My virtual avatar in the virtual Home Depot.
Ben Tobin
I visited Home Depot’s Virtual Kid Workshop it launched it Radcliffe City on gaming platform Roblox.
The virtual Home Depot was as a brilliant advertisement for kids, though extremely bizarre.
I found virtual supplies and built virtual items like a bird house and 2-seat car at Home Depot.
Hope Depot recently launched its first foray into the metaverse in Roblox, so I decided to visit and see what it was really like.
Ben Tobin
I’d never played on Roblox before, so I had to make an account.
Ben Tobin
Roblox is a free gaming platform with over 100 million active users, many of whom are children.
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Source: Insider
Once I finished creating my account, I was prompted to download and install Roblox.
Ben Tobin
While I’m not great with technology, the platform gave me an easy five-step guide to downloading it.
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Overall, the setup process only took a few minutes.
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And then the anticipation was almost over, as I could enter the “Radcliffe City” game where I could visit Home Depot’s Virtual Kids Workshop.
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I was asked to select between a “peaceful” and “loud” mode and opted for the latter.
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After selecting my mode, I received a message that Radcliffe City had a map update, including “The Home Depot Event!”
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Finally, I arrived in Radcliffe City, where I immediately was greeted by a Home Depot facade with a bright door instructing me to come in.
Ben Tobin
But as someone new to Roblox, I wanted to familiarize myself with the features of the platform, including free costumes for my avatar, before heading to Home Depot.
Ben Tobin
I also explored what tools were available at my disposal…
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…and decided I’d be best equipped to explore this world with some bread.
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I also played with various emotes for my avatar, with the dance pose action being my favorite.
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After dressing up my avatar and playing with emotes, I decided to explore Radcliffe City and see what it had to offer, including a toy shop called “Toys N’ Things” and a childcare facility called “ABC Daycare.”
Ben Tobin
I also visited a playground…
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After a whole lot of dilly-dallying through Radcliffe City, I decided I was ready to visit the Home Depot Virtual Kids Workshop and was told very clearly on my screen that the game is an advertisement for the company.
Ben Tobin
I arrived outside of a virtual Home Depot shop after walking through the bright doors.
Ben Tobin
I headed straight into the shop and was greeted by a “KIDS WORKSHOPS” sign in colorful letters. The experience here was supposed to resemble the real-life Kids Workshops the chain holds in its stores.
Ben Tobin
The graphics were quite ugly, and I was baffled by the world, but I was also impressed with the recreation of The Home Depot environment on a virtual platform.
Ben Tobin
From labeled aisles to products from paint to power tools, the virtual Home Depot seemed like a pretty good advertisement for kids who might not be going to home improvement stores.
Ben Tobin
After exploring the store for a little bit, I was admittedly a little bit confused about what I was supposed to do in there.
Ben Tobin
I finally found a kind virtual Home Depot employee who told me to “”talk to my teammate at the Kids Workshop table to get started on your build.”
Ben Tobin
I did as told and found the Home Depot employee at the Kids Workshop table, and I asked them “can I start a build?”
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The Home Depot employee kindly agreed and sent me on my way to collect lumber.
Ben Tobin
When I found the lumber, I was then instructed to collect a hammer…
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…and then nails…
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…and then paint…
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…and then I was finally ready to build.
Ben Tobin
The instructions were pretty easy, as I first clicked on a circle to “measure and cut the lumber.”
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Then I clicked again to grab the hammer.
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For the third step, I clicked again to hammer the nails.
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And finally, I clicked one last time to paint the bird house.
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And voila, I had a bird house after the scavenger hunt and building process.
Ben Tobin
I did this whole process two more times for two other items.
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First, I built a flower garden, following a similar collecting and building process.
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Come the third item, a 2-seated car, I was a pro at finding items and building, so I completed the task quickly.
Ben Tobin
At that point, the building became a bit redundant, and there was nothing left to build, so I left the virtual Home Depot.
Ben Tobin
After toggling with my keyboard for a bit, I discovered that I could put the car I built to action and drive it around.
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I drove it around, both (legally) on the road and (illegally) on grass.
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It was the most fun part of this bizarre experience, and I decided I’d leave the metaverse on a high.
Ben Tobin
So I left the metaverse about an hour after toiling around, unsure if I’ll ever come back. I can see what Home Depot is trying to do — connecting its in-person and virtual spaces — but I’m not sure how engaging or useful it really is to the average kid on Roblox.
Ben Tobin
Read the original article on Business Insider