# The Simpsons: Tapped Out **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Tags:** video-games-e-games\ **Created:** [December 6, 2012, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231 "2012-12-06T21:08:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 96
**Author:** ![ekweizn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7c8e57/32.png) [@ekweizn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ekweizn)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1904 "2013-12-11T16:08:33Z")
> [@Stink Fish Pot](#): > > I am still not clear on the gift bags. > > So i collected about 8 of them today, and I decided to see what would happen if I gave 5 to one person. > > Nothing. > > So, unless someone wants to make an arrangement with me, to give me all of their bags, and I’ll do the same, i think spreading the wealth would be better, i hope people that get a bag from me remember to toss me one when they visit, but giving 5 to one person I thought would do something like give you extra gift cards or something. > > I have no idea what people are talking about when they say “goo”. But one thing. I am curious about are the presents… How fast do they accumulate, and do you need to be playing the program to get them? Because I have gone back into my town and not had any near the tree until after a few minutes, then one would fall… But I thought they would generate while I was away from the game. The gift bag is a way for you to give other players gift cards (I seem to be getting 3 in each bag), which is this update’s “currency”. I’ve been giving bags to players with fewer gift cards. Goo was the currency for the most recent Halloween update, which could be collected from character tasks or from ghosts (i.e. Halloween “presents”). You could also release “gremlins” (i.e. Halloween “gift bags”) in other players’ towns that they could squish for goo, but you would also get additional goo for releasing gremlins. It appers that, in the Christmas spirit, we give gift bags without expectation of getting anything in return. Or what Intergalactic Gladiator just said. ---
**Author:** ![AlsoNamedBort](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alsonamedbort/32/3213_2.png) [@AlsoNamedBort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlsoNamedBort)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1905 "2013-12-11T17:04:45Z")
FYI, Someone did the math and you need to collect about 1000 gift cards a day in order to get all the individual prizes. Considering that you get 30 cards per friend visit plus the gifts in your town, seems pretty easy. ---
**Author:** ![Labtrash](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/labtrash/32/528_2.png) [@Labtrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labtrash)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1906 "2013-12-11T17:21:26Z")
> [@AlsoNamedBort](#): > > FYI, > > Someone did the math and you need to collect about 1000 gift cards a day in order to get all the individual prizes. Considering that you get 30 cards per friend visit plus the gifts in your town, seems pretty easy. After one night of this I’m already at 3000 cards, and I only have 80 or so friends. As someone stated earlier - easy peasy 😃 Even if the metal tree is the “drop Zone”, they still seem to place some presents randomly around my town. Wasn’t there a Doper with the Origin Handle punkyb1980 (or something close to that)? If so, there’s a present hiding behind your Sl— Eazy Hotel. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1907 "2013-12-11T17:32:49Z")
For the folks who have been playing for a year: did they do any kind of Xmas/New Years donut sale last year? ---
**Author:** ![ekweizn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7c8e57/32.png) [@ekweizn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ekweizn)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1908 "2013-12-11T17:57:24Z")
> [@Labtrash](#): > > After one night of this I’m already at 3000 cards, and I only have 80 or so friends. > > As someone stated earlier - easy peasy 😃 > > Even if the metal tree is the “drop Zone”, they still seem to place some presents randomly around my town. > > Wasn’t there a Doper with the Origin Handle punkyb1980 (or something close to that)? > If so, there’s a present hiding behind your Sl— Eazy Hotel. I like how they’ve replaced the annoying task of finding all your characters with the annoying task of finding presents. Hopefully the Elf House will make this annoyance go away. ---
**Author:** ![crypto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b3f665/32.png) [@crypto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crypto)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1909 "2013-12-11T18:58:41Z")
Here’s a question… What happens to all of the Christmas specific things bought for your town when the holiday is over? Do you get your money back, or is it lost forever? I doubt the candy cane or the bells will stay with the town after the holiday is over. Anyone know? ---
**Author:** ![Labtrash](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/labtrash/32/528_2.png) [@Labtrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labtrash)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1910 "2013-12-11T19:08:01Z")
> [@Stink Fish Pot](#): > > Here’s a question… > > What happens to all of the Christmas specific things bought for your town when the holiday is over? Do you get your money back, or is it lost forever? I doubt the candy cane or the bells will stay with the town after the holiday is over. > > Anyone know? You bought it, you own it, you keep it. That’s what the boxed inventory is for. ---
**Author:** ![AlsoNamedBort](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alsonamedbort/32/3213_2.png) [@AlsoNamedBort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlsoNamedBort)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1911 "2013-12-11T19:08:10Z")
> [@Stink Fish Pot](#): > > Here’s a question… > > What happens to all of the Christmas specific things bought for your town when the holiday is over? Do you get your money back, or is it lost forever? I doubt the candy cane or the bells will stay with the town after the holiday is over. > > Anyone know? You keep it. You can look around at some of our towns and see that there’s still Halloween stuff out. ---
**Author:** ![Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/intergalactic_gladiator/32/112_2.png) [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intergalactic_Gladiator)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1912 "2013-12-11T19:11:21Z")
> [@Stink Fish Pot](#): > > Here’s a question… > > What happens to all of the Christmas specific things bought for your town when the holiday is over? Do you get your money back, or is it lost forever? I doubt the candy cane or the bells will stay with the town after the holiday is over. > > Anyone know? You can keep them out or put them in storage for next year. I have stuff out from Halloween. Er, or what Labtrash and enzali said… ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1913 "2013-12-11T19:12:03Z")
> [@Stink Fish Pot](#): > > Here’s a question… > > What happens to all of the Christmas specific things bought for your town when the holiday is over? Do you get your money back, or is it lost forever? I doubt the candy cane or the bells will stay with the town after the holiday is over. > > Anyone know? I found that when I bought fall type things out of the store they stayed that way. I still have trees with no leaves and/or skeletons hanging off of them. But the ones that I already had that changed, changed back. I specifically bought some items yesterday with Xmas decorations just hoping they won’t change back. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1914 "2013-12-11T19:13:46Z")
> [@ekweizn](#): > > I like how they’ve replaced the annoying task of finding all your characters with the annoying task of finding presents. Hopefully the Elf House will make this annoyance go away. One of my friends ran out and bought the Elf House and was surprised at how many presents were hidden behind houses. I just moved my tree away from the houses and then once a day I hide the houses to look fro presents. You can pick them up and move them so you can click on them. ---
**Author:** ![Enderw24](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba9def/32.png) [@Enderw24](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enderw24)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1915 "2013-12-11T19:35:19Z")
I like that added feature of automatically putting characters on tasks. It automatically sorts by high priority tasks, and has the bonus feature of starting the top task line on the same duration. Want to give your first character an 8 hour task? It automatically assumes you want them all on 8 hour and preloads that as the top choice. Want it an hour? It’ll do the same there. It’s nice. ---
**Author:** ![crypto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b3f665/32.png) [@crypto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crypto)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1916 "2013-12-11T19:58:06Z")
> [@ekweizn](#): > > I like how they’ve replaced the annoying task of finding all your characters with the annoying task of finding presents. Hopefully the Elf House will make this annoyance go away. Yeah, presents can be literally anywhere. I tapped on my semi, and two cards came up. I figure there was a present behind it, out of view. They have also been behind houses, completely out of view until I either stumble on it by accident, or I move something, and it becomes visible when the houses become opaque. Someone said that tasks have a finite time span. Is that actually true? Or is that just for tasks that have only monetary rewards, and not buildings or something like Squid port attached to it? I am very far behind on my task list, and i don’t see any relief soon. I have to buy land and beach front property before i can build Squid pitt, and I don’t have the funds for that. I figure SP will be there for the length of the game, so I’m blowing that iff as well as KL for now, and focusing on the town itself. I don’t mind… I just don’t want to miss out on something that is needed later on, or is handy to have. If all of the Christmas decorations and things will be disappearing in January, I’ll focus my energy on other things. I can see how this becomes addictive. I need to scale back my time to twice a day. Maybe once in the morning, and once before I head off to sleep. Right now, it seems that every time I have a free moment, I’m checking on things, which is a colossal waste of time for the most part. ---
**Author:** ![crypto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b3f665/32.png) [@crypto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crypto)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1917 "2013-12-11T20:01:08Z")
FYI, I can accept friend requests from others, but I still cannot send a friend request. Every time I enter someone’s name, it falls off the server. But two people have sent me requests, and i was able to accept them. So if you need friends, send a request to me and I’ll accept it. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1918 "2013-12-11T20:05:30Z")
Love the new find character button, and visit next friend arrows. Things were going well late last night, but today it seems like the server is overloaded. Every ten seconds I get the retry screen. Makes it basically unplayable. I don’t know why they feel they need to check for and require the network every few seconds. That’s a very clunky way to run an app that isn’t live multiplayer. Other building games just synchronize in the background when the network or server becomes available again. I have three accounts, I don’t think I listed the third here, turtleSBU. The second account I created because I wanted to try things again with a new strategy. The third account was because there was a free donut glitch and I wanted to use it on one town and keep another town “pure”. On my older towns, it checks for lighted houses and then shows 10/10 or whatever complete. On my newer town it doesn’t come up at all. Are there any characters besides Lisa, Bart, and Homer with gift card tasks? ---
**Author:** ![Trion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@Trion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trion)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1919 "2013-12-11T20:15:52Z")
> [@jackdavinci](#): > > Are there any characters besides Lisa, Bart, and Homer with gift card tasks? More will be added as the quest progresses. For instance, once you are tasked with Apu having a gift card promotion, that task becomes available afterwards. ---
**Author:** ![Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/intergalactic_gladiator/32/112_2.png) [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intergalactic_Gladiator)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1920 "2013-12-11T20:21:30Z")
Ned takes his kids snowmobiling as well. Also, in regards to the new task button. It looks like if you have a character prompting with a speech balloon for a task, it will show that in the window. I’m starting to rethink my tapping strategies now. I used to tap the characters and send them on a new quest one by one, now you can send them all free and work through them with the button. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1921 "2013-12-11T20:25:34Z")
> [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](#): > > I’m starting to rethink my tapping strategies now. I used to tap the characters and send them on a new quest one by one, now you can send them all free and work through them with the button. That’s _exactly_ what happened to me this morning since I didn’t have to worry about characters getting lost anymore. ---
**Author:** ![Folly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/folly/32/3219_2.png) [@Folly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folly)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1922 "2013-12-11T20:32:15Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > That’s _exactly_ what happened to me this morning since I didn’t have to worry about characters getting lost anymore. I put my roads back in place instead of pavement. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231/1923 "2013-12-11T20:41:38Z")
> [@Folly](#): > > I put my roads back in place instead of pavement. I started doing that (putting in pavement) a while back. The idea seemed good, but I never liked the way it looked. I just clicked each Thumb and chased the person down. The problem is that when putting people on the same length jobs they tend to end up at the same place. With one hour jobs, everyone is at the Kwik-E-Mart, 8 Hours and everyone is at Moes and 12 hour jobs ends up with most of the crew at Church. Not a huge deal if I’ll be resetting them on my phone but when my Tablet got a major software upgrade (to KitKat) Tapped out became soooo sloooow that clearing and catching all those people got to be really difficult. In the last week or two I started taking some of those people and putting them on shorter or longer jobs just to avoid that. I guess that’s not an issue anymore. I was hoping this update would fix how slow Tapped Out was running with Kit Kat, but nope. And I know it’s not just me, there’s plenty of other people around the internet calling it unplayable now. It really is awful on the Nexus 10. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231.md?page=95) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-simpsons-tapped-out/643231.md?page=97)