Webkinz Next: Changes to Gardening

Since the release of Gardening in Webkinz Next, it has consistently been one of the best ways to earn KinzCash for players. Plant your crops, wait a few days, collect your crops, sell them for fun and profit. We love gardening so much that we added the Farmer’s Market to give you the ability to earn even more KinzCash selling your crops.
 
 

Over the years, some players have taken gardening to an extreme, filling multiple properties with nothing but crops and earning so much KinzCash that our own internal alert systems meant to prevent cheating have thought that there was a problem when there wasn’t. Simply put, the economy of Webkinz was not designed for this much KinzCash to be earned this easily.

 
 

We have therefore made some changes to how gardening works:
 
 

1) If you have 500 or more crops (growing plants), either planted or in your dock, you will no longer be able to purchase additional seeds from the W-Shop. This is a “soft cap” on gardening. If you have more than 500 crops planted right now, it won’t affect them in any way. Also, you can continue to purchase your three seeds per day from the Farmer’s Market, even if you have more than 500. This cap does not apply to harvested food/crops.

 
 

2) Plants can now dry out. You may now see a Watering Can over your crop. If you leave the plant without watering it, it will not continue to grow. When you do water the crop, it will return to its bright color and be ready to move to the next stage the next day. To be 100% clear, your crops can never “die”. All being dried out does is delay the growth cycle. Also, crops planted in the Farmer’s Plot will never become dried out. So, we’ve added a little work to gardening that rewards players who tend to their crops daily.

 
 

3) We’ve removed the notice for when your crops are expired, as long as you have at least one soil in your dock. This a much-requested feature from dedicated farmers, and we are happy to add it, while ensuring that players who are new to gardening know why their crop disappeared.

 
 

We have more plans to continue to improve gardening, such as adding weeding, bountiful harvests and rewarding players for dedicated gardening by giving their plants additional harvests beyond the standard 10. Finally, we are considering ways of allowing players to earn additional Farmer’s Plots.

 
 

Gardening has long been a popular feature in Webkinz World and we will continue to aim to make it fun and profitable, while ensuring that it is a balanced part of Webkinz’ gameplay.

 
 
Download Webkinz Next now — available for iOS, MacOS, Android and Windows 10.
 
 

 

               

137 Responses to Webkinz Next: Changes to Gardening

  1. grinningreaper says:

    I was so relieved when the weeding feature was removed from Classic. Please don’t add it to Next. If you want to prevent people from earning Kinzcash easily, then just leave it at the 500 cap. All this extra bother is just going to turn people off from participating in the gardening.

  2. CocoaBunny says:

    I have a similarly sized garden to the one in the picture, and it is already time consuming enough to harvest all of it every four days – I do not want to waste the time watering every single plant every day, when loading screens and daily plus weekly season tasks already take up so much time, and even more for pet care if you’re trying to earn a vacation (how is there only two tasks outside pet requests that counts towards filling the heart meter??). Please reconsider those of us who have limited time to play the enjoyable part of the game, and not add a redundant time consuming task that doesn’t.

    • sally says:

      There aren’t only two tasks outside of pet requests. Every hour for every pet, you can feed it (if it’s under 40), exercise it, play an Arcade game, craft something, and take a picture at the Photo Booth to earn Pet Care points.

      • rachelgirl192 says:

        I am surprised that exercising the pet counts towards the heart filling process, is this new? because I kept tryig the “usual” things that we do on Classic, like putting them to bed, exercising, bathing, and those things didn’t count. I must say, having to wait until they are under 40 (hunger) is something I am having problems with, because I don’t want them to be hungry. And when I have to craft something and take a photo with EVERY pet every day, this is not what I would call a daily chore. (feeding, exercising, bathing (or, like on Classic, brushing their teeth) would be a normal daily thing, I think. So for the time it takes me to do all this (including the photo and the crafting), and maybe not even be up to 100% because they were not hungry enough, I can as well wait for their request. Bottom line: I appreciate thatt here are tasks outside the pet requests, but I wish there were more which would help me to get my pet up to 100% every day without having to wait around. AND, even more important, PLEASE could you change the fact that we have to log on at exactly the same time as the day before (because otherwise, the pets are even down to 50%, not only 75). The way it is now, I have to set my clock because I am being punished when I don’t log on at the same time as the day before, and then I even have to wait for TWO requests per pet. On Classic, it does not matter at what time exactly you filled the pets’s hearts the day before. A day is a day.

        • sally says:

          These activities have been adding to Pet Care for about a year and a half now. I’ll pass your suggestions on.

          • rachelgirl193 says:

            Thank you.

          • marcblack21 says:

            I don’t want to push it too far, but it would be great if swimming, running and jumping on the trampoline counted separately for filling the pets’ hearts – as it is on Classic…

          • CocoaBunny says:

            Thank you for the reply! I never noticed it credited pet care points for crafting, photo booth pictures, or arcade games; had been more disappointed in the lack of ways you could care for your pet while at your house, as rachelgirl mentioned. And the pet care hearts dropping by half health instead of a quarter if it’s been a minute over 24hrs since you last logged in is incredibly frustrating. Thank you again for passing on suggestions.

  3. Mummabean says:

    Disappointing – I remember having to water in classic. No fun. I like to plant crops but I have barely 10,000 kinzcash. Most times if a challenge requires you to buy a rare item I do not have the funds to do so.

  4. webkinzwizard02 says:

    I think a lot of adult players forget that sometimes these little interactive things like weeding and watering crops are things that children really enjoy! My children and I have been playing Classic from the very beginning, and one of the things my daughters really loved doing was tending their “crops”. My oldest daughter is now married and has a real vegetable garden of her very own, and I think her little Webkinz gardens helped her learn that hard work pays off. We can’t expect the game to just give us everything without a little bit of effort on our part. These little challenges make the reward more fulfilling!

  5. persian says:

    That is unfortunate. It is already ridiculously hard to earn Kinz cash on Webkinz Next and the prices of everything in the W shop is insanely inflated. Without any of your new updates to farming, earning kinz cash from farming is still a lot of work because the profit is only 50% meaning you have to harvest five times out of the 10 harvest per crop, just to earn your money back for each crop you purchased. So not only do you have to harvest your crops but you have to refresh them regularly. I don’t know why your designers would think it’s a good idea to make the game such a chore and so difficult that people lose interest in playing. It should be fun, not a grind. “Rewarding us” for tending our crops daily. We have more than enough things that we are trying to do daily to keep up with the season, the vacation, the fish collection. I am so angry and frustrated by this.

    • 100dogs says:

      Yes it is hard to earn kinz cash in Webkinz next and sometimes can be really annoying but that also means the items you get from the wshop have more value since they are hard to get. It would be nice if there was a easy way to get kinz cash besides getting it from the season and growing crops.

  6. strawberrycream12 says:

    I’m really sad about these changes. I only recently discovered farming, and was so relieved to find a way to earn kinz cash to keep up with the insane prices at the W-Shop, Curio Shop, and seasonal themes and costumes. There is no easy way to make kinzcash in a manner where you can buy all of the themes that come in. I struggled to have enough to buy the costumes and Glampire theme, I’m saving for the Christmas theme, and I keep missing curio rare items because of saving. We don’t have an employment office, and many of the arcade games give very little kinz cash compared to the prices of themes. Also, the seasons already take a lot of time in the day to achieve the goals. Adding a ton of work to farming as well… I don’t know where I will find time to accomplish season goals, earn kinz cash, and keep up with the themes for decorating my house. Decorating my house is my favorite part of Classic, and I love it on Next because we have a lot more creativity for editing. I understand that you are saying some players exploited this, so I understand why you needed limits. But it really sucks for some of us newer players who just want to keep up with buying seasonal items, having enough to send back to our classic accounts, and realizing we have real world responsibilities with school and work.

    • 100dogs says:

      Yeah it is hard to buy the items from themes. DO not buy the costumes now if you are having trouble with the Glampire theme. Try to get the Glampire theme FIRST. The costumes will be in Webkinz next until the 30th of November but the Glampire theme will go away right after Halloween. Even being a new player it would take a long time to be able to buy 500 crops. Though even with having 500 planted after you have harvested all those it would add up to 25.000 kinz cash.

  7. davids1lilpixie says:

    Well I don’t know who’s making money off growing the crops, cause I can guarantee that I am not one of them. Allow me instead, to offer my own counter points of things I’m sincerely not fond in growing crops in Next gardens. Having your crops vanish after you’ve gotten 10 crops out of them, to me, is harsh and punishing. I don’t mind buying more seeds (don’t get me started on the redunkulous “crafting” materials) but the prices you charge per seeds is awful. which brings me back to I don’t who’s making money off this cause it ain’t me. Perhaps you’d better off asking yourselves how they’re getting ahold of the Next coins in the first place. Then there’s the matter of
    how incredibly limiting the seeds or lack thereof there is in the estore. The variety in the estore is pumpkins and onions only (and frankly this is where I usually buy most of my seeds) and while I don’t know about other players, I’m going dang well broke because their $25 a pop and I’ll refer to my previous statement, perhaps you should be looking into a few players have gotten ahold of the money in the first place. Nonetheless, I don’t mind buying seeds at the farmer’s market, but if we’re limited to buying only 3 seeds at time, I’m having a hard time how these players are buying enough for 500 crops, but if I need seeds outside of the farmer’s market, I can only buy pumpkins and onions, period. At first I was amused by this and then later appalled and unhappy with it the incredible lack of selection from the estore and congratulations, lol, because my garden in my one house, is primarily all pumpkins and onions. And again, I don’t know how anyone is making money off this because when I do sell produce in the estore, I get paltry prices for it. As for this business of having to water the garden every day? I’m sorry but as a housewife, I’ve got better things to do than water the garden every day. It’s bad enough that I am forced to get all of my pets up every single day, all 17 of them because, and just as frankly, I’m sincerely not fond of leaving my pets to “starve” and I’m not fond of the message that it’s okay to horde pets and to allow them to starve, in the first place. These are very bad messages to hand out to children and even I’m aware of how many youngster play in this game. You’re gonna do what you’re gonna do but, I will add this; Perhaps if you all hadn’t been so put out the sweeping notion (mentioned in a podcast year) that Classic players have “too much” money, ignoring the fact that some of us with “too much” money (and I can assure that I’ve not even broken the $500K mark), seemingly ignore the fact that we’ve been playing FOR 16 YEARS, perhaps if some bunch of someone’s hadn’t obsessed over this in the first place, perhaps, just perhaps it might not have become a been a problem here in the second place. And for the record, in two years that I’ve been playing Next, I have just over $60K on one account and because I’m an utter buffoon, I have just over $71K on my second account. I don’t know about other folks, but I am not getting rich.

    • 100dogs says:

      Let me try to explain a bit. YES you are the one getting the profit when you buy a seed for 50 kinz cash (And yes it is called Kinz Cash) And then you plant it. By the time it has been harvested 10 time you have 100 kinz cash when you sell those harvests. So you get your kinz cash back plus 50 kinz cash. And it does add up. I have planted 20.000 worth of seeds i got my 20.000 back and i am still getting more. By the time i am done i would have 40.000. Which is REALLY useful when i am trying to get the Halloween theme Glampire. This limit is mainly for those who do too much like have a WHOLE home just for crops and i am not joking i have seen it. The main way they do this is by getting crops then letting them grow harvest them then sell those to get more crops and they can make HUGE areas for crops. My garden is at least 400 crops at the moment. You can sell your crops to the Wshop OR farmers market. The market gives you better prices if you have the crop that is listed of the 3. And there is a thing in the kinz ville academy that you can get with ribbons (you get ribbons from doing the classes) and it will give you a better deal and give extra kinz cash in the wshop when you sell items. I think it is called negotiation skill.

      • davids1lilpixie says:

        Lol so, you’re proud of the fact that you figured out how to game the system and are boasting about it? Kind of suggests that you helped contribute to these changes. And I’m sorry but I stand by my words, I was going broke with the gardening. And at this point, it’s moot point. I’ll not be back, I’ve deleted both of my Next accounts because I’m sorry to say it’s not Classic and it will never have the charm, the grace, the adorability and the innocence of Classic. But you do you do and have fun. Lol and FYI, yeah, I do know that it’s called Kinz Cash. I’ve been playing 16 years on Classic.

    • rachelgirl192 says:

      What you say about the pets is exactly what I keep saying. At the beginning of Next, I thought at some point, it would be like on Classic: that we can fill their hearts by putting them to bed, feeding, bathing etc., but this is not the case and apparently it is not planned for the future, and I don’t understand why. What you say is true: the message that it is ok, even encouraged, to horde pets and then starve them and don’t care for them is certainly NOT a message that children (or adults, for that matter) should get. We are being encouraged to spark baby after baby, to grow our families, to take part in spark parties, but at the same time, it is impossible to fill their hearts and care for them all. And when you watch the podkinz and new features are being shown, you can also see that all the pets on the accounts there have empty hearts (they could at least fill their hearts before a podkinz, so that no request comes up while doing the podkinz, which has to be neglected, of course). Having a large family and then neglecting them is not educational. If filling their hearts is not considered as essential feature in Webkinz any longer, then the hearts filling should not be a feature at all, they could switch the “heart filling” process off, at least for the grown up pets who don’t need growth moments. And one comment about having “too much” money: Why would this even be a problem? It is not that players who have a lot of Kinz Cash are later entitled to get the same sum in $…. Of course I have a loto f money on Classic, because, as you say, I have been playing for many years and then it adds up, and I don’t spend so much because there is not much to spend the money on, apart from a new room design. Most of the really cool room designs are available for estore points, so for those, I don’t (or can’t) even touch my Kinz cash. Until now, I had no idea that being “rich” on Webkinz (Classic or Next) was a thing to be frowned upon. The gardening does not affect me that much. I only have crops in my farmer’s plot and only plant more if it is requested for the season (e.g. plant 5 cucumbers). It didn’t even occur to me that some people have such large gardens.

    • marcblack21 says:

      ‘I’m sincerely not fond of leaving my pets to “starve” and I’m not fond of the message that it’s okay to horde pets and to allow them to starve, in the first place. ‘ – Well said, davids1lilpixie! Thank you for pointing that out! Caring for my pets is the only thing why I still log into Next every day. I don’t want to let them down and it breaks my heart when they are unhappy.

  8. rachelgirl192 says:

    After all the complaints since yesterday, I must mention something that I really like with the new update: We can now search for things in the W Shop, like before in our docks. This is so great: the pets often ask me to buy this and that in the W Shop, and often enough, I could not fulfill the request in time because I could not find it. Thanks for this improvement.

  9. mtigger401 says:

    Is anything being done about the numerous problems wit the latest update? Pauses when interacting with pet, kid pet can’t feed baby, delay when harvesting crops, pet doesn’t bounce on trampoline. Also, family points are still not showing up when feeding or playing with baby. Was this eliminated? So many issues now.

    • 100dogs says:

      They are trying to do what they can. It would have been nice to be informed about this before it happened. But they are trying to fix bugs and add some new features. They must have spent a lot of time making it so you can water your plants. I just think we could be a little bit nicer about this and not go blame Webkinz for not fixing all the bugs. I think it would be a good idea if Webkinz keeps the crops growing as normal but added the option to water and weed your plants. For those who cant log on every day and would not need to worry about there crops not growing and for those who do log on every day can take care of there crops and could be awarded extra harvests.

  10. leaveitnow41s says:

    I don’t mind the changes. I watered and weeded for years on Classic. It is what it is.

Leave a Reply