WordPress plugin
A Halloween mode for your site
A seasonal mode visitors turn on themselves with a pumpkin button: spiders come down on webs, a worm and eyes peek out from under sections, a ghost peeps in from the edge of the screen. Every October the plugin reminds of itself on the dates you set.
Try it right here
The plugin works on this page exactly as it does on a real site.
- Click the button below or the pumpkin in the bottom left corner.
- Scroll the page: spiders, a worm, a “blanket” between sections.
- Click the pumpkin again and everything disappears. The choice is remembered.
What it does
Spiders
Come down on webs and run across the screen, running away from the cursor.
A worm
Peeks out from under sections and hides back.
A “blanket” with eyes
The edge of a section lifts, and eyes look out from the dark gap.
A mummy’s hand
Reaches up from the bottom of the page when you scroll to the end.
A ghost
Peeps in from the edge of the screen and vanishes.
A zombie in the banner
A custom effect for the eye banner on symonenko.com: I can adapt it to your first screen.
Settings
Its own page in the WordPress admin, no code.
- Mode
- off · button in season · on in season · button all year
- Season
- MM-DD dates, repeating every year
- Effects
- each one turns on separately
- For videos and demos
- ?halloween=1 turns the mode on, ?halloween=0 off
Under the hood
Vanilla JavaScript with no libraries or dependencies.
- Page caching
- the season is checked in the browser, so caching doesn’t get in the way
- Speed
- animation pauses in a background tab; effects load only in season
- Accessibility
- with reduced motion, only still eyes in the dark
- Themes
- all effects on UIkit themes (YOOtheme); on others some of them, I adapt the rest
Questions
Won’t it scare visitors?
The effects are soft and cartoonish, and visitors turn them on themselves. You don’t have to use the “on in season” mode.
What happens after Halloween?
In the “in season” modes the button disappears after the last date and returns next October.
Can the characters be changed?
Yes, the effects are drawn with code, so colours and characters can be matched to a brand.
Want this plugin on your site?
I’ll install it, match it to your theme and brand, or build a seasonal mode for your holiday.
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