by Susan, HSM team writer

If there was ever a day I said oops and did a double facepalm, it was when I bought a new personal space on PlayStation Home a few weeks ago (December 16th, 2013) — and the only person to blame is me.

It was a Friday morning (Dec.13th) and I was reading an email about a new upcoming space being released from Lockwood Publishing which was located in a lush tropical setting. After glancing over the video that was attached I was immediately ready to add this to my collection of personal spaces. This place reminded of Sony’s Waterfall Terrace ($4.99) location, which sits atop of a very tall, thundering waterfall and comes with a enjoyable and relaxing mini fishing game. Since I didn’t own that one I thought this could be my waterfall escape. I like the Waterfall Terrace space, but nothing about it really reached out and said buy me.

The following Monday I loged into Home and I saw MVP/PS Home Home Guide christophersteve at a new open house public space that was in situated in a rain forest setting. When I tried to locate the space itself using the XMB menu it was nowhere to be seen. I thought this was the new Lockwood place I just was informed about, yet it was out too early in the week — and I also didn’t remember seeing anything anywhere about there being an open house/preview for it (and whenever possible, I believe open houses are a great idea for any upcoming space being released onto Home). Since we are still unable to return any of our purchases for a refund of any kind, I believe still that a having an open house for newly released personal spaces benefits the whole community by empowering us to become better-informed shoppers.

6 pieces at $4.99..you decide.

I arrive and find maybe a dozen or so people there; a few of them were friends I knew from being active in several of the same Home social and media circles. The Guide was busy answering questions and doing guide business, so I decided to look around. I attempted to save it to favorites and I wasn’t allowed that ability. Looking around, I felt something was off about this place — but I couldn’t place my finger on what it was. Walking about, I saw it had three massive waterfalls, and the closer you got to them, the louder they roared.  Inside, it had a wall-mounted video screen that looked to be playing 2013 E3 highlights. It had a large pool, a hot tub and you could hear the birds singing off in the distance.

Sold.

I saw a commerce point next to the wall and I purchased the space for $4.99. I also saw in the menu that it had separate furniture items for sale and I grabbed those for a bundle price of $4.99.

I left within five minutes of getting there, without getting a chance to say aloha to the Home Guide — but I was on a mission to complete, and that was to do a write up about this place and get it ready to be published for the magazine. I figured I had an early jump on it getting the information out there to the public, and as a writer looking for topics to cover, I was going with the adage of the early bird catches the worm (even though HSM adamantly holds to a “have the last word, not the first word” policy). I still didn’t understand why the open house, if it was published, was being released this Wednesday.  I figured I had a day to put together notes about the place, write up a rough draft and after the update on Wednesday I would have it completed and ready to be published.

First item there that I wanted to gather information about: the wall-mounted video screen. I was a little concerned that there might not be any controls for it, which was confirmed immediately. It was a nice-looking monitor with what appeared to be a sound bar attached below it — however, not a an item you could control. I could put up with a video loop, but I should be able to control the audio, and for the most part that is the one thing that makes the room completely unusable to me. In that same room you will find a control panel that lets you show aloha to all your visiting friends by letting you gift them a reward: a parrot.

It’s not getting a cracker.

The bird sits upon a tree branch and once in a while it moves to show you it’s alive. It is an active item which not only uses 22 furniture slots, but is detailed pretty well — but unfortunately it don’t talk or sing or anything audible. A parrot should talk, or what’s the point? And if it’s an active item I would think it would come with some audible presets or just make a bird sound once in a while, especially when it uses so many furniture slots. Disappointed. My LOOT radio only uses 14 slots and I think it would make me breakfast if so asked.

So far I am kinda disappointed about things but I continue to look around and explore the place. The whole house sits along the banks of a river that begins where the waterfalls end.  The pool is a good size, however there are no swimming options and you are not able to use the ladder at the other end of the pool to exit. Attached to the pool is a six-person hot tub and you are able to hear the air bubbles emanating from the jacuzzi. Along the wood railing and past the mold you’ll see a interactive rainbow pop up which allows the user to change the weather conditions from a sunny day to overcast with a drizzle of rain.

When it rains you don’t hear any changes in sound such as the droplets falling on the leaves or them hitting the water. You don’t see any of the rain hitting the water, either; it just disappears.  Only the person using the weather control is able to witness the changing conditions.  Use it a second time and you change the sky back to a sunny one, and you will observe a rainbow appearing to the left of a waterfall which unfortunately disappears after a while — and again, only the user sees it. Disappointing.

Everyday brings a new rainbow.

On the plus side of things I found the surrounding lush forest to be well detailed and an extremely accurate depiction of what a rainforest jungle would look like. From the elephant ear plants, the different variety of Birds of Paradise that were scattered throughout the landscape, Red Ginger flowers, banana tress and to the towering coconut trees they did an awesome job visually and audibly recreating a tropical rain forest. You hear some animal life out in the jungle but I never, never, never saw any. Nothing flying around, nothing perched upon a limb of the trees that didn’t sway, no monkeys eating a banana, no fish swimming or jumping about in the water-nothing.  Why? Out of memory?

Another plus I liked was the design of the furniture items associated with this space, however they only offered six pieces — which in hindsight at $4.99 is a little high. I could see maybe $2.99-$3.49, personally. I also appreciated the architectural elements that were applied to the building. I had some questions I wanted to ask the Home Guide, and I saw he was still there. But then I actually read the location of where he was: it was at the Sony Rainforest Lodge open house.

It then just hit me that I just purchased the wrong space.

I just blew ten dollars on something I thought was the Lockwood space. Derp. If I had just taken the time to actually watch the video and see what it looked like instead of assuming…

So I went back to the open house, which by now was getting crowded, and I started to chat up the Home Guide . He giggled as I told him the huge mistake I just made by rushing into something without researching more about it in greater detail. He said the Lockwood space blows this one away, and upon hearing this I was grinding my teeth even more. Asking him how come I didn’t see this place on the XMB menu, he responded by saying this was an oops. This place wasn’t supposed to be loaded to the Home network at this time. That explained why I was unable to save it to favorites or why it wasn’t located in recent places visited tab either. Further research uncovered that this space is one of five personal spaces that have been created but not yet seen a full release to the public. Oops. 

Two days later, Lockwood released its newest addition to their Dream Universe: the Dream Forest Paradise. And I bought the clubhouse ($6.99) version as soon as I woke up that morning. Haven’t returned to the lodge since then. If you are in the North America region and would like a tour of Sony’s Rainforest Lodge during the month of January, check out the furniture items and also receive the active parrot reward item, send a friend request to PSNID: xx96791DEATHxx to receive an invitation to visit.

And make sure you know what you’re buying before you purchase it. Half a decade in and still no refunds, returns or discarding. Oh, Home.

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4 Responses to “Every Day Brings A New Rainbow”

1. Phoenix says:

   January 13, 2014 at 2:37 pm

   Good article here Sue. It is a cute little space after you get to know it, so to speak. It does have it’s limitations but you have done wonders with the space. I would live to have the furniture from there but I agree the price was a “No” for me. If at least one item had been active than yeah I would have gotten the bundle. I look at the space as primitive, just what you would expect in a rainforest. If it reappears I may just pick it up. Good article!

   Reply
2. Dr_Do-Little says:

   January 13, 2014 at 11:30 pm

   Excellent review. An old teacher once told us that a good review should urge the audience to see the play/show/whatever. Even if the review is negative. That’s exactly what you have done.

   Your description remind me a lot of the “Paradise at sea”. Shelved projects brung back to squeeze the last drop of profit …

   Reply
   • Susan says:

     January 14, 2014 at 2:31 pm

     Thank you Dr.D-L… I figure I could show it to others and maybe they might find the lemonade from my “lemon”..

     Reply
3. Gary160974 says:

   January 15, 2014 at 12:01 am

   You get all the good spaces lol this one and that yacht one earliar. Just need that inferno apartment for the trio of poor spaces out recently

   Reply