Hey Howdy Hey Tappers!
Update time in Springfield, and this time everything’s coming up Milhouse! That’s right, Bart’s blue-haired buddy is finally getting some attention! Loads of dialogue with this one, so be sure to read along to see what happens! And of course, I’ll be posting it as each week wraps up…
Once again we see another multi-event in Springfield. So love them, or hate them, they’re still here. So let’s all try to make the best of this…
Anywho….things kick off with 6s tasks for Bart and Milhouse.
After you’ve completed these initial tasks you’ll kick off the Van Houten’s event…
First, remember this was an app store update available for download. So if you haven’t already done so, and you don’t see the Splash Screen above for your game, head to your app store and update TSTO. You may have to search the store for Tapped Out, as it doesn’t always appear on the update list initially…
We did receive an update package from EA on this one, about 30minutes before the event is slated to start. Here’s EA’s event synopsis:
When Milhouse’s older, cooler cousin, Annika, comes to Springfield for Milhouse’s birthday, Milhouse
asks her to pretend to be his girlfriend so he can be more popular at school. After she begrudgingly
agrees, his plan yields great success and he quickly becomes the most popular boy in Springfield
Elementary.Bart has a hard time adjusting and is resentful of Milhouse no longer being available to hang out, so he
promptly gets to work sabotaging Milhouse’s newfound popularity. However, every time he tries to make Milhouse uncool, it backfires and only makes Milhouse cooler.Meanwhile, Lisa can’t suppress her jealousy any longer and eventually starts dating Milhouse. When the kids see Lisa dating the coolest kid in school, they crown her as the coolest girl in school. However, after Milhouse takes her on a few dates with his relatives, Lisa quickly realizes she’s made a mistake and breaks up with him, resulting in both of them going back to their uncool selves, and things return to normal.
We should all know by now unless of course, you’re new to TSTO that the prizes for this event follow the same questline format to unlock as our regular mini-events do.
Just like every large event recently, this is not your typical Major Event. And there are pros and cons to that, and everyone will find their own pros and cons. And some people’s pro will be someone else’s con.
As always, I just ask that you have an open mind, and reserve judgment until we’re into the event. It’s 5 weeks long, it should be fairly easy to complete, you’ll unlock a bunch of new prizes and no crafting to grind through, so let’s just have some good old fashioned TSTO fun! And, as long as you don’t rush things, you won’t get bored because it’ll change each week!
Here’s the event schedule:
Act 1 Starts August 12th (WEDNESDAY)
Act 2 Starts August 21st (FRIDAY)
Act 3 Starts August 30th (SUNDAY)
Act 4 Starts September 8th (TUESDAY)
Event Ends September 16th, 2020 (WEDNESDAY)
As I stated above, the initial quests are 6s tasks . Once completed you’ll start the Birthday Party for One questline, which is the Act 1 story to follow. This is how you’ll unlock the Act 1 prizes.
Note: Some of you have mentioned you are having trouble getting the event to start. You need to download the latest update and the requirements for this are: Level 12 and you MUST have Bart and his Treehouse unlocked. It won’t trigger without those two.
Claim to Fame
Auto starts
Milhouse: Hey Bart, let’s go to my house. A bunch of my relatives are in town for my birthday party this weekend.
Bart: That sounds great! But you know what sounds even greater? We go to MY house and finish planning my latest Skinner prank.
Milhouse: But Bart, my pretty cousin Annika is back in town. *wink*
Bart: As tempting as that sounds to my pre-tween hormones — whatever they are — you’re forgetting the banana pecking order. Of which you are most certainly second.
Milhouse: Oh, okay. You know I’m a sucker for fruit prioritization.
And this triggers the entire story premise for each act…
(and yes, just like I did for the past multi-events, I’ll be posting full dialogue for this one before each week is over)
Now let’s talk about what’s included…
Here’s the Act 1 Synopsis from EA:
Milhouse is helping Bart assemble a device for his latest prank at Springfield Elementary, the Go-Go Ray. When Bart unveils this contraption at school and zaps Principal Skinner with it, causing him to
uncontrollably dance, he is heralded as the coolest kid in school. Hoping to capitalize on this moment of
attention, Milhouse invites everyone to his birthday party this weekend.Unfortunately, the only kid to attend is Bart, but that doesn’t stop the two of them from having a good
time while enjoying all of the party tricks to themselves. Later, Annika makes an appearance. After Bart and Milhouse fail to impress her, Bart makes a comment about how cool she is, which gets Milhouse thinking…After relentlessly begging Annika to pretend to be his girlfriend at school, she eventually gives in and begrudgingly agrees. When the other kids see Milhouse hanging out with an older, cooler girl, they
instantly deem Milhouse popular.
DO NOT FORGET TO SCROLL UP AND DOWN IN THE TASK BOXES (PICTURED ABOVE) TO BE SURE TO COMPLETE ALL TASKS FOR EACH PART.
I’ll lay out specifically what you need to do for each part in the turbo tappin’ post, but I don’t want any of you to get messed up with this. So don’t forget to SCROLL!
Currency Act 1: 
Arcade Tokens
Here are the prizes for Part 1:
Go Go Ray – Birthday Party for One Pt. 1 and 115
Milhouse Archway- Birthday Party for One Pt. 2 and 95
Bounce House- Birthday Party for One Pt. 3 and 95
Mystery Box Token- Birthday Party for One Pt. 4 and 155
Annika- Birthday Party for One Pt. 5 and 195
Questline, which I’ll post later, will show how each is unlocked.
Characters who can complete tasks for Act 1:
Homer
Marge
Bart
Lisa
Grampa
Milhouse
Skinner
Willie
Kirkedemious Van Houten (New Premium)
Each Act will have a new premium character that will earn event currency. From what I can see, based on the info from EA, characters will be used throughout the entire event. So Act 1 will be used in Act 2, 3, and 4…etc.
Characters earn:
5/4hrs for Freemium
8/4hrs for New Premium
The Store
Here’s what’s included today:
New stuff…
Van Houten Villa w/Kirkedemious Van Houten- 150
. Will earn event currency for the entire event.
Returning
Mystery Boxes…
Van Houtens Mystery Box- Mystery Box Token Only. Includes:
Fit Milhouse
Magic Act Milhouse
Radioactive Milhouse
Sidekick Milhouse
Jake Boyman
Brittany Brockman
Allison Taylor
Erik
Bort
Childrarium
Shelbyville Elementary
Miss Tillingham’s School
STEM Conference Hotel w/ Brendan Beiderbecke
Mighty Pigs Practice Rink w/ Lewis Clark
Golf ‘N Die Retirement Village w/ Principal Dondelinger
Zip Zap and ‘Za w/ Wendell Borton
Juvenile Correction Facility w/ Jeremy Jailbird
Springfield Skate Park w/ Nikki Mckenna
The Mystery Box requires tokens to unlock.
Returning Premium:
All returning premium content will be available from today, August 12th, until the event ends on September 16th. Also, I’m not doing new SIB posts for the returning content (I may do the Mystery Box, but not sure yet). So I’ve linked the previous posts for you to review here. And I’ve also linked them on the Event Page for you to find later in the event.
Nana Sophie Mussolini– 75 Previous Post
Norbert’s Plane w/ Norbert– 125 Previous Post
St. Sebastian’s School for Wicked Girls w/ Samantha Stankey– 150 Previous Post
Were-Milhouse– 60 (costume for Milhouse) Previous Post (his questline and tasks are towards the bottom of that post)
Sidekick-Milhouse– 35 (costume for Milhouse) This was originally free (as in given to you at the start of an event) and I don’t think I ever broke down his tasks.
Milhouse’s Trailer– 40 Previous Post
Pyro– 75 Previous Post
Item Limits
Per Patric, the Item Limit has NOT been increased.
And that’s it my friends. The details of Act 1 of the Van Houtens Event!
Your thoughts on the event? Thoughts on the content? Excited to see the storyline? Sound off below, you know we love hearing from you!
A minor nit – the currency for Act 1 is Party Hats, not Arcade Tokens.
OK rain man. LOL
I will briefly confirm that Annika Van Houten isn’t voiced …. neither is Act 1 ‘s Premium Character Combo (but their ‘side quests’ are great, both are worth obtaining!) 😊👍🏻
Only 1 new character for this event is voiced, and he’s a premium character. Grandpa Van Houten.
Voiced by Hank Azaria (and living the good life in his RV) … that’s going to be worth the sprinkles! 😀
Looking forward to playing through this. I think the birthday arch would have worked better as a building skin for Milhouse’s house. As always, thanks for the info.
I agree 💯
It should have been a Building Skin for the Van Houten House (and it should have been available for Simpsons cash vs an Event Prize)
GOOD – everything is new (Event Prizes), except what you get from the New Mystery Box (which you may want, especially if it is unavailable from the Regular Mystery Box)
BAD – this event is padded with Dumb Decor Prizes (most of which will go right into Storage)
BEST – practically every Premium Character Combo is worth the 🍩’s
Ok
I’m halfway to obtaining the last Event Prize for Act 1 (Annika Van Houten), no rushing with 🍩’s (I should have her by tonight if I don’t get a Bart Simpson Screen!) 😀
I spent the sprinkles on the 1st Premium Character Combo (Kirkedemious Van Houten w/Van Houten Villa), because I felt this was worth the 🍩’s and I built an Island with Pier Tiles for the Building! 👍🏻
I spent more sprinkles on Samantha Stanky w/ Saint Sebastian’s School for Wicked Girls (another Character Combo not found in any Mystery Box, but she’s back in the Game App Store!), so EA gets a respectable “thank you” for allowing me to complete two Character Brackets (Other School Workers, Other Kids!) 👍🏻
My BIG constructive criticism (besides the Bart Simpson Screen occurring too many times!), there is no mother lovin’ way I’m spending real 💰 for a Truckload of 300 Donuts + Muscular Milhouse (Character Skin!) while L-EA-Z-Y refuses to fix this Game App! 👎🏻
Either than that, the writing is funny (please take the time to read the Character Dialogue!), but I would rather have less Decor an actually have Milhouse voiced in Game App finally (he has some great phrases in The Simpsons Episodes!) Just make the most of this Event and have fun! 😊🤘🏻
Not opening…is it just me and the spinning doughnut?
try uninstalling and reinstalling
I LOVE that, Safi! 🙂 I am really excited for this event! After reading Patric’s posts over the past few weeks, I have been super nervous this beloved game would be going away. It is the only game I have on my older phone, and will be thrilled to continue playing as long as they allow me to. 🙂
Honestly, I am really happy they still give us updates regardless of what they involve. If I need to store things, I will… I am just really thankful to be able to continue to tap. 🙂
And thank you, Alissa for always keeping us updated. You are worth more than donuts!!
Very disappointing that if you want all characterskins, you need to buy 300 donuts. Totally not worth it but for the completionists it is annoying
And the real kicker is, if enough people buy the Donuts to get the character, EA will do this again.
Yep! Those who complained about the Gil Deals being too cheap? It didn’t take long for EA to increase how many 🍩’s they cost! 😂
Back to 🍩 farming.
As a completist, I’ve had to let go too (not another purchase of 🍩’s for a Character or Character Skin! EA will not get any further funds for me, especially with all the problems this Game App has!) …. but I was grateful to complete 2 Character Brackets today (EA gets a 👍🏻 for that!)
We have a new Mystery Box + a Token in each Act as an Event Prize (this can be rewarding, or it could mean nothing, or it could mean 12 🍩’s – it will be different for every Tapper!)!
Stay Safe
I thought that I wasn’t going to get a mystery box if it was going to be Van Houten themed but I am delighted to see Principle Dondelinger & the Golf N Die Retirement Home and Nikki McKenna & the Springfield Skate Park in the mystery box. I’m looking forward to unlocking Anika and the decorations might work well in a Van Houten themed area.
Principle Dondelinger & the Golf N Die Retirement Home
I was really happy to get this in the new Mystery Box (so weird that this Premium Combo is not in the regular Mystery Box)
Sounds like you get another win next ACT with a free Token 👍🏻
Yeah, it looks like only 1/3 of the items in the new mystery box are also in the yearbook which isn’t bad. It also looks like a few items from the valentine’s day event last year have returned in this event. I didn’t realize that I typed Golf N Die Retirement Home when its actually called Golf N Die Retirement Village.
It’s not a small Building, but it looks well near the Beach (you can build a ⛳ course next to it – that’s what I’m doing), and when I read Retirement Village? I think of these master planned communities in Southern California from back in the 60s (Leisure World) …. it’s an Event padded with the Decor, but there are Characters and Buildings I am looking forward to obtaining (spending sprinkles for!) 😀
(Say it in your best Mr. Magoo voice) “Oh EA you’ve done it again” (I know most of you will ask who is Mr. Magoo. Google him! and watch Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol, rant over.)
Both get referenced on The Simpsons! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUmL0SOPUG8
Are Allison Taylor and Erik just characters? Did they not add their buildings to the mystery box?
I would assume they’re with their buildings, but I don’t have the mystery box available for me to check (I have all the items in it). I pulled this list right from EA’s info they sent over.
Let the complaining begin about the event .
Now serving number 42 .
Stop by and we will make a movie in black and white.
See ya bye . 👽
How many tokens to unlock the Mystery Box items? Apparently one token does not unlock an item. Is it 60 tokens?
1 token unlocks the box. Did you speed through all of the act 1 prize track already? If you unlocked the token from the prize track and you still don’t see the box, then you have everything available inside the box already in your Springfield.
There’s also Muscular Milhouse – a full character – attached to a 300 donut purchase.
So, not a skin? Good to know.
There’s also Muscular Milhouse if you buy the 300 doughnut package. He doesn’t, and the moment, help with the event.
Beat me to it! Just posted the same info 😃
Everything’s coming up Milhouse!
Let’s see if any of the new Van Houten Characters are voiced 😀👍🏻