Advent 2021

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The 2021 Advent Christmas event, labeled Advent 2021 in raocow's playlist and CYBERDIGITAL (Current Year Be Exhausting, Really Defeating. Irreverent Game Incoming To Augment Life) by the surtitle of the corresponding game, is the eighth annual Advent Christmas event.

Overview

With the continued threat of the COVID-19 pandemic, raocow decided to cancel receiving physical gifts for the second year in a row as a precaution. Following a hiatus in the All the Sonics series, raocow decided to dedicate the C LP slot to the event so that he could allocate more recording time to any games or levels he received.

Discussions about the event occurred on and off over the course of the year, with plans not fully crystallizing until late August. On September 3rd, RedMageSusie opened a claims thread for standalone digital gifts while Rixithechao, SAJewers, and Enjl began formally planning and organizing a collab game side of the event.

Gift Games

SMBX

Main article: A2XT Gaiden 2

Like with Cyber Digital Advent, the organizers chose to make a collab game to serve as the primary package for the event. Possible engines and prototypes for a collab game were discussed in both the Spotzone's #no-cows-allowed channel and the A Superb Discord Thing server until a direct sequel to A2XT Gaiden was settled on.

The resulting game was considerably larger in scope compared to the first title, featuring customized gameplay, a relay level, two final bosses, and a December 26th epilogue room. For his LP of the game, raocow chose a naming gimmick based on The Twelve Days of Christmas.

Other Games

In addition to A2XT Gaiden 2, raocow was given the following games in other engines:

The Amazing Maize Maze, a corn-collecting ZZT game made by ZinfandelZT
An ATS-Themed Christmas Thing, a Sonic Robo Blast 2 level pack made by RoyKirbs
Raocow's Kitty Cat Adventure 2, a 2.5D platformer game starring Demo built in Doom and developed by Rosie Ambrosian and Kapus
Monsters Are Involved Christmas Special: Fire and Ice, a standalone 2D platformer made by WhimWidget based on a tabletop roleplaying campaign raocow participated in and starring his character in the campaign, Zae

Steam Ambushes and the Ambush Train

Advent 2021 saw a notable increase in Steam gift ambushes, inadvertently encouraged by raocow when he mentioned how easy it was to find and add him as a friend on the platform.

Started by Cyril in the Spotzone on December 22nd, the "ambush train" was a mass-gifting sub-event organized in the server as a response to the Steam winter sale. Various members of the server coordinated in #no-cows-allowed to send raocow dozens of Steam gifts on each of the remaining days of the event, with several members gifting raocow multiple games. The resulting influx of ambush gifts forced raocow to begin splitting the ambushes off to their own dedicated videos, and the sheer generosity overwhelmed, confused, and slightly frightened both raocow and the organizer team (though the organizers eventually joined in themselves and even made a failed attempt to schedule their own ambush gifts to coincide with the events of the SMBX game's Christmas day finale.)