“Stunning visuals and buttery-smooth interactions – this app is a genuine delight for anyone who loves painting their way through the animal kingdom. The artwork pops, the puzzles are clever, and I’ve lost more hours than I care to admit making digital masterpieces of majestic beasts.”“However… I have to file a formal complaint with the Fauna Police. While I’m happily painting realistic elephants and coral reef fish, I suddenly run into a ‘creature’ that looks suspiciously like it flew straight out of a Zambian campfire story. Yes, I’m looking at you, Kongamato – proud breaker of boats and breaker of my educational dreams.If the goal is to teach users about real animal species and their habitats, sneaking in folklore cryptids feels like discovering a unicorn in the African savanna section. One minute I’m learning about actual biodiversity, the next I’m painting what is essentially a pterosaur cosplaying as a swamp monster. It’s like going to a science museum only to find Bigfoot doing interpretive dance in the mammal exhibit.Please keep the mythical beasts in the fantasy apps and let this beautiful tool stay grounded in reality. My inner biology nerd (and apparently my inner cryptozoology skeptic) would greatly appreciate it. Otherwise, fantastic work – just minus one star for the fictional fauna infiltration. 🦇”Thank you!
Hi!Well, this is a bit of what I feared when introducing the Cryptozoology package. There are three puzzles, the Kongamato is the less obvious one, but the Jackalope and Nessie are a bit more on the nose.These puzzles were added earlier this year as an April Fools joke. I had a bit of marketing around it, pretending these were real creatures, but then revealed in the app on April 2nd that they were in fact fictional, cryptozoological beings. You'll still get that message after finishing the Nessie puzzle.Now, my biggest mistake here was that I haven't yet updated the texts to make it immediately clear that the Kongamato and the rest are fictional creatures. The puzzle set itself also needs a proper description explaining what cryptozoology is and why this package exists. That's on me, and I'll be fixing it.That said, I do believe there's real value in keeping these puzzles, and not just because people found them entertaining. Understanding that certain creatures don't exist is part of understanding the natural world. And they are still deeply rooted in certain cultures and imageries, that people might think they are real creatures. After seeing its drawing, a friend of mine actually thought the Jackalope was an extinct mammal from the age of dinosaurs. So teaching people about these creatures and making it clear that they don’t exist can be helpful. But for that to work, the app has to be upfront about it, and right now it isn't. So I'll be updating the descriptions to make the context clear from the start.Thank you for the kind words and the thoughtful and the feedback, it's really helpful. And in case you still disagree with my point here, please just reach out via email and we can discuss this further!Cheers,Klemens
