Horrible Histories World

Horrible Histories World is a virtual world which is inspired by the Horrible Histories book series by Terry Deary. The premise involves the player travelling back in time and experiencing history. The game includes 5 different virtual worlds: Putrid Pirates, Rotten Romans, Terrible Tudors, Measly Middles Ages, and Awful Egyptians.^[1] It was put together by Scholastic Children's Books and Yomego Social Media Agency, and officially launched in August 2011.^[2] The world was built on the Huzutech platform.^[3] The publisher reported in November 2011 that: "We now have over 36,000 registered users to the Horrible Histories virtual world. We are continually adding new content and hopefully this will improve. The latest additions include a new game called Rat Runs, a joke machine and daily facts."^[2] Other planned features included an online virtual good shop, a moderated chat feature, and events where subscribers would meet Terry Deary or a historical character.^[4] The publishing and commercial director of Scholastic Children’s Books - Lisa Edwards - said: "We are very proud of the online Horrible Histories experience we have created and are delighted to make it available to every fan, in every corner of the globe. In this way, it more closely reflects the Pottermore model".^[3]

Horrible Histories announced the closure of the virtual world in a post to their website made on July 24, 2012.^[5] Scholastic announced that "the virtual world's key features, which include games, quizzes, quests and virtual goods trading, will migrate to the core brand site www.horrible-histories.co.uk.".^[3] The site has "gathered over 70,000 users in nine months but was only available to UK residents".^[3]

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