[News] LA's Christmas Housing Decor Contest Winners

[El of LA]

<center><font size=+1">LA's Housing Décor Contest Entries and Results</center></font size></p>

Yesterday, December 29th, was the final day for the LA Christmas Housing Décor Contest. Eight entries were received, and Vahne of HOT Auctions, Crimson Rose of DSR, and myself thoroughly enjoyed viewing and judging the wonderful houses. It was a hard decision to declare winners!</p>

You can take the tour and see all the entries for yourself. The runes to the houses are locked-down at the HOT Auction house in a green runebook on a frostwood podium.</p>

With such effort and beautiful pixel art created, all the entries were winners! Everyone who entered received a gift box containing a snowman, holiday tree deed, a poinsetta, and a candle along with another gift of another valuable item of décor like a Philips Steed, paintings, fans, or origami Christmas balls. In addition, the judges were so impressed with one entry's great detail that a new category of "Technical Achievement" was created for a prize!</p>

Below are the list of winners and picture highlights of the entries we received. Congratulations to you all!</p>

The winners of the contest were,</p>

1st place: Santa's Village, owned by Devin in Malas.
Devin received a check for 1 million gold pieces plus a Luna Lance.
Here is a picture of the winning design:</br> <center>

</center></p>

2nd place: Winter Sanctuary by Rose Cotton in Malas.
Rose Cotton received a potted plant, a pink plant, mistletoe, and a pink bonsai tree.
This is a screenshot of the second place winning entry:
<center>

</center></p>

3rd place: The Beaver's Den, owned by Canadian Beaver in Felucca.
Canadian Beaver received a flickering lantern and 100 ice white, ice blue, ice green, and red-blue cloth.
This is what we saw at the Beaver's Den:
<center>

</center></p>

The prize category created for Technical Achievement was for the intense detailed work on the house entered by Juneivy! It was a marvel of patience and expert pixel art!</p>

Technical Achievement Prize: An Unnamed House owned by Gennivva.
Juneivy received an Alchemist's Bauble, an old-style Pile of Snow, fur, and a check for 100,000 gps.
Here are two images of this great entry:
<center>

</center>
<center>

</center></p>

Here are some highlights of what we saw at other houses:</p>

This was Leia's marvelous Santa:
<center>

</center></p>

The Ice Castle was a beautiful sight to see:
<center>

</center></p>

This was the South Shore House in Felucca:
<center>

</center></p>

and a lovely layout at the UMP House with a neat Christmas greeting from the barkeep Santa!
<center>

</center></p>

Congratulations to everyone who participated! The runes to these houses will be kept at HOT Auction house until the Christmas trees are disabled so go take the Christmas deco tour!</p>

 

[imported_lindylou]

Congrats to the winners!! People have some amazing houses!!

 

[Rose Cotton]

Yay! The tour was so much fun and all the houses were really neat! We have such creative players on this shard. Kudos to everyone for a great contest and thanks to yall for hosting it! It was a nice little addition to the spirit of the holidays

Btw Leia I tasted a sample of the yummy meal on your lovely dining table... mmmmmmm

 

[Guest]

Thank you to all the participants and congratulations to the winners...although all the entries were wonderful it was a very tough decision to make on who won.
The details and designs of many were terrific and I truly enjoyed going and looking at them all.
Happy Holidays to all and be safe on your festival journeys.

 

[imported_lindylou]

Btw, who but our Rose Cotton would think to use a raw chicken in a manger??? Truly innovative.

 

[Rose Cotton]

LOL! Well it was more out of desperation than innovation... couldn't think of anything else that looked remotely like a baby face aside from a raw chicken hehe... but I made sure there were no animals in the manger so it wouldn't get eaten

 

[Guest]

congrats to all winners
all houses looked wonderful
have a great new year everyone

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>

Btw, who but our Rose Cotton would think to use a raw chicken in a manger??? Truly innovative.

[/ QUOTE ]

This was done in 2002 for housing contest winners (use of bird in Nativity scene)
Link to uo.com

 

[Rose Cotton]

Hey cool! That's a neat nativity scene

They even used oil too. And had a little drummer boy, how cute

 

[Guest]

I think that contest was the last Chritmas contest UO actually sponsored, which SUCKS! they should do stuff like that more often.

 

[Guest]

'Stuff like that' meaning contests or Christmas deco contests?

Since 2002 EA/Stratics has held contests, both house deco and other types. We also are always looking for contest ideas, too! You can email those straight to me at [email protected]

 

[Crystal Canyon]

Hey ya Zig Zag...

That picture was actually taken in 2002 of the house I did for a Holiday contest I believe was sponsered by EA. The contest was open to all shards and then the final ten were sent to a test shard and given the little houses to decorate in a Holiday Theme in a weeks time.

There was also a big celebration on the test shard to announce the winners in which, If I remember right, Sannio announced the winners and gave out the prizes.

Yes we need more contests like these that let people from all shards come together to compete. I dont remember any other contests like this one since that time. It was great and hundreds of players came to the test shard while we were decorating to help get us supplies and give moral support.

Of course one of the best parts of the whole thing was the Valorite Apron and Valorite Picture I won that has the details of the contest on them...LOL

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>

I dont remember any other contests like this one since that time.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm sure not trying to make an issue here...I too would like to see more contests...that's for sure!

I do have to say though that we have had conetsts both deco and otherwise that are aimed at all players:<ul> UO Autobiography Contest, 4/05
Home Deco Contest, 2/05[/list]

Those are two that come to mind, and I remember EA doing at least one type of contest thing on their own in the not to distant past.

Like I have said, we are always open to any ideas anyone has for contests. Let us hear some !

 

[Crystal Canyon]

Im sorry, I meant that I dont remember any contests that were held on a test shard where everyone got together to do it, and everyone was given the same amount of space to work with.

I know some folks decline deco contests because they feel thier houses is too small or that they dont have the "extras" some might have to deco with.

What I was saying is that the contest in 2002 was a great contest because we all got to come together to do it and also we all had the same items available to decorate with. Just seemed to make it more fair and alot of people took advantage of it.

 

[Guest]

Ahhhh....test shard specific...I see!

I'll see if something like that would be feasable with the differences in the way test shards are handled now. If it's do-able, I will see if we can gear our next contest around that idea!

 

[Guest]

Well, not test shrad specific per se, but one on your own shard, THEN the winners from each shard taken to test shard to find an overall winner.

 

[Wanda Lust]

Very nice. I especially like the house that won the technical achievement prize. Those purple christmas lights are pretty! The other winners are nice too, but there seems to be a little lack of, oh, I don't know, individuality?

 

[Guest]

aww ty glad you liked it i enjoyed doing it hoped i would win 1st but winning my own title is pretty cool