Pet Styles

Classic pets (above) in comparison with their NC counterparts (below), as shown in TNT's Jan 2024 AMA

Pet Styles (aka. NC Pet Styles, Alt Styles, NC UCs, or Nostalgic Neopets) are species-specific NC items that can change a pet's entire look. These tokens are inspired by the original unconverted Neopets (UCs), of which they replaced on January 22nd, 2024; on this date, any remaining classic UCs were automatically applied with a colour-appropriate Nostalgic Neopet token to prevent them from accidentally converting.

How Pet Styles Work

Main article: Styling Studio#How it Works

To get a Pet Style, the user must purchase a set of Styling Studio Supplies, go to the Styling Studio and pick between Umbra's currently available styles for the user's desired pet. Some styles (such as Coconut, Jelly, Mallow, MSP, and Usuki) are always available (though this may give the user at least a 1-in-4 chance of getting their desired style when using regular Styling Studio Supplies), while others will cycle in and out after at least two months.

Unlike classic UCs, of which, when displayed in Quick Ref, had a button next to their image that said "#Name must be converted to be fully customisable," pets wearing Pet Styles can have them taken off and/or changed via the Styling Chamber. These items can also be transferred via Gift Boxes or returned to the user's inventory.

The user's own styles can also be recolored into new Prismatic styles via a Styling Studio Prismatic Brush. Once recolored, the user will also keep the original styles.

Restrictions

• Much like classic UCs, pets wearing Pet Styles cannot show any emotions besides happiness and can only wear items such as trinkets, backgrounds, music, and foreground items.
• Once transferred or abandoned, the pet's style will automatically be sent back to the Chamber.

Release

Along with the Styling Studio and Styling Chamber, Pet Styles were released on January 23rd, 2024, weeks after being teased on Neopets' social media pages (here and here).

With the release of the Pet Styles-related FAQ the day prior, it was revealed that UCs were officially no more, essentially being transferred to the new NC system. Additionally, any pets that were created prior to the date of the big conversion (April 26th, 2007) received a commemorative Old Pet Trophy for their lookups.

Pound Shutdown

To help prepare for the Pet Styles' launch, from January 18th-26th, all features of the Neopian Pound (adopting, abandoning and transferring pets) were disabled to ensure that no pets got lost in transit during the great UC transition.

Trivia

• Pet Styles may also be inspired by a request made by a Neopets user called aznnerdgrl on a Neopian Times editorial:

Throughout the years, I've been a loyal Neopian. Each painted Neopet was original and had their own touch. Unfortunately, I have noticed that Neopets have converted many of the pets so that they can wear [clothes], and as a result have lost their personalities. Therefore, I have come up with a solution that will solve everything. It will not only be economically beneficial to Neopets, but also to its users. Neopets should have an option where their users pay NC to revert their converted Neopets into the original Neopets. I can name several Neopets that would benefit from this: the faerie Pteri, faerie Draik, Darigan Ixi, and all of the plushie Neopets. I assert that I am not speaking on my behalf, but for the greater good of the Neopet community.

• On October 31st, 2022, Neopets released a survey polling Neopians for preferences on updated UCs (which would lead into today's Pet Styles), one of the choices being an unreleased Darigan Kiko design that still went unused with the release of Darigan Pet Styles in January 2023.

• The first Pet Styles released for pets that never had unconverted/scrapped versions of a specific colour (this one being Grey) were released on June 2024.

Gallery

A full list of classic UCs can be found here.

External Links

• UC Conversion/Pet Style FAQ
• List of Pet Styles on Jellyneo's Rainbow Pool