Changes: Marketplace

Revision as of 20:01, 23 December 2019

Information

Itempage — The item page layout since September 2016

The Avatar Shop, formerly known as the Catalog, is a section on Roblox where users can purchase virtual clothing and items for their avatar using Robux. These items include heads, faces, gear, accessories, T-shirts, shirts, pants, bundles, and animation packs. Items which cannot be purchased are regarded as "off-sale", and limited items are available at community-based prices in finite quantities (existing copies are resold rather than new ones being created).

Both ROBLOX and selected UGC creators have the ability to create and edit their items in the Avatar Shop (occasionally Games will also upload test items), while normal Premium players are able to publish clothing. It is worth noting that new items are most likely to be published when a new hour strikes during weekends, however they may also be released at non-specific times.

Catalog Legend

Current Icon	Former Icon*	Description
		Item is available in finite quantities from resellers and can also be traded.
		Serialized variants of limited items. Always sold for a fixed price initially and become limited after selling out.
		Item is exclusive to 13+ accounts.
	No	Item is a Rthro bundle or animation pack.

Discontinued Requirements

Current Icon	Original Icon*	Description
		Item was exclusive to Builders Club or higher-tier users.
		Item was exclusive to Turbo Builders Club or higher-tier users
		Item was exclusive to Outrageous Builders Club users.

* Images in the "Original Icon" section were retrieved from the old catalog page. Attempting to access items will revert to the new layout.
** In early May 2019, all on-sale BC, TBC, and OBC-exclusive items became available for all users to purchase. ** On June 25, 2019, all on-sale rental items were transformed to nonrental items and some off-sale items were transformed to trophies but still showed the Rental detail in the description.

Community Creations

User-Generated Content update

During August of 2019, Roblox introduced a new feature called User Generated Content onto the Avatar Shop which allows users to be able to publish their own items. All items created by other users besides ROBLOX can be viewed under the "Community Creations" category.

Eligible users

This list contains all of the users who are currently creating new items right now, with the exclusion of Roblox Video Stars:

Types of items

Rental items

Rental items were items that have a set expiration date. Many gears did have expiration times, not limited to gears but other catalog items. Some Sponsored items such as the Flintstones Car and The Amazing Spider-Man are rental items. They had 4-week and 2-week rentals, respectively. On June 25, 2019 all currently on sale rental items were discontinued meaning there were no longer any Rental items on-sale, and the Rental detail does show up for off-sale items.

Timed items

Timed WCS — As shown on the catalog page.

A timer is something that is placed on exclusive items lasting for a rather short period of time, this is shown on the Avatar Shop or the item's page itself. Timed items have this countdown on them. They are usually put on normal or limited unique items during a sale or special holiday. Once the countdown has reached its chokepoint, the item goes off sale and is updated, Sometimes, Roblox would randomly make various items that were on sale for a period of time timed, usually, so Roblox can focus on other catalog items. Some examples include the Fallen Artemis Bow gear item being marked as timed sometime during March or April of 2016, and the Red ROBLOX Glider gear item being marked as timed during early July 2016. Some holiday-related items or items related to a special event would go on sale sometime before or during a holiday or special event and become timed, and would usually go off sale once the holiday or special event the catalog item is related to is over. An example would be the Classic ROBLOX Pumpkin Head, which is only available during the month of October and would be put off sale once Halloween ends. Some items are immediately marked as timed after they go on sale. For example, the Blue Sparkle Time Bowler was timed for one day for 5,000 Robux sometime during the end of June 2016. Occasionally, these items would later become limited items (usually during a sale, such as a President's Day sale, a Memorial Day sale, a Labor Day sale, or a Black Friday sale).

WCS — Example of a timed item. As you can see, the timer has an approximately 4-hour countdown visible below the "Buy" button. This is also evident shown above the item itself. Two red indicators that it is especially on sale for a limited amount of time.

Deep Avatar Shop

UnnamedGearItem — The page of the gear item titled "."

The "Deep Avatar Shop" is a name given to the items in the Avatar Shop that are "hidden" in the "deep" areas of the Avatar Shop. Some notable items in the deep Avatar Shop are Item, a LimitedU item, adslkasljdfla'd, and an unnamed gear item which only consists of a period in its title and has no content. Players will usually use their imaginations to create myths and legends surrounding these types of Avatar Shop items, but the purpose of these items is either for testing or through some kind of mistake during the uploading of the item.

Role in Trade Currency

Until April 15, 2016, players could use the Trade Currency button to transfer Tickets for Robux, and vice versa. This often helped when users wanted to purchase items being sold for Robux since it was a currency that only Builders Club members get a stipend of. This feature was removed after the removal of Tickets.

Renaming of the Catalog

On December 5, 2019, the Catalog was re-named to the 'Avatar Shop', seemingly out of nowhere. This caused a large amount of confusion across the Roblox community, with some even claiming that it was 'unnecessary' and 'ridiculous'.

This change was announced at RDC 2019, showing the merged Catalog and Avatar Editor in action on a Mobile Device. As of now, this Catalog and Avatar Editor merging has taken effect on Mobile Devices, and will likely make its way to computers in the next month. It was likely the renaming of the Catalog would be in preparation of this merge.

Criticism

Plagiarism

As clothing templates are readily accessible on the Roblox Website, many designers face issues with copying. With many popular clothing items, pages of duplicates may be created by users or clothing groups looking to cut into the original designer's sales on that design, leading to catalog spamming. As there is no way to note original clothing items, players frequently unintentionally purchase clothing that may be copied. Clothing designers frequently see less revenue from their clothing sales when their designs are copied.

Removal of tickets

Tickets were a currency that was awarded to a user when they logged onto their account daily, being 10 tickets a day. Tickets could be used to buy some items on the catalog, but it was removed on April 15, 2016. With the removal of Tickets as a Roblox currency in, the only way to purchase items from the Roblox Catalog is through Robux. Tickets were removed right after the Tixapalooza which resulted in many players to be forced to buy Robux or BC in order to buy paid items. Along with the removal of tickets, the Trade Currency feature was also removed.

Price floor

Initially, clothing assets could be put on sale for a minimum of one Ticket or one Robux. A price floor was added in 2013 that raised the minimum price of clothing to 300 Tickets or 25 Robux. The price floor on clothing currently set to 2 Robux for T-shirts and 5 Robux for shirts and pants, many players are unable to purchase clothing items without purchasing Robux or Builders Club.

Technical issues

When a player loses connection while on the Avatar Shop, a red box will appear on top of the Avatar Shop, notifying them the Avatar Shop is "unavailable". When a LimitedU item is released onto the Avatar Shop, they will rarely have the option to not be bought, sold and not have any stock.

Any section including shirts, pants, any accessories, anything that can have more than 20 pages, will break and won't go past page 20. This has been an ongoing unsolved issue for several years to this day. It was decided to end the Avatar Shop at page 20, making it harder to search for items.

Limited item glitches

As of 2019, some limited items released during the Presidents' Day 2019 Sale have "glitched", allowing players to purchase them for free and to allow infinite copies to be sold. Items such as the Torque the Blue Orc, the Disgraced Baroness of the Federation, and Ruby Archfey Visage experienced this glitch allowing thousands of players to obtain these items for free.

Trivia

This section is a trivia section. Please relocate any relevant information into other sections of the article.

Sometimes, the Avatar Shop will completely glitch out and cause the featured items tab to be littered with random (possibly stolen) clothing.

File:Catalogshirtglitch.png

@@ Line 51: / Line 51: @@
 |}
-''<nowiki>*</nowiki> Images in the "Original Icon" section were retrieved from the ''[https://www.roblox.com/develop/library?CatalogContext=1 old catalog] ''page. Attempting to access items will revert to the new layout.''<br />''<nowiki>**</nowiki> In early May 2019, all onsale BC, TBC and OBC-exclusive items became available for all users to purchase.''
+''<nowiki>*</nowiki> Images in the "Original Icon" section were retrieved from the ''[https://www.roblox.com/develop/library?CatalogContext=1 old catalog] ''page. Attempting to access items will revert to the new layout.''<br />''<nowiki>**</nowiki> In early May 2019, all on-sale BC, TBC, and OBC-exclusive items became available for all users to purchase.''
 <nowiki>**</nowiki> On June 25, 2019, all on-sale rental items were transformed to nonrental items and some off-sale items were transformed to trophies but still showed the Rental detail in the description.