Cyberpets

What is a cyberpet?

Way back in the late 90s/early 2000s, web graphics called cyberpets were a cool thing you could add to your web site. These were usually pixel-drawn animals, objects, and fantasy creatures that you could fill out a guestbook or form to "adopt," with some adoption agencies requiring that you show them where you'll be putting their art, etc. Anyway, these were some of my formative experiences online, and I remember idolizing certain sites for their atmosphere or their iconic cyberpet graphics. I was under the age of 10, so my art skills were not yet up to par for joining the cyberpet community, but I watched eagerly from the sidelines and tried valiantly to understand how to make my own adopted cyberpets web pages to "live" on.

On this page, I'm going to showcase some of my old school favorite cyberpets, along with anything I know about their artists and sites!

Page News and Updates

  • 4.5.2026 -- Created this changelog;
    Added 6 new dracony to the Jona section;
    Also added... a number of creatures to the Cypris.org section, I lost count!
    Aaand added scroll bars to the existing sections!
    Next... Hopefully adding the Nightlyre's Adopt-a-Haunt section soon... I found a werewolf... :3c
    I also have a ton of Egyptans, oh my goodness!! I'll need to do a deep dive for more and post them...

Full disclosure: In many cases, I dug these images out of the Wayback Machine after hours of searching through broken images and defunct sites. Many examples are other people's "adopted" pets if I couldn't find an official site graphic. I'm not trying to "steal them" by putting them up here--I just want to bring them back to the surface so others can also appreciate them!
I can always link to your site or credit you if one of these ancient images happens to be "your cyberpet"--just let me know, I don't bite! I'm @pseudocities on most sites, or you can email me or find me on Neocities.

Did you make these?!

If you are one of the artists behind these cyberpets, I would love to connect! And if you post your art or various creations anywhere new these days, I'd love to add your various credits and links as they are due! And, of course, I'll happily honor any wishes you might have for taking these down (but please nooo don't, so many people like these ;o; what you should do instead is send me more of all your old files, so we can all enjoy them together...!

Artist: Jona of Jona's Weyr

Orphan Dragon Adoptions (ODA)

[Wayback Machine link to Jona's Weyr via Geocities] // [Wayback Machine link to Jona's Weyr via Passagen.se c.2003]
This was some of my favorite artwork!! One time, I won a special variety of this dragon because I entered an art contest (I was SO EXCITED because my entry was mouse-drawn and not very good...!!). I hope I can find more of these someday--there were babies, too, and elemental varieties that were very pretty... I think I had a wind species at some point... 5/10/2022: GOOD NEWS, I FOUND SOME MORE, AWWWW YESSS


Society for Dracony Competing League (SfDCL)

[Wayback Machine link to Jona's Weyr via Geocities] // [Wayback Machine link to Jona's Weyr via Passagen.se c.2003]

This site had a complex game mechanic to it where you could train your dracony and battle/compete with other user's draconies... There were different sub-species with tactical advantages/disadvantages and it seriously ruled (but I was not good at participating lol)
There are two versions of the dracony species here--the thin line art versions at the beginning were apparently the predecessors to the thicker line art versions later down. I really like the thin line art, though! The delicate outlines fascinate me.

Artist: Syriiu

Cypris.org

[Wayback Machine Cypris.org Link c.2003]

Wendy Orion Lee, AKA Syriuu, was the webmaster of Cypris.org--one of my very first obsessions with cyberpets. I was fascinated with the variety of creatures and the layout of the pages (all pages had midis and distinct styling--very atmospheric!). I also almost never got an egg to hatch, lol--I have a feeling that Cypris.org was quite popular in its hayday (c.2001-2005), and probably a lot for the owner to keep up with!








Artist: Starluck

Starluck's SweetWater Valley

[Wayback Machine link to Starluck's SweetWater Valley]

MAAAAN, STARLUCK WAS LEGENDARY. This artist is also known as EJR/Erika Jean Rogers, so when seeing old web graphics, if you spot them signed with "EJR," that is also Starluck.
Extremely prolific adoptions, often of animated fantasy creatures in a delightful style. By the time I was online in the late 90s and mid-2000s, there were already various iterations of the SweetWater Valley adoption site that had been revamped, with various creatures no longer available for adoption... So, as I collect these, I'll be honest and say I have no idea what cohort or era of Starluck's that they're from. I just remember that some of the most beautiful creatures I'd ever seen would be on other owners' pages, then I'd go to the SweetWater Valley and try to find them, only to wonder in vain where they'd gone... So it's a delight to have them here again! I'm not crying, you're crying! It's okay, I'm fine, I'll be fine... :'^)







More ancient cyberpets coming soon!


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