Happy Pets: Guess the Toy Story characters in this new Limited Edition series

Following the recent trend in Happy Aquarium, it's a given that Crowdstar loves Disney and can only be expected to churn out more bootleg versions of Disney's characters due to the brand's broad appeal. This strategy must be pretty successful too, and when timed to a film release, the results can only be positive. In this latest pet set from Happy Pets, Crowdstar have ordered in six new Limited Edition premium pets, along with three props, all to tie into Pixar's and Disney's upcoming Toy Story 3 movie.
Happy Pets Toy Story Pets
Three of the six new pets cost 90 Facebook Credits, or $9 USD each -- Cowboy Cat, Space Ranger Cat, and Alien Guinea Pig. The next two are a bit plainer, and go for 80 FB Credits, or $8 USD, each -- Spring Dog and Cowboy Horse. Last one is the Bacon Pig, going for 70 FB Credits, or $7 USD. So what's so special about the last three to warrant the $7-8 price tags? Well, the Catzilla Cats series introduced various pet sizes (size comparison chart included) as breedable traits, and all the pets in this set are half-sized.

Can you guess who's who in the Toy Series? Get the answers below!

Clicking the following links will lead you to the Toy Story characters that inspired each pet:

Cowboy Cat
Space Ranger Cat
Alien Guinea Pig
Spring Dog
Cowboy Horse
Bacon Pig

Happy Aquarium creator CrowdStar plans to take its games mobile

In a recent press release, it was announced that CrowdStar's recent explosive growth has led the studio to release two of its games, Happy Aquarium and Happy Island, on Yahoo! Japan through DeNA's Mobage platform. Recently, CrowdStar encroached on the coveted Number 2 position as most popular Facebook developer under the almighty Zynga.

This is a pretty impressive feat considering CrowdStar, a largely independent studio with backing from the YouWeb entrepreneur platform, beat out both Playfish and Playdom for the position, backed by Electronic Arts and Disney, respectively. The company plans to release several more Facebook games by the end of 2010 and continue to hire more team members.

"CrowdStar has its foot on the gas -- we're aggressively scaling the company to build on all the momentum we gained this summer," said Niren Hiro, CEO of CrowdStar. "We're prepared to go to the next level."

Apparently, the next level for CrowdStar is in your pocket as the developer released a bullet list of plans for the future which includes, "Upcoming launches of mobile versions of all its Facebook games through YouWeb-incubator partnerships." Hopefully this means mobile versions of CrowdStar games similar to Zynga's FarmVille for iPhone, which recreates your actual Facebook farm within the mobile app.

While the developer is reporting record growth and shows no signs of stopping with hires aplenty, CrowdStar is going to need some truly new game ideas if it hopes to compete with Zynga much less maintain its Number 2 spot. Especially considering Zynga seems to have caught on to the idea of new game mechanics; it should be an interesting winter.

Happy Aquarium Black Friday Sale begins 10 a.m. PST

CrowdStar has been preparing for this day for a long time, gathering just the right sales for this fine Black Friday. Today starting at 10 a.m. PST (1 p.m. EST) in Happy Aquarium, all critters will be 40 percent off for just three hours. On top of that, all wallpapers, gravel and tankmates are 15 to 30 percent off. Feeders and cleaners are 15 percent off with all Potions to be reduced by 40 percent. Oh, and those sales are good all day long. So, don't fret if you can't make it for the big event--you'll save one way or another this Nov. 26.

Better yet, the first 100 players who log in at 10 a.m. sharp (PST, of course) will be rewarded with the exclusive Black CrowdStar-Fish. According to the official CrowdStar event page, there are over six thousand players waiting for that item. So, expect stiff competition for a item that's so limited. I know my trigger finger is ready, but what about you?