On April 18, Mr. Lehman invited his junior and senior students to a Club Penguin prom! That day was scheduled to be North’s prom, but due to COVID-19, it has been postponed indefinitely. Mr. Lehman wanted to still celebrate the day however and thought it was something fun for us to do.
If you are not familiar, Club Penguin is an online game where users play games to earn coins and interact with other users as penguin characters in a virtual world. It was originally released in 2005 and gained popularity fast with over 30 million users by 2007, according to Andrew Walmsley, a digital media manager from BMP Optimum.
With its release date in the mid-2000s, many high schoolers grew up playing this game as kids. The Club Penguin we played unfortunately shut down in Mar. 2017, after losing popularity and profit. Now, there is a free version called Club Penguin Online. This is the platform we used to host our virtual prom.
It started at 7 pm in the “dance club” located in the “town.” People even dressed up their penguins in suits and dresses. Fellow Scroll member, Jaden Zander, agreed to be my date after I asked him if he would, “waddle to prom with me.” Once we were there, it was really fun to see all of my classmates online somewhere other than Zoom!
The dance lasted about half an hour, which was plenty as most of it was just sitting there watching your penguin dance with the others. Nonetheless, very enjoyable!
Afterward, a couple of my friends and I continued exploring Club Penguin as our childhood memories started flooding back. It was a super fun night spent interacting with friends and playing games.
With quarantine reaching almost two months, this could be a fun way to pass time if your other hobbies have started to get boring. Creating an account and accessing all features is completely free, which makes the platform even more appealing. Try it out for yourself and see if a game from your childhood can be just as entertaining years later!