Virtual Worlds – Page 116

October 27, 2014

Blood Letters – MadPea Games First Adult Hunt

Blood Letters Promo Poster — Blood Letters

MadPea Games are well known in Second Life circles for their interactive games and hunts. However on November 1st they are taking a small step into unchartered waters as they unleash their first ever adult hunt in the shape and form of Blood Letters.

This isn’t the first time MadPea Games have ventured into the world of noir, Mad City had a very noirish feel to it but this time they are stepping into a new dimension with some very adult themes. This is more than just a find the objects hunt, Blood Letters is billed as an erotic thriller.

Writing on the MadPea blog, Kess Crystal wrote :

Samantha “The Mantis” Mason, is an internationally infamous serial killer due to her particularly gruesome hobby. Seducing men and women alike, she lured them with the promise of fulfilling their lust, only to appease her own thirst for blood with these hapless pleasure-seekers.

Society breathed a collective sigh of relief when, after 8 brutal murders she was finally apprehended and brought to justice. However, a year after The Mantis was put behind bars murders have started occurring again, and the sadistic killer operates in a way that keeps everyone in fear.

The players will take on the role of a Private Detective and get prepared to solve a grisly series of shocking murders to test the boundaries where eroticism meets morality.

The game will take place on the very impressive and R3Volt sim. I’ll include the SLURL for that in the official press release below the cut.

Continue reading “Blood Letters – MadPea Games First Adult Hunt”

October 27, 2014

A Visit To Matanzas In Second Life

The recent Designing Worlds 250th edition grabbed headlines for Designing Worlds reaching such an impressive milestone and for an interview with Linden Lab CEO Ebbe Altberg. However the carefully selected location of Matanzas has been somewhat overlooked, so I decided to visit the sim to see just why this impressive location was considered the ideal venue for the landmark edition of Designing Worlds.

The sim was chosen not just because of its undoubted beauty but also because in a very early edition of Designing Worlds they visited Skate Foss’ parcel on the sim and gave it a makeover. Skate Foss was so impressed with the location that over the years she became not just a parcel owner, but the owner of the whole island and it’s a very impressive sim indeed that exemplifies not only what can be achieved within Second Life but also how much you can pack into a sim without leaving visitors with the impression that they are treading in treacle.

Part of the challenge of most Second Life sims is to engage visitors and strengthen community. Matanzas manages to do both with a mixture of public and private areas. The private areas are for tenants of the sim and visitors are respectfully requested to avoid these areas but that’s not a problem because of the impressive amount of public areas on the sim and the impressive design that makes navigating the public areas such a pleasure. Amongst the early public areas are a public beach, Island dance floor and Cafe.

Continue reading “A Visit To Matanzas In Second Life”

October 12, 2014

Ciaran Goes On Holiday

I’m taking some holiday time over the next fortnight so this blog is also going to take a holiday for a fortnight too. Fear not faithful readers, I shall return triumphant with tales of many drow, dwarf, wizard and human adventures upon my return.

I have been taking a look at a couple of sims which I intend to blog more about on my return. The first is Morgan Straits which is a pirate themed sim. Yarr! I like pirates. This is a well presented sim but obviously you need to tread carefully because of those pirates.

The other sim I’ve been taking a look at is the stunningly picturesque Matanzas.

Continue reading “Ciaran Goes On Holiday”

October 11, 2014

Second Life Payout Requests Delayed Due To Significant Number Of Payout Requests

A few days ago I blogged about the delays people are experiencing in getting their accounts verified for account and tax information requests issued by Linden Lab. However new information has came to light which suggests that it’s not just an issue for account and tax information requests, it seems that the broader issue is that off payout requests full stop.

The tax and account information requests are often tied to payout requests, so this explains why there are delays there. The information was relayed to me via Pete Linden in a comment on my earlier blog post :

Due to a significant volume of payout request in recent weeks, payout requests may take longer to process than expected. We apologize for the delay, and we are working hard on clearing the backlog and process requests as quickly as possible. In the meantime, we advise residents to please address any specific questions through their Support cases. We appreciate the cooperation and patience from all residents, and hope to have payout request processing times back to normal soon.

I’m not sure why there is a significant volume of payout requests in recent weeks, some people have suggested it is related to the new skill gaming policy and there will be people who are putting payment information on file in order to engage with skill gaming regions.

Continue reading “Second Life Payout Requests Delayed Due To Significant Number Of Payout Requests”

October 10, 2014

Linden Lab’s Next Generation Platform – Safe Sex Is Better Than No Sex At All

Over at New World Notes Hamlet Au has decided to tackle the thorny subject of adult content in virtual worlds. In a blog post entitled : Half of Second Life’s 50 Most Popular Sims Now Adult-Rated: A Lesson for Second Life 2 Hamlet says :

As Linden Lab develops Second Life 2, there’s an important lesson to be learned here:

Forbid pornography and extremely violent content, at least in the first few years of launch before SL 2 achieves mass growth (assuming it does). It’s inevitable that Oculus Rift and other VR platforms will inspire pornographic content, and many of the games set for deployment in VR are already violent, and that’s fine for adults who want to immerse themselves in that kind of content. But virtual porn in particular has always been an impediment to Second Life going mainstream, hurting its brand, scaring away mainstream institutions, and just generally causing it to be a laughingstock for anyone who wasn’t familiar with how much more non-porn content the world contained. (That is to say, just about everybody.) The alternative facing Second Life 2 is what we see now: A niche MMO where roughly half the active users are mainly getting on to get off.

Now whether you agree with Hamlet or not you have to give him credit for having the balls (for want of a better phrase) to raise this subject. I disagree with him and I disagree with him because adult content is already very much a part of mainstream culture. Now before we take one step forward, let’s take a couple of steps back. Back in July Mona Eberhardt posted a blog post entitled : Time to stop bashing Second Life for its sexual side. Mona opens that post with a rather challenging gauntlet to bloggers :

I guess you haven’t really arrived as a Second Life blogger or commentator unless you’ve reached the point where you frown upon “pixel sex”, openly sexualised avatars, or the “skanky” nature of female avatars’ attire in SL. It seems to me that coming to view your in-world romantic and sexual escapades (if any) with feelings of shame actually gives you bonus points. And the sooner you’ve denounced your desire to explore your sexuality in-world, the more respect you’re going to garner. Apparently, your opinions can’t be taken seriously if you’re viewed by others as a sexual person.

The article is a good read and whether you agree with Mona or not, she deserves credit for tackling this subject. Now it’s clear that Hamlet and Mona are coming to this subject from different sides of the fence but it’s also important to remember that both Hamlet and Mona believe passionately in the concept of virtual worlds.

Now to me, banning adult content in Linden Lab’s brave new world is going to be a bad strategy. On the other hand I also think that promoting adult content in the brave new world is a bad strategy. The answer to me is all about sitting on the fence and ensuring that safeguards are in place to avoid some of the situations we have seen during the evolution of Second Life.

Continue reading “Linden Lab’s Next Generation Platform – Safe Sex Is Better Than No Sex At All”