Quote: Before we begin... I need to clean out my Storage Trunk of all the Gaia Event Items I've collected, but I don't really feel like selling them despite the fact I've been on a quest for the better part of three months. So here's what I'm going to do. I'm holding an avatar contest.
The winners gets a complete set of G-Shades and a G Belt Buckle random Cash Shop Item delivered by Lance. RULES* All Avatar Contest entries must be about MY AVATAR and must involve the items worn. * The Avatar Contest has two catagories you may enter in: ART or FICTION * All avatar art must adhear to the rules of the image signature rules. No more than 500 x 500 pixels with a file size of 100 kb. * All avatar fiction must be about the avatar and nothing else. Any fiction that introduces a new character or figure not in the avatar will be disqualified from the contest. * Avatar fictions must also be done within your own Gaia Journal. No off-site stuff. * All submissions must be linked in the journal comment of this entry. If anyone PMs me their entry, they will be disqualified. I'm only taking submissions linked in the comments.You have until the end of this month to submit an entry. Winners will be announced in the December 2007 Critique.
Okay, now that's out of the way, on with the critique for the month. <span id="test15427557">. . .</span><br/><div id="post15427557" style="display:none; margin-right:75px;">
This month's collectibles are the Wild Things and the Autumn Glory.
 Ya think?!
The hint images they used pretty much gave away what at least one of the items was going to be. That said, I'm not really surprised by either of the items. Though the lack of Wow Factor may have something to do with the Cash Shop. This is just a personal theory of mine I have at the moment. But we will see how these new items fair against the Cash Shop items.
Tigers and Wolves and... Chickens? Oh my...
With the addition of Gaia's first and second generation of evolution items, one can't help but wonder why they released three new pets for the Gaia world under the idea that these are transportation animals. Which they kind of are. They have their own walking animation that replaces your avatar's normal walk blur, but they don't help you move any faster in Towns. In some respects, the only thing these guys are good for is giving your avatar another large pet.
The first creature in the line up is Fenrir the wolf. Named after the mythical Norse wolf who "so large that his upper jaw touches the sky while his lower touches the earth when he gapes," he pretty much is a wolf of giant proportions. Thankfully he's not as big as the actual Fenrir. His design is that of a very agressive stance suggesting that he will always be on the hunt when you walk around Town. Even his Town animation suggests he is stalking. Now I know Gaia hasn't been the best at keeping to its colour pallet, but I can't tell if Fenrir is suppose to be grey like you would think a wolf would be or some kind of fantasy wolf muted navy. Either way, if you want to "match" the look of Fenrir, you would probably do best with something on the dark end of the color spectrum.
Roc is a confusing creature. On one hand, you have essentially a walking fire bird. On the other, you have something that looks eeriely similar to a Final Fantasy Chocobo. Yet it's name suggests yet another mythical creature from the area of Sinbad the Pirate and the Middle East. Either way, I see this as Gaia's attempt to please all the people out there wanting more Final Fantasy items on Gaia. I can't say that I'm happy with it, but at the same time I understand why they did what they did. And for what it's worth, they did a nice job making Roc cute. I also like the fact that he pretty much replaces the lower half of your body. The way the avatars line up with Roc, your foot would show up where his knee is. With the wing covering up the lower part of your body, you pretty much imply that you are riding him like you would any other giant chicken. Kudos for that, as it means nobody has to redraw all the items from the waist down in order to make it look like your avatar is riding a saddle.
Khan is the third creature in the set, and before people start crying out this guy's name like Captain Kirk, it should be noted that the name is a very common Central Asia name. It is also the title the Mongolians give to their king. With Kaya establishing the Tiger pet speices, one could argue that Khan is the king of the Gaia Tigers. And seeing how his jaws are about the size of our avatar's head, I can see no reason to argue with that. Khan also demands out of the three a very theme-oriented pet. The elegance and grace of the tiger as majestic as he is means you have to dress to impress. Gaia Ninjas and those who are a fan of the Asian line of clothing we have shouldn't have a problem.
Overall, this item feels rather odd. You have three totally different animals with the only common trait being they are all used as transporation. Yet, we have Evolution Items that will reveal what kind of pets they house. These pets could have come from something similar, but instead all three have been lumpped together into a single item based on the fact that they supply a transportation service. But, hey, if you've always wanted your avatar to look like a Final Fantasy character, I guess now you have the item to make it possible.
Shades of Gold and Brown
I would say that the Autumn Glory is the counterpart to the Winter Rose, but that would mean we have a Spring and Summer flower item in the future. Which might very well be the case. However, there are enough options in the item to warrent said comparision.
The default mode is with the leaves falling around your avatar. This is similar to the Winter Rose's petal shower option. However, don't expect to be able to equip both and make it look like you're walking along a cherry blossom garden in Washington DC. It doesn't work that way.
Let the leaves continue to fall around your avatar, and they will eventually pile up at your feet. This pose is one of those poses that looks better sitting down that standing up. There is something more aesthetically pleasing about having the pile stop at your waistline rather than at your knee. It may have something to do with the fact that our avatars look like kids, and kids tend to play in piles of leaves. I know I used to around this time of year.
Leaf Umbrella is an odd thing to have for the Fall, but then again we have umbrellas designed for the summer time in real life, so what do I know? Here, Juno and her team really shine with the little details that make this mode very interesting to look at. The handle and shaft is made out of a birch tree branch, and the top of the umbrella is a little acorn. The umbrella itself is a combination of golden fabrics with leaf pattern trim and actual falling leaves. As nice as this looks in design, I can't help but wonder why this is the only umbrella not available in both a closed version and a "sheild" version. Even the Ubi Parasol got that treatment, as well as another option where it looked like your avatar was holding the umbrella out for another person.
Leafy Cap is, once again, similar to the Flower Hat option of the Winter Rose. And much like the Winter Rose, it shares the same design element of making the small leaves of Fall big enough to cover your head. Though it lacks volumn, it does offer a more colorful alternative to the Winter Rose hat. Fans of the Fairy fashion will easily be able to use this with the whole angle Disney set up about leaves and flowers being used for clothing. Creative Gaians will probably find a way to dress up like a person hiding in a pile of leaves with this hat and the Leafy Pile mode mentioned earlier.
Leafy Scarf gives us another scarf to add to the database. I would complain about how we have too many of these special scarves and not enough in the common store market, but this is the cold season for North America. Scarves are going to a part of the dress for the next several months, so I might as well get used to it. That said, the scarf is very elegant in design. It plays off the golden color of the season and then changes into the bright reds and browns of the leaves in a way that would make most grandmothers that knit scarves jealous of the design. Don't be surprised to see this as a future Gaia Store item you can buy in the future, because it litterally screams marketable with its design.
Acorn Mug may not seem like it fits, but it is a cute addition to the set. Here, you get... well, an acorn mug. And depending on how you hold it, the lid will open up to reveal a warm drink to keep the cold out of your body. Throw on your favorite pair of pajamas and grab a book, and you'll be able to fall asleep comfortably as the weather outside begins to take a dive off the deep end of the temporature scale.
The last position is known as Autumn Boughs, which pretty much means branch. And it's one of those strangely obligatory "wings" option we sometimes get with some items. This item around, it feels very much unnessicary, similar to the wings options with the Plasma Gear. What you end up getting isn't a pair of wings at all, but rather two branches that imply wings. They look more like shoulder antlers. If you still have this item when Spring rolls around, go ahead and break it out with the bird nest wig found in the Elemental Hair. It makes you look like a tree giving new life to nature. And this mode does work with the Winter Rose giving your avatar the impression that you are walking around with some cherry blossom branches on you.
Overall, this critique may be a bit confusing. There are some nice elements about the item that I like as far as design goes, the item as a whole is pretty much unnessicary. In fact, it feels rather forced. So much so it feels like they were just phoning in a second item for the sake of having a second item this month, with with most of the new items that function similar to this being in the Cash Store. But the item is nice, so if you find yourself attracted to at least one of the modes, go get it.
GCS or MC? Who wins?
This month has seen a lot of items that have come out with the intent of making sure Gaia has enough money to pay developers and server opperation costs. This is also the debute of the Evolving Items. And because most of the users that can get these items easily are shelling out real cash, one would hope that these items would be better than just average.
I can't say the same for this month's items. These guys are great in their own right, but they came in to face a load of equally great items. Competition doesn't really lend itself to fairness. The MCs used to have a reputation of either standing out or flopping, but not as bad as how I see them this month given what else has come out that is still very similar to what Wild Things and Autumn Glory have to offer.
If I didn't have to compare them with the GCS items, I would say that these items are on the low end of the scale for the year and may stay there for a while simply because of how predictible they were given the images, as well as the fact that they offer very little to the aesthetics of the avatar short of something seasonal to wear. But there is appeal there to one demographic or another, and as along as there is that, someone will buy it.
Now then... let's see how many people cosplay as Final Fantasy characters in the arena the following week...</div>
 Zeek Slider · Fri Nov 16, 2007 @ 01:30am · 5 Comments |
