The army community has been increasingly dependent on Club Penguin Army Battleground for hosting events. Its creation changed the environment of armies significantly. Let us take a look back at when it all began.

Designed by Cassie

Since its creation, the community has hosted dozens of events every week on CPA Battleground. Despite it not supporting all of the features from Club Penguin, the community continues to use and enjoy using it. With that being said, CPAB has been consistently improved and developed by Army Legend Superhero123. One can only wonder if and when we will get some of the original features like Card Jitsu but one thing is certain, the game has come a long way since its creation.

Early Development

Super’s idea was to create a Club Penguin private server solely dedicated to wars and other army events. After Adobe Flash reached the end of its life, several Club Penguin private servers failed to last long. Super saw this and decided to create his own private server specifically for armies, using HTML5 technology. This private server was not his first prototype. He previously worked on a project during middle school to recreate Club Penguin. It was one of the first programming projects he had ever worked on. This gave him all the experience he needed to create CPAB.

The game was created using the Yukon and Phaser libraries, which can be understood as modules that are present on the backbone of the game. Following its creation, early registration was open, but activation was not allowed until the game was released. The game held a public BETA on April 23rd, 2022. allowing the community to test the game. From here, bugs were fixed and the game’s release was set in motion.

CPAB was initially entitled Untitled Army Game. Soon, a poll was conducted to decide the name of the game. The poll was unsuccessful since no more than 22% of votes were given to a singular choice.  Therefore, another poll kicked off with a total of 76 voters partaking in the voting process. Ultimately, CPA Battleground was decided as the name of the game, with 28.95% of the vote. A little-known fact is that the name was originally suggested by Dman64w. Thank you Dman!

An announcement conveying the release of CPA Battleground.

Progression

Super has been paying a decent amount over the past two years to keep the game running. He has also received support from the army community on his Patreon page. Overall, the progression of the game has been slow. Fortunately, however, the game has become a well-designed stage for armies to perform on. Unlike other Club Penguin private servers, commands were added to count the number of troops instantaneously. Not only does it count the amount of troops in a room but also on the server or in an army’s uniform.

Rooms are frequently updated/adapted for tournaments, seeing easter eggs and logos placed in specific rooms. Alongside this, there is often a focus on server stability. In the past, servers had stability issues because of the large amount of penguins online. However, over time, this has only been improved. Because of this, the community has been able to witness battles between multiple armies take place. This includes the recent New Year Bonanza tournament which saw five major and four small/medium armies facing off.

The Forest was redesigned in August 2022 to allow armies to battle in it more freely

Currently, as of March 2024, over 36,000 accounts have been activated on the game. This is a tremendous amount which will only increase as time goes on.

Future

Currently, the game does not support most minigames. However, the developer may decide to add them in the future. The game may even shut down at any point in time. Neither the future of the game nor the community is certain but as long as there is a will, there is a way. As long as the game is supported and funded, it will be available for as long as it can be.

Club Penguin Armies approached Superhero123 to learn more about the creation of CPA Battleground and its development.

What motivated you to create CPA Battleground?

When Flash died the need for an HTML5 army CPPS quickly became apparent. A lot of people kept asking me to develop one and so I did just that.

What did you do behind the scenes to develop the game?

Mainly write code for new features for the game/bot, or implement new updates from Yukon, the base CPPS source CPAB uses.

Did you gain any experience throughout the game’s development, if so, what?

I would say I primarily gained experience in managing medium-scale online communities. I also learned some programming skills but to a lesser extend since I was already quite familiar with programming from high school and university.

Do you have plans for the game’s future?

Plenty! New rooms, multiplayer games and more are on way. Only obstacle for everything is my lack of free time. There will hopefully soon be new developers joining me though.

Do you have an additional message to the army community? If so, what is it?

The point of CPA is to have fun, never forget this! If you aren’t having fun then maybe your role in the community isn’t the one that suits you, or you may simply just need to take a break.

You can also learn more about CPAB’s creation and development, and Super’s time in the community on CPA’s recent podcast, hosted by Toxic Storm on CPA’s YouTube.

The creation of CPA Battleground has left a lasting impact on armies, allowing them to select a unified and preferred server that meets their needs. Do you have similar aspirations to build a Club Penguin private server? How long do you think CPA Battleground will last?

More Information

Fun X Time

Hi! I am Fun X Time, formerly and popularly known as Krill 300, or simply Krill. I am currently serving as a Commander-in-Chief at the Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) since November 2023. I have been in armies since February 2020. I am interested in computer science, programming, physics, chemistry, and biology. What about you?