is this before items become too expensive to build. What exactly is going on here…
lol everyone is so doom and gloom. “uh oh EA’s giving us donuts, that means the game is over!”
It’s just a replacement for the Daily Prize combo. You know the Mystery box you got every 5th day? Sometimes you’d get 30 free donuts in that. That’s what this is. Just a update for that. You won’t always get donuts as the final prize, but it is an option. Enjoy it for what it is 🙂
30 Donuts?!
My last Daily Prize got me a cheese steak prov wit, a Flyers snap back and 5 SEPTA tokens. WTF?! Dis game iz whack!!
😀
Confused.
They’re trying to get you to buy more donuts by giving you freebies, but not enough to really afford stuff.
Um, what?!? Almost every premium item I own I bought with donuts that I had earned in the game in drips and drabs. Those “freebies,” when added together, can get you lots of stuff. Even before this new feature, and not including Sideshow You and the Mystery Box, you could easily earn 21 free donuts a week (5 rail yard, 6 Maggie, 10 neighbor visits). That means you could buy a character, or even cheap character combo, in about a month. If there’s an event or you got lucky with the mystery box or a new level hit or you leveled up (naturally or with the collider running), you could earn considerably more than that.
Plenty of people were saying that 2014 would be the last year of the game because there weren’t enough “good” characters left to last us much longer, and it was taking months for us to get a new level. Then 2015 was going to be the last year of the game because the developers were burning through all the “good” event ideas and EA would be focusing more on titles like Battlefront. Now, 2016 is certainly going to be the last year of the game because we’re getting a better daily bonus than we used to, and it’s been months since we had a new level. And then, 2017 is going to be the last year of the game because the developers have burned through all the good characters and event ideas and EA is going to start focusing on virtual reality games or something.
It will end when Star Wars movies end. That year.
I have all Private Islands to Level 5. I cannot get past the Upgrade a Private Island to level 2 task. Even after storing unstoring or restarting game. The other upgrades autocompleted as I had resorts at level 5
It’s just a glitch in the programming. Contact EA let them know, they’ll need to release a patch to fix it.
I’m glad the measly $150+ for 4 days continuous play is gone. I liked the mystery boxes though.
You could spend six of your weekly challenge donuts on a mystery box if you so chose.
If it helps I got the exact same tasks too…