Lots of exciting things have happened in The World of Meeroos over the past few weeks! We've seen the reveal of some new head shapes, new coats (The Emperor, Koi, Amber, Highland and now Cinder!)

Some of these have been found in starter packages which has resulted in some concerns and questions from members of our community, and I'd like to take the opportunity to fill in some gaps for you here.

All starter Meeroos are the children of Levio and Dawnara Meeroo. They are two modern meeroos who genetics are incredibly distant from their ancestors, although within their vastly complext and history-filled DNA, all of their rich history in imprinted, some imprints are much more weak the further they go back in time and generation. At times, albeit rarely, an unexpected mutation can occur resulting in the manifestation of a weak gene appearing in an offspring!

Now, considering Dawnara and Levio Meeroo have had nearly 200,000 babies in such a short frame of time, we would naturally notice an occasional mutation of their genetics! However, the spontaneous instances are not typical, or even expected results when breeding a pair, which is why it's called a mutation. The same thing happens in real life. Two dark haired, brown eyed parents can suddenly find their new born infant has red hair and blue eyes, reaching back deep into the DNA to the Mother's great, great, great Irish Grandmother! It's highly uncommon, but it does happen! It essentially reinvigorates an old gene, and redeposits it back onto the surface by imprinting freshly in an offspring. It diversifies the gene pool and is one reason we're all so unique. The further we get from our origins, the more likely these spontaneous events broaden the presence of new or unique traits in people, and in Meeroos!

Remember, we're only a little over a month into this! Even with the expedited 5 day breeding cycle, there are still thousands more Meeroos coming from our Origin Meeroos (Dawnara and Levio) than coming from you breeders. We expect that ratio to shift dramatically soon, as you guys continue breeding. Despite this, many in the community have already revealed new traits through their own breeding strategies.

Also, aside from spontaneous mutation, you can considerably increase the chances of success by increasing your status with the Meeroos, by raising the regard points of your breeding pairs as well as your own- I know many of you were worried that petting and acquisition of regard appeared to be nothing more than a time sink, and I can assure you that isn't so. All of these factors come into play when breeding,

Now, I've heard from many folks who have written to me with the complaint that they didn't get a million dollar Meeroo on their first or third try! Well, here's the thing. Genetics simulation, in a system as complex as this, doesn't ever guarantee you any absolute result. You can use strategy to increase your chances, use logic to increase your chances, but right now we're all very early in the game, and if everything was revealed already, we'd all be disappointed! Meeroos DNA goes back centuries. You're not going to remove yourself far enough away from the modern incarnation in only 5 generations, unless you are lucky enough to experience a mutation, and if you have been lucky enough, thank you because you've resurfaced some old DNA! Keep breeding it out as best you can and making that strand more concentrated until it's a rich vain and not a weak imprint! It'll take some work, as any real life animal breeder can testify, but the results and determination are rewarding!

On to food! Rememeber, I was a customer before a creator, and it felt to me like I was simply in a rat race to get something good before someone else did. The diverse biology or Meeroo diets allows interested breeders to specialize, making their efforts unique to them. Not everyone will have the same regard, or Meeroos with the same regard, so not everyone will get the same results! Not everyone will want to specialize in berry eating meeroos, they may focus on Junglevine eating Meeroos giving them the opportunity to branch and explore in a more intentional direction rather than throwing a couple together and awaiting random results. This makes our community of breeders AND their intended practices as eclectic as the Meeroos!

As I have stated in the past, our game is in a constant state of development, planned far, far ahead of time. Meeroos will not ever be "Done" as we continue to improve upon existing features and expand into new ones, while introducing new and exciting content at regular intervals. This world is an ever expanding universe. I'm tremendously excited about the things to come, and all the areas you have yet to find and explore.

My goals for the short term include improving forum usability, expanding fellowship tools, introducing different HUD sizes for people with differing UI sizes and screen resolutions, an update to the Oracle, and tons of new Meeroo content. Now, your obvious question is to ask when, and the sad reality is that I can't give you exact delivery dates. That's not fair to us, because we want to spend as much time as necessary to get it right, and it's not fair to you, as I don't want to make promises I cannot keep.

In the coming weeks we'll also be introducing our weekly "Blogger Mee-feature" where we spotlight a players Meeroo related website!

See you all very soon! Have a great week!

Catherine