The Seasons of Home
by Kassadee Marie, HSM team writer
Home is a wonderful and extraordinary place, and yet it could be even more extraordinary if there added climatological effects to make it seem more real.
Wouldn’t we all love to have diurnal changes, different weather, and all of the seasons on Home? The public spaces, Great Edo of Nippon and Southern Island Hideaway — both from Granzella — have time of day changes in two hour cycles. Two of the yachts – the Sunset Yacht and the Dream Yacht – offer time of day changes presently. Cutteridge Estate offers intermittent rain storms. Some personal spaces are unchanging day-time spaces and some are unchanging nighttime spaces.
There are also some estates that have built-in seasons as well. Let’s take a closer look at four of these spaces.
The Summer House personal space is one of Sony’s earliest Home estates. There are furniture items in the store that coordinate with this space and one of them is an interesting modern sculpture.
This space has three main areas, divided between two floors. Both floors have fires burning in large fireplaces, which are rather out of place for this season, but enjoyable. The first floor has a two-story high ceiling and a step-down area perfect for a living room or a vividly flashing dance floor, perhaps. Just add one of the boom boxes or one of the other sound items for music. The large upstairs room could be made into a master bedroom suite including bath, or the VIP room of a trendy dance club with a bar and several other conversation areas.
One small but outstanding feature in this space is the built-in shelves on both floors that allow for the placement of ornaments. The third area is a large patio that is perfect for summertime activities like barbecuing, lounging in the sun, lazy conversations and all-day partying. This outside area is bright with a brilliant sun, beautiful blue sky and fluffy white clouds. There is a pleasant river flowing by that gives the feeling you want to jump in and swim and there’s a dock nearby that looks ready for boating or fishing. For a night-time perspective of this space, pick up the Xi Party House.
Autumn is a favorite time of the year for many people and it’s so colorful in large parts of our country. Creek Falls has all the best that this season offers in it’s views.
The setting is in the countryside with no neighbors for miles in any direction and there is a creek running down from the small waterfall nearby. Looking at the leaves turning colors all around you, you can almost feel the crisp and tangy air in your face. There is a nice-sized deck here with the perfect place for one of the hot tubs offered for sale in Home. The view from here is of the rocky hills, colorful trees and the waterfall and creek.
Inside, the first story is for the most part a large open area with a floor covered in green tiles. There is one area that is slightly raised from the rest, with a narrow deck area just outside through the sliding glass doors. There are places for several pictures or wall hangings and there is a cozy fire in the fireplace at one end. The second floor here is a small loft that over looks the rest of the living space and would be perfect for a bedroom.
The furniture package that matches this space has one of the new “active item” beds that you can lay on. As a bonus this space offers a reward to your friends who visit of a small, colorful tree with falling leaves.
The Winter Vacation Villa is the perfect winter season get-away place. This estate offers a lot, including a huge deck on the first floor with a built-in hot tub and another of the incredible views available on Home. This view is of a large icy waterfall on the mountain side and a little snowy village nestled down in the valley below.
In the interior of the villa, the first floor has a complete kitchen with island, a dining room with a reflective mirror and a living room area with a welcoming fire burning in the fireplace to keep you warm. Stairs lead up to the second floor which is also is a small loft that over looks the rest of the living space and this room has a built in bed. Through a small door, there is also an upper deck with the same valley view and a wrap around walkway on all sides that offers views of the mountains and snow-covered evergreen forest all around. It would be nice to be able to close all three of the doors in the villa. Brr!
So there are three of the seasons. Where is spring?
I think, perhaps, spring is at the Bonk Living Space. With overgrown vegetation on all sides, a fast-running river of clear water and sprouting large red flowers, this large estate seems to epitomize the season. This is one of the largest spaces offered on Home and has many visual delights. There is an active volcano, the crystal water stream with fish swimming in schools, the lush vegetation everywhere and a pterodactyl flying overhead. The living space here is a two-story hut in a small clearing high above the river. There is a mini game which allows you find items in the river, such as the primitive furniture for the first story of the hut. You can also find seeds for the bounce flowers here, which are quite fun to plant and jump on. One of them lets you jump all the way to the conical roof of the hut for an incredible 360-degree view of this prehistoric world in all its spring-time glory.
So until Home offer us seasonal, diurnal or weather control in all of our personal estates, we will have to make do with the time of day, time of year and the weather that is offered to us. But until then, at least with these four spaces, we are offered true seasons of the year to enjoy.
March 6th, 2012 by Kassadee Marie | 7 comments
Home is endlessly entertaining to this California girl. Kassadee has been in Home for about four years, and loves almost everything about it (with a few notable exceptions). She spends way too much money there, and perhaps too much time... Someday she will travel the world and write about the people she meets and the places she sees.
Yes! Changing of seasons or time of day option would be wonderful add on for personal spaces. I like yourself, as you mentioned in your “It’s always Christmas at my house” article have spaces set up for specific seasons year round because it adds some variety. Great Read!
Plum Palace Pavillion is going to be the ultimate Spring space when it releases. Seasonally, it offers the red maples of autumn, but also the cherry blossoms of spring, and the lighting certainly feels appropriate to a warm spring day.
Lakeside Log Cabin is an overlooked gem of an Autumn space…no colorful trees like Creek Falls, but the clear sky and smoke wafting from its chimneys suggest a strong chill in the air.
the seasons of Home…
Great article, Kass.
Personally, it’s getting to the point for me where diurnal controls — or at least some ability to manipulate the setting and climate — are practically pre-requisites for an estate. There are a few properties (such as Plum Tree Pavilion) which are sufficiently dynamic that they don’t need it, but this latest crop of estates from Sony — Gothic Manor, French Chateau, Hillside, Mt. Olympus, etc. — all feel horribly static compared to, say, Cutteridge or the Sunset Yacht.
Are there estates which are so aesthetically pleasing that they can rest on those merits solely? Sure. I love the Log Cabin, and that’s Home’s second-oldest estate. But in general, innovation and user immersion are good things, even if they drive the price up.
I agree, unless these newer spaces up the ante they will see poor sales I think, at least from the older people who have watched Home grow for the past couple of years. Once you have experienced the Dream Yacht space or something like it you are going to be forever looking for that extra something that sets a space apart from the others.
When it comes to season I always think of the Waterfall Terrace as full summer, the Creek Falls is one I got to represent autumn, spring could be the Japanese space and winter has to be the Vacation Villa as it is one of a kind, though I have never bought it. I guess if the new one I have decided to call the “blue mansion” ever comes to Home it will be a second winter space.
Good job covering several of the spaces in one article Kass.
You are all kind, as usual. Thank you. I still wish I could write something with more substance, something truly thought-provoking.
what comes after winter?