Tag: Group Gifts

Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Asteria

If course, you all realize that I have completely broken my promise not to blog over the holidays, don’t you? Oh well. In for a penny, in for a pound.

My favourite SL freebies vlogger, Cat Pink SL, has just published an end-of-year rundown of various stores offering free group gifts:

Among those stores is Asteria (here’s the SLURL), which has a free group join. Just click the sign outside the store:

The group gifts section is very conveniently located right next to the sign, outside the store:

This is an extremely generous selection of group gifts! You can get up to eight different versions of each of the outfits. However, you should know that these are mostly older items, which come in the five standard mesh sizes (instead of models to fit Maitreya, Belleza, and Slink bodies). Also, in a couple of cases, the outfits consist of system layers, prims, and mesh components. So your mileage on these deals may vary. I found I had to fiddle around a good bit to get some items to fit my Maitreya Lara body, and in some cases I just gave up in frustration.

Please be sure to check both the front and the back of each of the group gift displays, as they show different group gifts, and don’t forget to use your camera carefully, so as not to miss any gifts because of those pesky transparency overlapping issues that can happen in Second Life—the outfits you are clicking on can appear and disappear behind the grass!

Here Vanity Fair shows off some of the Asteria group gifts. First up is the Agnes belted turtleneck dress, which comes in four different colours: beige as shown, mint, black, blue, and claret. (Tucked away to the side of the Agnes outfit display are matching boots, but unfortunately they didn’t fit my Maitreya Lara mesh avatar, and I could not resize them.)

Next Vanity models the Lily top (which comes in seven different colours) and the Lily miniskirt (which comes in six different colours, including lace and leather versions):

Here is the midriff-baring Sophia blouse in claret red, matched with the low-cut Sophia pants in black. The blouse comes in seven other colours (beige, floral pink, yellow, black, maroon, blue and white, and the pants in six other colours (claret, yellow, black-and-white, floral pink, maroon, and blue), so you can mix and match to your heart’s content:

This very pretty pink patterned shirt is part of the Wild Bedrosian outfit, which also includes shorts, and comes in pink as shown, and also powder, black, and blue. I had absolutely no luck fitting the standard-sizes shorts to my Maitreya Lara body, however (you might have better luck with your own mesh body).

In total, I picked up well over a hundred different free articles of clothing in one stop! So come on down to Asteria and vacuum up some fabulous, fashionable freebies! Thanks to the store for being so generous!

In these pictures, Vanity Fair is also wearing:

Happy freebie shopping!

UPDATED! Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: What Christmas Trees and Advent Calendars I’ll Be Hitting on Christmas Eve/Christmas Day

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Photo by Evelyn on Unsplash

There are various locations within Second Life where generous content creators have placed free Christmas gifts under the tree:

  • FaMESHed Event: You can join the FaMESH ed group for free to pick up the gifts under this Christmas tree. As a bonus, there’s also a wheeled cart off to the side where you can still pick up an assortment of gifts from a recent autumn round of FaMESHed!
  • The Dubai Event has an assortment of gifts under their Christmas tree (including a particularly nice blue and gold ballgown by Virtual Diva, for Maitreya Lara mesh bodies only).
  • The Free Dove has gifts under a large Christmas tree, located to the right as you enter the freebie store. You do need to join The Free Dove group for free.
  • The Swank Event has quite a few gifts under their tree outside, but also many more scattered around outside in the snow! So wander around and see what you can find. No group is required.
  • Epiphany has some lovely gifts under a Christmas tree in the centre of the event. No group is required.
  • At the Man Cave event, the “tree” is a stack of green beer bottles, and the “gifts” are beercans with red ribbons standing underneath it! There are over 30 gifts here, all for male avatars.
  • The VERSUS event has five gifts at the landing point, including ice skates, roller skates, and a jetski, and there are many other gifts which are located in Christmas stockings at the various vendor booths. You must join the VERSUS group for free to get these gifts, including the Estephania full-body female mesh avatar by Altamura, which previously was a gift in the SL Frees & Offers Hunt. (UPDATE: Although this was a free group join when I first visited, the organizers have since raised the group join fee to L$50.)
  • The Très Chic event has a pile of presents under the Christmas tree outside, plus gifts at some of the vendor booths inside. Join the Très Chic group for free to get these Christmas gifts.
  • As in past years, the Cosmopolitan event has gifts in over 30 Christmas stockings hung on the large Christmas tree at the entrance. You do have to join the Cosmopolitan group for free to get these gifts.
  • UPDATE Dec. 23rd: I just found out that all the gifts under the Christmas Tree at Sn@tch will be FREE on Christmas Day!
  • UPDATE Dec. 25th: Fallen Gods has a wonderful assortment of gifts under their Christmas tree! No group is required.

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Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

Most of the advent calendars and 12 Days of Christmas calendars operated by in-world stores in Second Life require you to show up each day to get the advent gift for that date. Sometimes, you may be able to purchase previous days’ gifts for a small fee. But there are a few calendars which allow you to pick up today’s gift, plus all the previous days’ gifts, for free or a small group join fee. Here’s a list of locations where I intend to visit sometime on Dec. 24th or 25th to pick up all the gifts at one time!

  • ALB Dream Fashion & ShuShu has an advent calendar where you can pick up most (not all) of the previous days’ gifts. No group is required.
  • At ML Fashion, you can not only get all the gifts at once on their Advent Calendar on Christmas Day, you can also pick up their Peace on Earth Hunt prize, which is tucked away at the very top of their Christmas-tree-shaped calendar! No group is required.
  • Both Emerald Couture (women’s wear) and Emerald Man (menswear by the same designer) have not one, but two Advent calendars: one requires you to join their respective groups (for free) and you can only pick up gifts on the appropriate date, but each store also has a second Advent calendar which does not require a group, and you can pick up all the previous days’ gifts for free! (Use the provided SLURLs to find the exact locations of the no-group-required Advent calendars; they are in a different location than the “regular” Advent calendars.)
  • JUMO has a 12 Days of Christmas calendar where you pick up all the gifts at once. Remember to come back on New Year’s Eve for a final gift! All gifts are free and do not require a group membership.
  • And, last but not least, Altamura lets you pick up all their 12 Days of Christmas gifts under their Christmas tree at one time! You do have to join the Altamura Design/Mesh Avatars group for L$25 to get these gifts, which include the Omega-compatible Leila Bento mesh head for female avatars, and a nice set of Omega skin appliers, in all the Altamura skintones, to use with that head! And apparently, they will also put out a male Bento mesh head as an Advent gift well sometime in the coming days. Altamura often has group specials and gifts throughout the year, so it’s well worth it to spend the L$25 to join their group now, and stay subscribed (usually, the join fee for the Altamura Design/Mesh Avatars group is L$50).
  • UPDATE Dec. 25th: Surprise! Firelight Hair has made all the previous days’ Advent gifts available for free (you do need to join the Firelight group for free).

So, there you have it! Play your cards right on Christmas Day, and in one series of teleports around the grid, you can pick up dozens and dozens of Christmas presents for free or next-to-nothing! Happy freebie shopping!

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Photo by Andrew Neel on Unsplash

 

Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Nine Blogs You Must Follow!

Have you joined the RyanSchultz.com Discord yet? More details here. 

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Back in June, I posted about 4 blogs and 4 Flickr groups you should follow for news and pictures of Second Life freebies. The four blogs I originally recommended were:

The first three I check daily; the fourth one I check about once a week, just to see what’s new. I often find some treasure that I have unaccountably overlooked in my travels across the grid! The third one is good because it is an aggregator; it gathers together blogposts from various blogs such as FabFree (but note that not all of the posts in SL Freebies Cheapies Dollarbies Lucky Chairs Hunts are about free items; there’s a mix of free items and deals).

Well, I have found another 5 blogs which are also worth checking out regularly if you are serious about hunting for steals, deals, and freebies in Second Life! Let’s look at them, one by one:

SL Freebie Addiction

SL Freebie Addiction is a blog written by Genna since 2011, entirely devoted to freebies. She very clearly indicates what items are and aren’t free in her detailed styling notes under each picture, and she also indicates whether items are group gifts or hunt gifts.

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0L$ Fashion in Second Life 2

This is a Japanese blogger who posts every day about the freebies she has found all over the grid. Right now she is putting up one post every day showing the advent gifts she was able to pick up on that day. All items pictured include a SLURL to help you find it in-world. Here’s a link to the blog.

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Midnight Magpie

Midnight Magpie is another blog which is really covering all the advent calendar goodies right now! Every picture includes full style notes with SLURLs to the stores.

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Pure Eggs & Spam

Faithless Babii is a relentless freebie hunter, often churning out two or even three blogposts a day! She covers freebies from all over the grid. Pure Eggs & Spam also covers sale events such as L$35 Saturdays. She seems to have a knack for finding things that other bloggers overlook.

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Dancing in the Square

But I saved the very best for last: this blogger, Cherie, is an absolute inspiration to all freebie fashionistas! Cherie pulls together impressive fashion displays, only using freebies and group gifts! She’s fearless, too; she’s not afraid to try a men’s jacket or a men’s pair of shoes on a female avatar if it fits the look she is trying to create. Browse through her blog and you’ll get all kinds of tips on where to find great group gifts and freebies, and how to put them together in true style!

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Here are just a few pictures from Dancing in the Square (I really like how she includes a bag of some sort in almost every outfit):

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So now you have nine blogs to follow. Spend a few minutes every day to visit them, and you’re certain to find out about the latest and greatest steals, deals, and freebies! Most of these blogs update daily, if not more often.

Oh, and don’t forget to join and follow these six SL groups for even more news about freebies and deals:

  1. Fabulously Free in SL: their group is free to join; here is a list of the gifts you can pick up with that group tag active
  2. Maitreya Gifts, Sales & News: their group is free to join; follow their blog to find out what gifts you can get with this group
  3. Mesh Avatar Appearance Maniacs (MAAM): it costs L$50 to join the MAAM group; here is a list of freebies you can pick up with that group tag active
  4. SL Frees & Offers: their group is free to join; here’s their blog
  5. TeleportHub.com: it costs L$10 to join their group; here is a list of gifts you can get
  6. THIRD LIFE [Frees, Gifts & Hunts]: L$10 to join group; here is their blog

Do you know of a great freebie fashion blog that I have missed? Please leave me a comment if you do, with the name of the blog and the URL, thank you!

Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Ryan’s Eight Rules for Freebie Hunting

Here are 8 rules for freebie and bargain hunting that I have compiled over eleven years in Second Life:

  • Be patient: Freebies can come and go; freebie stores like The Free Dove and Ajuda SL Brasil rotate their freebies regularly, so it’s worthwhile to visit every couple of month just to see what’s new. It can take some time to pull together a complete look from various components picked up as freebies at different times from different stores and events.
  • Monitor the various freebie news sources: Here’s the best six groups to join for freebies. Here are four blogs and four Flickr groups to follow for news of freebies. And read my blog 😉 and other SL fashion blogs and Facebook groups for news. And watch the Cat Pink SL series of YouTube videos for more news about hunts and other freebies.
  • Join groups which are known for giving great deals and freebies to their members: For example, if you joined the Akeruka mesh heads group a year and a half ago, you would have picked up no less than six fully-adjustable Bento mesh heads (three female and three male), all for a single group join fee of L$150. That works out to only L$25 per Bento mesh head, a truly outstanding deal! Also join the Altamura group for L$50, which gives you access to the deals that Altamura offers on mesh heads and bodies at various events around SL, as well as many group gifts in the mainstore. Alien Gizmo’s regularly gives away L$200 gift cards for their store to their group members. Join these groups and stay in them, because you never know when there will be a bargain or a freebie available in future.
  • Watch for free group join periods: A perfect example is Scandalize, which has lifted its group join fee of L$100 from Sept. 15th to 17th (more info here).
  • Use the lucky chairs and panels: You can often pick up some great freebies this way. Here’s my list of the 18 best lucky chair and panel locations in Second Life.
  • Participate in hunts: Hunts are often a great way to pick up free or inexpensive items. The Free Dove picks three different designers every month who hide hunt items all over the store. A recent example was the August hunt by Sweet E’s at The Free Dove and Sweet E’s mainstore.
  • Visit fashion and gacha events: These can be another great place to pick up free gifts (be careful, though; some gifts at some events can be as much as L$10!). For example, the regularly held events run by the Gimme Gacha group have dozens of free gifts available for you to pick up. FaMESHed is another regular event with many high-quality freebies.
  • Don’t be too picky: Even though the free item might not be the exact style or colour you wanted, you can probably still make it work, and look good too. It’s the picky shoppers who land up spending a lot more money to get exactly what they want. For example, do you really want that expensive ballgown, when you can pick up that simple but beautiful Nadia ballgown as a free gift from Hilly Haalan (the group is free to join), with a HUD that gives you 15 different colour choices? You can probably make that work well with accessories already in your inventory, and look stunning.

Here is a perfect example of an avatar where I was able to pull together the entire look, over the course of a year and a half, for only a single Linden dollar! It is a combination of lucky chair prizes with free group gifts (joining the group when it was free for a limited time), plus store giveaways. Please click on each picture to see it in a larger size:

This avatar is wearing:

Mesh Head, Eyes and Makeup: Kenna mesh head (free group gift from Genesis Lab; the group join fee was free at the time I joined, but they have since raised it to L$99)

Mesh Body and Nails: Afrodite body by LUCYBODY (free from the Midnight Madness board if you join their group for free; more details here)

Hair: Ivy hair (free gift from Entwined; the 3 HUDs included in the package give you a total of 65 different hair colours!)

Dress: red and black Devil’s Heart Sweets dress (lucky chair prize from Alien Gizmo’s; enter the store at the main entrance, turn left, and walk along to the second courtyard near the far end to find the lucky chairs, or just use your map and follow the red arrow from the provided SLURL)

Choker: Nina choker by RxK (free from the Ajuda SL Brasil freebie store; more details here)

Clutch: Helena clutch (lucky chair prize from MODA; the HUD gives you 24 colour choices for the purse, and a choice of either gold or silver for the metal accents; enter the main store in front of you at the spawn point, and go around into the back room where the four lucky chairs are located or just use your map and follow the red arrow from the provided SLURL)

Shoes: Bijou pumps (lucky chair prize, also from MODA; the HUD gives you 36 colour and pattern choices each for the shoe and the platform)

Avatar AO: Your First AO Basic Female Mocap by Vista Animations (L$1; it’s located at the back of the Female AO section of the store, so use your map and follow the red arrow provided by this SLURL)

Bento Hands AO: Jenny Hands AO (part of the free Jenny Altamura mesh body package available for free at the Freebie Megastore in London City; it can be worn with the Vista AO, which does not have built-in Bento hand animations; more details on how to get Jenny here)

Ankle Lock: by Baby Monkey (freebie from the blue bag on the reception desk)

My total cost to assemble this complete avatar look was only L$1 (for the Vista AO).