Every month, I’ll post an announcement with news and information about the server.

As a player, this is something I would personally appreciate when planning to spend time on a project, so this is my way of staying connected with you all.

This is the most important topic and my main priority. We’ve been experiencing a low number of active players. Being a multiplayer network, the best experience requires activity. I do have some ideas, and I’m also willing to listen to suggestions that help Stadium grow, or even constructive criticism. The goal is to be better every day.

Social Media
I want Stadium to be more active on social media. I can create images and posts, but that will always be limited to one person’s perspective. That’s why any player who wants to share content in the Stadium Chronicles section will be rewarded, and their content may be used on our social media.

Website
Some new content and guides have been added to the website.

Person to person
This is the most important part. If you like Stadium, please recommend us to friends and people you know. We have a very attractive referral system, and I’m always willing to give extra rewards if someone helps advertise the server.

Current player base
I’ve been keeping track of who has remained active since our transition to 1.21, and those players will receive a surprise gift. Thank you for the time you’ve invested in the server. Additionally, I’d like to invite anyone currently on the server to give it a try and have some fun with us.

Goal
I would love to see the activity numbers rise. I truly believe the server is good, or at least that we try our best, but I also want to keep expectations realistic. Reaching an average of 10 online players is the goal for the month of February. We will try our best, but we can’t accomplish this without your help.
So, can we reach the goal?

It’s no secret that I love competitive Pokémon, and sometimes that’s why many things seem focused in that direction. However, the server aims to offer content for everyone. I’m actively taking suggestions for the next event. Building, drawing, parkour, anything Minecraft or Pokémon related is welcome.

Our goal is to provide fun activities and allow players to be directly involved in shaping server events. If I don’t receive suggestions, I’ll come up with something myself, but I’d really like players to have a voice in this.

Draft League
As previously announced, the server’s Draft League is about to start. The draft will most likely take place next weekend. Not everything is set in stone, but it’s likely we’ll use a platform that allows a live auction draft. It’s a very fun format, and there’s still time to sign up if you want to participate.

Tournaments
The Legends Tour will resume this month. Tournaments are an important part of the network, and we’ll be bringing more of them. As mentioned above, activity needs to increase. For that reason, Singles tournaments will take place inside Pixelmon, while Doubles tournaments will be hosted on Pokémon Showdown.

I want everyone to understand how the transition from 1.16 to 1.21 has been. Pixelmon 1.16 was released many years ago. At that time, Pixelmon was essentially the only Pokémon mod available, as Cobblemon didn’t exist yet. Because of this, many plugins and mods were developed and sold for 1.16, and we used several of them on our old server. They were expensive, but they allowed us to offer solid content.

The biggest limitation was that we couldn’t adjust or expand those systems easily. While we did have some custom mods on the previous server, it was about a 50–50 mix. With 1.21, we decided to go fully custom. This required a massive amount of work, but we’re very happy with the result.

We’re extremely lucky to have Blissy as our developer. The content he has created is outstanding. As an example, the Battle Factory system was coded completely from scratch. Back in 1.16, I contacted one of the most well-known developers in the scene, and they told me it was impossible. Blissy made it happen.

I often emphasize Battle Factory because I personally love it, but also because it’s the foundation for many other features we want to develop in the future.

The main reason why very few servers have moved to 1.21 is simple, it’s extremely difficult. If you want quality, almost everything needs to be custom. It wasn’t easy. Even outside of development, I had to handle many tasks to make this transition happen. Blissy and I would wake up and go to sleep discussing features and working on them.

We have a long list of major projects we want to bring to Stadium, truly big things that haven’t been seen before in Pixelmon. However, we’re honestly exhausted from the process, and we’d like to see more activity to feel that our efforts are worth it.

The only part that is mostly out of our control is Pixelmon bugs. The internal Pixelmon code can only be modified by their developers. Since there are very few multiplayer servers on 1.21, their focus is mainly on single-player experience. I say “mostly” because Blissy has already applied several patches to fix some major issues, but there are still limits to what we can do.

I’m not sharing this as a complaint, or to say play here because we worked hard. If you find the server fun, you’ll naturally want to play. I’m sharing this because this kind of information isn’t usually public. Large networks rarely talk openly about these challenges because it affects their image.

We’re happy with what we’ve achieved so far, and we have much more planned. I truly believe this transition brings many positives, especially in the long term.

Running a server is expensive and time-consuming. From a business perspective, the server is currently operating at a loss, and that doesn’t even account for the countless hours invested. We love Stadium and are proud of how fair the experience is. Free-to-play players can fully enjoy the server.

However, if it’s within your means to support us through the donor store, it’s greatly appreciated. There are ongoing expenses to cover, and we also have families and personal lives. Donations allow us to keep improving the server, adding new palettes, cosmetics, furniture, and more. They also help us hire artists and, eventually, advertise the server to reach a wider audience.

We currently have a custom SpongeBob palette that no other server has. It was commissioned from an artist, and while expensive, it was absolutely worth it. Ideally, we’d like to continue adding unique content like this. The next palette we’d like to commission is Yu-Gi-Oh, but that will depend on how the SpongeBob collection performs.

Finally, I’m planning to introduce a monthly crate. It will be limited to a certain number of purchases and will offer better value than buying badges or shards separately, along with exclusive rewards such as a custom Pokémon palette.

This section will be revealed once we reach the activity goal mentioned above.

So I’ll ask again, can we do it?

Spoiler: The content we’re planning is amazing.