How to Play: The Spanish Codex
⚔️ Your Quest
Complete Spanish exercises to earn XP and Gold. Level up, unlock new ranks, and use items from the shop to boost your progress.
📊 XP & Leveling
- First attempt each week: You earn full XP for completing an exercise
- Repeat attempts: Doing the same exercise again in the same week gives you half XP
- Weekly reset: Every Monday, all exercises reset to full XP
- Your score matters: Better performance = more XP (100% = 50 XP, 80% = 40 XP, etc.)
💰 Gold System
- Every exercise awards random gold (40-60% of XP earned)
- Gold can be spent in La Tienda to buy powerful items
- Like XP, gold is reduced on repeat attempts within the same week
🏪 Shop Items
How Items Work
- Buy items from La Tienda - they appear in your inventory
- Items activate automatically when you complete an exercise
- You'll see a notification when an item is used
- Items disappear from inventory once all uses are consumed
- Strategy tip: Use the shield to retry exercises without XP penalty
🔥 Daily Streak System
Log in every day and complete at least one exercise to maintain your streak! The longer your streak, the bigger your rewards.
Streak Milestones & Rewards:
- 7 days: +50 XP, +25 Gold
- 14 days: +100 XP, +50 Gold
- 30 days: +200 XP, +100 Gold
- 50 days: +300 XP, +150 Gold
- 100 days: +500 XP, +250 Gold
- 150+ days: Bonus every 50 days!
How It Works:
- Complete at least one exercise per day to keep your streak alive
- Your streak resets to 0 if you miss a day
- A special celebration bubble appears when you hit milestones!
- Click the bubble to claim your bonus XP and Gold
- Your streak is shown on your profile and the homepage
💡 Pro Tip: Set a daily reminder to log in and complete one quick exercise, even two minutes of Spanish a day counts!
🎁 Daily Login Bubble
Every day you log in, a special bubble appears with a surprise inside! Click it for bonus rewards and a Spanish learning tip.
What You Get:
- +10 XP just for logging in
- +10 Gold to spend in La Tienda
- Daily Spanish tip: vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, culture, or false friends!
- Today's date in Spanish: practise the days and months
- Motivational message tailored to the day of the week
How It Works:
- The bubble appears 2 seconds after you log in
- It floats around the screen, chase it and click it!
- You can only claim it once per day per account
- If you miss it, it won't reappear until tomorrow
- The bubble shows on all devices: phone, tablet, computer!
💡 Pro Tip: Make logging in daily a habit, grab the bubble for your free rewards and tip!
📅 Weekly Reset System
Every Monday at midnight (UK time), all exercises reset to give full XP again!
How It Works:
- First attempt (this week): Full XP + Full Gold
- Repeat attempts (same week): Half XP + Half Gold
- Monday reset: All exercises become "first attempt" again!
- This encourages you to try different exercises throughout the week
- You can still practise the same exercise multiple times for learning
Strategy Tips:
- Do a variety of exercises each week for maximum XP
- Repeat difficult exercises for practice (half XP is still progress!)
- Use Escudo del Aprendiz to avoid XP penalties when practising
- Plan your week: try new exercises Monday-Friday, review on weekends
📖 El Léxico del Reino (Added: 17/11/2025)
Build your personal Spanish dictionary by collecting words like Pokémon! Each word you unlock teaches you authentic Spanish vocabulary with context.
How It Works:
- Buy Cofre de Palabras (50 💰) from La Tienda
- A random word is revealed and added to your collection
- Visit El Léxico del Reino to see all your collected words
- Each word includes:
- English definitions
- Example sentences in Spanish
- Highlighted translations to help you focus
- Word type (verb, noun, adjective, etc.)
Rarity System:
Collection Goals:
- 200 words available to collect (more coming soon!)
- Track your progress with collection stats
- Unlock badges at milestones: 25, 50, 100, 250, 500 words
- Use search & filters to find specific words
- Study your collection anytime as your personal Spanish reference
💡 Learning Strategy:
- Buy a few words daily to build vocabulary gradually
- Review collected words before exercises
- Focus on common words first for essential vocabulary
- Getting rare words is exciting, celebrate them!
- Use El Léxico as your study guide before exams
✍️ Redacciones del Reino (Added: 21/04/2026)
Write Spanish essays and receive personalised corrections from Álvaro! Earn XP and Gold while improving your writing skills.
How It Works:
- Choose from 30 essay topics (GCSE, A-Level, General Spanish)
- Write your essay directly on the platform
- Submit for review, status shows "Pending Approval"
- Álvaro reviews and provides detailed feedback
- When approved, you receive XP + Gold rewards!
Word Count Guidance:
- GCSE Foundation: 90-150 words recommended
- GCSE Higher: 150-250 words recommended
- A-Level: 250-400 words recommended
- General Spanish Students: Write as much as you like!
💡 You can write more than the suggested length to practise, but when doing an exam, make sure to match the exam conditions!
Reward Tiers (After Approval):
📝 Submission Limits by Patreon Tier:
Support AVA Spanish on Patreon to unlock more essay corrections and premium features!
- Aliados del Reino (Free): 1 essay per month → Join Here
- Aventureros (£1/month): 2 essays per month → Join Here
- Caballeros de Oro (£5/month): 4 essays per month → Join Here
- Maestros del Reino (£10/month): Unlimited essays! → Join Here
Note: During quieter periods, I may correct additional essays beyond these limits! Feel free to submit, and I'll do my best to review everything when time allows. 💜
⚠️ Important:
- Rewards are given after approval, not immediately upon submission
- Essays must show genuine effort, random nonsense won't be approved
- You'll receive a notification bubble when your essay is approved
- All feedback is personalised and aims to help you improve
📜 Las Crónicas del Reino (NEW! - 14/05/2026)
Explore real-world Spanish through authentic articles on history, society, technology, the environment, and more! Each Crónica is a reading comprehension quest with rewards for understanding and bonus rewards for sharing your opinion.
What Are Crónicas?
Crónicas are short pieces of real Spanish writing; articles, stories, chronicles and more from across the Hispanic world, turned into interactive reading missions. You'll read in Spanish, answer comprehension questions, share your opinion, and walk away with new vocabulary for your Léxico del Reino.
Difficulty Tiers:
XP & Gold Rewards:
- Principiante: Up to 40 XP + Gold based on your comprehension score
- Intermedio: Up to 70 XP + Gold based on your comprehension score
- Avanzado: Up to 100 XP + Gold based on your comprehension score
- Higher score = more XP: 100% = full XP, 80% = 80% of XP, and so on, every correct answer counts!
- ¿Qué opinas? Bonus: Extra XP + Gold once Álvaro reviews and approves your opinion
- Weekly reset applies: Repeat attempts within the same week give half rewards, just like regular exercises
💬 ¿Qué opinas? The Feedback Loop:
After every Crónica, you'll see the ¿Qué opinas? section where you can share your opinion in Spanish about what you've just read.
- Write in Spanish, agree, disagree, share your own experience, ask a question.
- Submit and Álvaro receives your opinion for personal review.
- When he's reviewed it, a special 📰 opinion bubble appears anywhere on the platform.
- Click it to see Álvaro's feedback on your thinking and your Spanish.
- Approved opinions earn bonus XP & Gold on top of the reading reward.
💡 Pro Tip: You don't need to write a lot, even 30 words of genuine opinion counts! Quality of thought matters more than length.
📖 Vocab Loot: Words That Stay With You:
Every Crónica unlocks 4 new vocabulary words connected to the article's themes. When you score above the minimum on the comprehension, the words reveal at the end with their meanings.
- Words save permanently to your El Léxico del Reino collection
- Each word includes definitions, examples, and difficulty rarity
- Even if you forget the article, the vocabulary stays in your collection forever
- Review your collected words anytime as your personal Spanish study reference
🗂️ Categories You'll Explore:
Crónicas are organised into themes that grow with every release:
- 👥 Identidad: Identity, culture, who we are
- 💻 Tecnología: Technology, AI, the digital world
- 🌿 Medioambiente: Climate, ecology, sustainability
- 🎭 Sociedad: Society, migration, current affairs
- 🏛️ Historia: Spanish and Latin American history
- 💼 Trabajo: Economy, work, labour
- 🎨 Arte: Music, art, literature, and culture
🏆 Unique Achievements:
Crónicas unlock their own set of achievements in your Códex de Logros:
- Completion tiers: 1st, 5th, 10th, 25th, and 50th Crónica completed
- Per-category badges (complete 3, 6, or 10 Crónicas within a theme)
- Opinion milestones: 1st, 5th, 15th, and 30th opinion submitted
- Vocabulary milestones from words collected through Crónicas
- Special story badges for specific articles (Urraca, Gaviotas, La Llorona...)
- Hidden seasonal and time-based secrets to discover 🔮
💡 Learning Strategy:
- Try one Crónica per week alongside your grammar exercises
- Start with Principiante if you're new to reading Spanish, build up gradually
- Don't worry about understanding every word, focus on the main ideas
- Use the vocabulary loot to expand your Léxico naturally
- The "¿Qué opinas?" section doubles as essay writing practice, great prep for exams!
💜 Pro Tip: Crónicas absorb real Spanish into your brain without you realising it. A single weekly Crónica + your regular exercises = serious progress.
🏆 Tablas del Reino (Leaderboards)
Compete with other Spanish learners across the kingdom! See where you rank in XP, streaks, and vocabulary collection.
Leaderboard Categories:
- Total XP: Who has earned the most experience points?
- Current Streak: Who has the longest active learning streak?
- Words Collected: Who has discovered the most vocabulary?
- Nivel (Level): Who has reached the highest level?
Privacy & Display:
- Only your nickname appears on leaderboards, never your email
- Leaderboards update in real-time as players progress
- See your personal rank and the top performers
- Rankings reset monthly to keep competition fair and fresh
Remember: Learning Spanish is not a sprint, but a marathon! Use leaderboards for motivation, not stress. Your personal progress matters most. 💜
🏆 Ranks
As you level up, you unlock new ranks:
- Levels 1-4: Adventurer
- Levels 5-9: Explorer
- Levels 10-14: Warrior
- Levels 15-19: Champion
- Level 20+: Master
💡 Pro Tips
- Do new exercises every week for maximum XP
- Save gold for the Libro del Conocimiento, best value for leveling
- Buy Cofre de Palabras regularly to build your vocabulary
- Use the shield strategically when you want to practice difficult exercises
- Collect rare words, they're exciting and expand your Spanish knowledge!
- Check your profile to see your stats and progress
💜 Support AVA Spanish
AVA Spanish is free for everyone thanks to amazing supporters on Patreon!
Want to help keep the platform free while unlocking premium features?
- 👑 Maestros del Reino (£10/month): Unlimited essays, priority review, video corrections & group classes
- ⭐ Caballeros de Oro (£5/month): 4 essays/month, comprehensive feedback & video corrections
- 💜 Aventureros (£1/month): 2 essays/month, detailed feedback & early access
- 🌟 Aliados del Reino (Free): 1 essay/month, form part of the community, support Álvaro testing the platform