"Valenth is monsters and moral dilemmas and black-market dealers and shady business and tragic figures and a very, very deliberate lack of such black and white concepts as 'good' and 'evil'."
-DNA, co-creator of Valenth
Valenth
was a Mad Science, Steampunk, and Fantasy-themed adoptables/story site. Players could adopt various creatures and level them up through several life stages, with each species having three different potential final forms. The site also had an extensive ongoing plotline, which often influences the selection of adoptable species available.
The site ran from mid 2008 to early 2014, and had over 100,000 members.
Valenth provides examples of:
- Allegedly Free Game:
- Cash Shop adoptables can only be obtained using real money. However, the trading system does make it possible for non-paying users to obtain them.
- There are now also Gold Accounts, paid account upgrades that give players additional perks.
- April Fools' Day: The Miraleupak and Kumopakalion joke species.
- Back from the Dead: Kelan Flarion.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Lyric'ai Dreamscar. Don't mess with his family. EVER.
- Body Horror: Leupak eggs, transformation due to leupak venom, horrible monstrous mutations caused by Mirajin exposure...
- Call a Rabbit a "Smeerp": Gierketts (a breed of cat), Talstags (caribou)
- Calling the Old Man Out: Valdren does this to Kelan in Book II, starting his (Valdren's) Face–Heel Turn.
- Clockwork Creature: Steampunk automatons powered by magic crystal shards. They range from tiny flying voice-messengers to humanoids with Artificial Intelligence.
- Crossover: Several promotional adoptables feature species from sister site Subeta. The Brass Hatchling also appeared as a Subeta item several months before its Valenth release.
- Dream Land: The Reverie.
- The Fatis Mirajin is purportedly slowly turning Valenth into one.
- Elemental Powers: There are seven elements: Air, Fire, Water, Earth, Vitae, Mirajin, and Mortenote
- Face Full of Alien Wing-Wong: How leupaks reproduce, usually ending in Chest Burster if the resulting baby leupak isn't removed surgically. Some hosts actually go through this willingly (abit with the surgical removal).
- Face–Heel Turn: Valdren Flarion, who went from a slightly uptight Jerkass to Knight Templar.
- Fantastic Racism: The Firestarters hate mutants and leupaks, and anything else associated with Mirajin. Some Dremish Aeneski look down upon humans and other races as inferior. The Anshe Aeneski hate everyone.
- Freudian Excuse: Valdren Flarion seems to be rather screwed up due to his "Well Done, Son" Guy father and Missing Mom.
- Funny Octopus: The Skid, cute squid creatures which were the first official species on the entire site.
- Giant Spider: The Enxiryixx, massive sapient spider creatures.
- Gotta Catch 'Em All: Optional, but some users choose to do it for the sake of 100% Completion or as a
Self-Imposed Challenge.- And for some newer members, this could quickly become impossible due to adoptable retirement.
- Grey-and-Gray Morality: To the point that who the Light Shade of Gray is really seems to depend on the viewer—if there even is one. Everyone gets the Sympathetic P.O.V.. See also page quote.
- Hellfire/Holy Hand Grenade: Flarion fire will burn almost anything, destroying any and all lifeforms on the surface (barring magical intervention), and purifying any traces of Mirajin and Morte in the area, before regrowing vegetation much faster than normal. (However, it has no association with hell. Or Hel.)
- I Have Many Names: Kelan Flarion, the Flamekeeper, the Bright One, the Soul Phoenix; Nefirion Dreamscar, the Dreamwaker, the Lord Doctor, the Watcher...and Nef.
- In-Joke: The Suspicious Green Treat food item. It was inspired by one user's particularly hilarious browser cache error, which replaced a normal Valenth food icon with a Dragon Cave sprite.
- Killed Off for Real: Aqk.
- Last-Second Word Swap: "The son of a bitch r— hurt my Paloma!"
- Lizard Folk: Silisk and Slithr, and some of the more humanoid leupaks.
- Mad Scientist: Doctor Nefirian Dreamscar, and most of the Silent Rose Organization.
- Magitech: Miratechnology
- Mon
- Money for Nothing: The site currency, Krüs, is earned by feeding adoptables, and it's fairly easy to amass large quantities of it. Various shop items and species that cost Krüs to adopt were introduced as a Money Sink.
- Horse of a Different Color: Griffins, Land-drakes, Prrbs, Talstags caribou, Unicorns, Baslisks, and Sand-Cavy
- Mutants: Mirajin mutates things in unpredictable and painful ways. Some "tainted" adoptables are visibly mutated to reflect this.
- No Biological Sex: Adoptables originally had no assigned genders. When the gender system was introduced, all pre-existing adoptables were deliberately left with the special "genderless" status. They are now very rare collectors items.
- Additionally, leupaks lack a physical gender (though due to influence of the other races, many identify with one), as do (obviously) the automans.
- Opposite-Sex Clone: The Erosion dragons are sterile, and all individuals, including the males, are actually clones of Lady Marquise. This is explained as their gender being determined by temperature during egg incubation, as with some real-life reptiles.
- Our Monsters Are Different: Lots of them.
- Our Demons Are Different: Viadante
- Our Dragons Are Different: There are, let's see, how many kinds?
- Our Elves Are Different: They call themselves Aeneski.
- Our Fairies Are Different: Both the Aeneski and the Smallfae technically are fae, though the former are elves. The latter...vary.
- Our Gargoyles Rock
- Our Vampires Are Different: In addition to the aforementioned Viadante who eat souls, Valenth also has more traditional blood-drinking Vampires.
- Our Werewolves Are Different: Varworgn
- Our Souls Are Different: Vitae life-energy. The planet has a finite amount of this, and it usually returns to the vitae reservoir upon an individual's death so that it can be recycled into new life. Mirajin mutation corrupts vitae and interferes with this process, however...
- Palette Swap: The Pandaprrbs, the Pacos, the Clockwork contest prize adoptables, and the original Chicklets. Also the rare alternate colored "shiny" variant adoptables.
- Power Crystal: The Fatis Mirajin, a Philosopher's Stone Gone Horribly Wrong. Small shards from it are used in various alchemical, magical and technological applications.
- Rare Candy: The Elevelixir item.
- Retcon: The unfinished Halloween 2008 plot was later retconned out of existence.
- The retired Imp adoptables which were associated with it became one of the most highly sought after species on the site, until they were briefly re-released in September 2010.
- Rodents of Unusual Size: Sand-Cavies, enormous guinea pigs that can serve as mounts.
- Shout-Out:
- Steampunk: One of the main themes of the site.
- The Fair Folk: Aeneski elves. The Anshe tribes in particular are quite nasty, perpetually at war with each other and violently xenophobic. Dremish Aeneski, not so much, though they do have the standard elven superiority complex.
- The official wiki also counts as a Universe Compendium.
- Unlockable Content: Some species can only be obtained by meeting special requirements. Faction membership has several different levels of exclusive rewards.
- Unsettling Gender-Reveal: Initial user confusion over Elliot Christoph's gender.
- Walking Shirtless Scene: Bastion Bloodhawk.
- Weirdness Magnet: Poor Gabriel Gaunthier. He's had to deal with Lab Gremlins (not those ones), Shadowling Imps, Night-Worgn, Varworgn including his partner Eva Santora turning into one, and now dinosaurs.
- With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Nefirian Dreamscar, Mad Scientist. Later Valdren Flarion, who turns into a Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds, depending on your point of view.
