Poupee Girl
Let's talk Poupée!
A popular browser-based Virtual Paper Doll game, poupéegirl (commonly shortened to "Poupée") was also a personal fashion blog, since players can upload the items they own in real life. It can be considered a Fashion Magazine thanks to the site's recommendations, and a social network, since players can befriend others with similar interests.
When users sign up they get to customize the physical features of their "poupée" (French for "doll"), who will become their avatar on the site. Poupées are Always Female, and outside of generic starter outfits, clothes for them to wear are earned by uploading photos of the user's real-life wardrobe, redeemed through cashing in the "shells" (collected by exploring poupée profiles), or bought with "Ribbons" (free virtual currency) and "Jewels" (cash-based virtual currency) from other poupées or the site's matriarch Katharine.
The site is based in Japan, though it has millions of users worldwide, and most of the site has been translated into passable English. If you can withstand the bugs, a fan-made tool called Pupemodel is available, which lets you create and dress a doll with any item you wish for free without a poupéegirl account, if you have the codes[1].
Tropes used in Poupee Girl include:
- Betting Minigame: Both the Shell Spring and the Piyo Catcher, where you have a chance of winning a selection of either really cute or really dumpy items, and nothing stopping you from getting doubles.
- Blind Idiot Translation: Everywhere. The site is full of Engrish, be it the instructions, the item names or Katharine's posts.
- Some members of the English LiveJournal community actually tried contacting Katharine for amnesty from brownboxing (being disallowed from showcasing your Closet due to rulebreaking) because the English translation of the rules is so confusing.
- Digital Avatar
- Fashion Magazine
- Game Within a Game: "Go! Go! Piyo Balloon"
- Gratuitous English
- Gratuitous French: The game's name.
- In-Universe Game Clock: The view of Poupée Town and the window in your poupée's room changes according to the time of the day and the season.
- Kawaisa
- Mini Game: "Piyo Catcher" and "Go! Go! Piyo Balloon".
- No Bulk Discounts: You never get these at Katharine's Shop or the Poupée Market. Averted by the Piyo Catcher, where you can get a discount for going for three items instead of one.
- No Export for You: Pupegirl DS, which is available only in Japan.
- Reality Subtext: More seasoned poupées and those that read Katharine's blog are very familiar with Ken, her ex-boyfriend. Ken has appeared as a bonus in several event backgrounds, and Kath sells Ken-themed items around April Fool's Day.
- Kath admitted to gaining weight on her blog after her break-up with Ken, which was followed by a wave of candy- and sweets-themed items in her shop.
- Scoring Points: The Suteki feature for both your poupée and the items you post. There are even daily Top 10 rankings with prizes for them.
- Series Mascot: The Piyos are small, colourful birds.
- Anime Hair: Averted, despite the cutesy anime style of the poupées themselves. All of the hairstyles are possible in real life.
- An Interior Designer Is You: You can change the wallpaper of your poupée's room, and if you're a Jewel user you can also purchase flooring.
- Barbie Doll Anatomy: Poupées wearing nothing have brown undies by default, but even if you glitch them into nakedness they don't have anything to hide.
- Bare Your Midriff
- Bishie Sparkle
- For Ribbons users, animated face and body sparkles are possessed by a lucky few, as they were sold as limited-edition unsellable items, meaning that they are unobtainable if you didn't buy them during the event.
- For Jewel users, there are several animated sparkle items available on the "Effect" floor of Katharine's Shop. As long as you're willing to dish out 200-400 jewels each.
- Character Customization
- Costume Porn
- Culture Equals Costume: Katharine is rather notorious for doing this for her "Ethnic" events.
- Elegant Gothic Lolita: One of the most popular styles in Events and Closets.
- First-Person Snapshooter: You update your poupée's status by taking snapshots of her. There isn't much variety in the result, unless you catch her blinking or are wearing an animated item.
- Hair Decorations: Hair Accessory is an entire dress-up category, boasting over 600 items.
- Flower in Her Hair: One popular style of Hair Decs.
- Everything's Better with Sparkles: Certain items sparkle, as well as the otherwise invisible body glitter that results in the Bishie Sparkle described above.
- Form-Fitting Wardrobe
- Funny Afro
- Giant Waist Ribbon: Prominently featured during New Year's events.
- Girlish Pigtails
- Gorgeous Period Dress: Though accurately period clothing is less common than the other gorgeously pimped-out regalia.
- "Happy Holidays" Dress
- Hollywood Dress Code: More or less the idea behind many of Katharine's events.
- Impractically Fancy Outfit
- Only Six Faces: Averted. Taking into account all the possible options for eyes and mouths, there are 108 possible faces!
- Opera Gloves
- Palette Swap: Many dress-up items fall into this category, known colloquially as "colorways".
- Pandaing to the Audience: One of the "Character Motif" sets was panda-themed, as well as a panda catcher game.
- Petting Zoo People: Most of the early animal-themed items took the form of ears-on-hairbands, but as time went on Katharine's items evolved into legitimate animal ears and tails. Gloves and boots that look like paws are also available.
- Pimped-Out Dress
- Pirate Girl: Made possible by the Pirate Girl Piyo Catcher.
- Requisite Royal Regalia: Katharine's "Nobility" events embody this trope.
- Sailor Fuku: Sold during various "School" events.
- Sexy Santa Dress: And sexy reindeer dress, and sexy angel dress, and...
- Sweater Girl
- Yamato Nadeshiko: Kimono and other Yamato Nadeshiko staples are some of the most valuable items on the site, and Katharine frequently holds events featuring items for traditional beauties.
- "Yamato Nadeshiko" is actually the name of an item (a fan).
- You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Surprisingly averted; all of the available hair colours are natural with the exception of dark pink.
- Zettai Ryouiki
- ↑ most item codes can be looked up on Oribon, and unlisted items can be found with the help of the thriving LiveJournal community