Gift Items 2012: Review!

ROBLOX has finally released all the gift items, and I honestly believe these have been some of the best gifts ever. Like I did with Halloween 2012 gifts, in this post I will review what came out of each gift. We'll start with the ROBLOX Newshound Gift. If a hat says "decent", it means that I believe it was okay but not great. Hats that say "good"  are pretty good looking in my opinion. Any hats that say "great" are in my opinion, well done and were a great gift. Finally, any hats that say "excellent" are what I believe was a perfect gift.

Newspaper Shades

My Opinion: Good

The ROBLOX Newshound Gift was the easiest gift to obtain this year (and in my opinion, almost all of them were a bit too easy to obtain) and you got it by signing up for the ROBLOX newsletter. For those who didn't get it, the gift went onsale for 50 robux. Inside of the gift was Newspaper Shades. These shades are really nice considering how many got them for free. They don't look excellent, and their positioning is a bit odd, but they go well with a lot of hats.

The Commissioner

My Opinion: Great

This hat came out of the Commissioner's Gift of Commissions (another really easy gift to get.) The gift was worth 250 robux for those who didn't earn it, and the Commissioner was inside the gift. It's a really nice hat, as it's shades, a fedora, and a moustache all in one! It's perfect for those who look for the best hat combos and are annoyed that they can only wear 3 hats at a time. My only complaint with the hat is that it's a bit small.

Candy Cane Antlers

My Opinion: Excellent

These gnarly antlers came out of the Self-Referential Gift of Referring. The mesh itself resembles the classic Wanwood/Silverthorn Antlers mesh, which just about everyone in the ROBLOX community loves. For those who didn't earn the gift could have bought the gift for 300 robux, which is a great deal for classic looking antlers. The texture itself looks very nice and polished. Some consider these antlers to have "ruined" the classic limited Wanwood Antlers even more (because it has an identical mesh). Whenever I refer to the word "ruined" in this post, it means that a gift hat or gear will make a classic limited's price drop dramatically. To be honest, I believe Black Friday actually ruined the Wanwood Antlers. This is because on Black Friday, the Silverthorn Antlers (a much cheaper version of the Wanwood Antlers) went onsale again for a short time. Silverthorns now have around 20k copies, which means there are 20k people who probably aren't interested in Wanwood Antlers.

Paper Money Hat

My Opinion: Decent

This hat came out of the Festival Gift of Group Fundraising (again, a really easy gift) and was worth 75 robux. To be honest, this hat looks way too small on a ROBLOXian. Also, if you look at the texture, it literally is just a ton of dollar bills slapped onto a small mesh. No detail whatsoever. 

Hollywood Shutter Shades

My Opinion: Great

These shades came out of the Razzle Dazzle Hollywood Star Gift and was worth 500 to 550 robux (as I said before, all of the gifts this year were too easy to obtain.) The texture looks gorgeous on these shutter shades, and they go well with many combos. The only problem is that there's quite enough shutter shades in the catalog and it's not very original. 

Conductor's Gold Pocket Watch

My Opinion: Decent

This watch came out of the Ticket to Ride Gift, which was 100 robux for those who didn't earn it. Like most of the gifts this year, this gift was a bit too easy to earn as well. The texture itself looks like a yellow texture with a clock slapped on to it. When worn, the hat is really small, and thus it's hard to find good combos with. Plus, not many people in the community like small hats. The hat idea was good but it's not a super great hat.

7 Jeweled Circlet

My Opinion: Good

This hat came out of the Lucky Gift of Sevens, which was priced at 777 robux. Unlike most of the gifts, this gift was tough to obtain, as the only way to get it was to own a limitedu #7 item. Right after people figured out how to get the gift, people starting trading the craziest things for a #7 item. So, this gift was underpriced. The 7 Jeweled Circlet is an obvious and well made remake of the original Crystal Circlets. It's really nice how the crystals all have different colors, but the mesh feels a bit too small. The crystals are barely touching your head, and it would have been nice if the mesh was a bit bigger so that the crystals were hovering over your head. However, right now it feels as if the crystals are sticking out of your head (which looks weird).

Profit Vision Goggles

My Opinion: Excellent/Decent (it depends, I'll explain why)

The Profit Vision Goggles came out of the High Frequency Trading Gift, the second most expensive gift this year (5k robux). Though, this gift was really easy to get, as all you had to do was complete 8 trades to get it. Now, if you know, the rarest gift hat of 2007 was the Night Vision Goggles. The "NVG's" as called by the LMaD forum later went limited, and since then have been one of the biggest limiteds ever. Until now. The texture of the profit vision goggles is definitely the WORST gift texture ever, as all the admins did was take the NVG's texture and slap a dollar sign clip art on the lens. That's it. No changes to the actual goggles texture whatsoever. So, if you got this gift, you pretty much got a free nonlimited copy of Night Vision Goggles. Now since the gift was so easy to get, there are now tons of copies of Profit Vision Goggles in existence. In fact, since it was a gift about trading, almost EVERY LMaD forumer owns these goggles, and LMaD is pretty much the only people in ROBLOX who have enough to afford NVG's. Thus, since most of LMaD has Profit Vision Goggles, they don't need NVG's.

tl;dr version of the previous paragraph: Night Vision Goggles have lost significant value because of Profit Vision Goggles

Dual Illumina

My Opinion: Great (it varies between people)

The Dual Illlumina was the most expensive gift this year, costing you 40k if you didn't make a top 100 game of 2012. This gift was a shocker as not many expected a gear item to come out. Many have debated over this because some people really like it, but there are also others that hate it. I'll explain some pros and cons about it.

1. Con

Many who bought the gift expected a retexture of a rare hat to come out, like usual. Not a gear item. This gear you could say ruined the original Illumina, as now many own two illuminas in one for 40k. This gear is not the most creative (I mean really, it would be nice if there were some new hat and gear series in these big gifts. So far ROBLOX has started a new Powerface/mask series which is okay, but not great. There's also "rumors" that there's going to be a big new series soon, so save up your money.) Plus, most games don't allow gear items, so you can't use it in many games. A lot of people who bought the gift feel as if they wasted their money. Also, the Dual Illumina will take a long time to ever go limited (Red Domino, the big gift of 2010, has been out for 2+ years now- it's about time for it to go limited @ admins)

2. Pro

Okay, Illumina looks great on profiles. It gives your character the perfect profile view, and adds lots of sparkles. Plus, it will likely go limited someday, which means great profit considering how much the original Illumina is worth. Many are glad they bought it, though many are not. In my opinion, I'm glad the admins didn't do another Domino Crown retexture, but as I said earlier, the admins should come up with a lot of item series this year. The Dual Illumina is also one of the most powerful gears out in the catalog now, meaning you can easily pwn people in fighting games.

Overall, this was a pretty good ROBLOX Christmas. I felt as if there were not enough gifts this year (in fact, people have already discovered that there are three gifts in the backlog made this year that were never released.) I also felt as if the gifts were too easy. For example, the admins gave away through the blog how to get the newsletter gift and the trading gift. The Lucky Gift of Sevens and the Ticket to Ride Gift also gave away how to get them. (I mean really, you only had to sell 1 gamepass?) The only really hard gift to get was the Self-Referrential Gift of Referring (which was underpriced.) All of the gifts felt themed around new features this year, so I honestly believe this year's gifts could have been a lot better. However, the items inside the gifts were much better than last year's, and I applaud the admins for that.

This was a great year and I wonder what 2013 will bring.

- NonstopEpic, Catalog Manager