January's Big Red

Is it just me, or has January seemed to drag on for an exceptionally long time? New Year's Day already feels like it was such a long time ago...

We're back to snow again here after an unusually long snowless spell. On HI3, though, we can avoid the snow all we want, which I've been doing when it's my turn to play.

We almost made it through the whole month without any herd contenders, but one finally cropped up yesterday.

Before we get to her, though, here are a few other neat wilds from the past few weeks:

you rock those feathers, dark draftie!

a fancy pintaloosa who was hanging out by our lavender pool

such a classy sooty buckskin

we couldn't totally avoid snowflakes, but this kind I do not mind!

Meet Cheerful, who is anything but...

...and Mind Your Own Business, who really did want to be left alone!

We thought we might finally have a herd hopeful in this markingless, twinkle-toed "Demeter."

Her genetic stat total is quite high for a wild, and she's very cute despite her common coat color and lack of markings.

Alas, stubborn leader.

Sure enough, she began circling under saddle almost immediately.

Too bad, it's fun to see horses with high-flung tails pace. 

Also, HI3 recently changed equines' walk and trot animations, and I can't help but comment.

I'm getting used to the new walk. It's probably more realistic - looks better in screenshots, anyway - though my first impression was that the equines are kind of sashaying more in the back end than necessary, ha ha.

Here's Merlin demonstrating the new trot. I can't tell much difference between the old and the new in screenshots, but I was pretty disappointed with this change in real time. With the old trot animation, there seemed to be a difference in slow trot versus fast trot: the equine seemed to extend its legs more as speed increased. Now, the equine is stuck in a more collected trot all the time, and the only thing that changes is leg speed. Not an improvement at all in my personal opinion. 

We got busy the first half of January and were late to the party to notice the gait updates, so we missed out on other players' comments. I thought there would be all kinds of opinions posted in the forums, but so far I've only seen one comment, and it got shot dead in the water for being posted in the wrong section. *Shrugs* I'm hoping that the trot is a work in progress and we won't be stuck with the current animation forever.

Fortunately, for now, at least, canter and gallop animations have not changed, and we spend most of our time in those gaits.

Okay, enough of that sidetrack. On to the star of this post, our one and only January herd hopeful. She's yet another big, speedy bay from the savanna. (She doesn't look much like Topi or Bandwagon, though.)

I love those ears and her solo stocking.

She's skittish, as most savanna wilds are, but other than that she's fun to ride.

...and Pepsi is a good size for her. We plan to change her name, but inspiration hasn't struck yet. We're also considering giving her a longer mane but aren't sure yet. Here's what she'd look like with the various silky manes:

It's quite something how much a mane changes the look of a horse! I think my favorite for her is the medium one.

At any rate, I sure am glad we found her! It would've been sad to slog through all of this long, dreary January without finding a single wild we wanted to keep.