We are in the peak of summer, and, with that, Origins launched Habbo Football for the month of July!

Let’s get into the review. As always, these are my own views, while also taking into account what I’ve seen and heard across the community. I always try to remain fair when writing these reviews, and any criticism is intended to be constructive.

Football Fever hits the Hotel!

The first article of the month kicked off announcing Habbo Football. With that the article stated that Sports Café and The Stadium were reopened (I wasn’t even aware that they were closed…).

Two new mini-games were introduced, Penalty Shootout and Goalkeeper as seen below. These were cute additions in my opinion and should just be kept in the game for a cute additional activity.

The Flags section of the Catalogue was also expanded with more countries, which might seem like a small addition, but this has actually been a pretty big ask from the community since the beginning of Origins. It’s nice to finally see more players able to represent their country within the Hotel, and hopefully we’ll continue to see the selection expanded where possible.

We also received new Football Trophies within the Trophy section of the Catalogue, available in Gold, Silver and Bronze. I really like the gold and silver versions, but I’m not sold on the bronze at all. The colour is quite off-putting and doesn’t really match the other ‘bronze’ colours we’re used to seeing across Origins, so it looks a little out of place alongside the other two. The trophies were also released bugged and remained in this state for the entirety of the month, which I can’t imagine encouraged anyone to buy these or gift to others.

Football & Sports Furniture arrived in the hotel!

This section will be quite small because overall, I really like the Football furniture line. It fits perfectly within Origins, it’s fun and there is plenty there for players to create their own stadiums, pitches and Football-themed rooms.

Habbos were also pleased to see the Sports section return to the Catalogue after a two-year wait, which was a welcome return and obviously made sense alongside the Football theme throughout July.

The Football itself being 15 credits, however, is absolute madness to me and far too expensive. Considering it is quite literally the main item required to actually play Football, I really don’t think it needed to come with that kind of price tag.

Later in the month, it was announced that the Football furniture wouldn’t be staying permanently within the Catalogue. Instead, it will eventually be available to trade through an NPC Bot which is due to arrive in Origins. This means the furniture will still remain accessible going forward, just through a different method.

Event Creators – Season 2!

I feel like this was probably the right amount of time to move on from Season 1. With Season 2, Habbos involved in EC events will receive fresh rewards, including updated Jade Giftboxes containing new ducks and a new rares, while the Dragon remains. The Season 1 token has also been updated to reflect Season 2. The second season won’t officially begin until July has ended.

Regarding the Event Creator side of things, which I always tend to cover in these reviews, things do seem a little quieter than usual. However, we need to remember that Event Creators are players and members of the community - this isn’t their job. If they’re taking some time off or simply have other things going on, they’re absolutely allowed to do so.

If there’s anything we can do as a community, it’s to keep that in mind. Everyone involved gives up a bunch of their own time to create events and activities for the rest of us to enjoy!

Origins Football Cup!

Spidercides is also kicking off Season 2 of the Event Creators with the Origins Football Cup, and there has clearly been a huge amount of work put into organising this.

32 players have had to be selected and organised into teams, with country rooms, uniforms, match schedules, rules, substitutions, prizes and even contingencies for golden goals, penalties and no-shows. Trying to organise all of that around 32 different people’s availability, on your own time, is no small task.

There was also a livestream for those who wanted to watch, while everyone who logs in on the day can receive the Origins Football Cup badge. I think making the badge available to the wider Hotel is a particularly nice touch and gives everyone something from the event even if they weren’t selected to play.

My only slight criticism is really down to timing. With the World Cup now over, some of that football hype has naturally started to die down, and I think this would have hit even harder while the tournament was still ongoing.

That said, I absolutely appreciate the sheer amount of planning Spidercides has put into making this happen. Events on this scale take considerably more work behind the scenes than players probably realise, particularly when you’re trying to make everything work around everyone else’s time. Hopefully it all goes smoothly on the day!

Football Activity Tracker

I’ll start off by saying that I really like the Activity Tracker idea and thoroughly enjoyed it throughout Anniversary Month. However, this month it just did not land with me at all - I didn’t even spend the 100 credits.

The communication surrounding the tracker was, in my opinion, extremely poor. Initially, nobody seemed to know that levels were capped daily, which naturally resulted in complaints that the Activity Tracker was bugged. The whole roll-out felt a little scuffed and, ultimately, like a lot of effort for not a lot of fun. If you wanted the Gold Football Trophy then fair enough, but it just wasn’t for me, and I certainly didn’t think the rewards were worth the credits required.

The Football Skill Rooms absolutely helped Habbos complete the tracker, and I did participate in the free one, but let’s imagine for a second that these rooms didn’t exist. One of the objectives required you to kick a football, I believe, 4,000 times. Even with a Skill Room doing the work for me, while I quite literally wasn’t at my laptop, my Habbo took roughly three hours to complete this objective.

Can you imagine how utterly boring and tedious that would have been if you were sitting there ‘playing’ football on Habbo for the entire thing?

For me, the bar was simply set far too high with this tracker. While the Skill Rooms were beneficial and certainly helpful, the reality is that many Habbos using them weren’t sitting at their computers. So, while technically there was ‘activity’ happening, there was very little actual player activity taking place in the Hotel - and to me, that somewhat defeats the purpose of an Activity Tracker, and it just doesn’t look great for the game. The lack of communication or guidance surrounding the tracker I can’t imagine is too appealing to anyone new signing up for origins and I think given how long some objectives took, it should have continued for the entire month so people, specifically those who paid have the best chance to complete it.

Competition – Build the HABCUP FINAL

I will die on the hill that we need two competitions a month, always. However, I’ll always take the one, and realistically we know there is a lot of shifting happening on the Sulake side right now, so we may not see a consistent two competitions being run each month for some time.

This competition more or less wrote itself: build a Habbo Football Stadium. Honestly, there are so many creative people within the game and, from what I’ve seen already, I think we have some clear contenders for those hammers.

Kudos to the creativity on display and the genuinely advanced building we continue to see within Origins. Some of you really do know how to push what can be done with the limited tools available in the game.

Fishing Derbies re-imagined!

Fishing Derbies received a pretty substantial overhaul this month and, although I haven’t had the chance to actually participate in one yet, I really like what I’m seeing here.

The biggest change is that Derbies now put everyone on an equal playing field. Your normal Fishing level is essentially put to the side during a Derby, with everyone receiving the same fish, catch chances and weight ranges. There are also now two different modes: Standard, where your ten heaviest catches determine your score, and Frenzy, where it’s simply about catching as many fish as possible before the time runs out.

What I particularly like about this update is that it originated from a player-created concept. We’ve spoken plenty of times about how important community involvement is for Origins, and seeing an idea from a player actually developed and introduced into the game is exactly the kind of thing I want to see more of.

It also makes Fishing Derbies feel a little more creative than they were before. Rather than every Derby essentially following the same formula, there’s now some variety in how they can be played, while the changes to fishing levels and catch rates should make them much more accessible to newer players.

I haven’t played the revamped version yet, so I’m not going to pretend I can judge how well it works in practice, but on paper? I really like this. More player-created ideas making their way into Origins, please!

Articles & Communication

This month felt flat on the articles and communication front. There really wasn’t a lot given in terms of information, and even some of the basic promotional articles we would usually expect for things like Rares, Funky Fridays and other smaller releases were noticeably absent.

While those articles might seem minimal in the grand scheme of things, I think they’re really important - particularly for a game and community the size of Origins. Communication creates engagement. An article appearing on the homepage gives players something to check, something to talk about and, importantly, another reason to actually log into the Hotel.

It also keeps the game looking busy.

Not every article needs to announce a huge feature or contain some ground-breaking update. Sometimes simply promoting a rare entering the Catalogue, reminding players about an event, highlighting a Funky Friday or showcasing something happening within the community is enough. Those smaller articles create a steady stream of activity and give the impression that there is always something happening within Origins.

Overall, we had 17 articles published throughout the month. Looking back at everything that happened during July, I genuinely think another six or seven articles could quite easily have been produced without unnecessarily padding things out.

Communication has been something I’ve spoken about repeatedly in these reviews because I genuinely think it matters. When communication slows down, the Hotel can begin to feel quieter than it is. Origins might not have massive announcements to make every week, but consistently talking about what is happening goes a long way towards keeping players engaged and the game feeling alive.

Rares

Foosball Table – Released 07/07/2026

I loved this Rare, really cute animation and a nice price point for what it is. No promo image or article for it though! Big womp.

Emerald Spaceship Door – Released14/07/2026

Now I know that it’s a ‘Spaceship’ door but for the month just caller it an Emerald Stadium Door. Missed opportunity but at least a promotional image with it.

Stadium Smoke Machine – Released 21/07/2026

Big sigh whilst also making no sense in relation to the month aside from grass being green.

Orca Ice Cream Machine – Released 28/07/2026

It’s fine, people like ICM’s. 

Funky Friday

Football Pitch Rug – Released 04/07/2026

Didn’t get one myself but I can’t deny its very cute and clever. No promo image.

Franks Football Shirt – Released 10/07/2026

Another cute wall furni! I liked this a lot. No promo image.

Heritage Vendro – Released 17/07/2026

Should have in all honesty just been a rare, this makes more sense than a smoke machine. Really liked this! No promo image!

Silver Glide Roller - Released 25/07/2026

Nice price compared to the 7c rollers in catalogue. No promo image.

*Article will be updated tomorrow with 31/07/2026 Funky Friday*

Noco Arrives !

Noco came and went once again - although “24 hours” seems to be becoming more of a loose suggestion, with it sticking around for a few days again this month.

I always struggle to find much to say about Noco, purely because I just do not care for the feature. I understand the concept and there are clearly Habbos who enjoy seeing what appears each time, but personally it does absolutely nothing for me.

There isn’t much more I can add here without forcing an opinion for the sake of filling a section.

Project Keystone

I’ve already covered Project Keystone extensively through Origins Observer, so I won’t go too deeply into it here. However, I do think it provides some important context as to why July has felt considerably slower than previous months.

Development is heavily focused on Keystone right now, and we already know that this has resulted in other features such as Cooking and Blueprints progressing a little slower than originally hoped.

There is a lot to look forward to with the new client. The sprite limit will finally be gone, loading times will be dramatically faster, we’ll be able to select our Hotel and Hotel View directly from the client and even pressing ESC will no longer close the entire game! Keystone will also allow assets such as new furniture, clothing and hand items to be delivered much more easily, while giving the developers far more freedom to experiment with new features in the future.

Dave has also been regularly teasing progress through videos on Discord and X, and from what we’ve seen so far, it’s shaping up nicely.

Obviously, I can’t include Keystone when it comes to scoring July. It isn’t content we can currently play or experience, and I can only review what has actually been delivered during the month. However, I absolutely think it provides some explanation as to why things currently feel slower.

With summer holidays, people taking time off and a huge amount of focus going into getting Keystone ready, perhaps this is the right time to have a quieter period. My only ask would be a little more communication around that. If things are going to be slower while Keystone takes priority, tell us! It gives the community some context while we wait for what could be a very exciting next chapter for Origins.

Conclusion

I’m going to be quite straightforward with July: I didn’t particularly enjoy this month.

That doesn’t mean there weren’t things I liked. Football was a fitting theme for the summer, the return of the Sports furniture was welcome, the new mini-games were cute additions, and the Fishing Derby overhaul is exactly the type of player-inspired development I want to see more of. There were good ideas here.

Unfortunately, when I look at July as an entire month, it just felt flat.

The Activity Tracker was probably my biggest disappointment. Something I really enjoyed during Anniversary Month became tedious, expensive and poorly communicated this time around. The Football theme had potential, but beyond the initial additions, I don’t think enough happened throughout the month to keep that momentum going.

Communication really hurt July for me as well. Fewer articles, missing promotional material and generally less noise surrounding what was happening made Origins feel even quieter. When the amount of playable content is already lighter, communication becomes even more important, not less.

I completely appreciate that Project Keystone is taking priority behind the scenes, and based on everything we know about it, I think that is absolutely the right decision for the long-term future of Origins. Summer may also be the perfect opportunity to focus on getting it over the line. However, as I mentioned earlier, I can’t award July points for something we cannot play yet. It provides context for a quieter month, but it doesn’t change my experience of the month itself.

July wasn’t necessarily a bad month for Origins but for me, it was simply an underwhelming one. There were some good additions and ideas scattered throughout, but I did not feel particularly engaged with what was happening.

Overall score: 5.8

Hopefully, July is simply the quieter month we needed to have while something much bigger is being built behind the scenes.

I don’t take any enjoyment from giving Origins a lower score. I know there are real people behind the game who put a huge amount of time and effort into what we eventually get to experience as players. I always try to articulate my criticism as fairly and constructively as I can, without making things personal or being unnecessarily harsh.

At the same time, for these reviews to have any value, I have to be authentic about my experience each month. Some months will naturally score much higher than others, and unfortunately, July just didn’t land for me. Hopefully August gives me plenty more to shout about!