Over at New World Notes Hamlet Au recently published a post about declining tier income for Linden Lab. In the post Hamlet argues that cutting tier prices is not the way forward, attracting new users is. I agree with him on the tier angle for now, cutting tier would drastically cut Linden Lab’s income. However I’ve long argued that Linden Lab need more income streams, Second Life is too reliant on tier. Hamlet argues that Second Life needs more users, but more users are not the answer to the tier conundrum on their own. They need to be incentivised to part with their money and tier is a barrier not an attraction.

Hamlet also makes the following comment:

“So no, the future for Second Life isn’t private land — it’s new users, and new platforms, and radical experiments in how Second Life is used and designed. For instance, some Lindens have been trying to add game mechanics to Second Life for several years, but have been stymied by bureaucracy and fear of protests by a minority of hardcore “Second Life is not a game!” users. But as we keep seeing, something dramatic has to change, or the hemorrhaging will continue, until it no longer can.”

The problem here is that game mechanics are not going to deal with the income issue, Linden Lab need new income streams which may in turn lead them to be in a position to reduce tier costs. The other issue is that game mechanics will put some people off because Second Life is indeed, not a game, although there are games within Second Life. A Second Life wide gamification system would be controversial. An optional gamification system that people could tie into their own game development would be potentially wonderful. For example a Linden Lab hosted achievement system that you could tailor to the needs of your roleplaying sim or even your store would have potential.

One way of attracting new users to Second Life is to have more games inworld. Linden Lab could develop pathfinding further and introduce skeletons that can be animated and used as NPC’s. That way more exciting experiences could be created, which in turn may attract new users.

However then we’re back to the tier is too damn high because there are not enough people who can afford to throw away USD$295.00 (plus VAT for some) to create the kind of experience that may attract new users. The fact that tier will be due whilst people are planning, developing and testing these experiences undermines the concept even more. Vicious circle indeed.

However there are games in Second Life. Estelle Pienaar’s SL Play Instinct is largely dedicated to highlighting games within Second Life. The destination guide also has a games category with pages of games. Some of the games are made to be played on parcels or breedable games. Breedable games are good for Second Life as they require those involved to have land. Other games are sim wide experiences, the latter are much harder to maintain.

Then you have the likes of madpea games who have created quite a few game like experiences in Second Life.

Then there’s the independent star in the shape and form of Loki Eliot. Loki recently rebuilt The Well and had that up for the month of October. The Well is closed now so don’t go there!

However in a more recent post Loki muses over some of the difficulties of implementing the game experience into Second Life. However Loki is most certainly positive about the potential of the game experience within Second Life.

Cloud Party is a better option for developing game like experiences than Second Life because you can develop your game in Cloud Party for free. Cloud Party of course doesn’t have the audience but to be able to develop something without the overbearing costs of tier provides the developer with the breathing space to develop their product in a less stressful fashion. Now if you did go to Cloud Party and made an uber successful game I’d trust that you’d consider taking out a subscription to help pay for the platform that allowed your concept to see the light of day, but in terms of development, it’s an excellent option.

Of course it may well be argued that virtual worlds aren’t the place for game development and that you’re better off learning something like Unity3D. There’s a free version of Unity3D which you can obviously, use for free. However if you want Unity Pro prices start at USD$75.00 a month with a commitment to an initial twelve month subscription. The subscription can get more expensive with all the add ons but USD$75.00 a month for Unity Pro versus USD$295.00 for one full sim in Second Life? I’ve mused before about a Second Life game engine, now maybe if one were available, game developers could develop Second Life game experiences without the burden of tier.

The Second Life Marketplace provides merchants with exactly the sort of option that game developers and those who want to run roleplaying sims simply don’t have. The Marketplace allows content creators to develop and sell their wares with no up front subscription. This allows content creators some artistic freedom to create in peace, as the overbearing tier costs are not stifling their development.

Second Life is what it is, the servers have to be paid for and tier is the favoured payment tool of choice for Linden Lab. However if Linden Lab want people to create more experiences, then they should be looking at alternative solutions for server space. Cloud based solutions, pay as you go solutions, cheaper land solutions, shared sales solutions. Some of these have been mused over by Linden Lab in the past. Their current infrastructure is not flexible enough to implement these options.

People come to Second Life for a variety of reasons and I’ve said before that in virtual world terms, Second Life is where it’s at. However if Linden Lab want to attract more people and encourage people to create more experiences to not only attract, but also retain users, they need to offer prospective developers better options on land holdings because, and it has to be said again, the tier is too damn high.

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