How to play · VanillaCity

Your first day

Choose a name (3 to 16 letters, numbers or underscores) and a password, and confirm you're 13 or older. Then Kassi, the city's Ambassador, takes you on a tour:

The closet. Every citizen starts in the closet at the back of Vanilla Threads, where you choose your body, face and hair.
Vanilla Threads. Meet Sxniyah and buy your first clothes and a bag with your 300 starting coins.
City Hall. Meet Mayor Ty and Assistant Mayor Lucian, read the city rules and sign them.
The Post Office. Mabel gives you your P.O. box, and there's a gift waiting in it. Send Kassi a thank-you postcard.
The police and the fire department. Officer Haith and Captain Hayes, and a look round the cells.
Your apartment. Dottie at The Garden Apartments has a room with your name on it. Make your first chair from Kassi's toolbox.
Ken, Donna, the Job Board, the bank and the Chamber. Where furniture, pets, jobs, savings and businesses come from.

After the tour you can go wherever you like.

Getting about

Tap or click the ground to walk there. Tap a door to go in.
Tap a bench or a chair to sit on it. The Emotes button has Wave, Jig and Sit, and Sit works anywhere off the road. Walk off, or pick Stand up, to get going again.
Zoom with + and −, the mouse wheel, or two fingers.
Type in the chat bar at the bottom to say something out loud. What's been said in the room lately shows above it.
Tap someone for their card. From there you can wave, send a postcard or a gift, add them as a friend, visit their apartment, trade, or report them.
Your name, level, reputation and money are at the top left. Mail, Friends, Tasks, Bag and the Menu are at the top right.
Tap the clock for the forecast: VanillaCity keeps real time and real weather.

Levels, tasks and your paycheck

Most things you do earn EXP: shifts at the Job Board, fish, games, meals, a candle lit at the church. Your level goes up as it adds up, 25 levels in all, and it shows on your card. Some places, like Downtown and the old State Hospital, open at level 5.

Every 60 minutes you spend in town is paid: 25 coins and 5 EXP. If you leave partway, the minutes wait for you.

Tap Tasks for the day's four. They're the same for everyone and change at midnight. Each one pays 20 coins and 15 EXP, and finishing all four pays another 40 coins and 25 EXP.

The town keeps a reputation for you too: New Arrival, Familiar Face, Trusted, Valued, Pillar. Helping out and reports that turn out right raise it. Tickets and time in a cell lower it. People see the name of your tier on your card, never a number.

Money

There are two kinds: coins, for nearly everything, and VanillaBucks, for a few special things. Coins come from odd jobs, fishing, 8-ball and your business; your business also puts a VanillaBuck in the till now and then. The Bank of Vanilla keeps both safe and sends them to friends (5% of what you send in coins, 10% in VanillaBucks). VanillaBucks change hands only at the bank. Everything about money, from what each job pays to what things cost, is on Coins and VanillaBucks.

Your Bag

Tap Bag for everything you carry, with a tab for each kind: your bag itself, clothes, toys, rides, pets and the finds from your Collection Book. Get dressed from Clothes, pick a toy to hold from Toys, and get on something from Rides.

Bag full? Tap one of the green trash cans round the park to throw things away. Anything bought with coins can go in, and so can things you found or caught. Nothing bought with VanillaBucks can. Anyone can look in a can and take out what's in it. People throw all sorts away, so a look now and then can turn up something good. The garbage truck comes round about every half hour and empties them.

Your apartment

Your apartment is up the stairs at The Garden Apartments. Tap Decorate to place and rearrange furniture, which you either build at Ken's workbench from materials he sells or buy ready-made from his showroom. You can change the wallpaper and floor too. Tap a radio, jukebox or TV to play something for everyone in the room.

Jobs

The Community Job Board is by City Hall's door. Take a job, do it, and you're paid in coins each time, a few times a day: emptying the park's bins, clearing the cups from Peach Tree Cafe's tables, reading the children a story at the library, walking dogs, and in season raking leaves or shovelling snow.

A business of your own

Apply for a business voucher on the Job Board, under Start a business: say why you want one.
City Hall reads it and writes back. If it's approved, take the voucher to Mr. Whitaker at the Chamber of Commerce and send your business request: the kind of business, its name and your plan.
Once it's open, your shop is one of the storefronts in City Central, with its name over the door. Stock the shelves, set your prices, keep the place tidy and open up. Shoppers come in while it's open, and you empty the till at the counter.

A shop only earns while you keep it going. It closes itself when it runs out of stock or gets too messy.

Pets

Donna's Pet Pause on Ogeechee Street sells pets of all kinds. Open the Pets tab in your Bag to take yours along or send it home, and tap anyone's pet to pet it, play with it or give it a treat. You can keep a few.

Things to do

Fishing: buy a rod from Ken or make one at his workbench, then fish from the riverbank or the pier. Tap Cast, and Reel in! when the bobber dips. Marisol buys your catch at the Town Market.
Basketball: at Ogeechee Park, stand on a court, hold Shoot (or the space bar) and let go in the green.
The arcade: arcade games and the pool tables at Vanilla Arcade & Billiards. Winning a game of 8-ball against another citizen pays coins; arcade tickets buy prizes at Benny's counter.
The cinema: put a YouTube video up in one of Vanilla Cinema's screening rooms, and everyone in there watches it together.
The train: buy a ticket from Johnny at the station and ride the Midland Pacific Downtown and back.
Round the square: eat at the Ogeechee Diner and pick a song on the jukebox, get the day's special at the Peach Tree Cafe, buy a book at Pages or flowers at Bloom, take Captain Hayes's fire safety quiz, and light a candle at the church.
The police station: anyone can walk in and see who's in the cells. Whatever's said in there stays in there.
Winter: sled or tube down Ogeechee Park's sledding hill, and skate on the frozen lake.

Rides and toys

Spoke & Sprocket in Vanilla Town Center sells things to ride, from a skateboard to a go-kart. Once you buy one it's yours for good, and you get on it from the Rides tab in your Bag. Rides are for outside: you'll go back to walking at a door. Riders can use the road, but don't stop in it. A minute standing still in the road gets you walked to the pavement and a ticket.

Jinx's Gag Shop next door sells toys to hold: flashlights, glow sticks, balloons, bubble wands, confetti poppers, squirt guns, water balloons and paintball markers. Pick one from the Toys tab, then Aim and tap where you want it to go. Your play settings say who's allowed to splash you: anyone, only your friends, or nobody. When there's snow on the ground you can pack a snowball for free.

VIP

VIP members get into the VIP Lounge in the VIP Club by the lake, wear VIP on their card, can use VIP banners and frames, and pick a color for their chat and their name. There are 8 colors to choose from, at the stand by the Club's door or at Monroe's desk inside. A month is 10,000 VanillaBucks, a year 50,000, and life 1,000,000. Buying again adds to the time you have left. If your membership runs out, your chat and name go back to plain until you renew. You can also buy VIP in the store.

Ribbons

There are 336 ribbons for things you do in town, from your first fish to a year without a ticket. Tap your card and Ribbon Book to see what you've earned and what's left, and pin your favourites to your card. The Ribbon Book is on this site too.

Friends and the post

Tap someone and Add friend, or tap Friends and type their name. Your list shows who's online and which part of VanillaCity they're in (never the building), or that they're aboard the Midland Pacific. There are no private messages: send postcards from the Post Office or any blue mailbox, and wrap gifts at the Post Office. Trading happens face to face: tap someone and Trade, put in what you're giving, and tick when you're happy; nothing changes hands until you've both ticked.

Staying safe

Never share your address, phone number, school or passwords, and never ask anyone for theirs. If someone bothers you, tap them and Report: staff read every report. The city rules are here.

Everyone has a page under Citizens on this site, showing what anyone could see of them in town. To take yours off, open the Menu in the game, then Account, and turn off My page on the website. You can hide just the numbers for what you've done in town there as well.