A Gift For Home – VeeMee’s 3D Printer
by Burbie52, HSM team writer
Giving and receiving gifts is a practice that has been around for a very long time. It is something that man has done all through recorded history, and probably even before that. Gifts were used to gain favor with the powerful, to show respect to elders, let family and friends know that you love them and to attract a member of the opposite sex as well, much like today.
Up until now, when it came to giving gifts in the Home community, Lockwood had a monopoly of sorts. Though others have built in machines, such as Juggernaut’s MiniBot and Seven Winds personal spaces, and Heavy Water’s Avalon Keep, Lockwood was the only one who had a portable one available to use anywhere that was free, so you didn’t have to own a space to have it. That changed this week when VEEMEE threw their hat in the ring.
I love Lockwood’s machine, though I never use the portable one because I have always had a freezing problem with it. I own several of Lockwood’s estates that have built in ones, and I generally use my Midnight Glade to gift my friends and receive what they send me as well. The idea was revolutionary when it first came out, and they have a wonderful assortment of gifts to choose from. The one drawback is one that what many people have stated – you couldn’t gift yourself. You had to have an alt account to do that or exchange with a trustworthy friend. It can also take a bit of time before the servers give you a gift someone sent you. This has eased a bit as time has gone on, though there is still a waiting period.
The gift is shirt I am wearing. Cool gadget.
VEEMEE’s new 3D printer has eliminated all of that. Not only can you gift yourself – it is instantaneous. If you gift a friend when they are visiting you or even if they are at their own space, they receive it immediately, much like the machines that are built in at Avalon Keep and the Juggernaut spaces. Though in the case of those machines, the person has to be present to get anything.
This a a win-win situation. People in this day and age are all into instant gratification, and this new gift machine does that for them. The only thing you need to get your gift is a machine, and it’s there waiting for you. Lockwood has a messaging system built in to their machine, and though it is nice to get that information handed to you, I think it might be part of the slowing down process that occurs with their machine. By not having that in place, VEEMEE has made it so you will have to go to your machine every day and look to see if you got anything from someone. This is smart marketing, because it keeps the company and their machine in the forefront of your mind each day. There is a notification in your text box that appears when you enter your space that contains the printer. It will tell you if you have gifts to collect or if you sent one that someone already had and are due a refund of your tokens. This is a very cool feature.
Juicer, dress and wine rack gifts
While Lockwood has a much wider variety and scale of products available to gift, I think that the ones that VEEMEE has started with are very nice as well. Some are very unique, like the wine rack, juicer and fantasy creature, others are more normal, like the leather jacket with tie. The one thing I could suggest here is that they somehow mark what is for females only and what is for males, as some of the things look like they could be either, such as the beanie with hair.
I am sure that as time goes on, VEEMEE will be adding things to their available product lines in the machine. Lockwood started small as well, and look where they are now. The way that the 3D printer is formatted right now is very jumbled. The items are all thrown in together without any categories, this might have to change in the future if they continue to add more things, unless they go the route of just making new items and taking out the old ones as they go along. If they choose to do that, it will add a bit of exclusivity to the items as they will not be available anymore, and that is always sought in the Home community, for some reason.
As it stands, this new machine with its animated creation sequence is very interesting and a great new addition to the gifting capabilities we all enjoy in Home. I hope to see many more new products added as we go into this year and beyond, but time will tell whether this new concept in gifting has the staying power of its competitors. I think it does and from the positive comments I have heard so far, they are going to be here for a long time to come.
- Items are varied and well done
- Instant gifting and receiving
- Reasonable pricing for tokens
- Ability to gift yourself
- None so far
May 10th, 2013 by Burbie52 | 6 comments
Burbie52 is a 62 year-old published author and founder of the Grey Gamers group within Home. Born and raised in Michigan, she has lived there her entire life, with the exception of a twelve-year residency on the Big Island of Hawaii. She enjoys reading and writing, as well as video games, especially RPG's. She has one son in his twenties.
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Watch out Lockwood!!! Heh, competition is good though, right?
There’s some fun lookin’ quirky stuff in this thing, like the feet-for-hands and hands-for-feet! And some cool stuff too, like that holographic thingy-mah-joo, or the tumbleweed companion, that made me giggle.
I’m sure I noticed male/female in the descriptions though Burbie, maybe not, I dunno.
Good luck to Veemee with this though, first the brilliant Park space and now a gift machine rival! Me thinks someone at Veemee has been yappin’ in the War Room! Which is great news for us Token Plebs! BRING IT!!!
Yes some of the descriptions do say what gender, but only in the case of items that have 2 choices. The others are left to the pictures to let you decide who they are for. If they put a small symbol on the picture it would make it easier for us. Also many people aren’t used to having any descriptions on their gifts, Lockwood doesn’t do that so some may not read it first. A symbol would remedy any mistakes very easily.
Ahh, that sounds right about the gender thing Burbie, and a male/female icon would clear that right up.
So far my main complaints are interface-design details. Lockwood has these down to a science — a combination of sounds and dialog boxes that lets us know exactly where we are in the process.
For instance, we could use a bit more interface feedback to confirm that a transaction has been completed. And completing a transaction should return us to the main menu, not dump us out of the interface entirely. And there seems to be no way to avoid sending someone an item they already have. Do we have to depend on their “rejecting” the gift to get our tokens back? This is not made clear. I’m sure these things will be fine-tuned as the product evolves.
I agree about the need for item categories and specific gender information. There were things I might have gotten if I could have been sure my female avatar could use them. And active items should be flagged as such, with the number of slots they use. Again, these are things that will likely evolve as VEEMEE polishes the product.
That said, I’m very pleased with the quality of the items I have seen so far. The Star Map is a lot larger and more impressive than it looks in the icon. (It’s a five-slot active item, by the way.) And the Hologram Chair is very nicely done. Both of these are perfect Homeling items. I look forward to exploring the other 3D Printer offerings.
OHH! Star Map!? Gimme gimme!
Looks like I’ll be making a purchase soon, could do with seeing it properly first though…
Nice review Burbie,
The timing of the 3D printer is well timed. The news right now is full of 3D printer stories, and this just seems like the perfect moment.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see Lockwood letting you gift yourself with the gift machine now that it finally has competition.
It is nice to see VEEMEE stepping up right now!