SL Go from OnLive have today given the Firestorm Viewer team a major voted of confidence by announcing : Firestorm Mobile on SL Go! At first glance you may not think this is much of a vote of confidence, I mean after all Firestorm is already a choice for SL Go users when it comes to the desktop version of the app. However when it comes to mobile, there’s one glaring difference, choice is not an option :
OnLive is thrilled to announce today that due to overwhelming demand from our community of SL Go users, we are making the Firestorm Viewer available for mobile devices including Android and iOS. Due to current technical limitations, we are only able to offer one viewer for mobile devices. Our studies have shown that the SL Go community prefers the Firestorm Viewer, and now they can enjoy the same rich experience on their mobile devices.
Please note that desktop users will still be able to have a choice of whether they use Firestorm or the official Second Life client, but when it comes to the mobile version, all roads lead to Firestorm.
I’ve been happily using SL Go on my desktop devices for a while now and it definitely meets my needs for flying around, taking pictures etc. However there are limitations, voice being a glaring example, so it’s not the complete package.
However, for those who don’t want to use voice or just want to visit places, it’s a very good option in my experience and certainly allows me to view Second Life in a better light than my desktop PC allows me to view Second Life.
For new users, there are two ways to sign up for SL Go :
- For a 7 Day Free Trial visit: https://games.onlive.com/landing/slgo and sign up. Credit card or PayPal required.
- To pay “in-world” visit our SL Go Island to sign up and pay in L$. No name and no credit card are required.
The monthly cost is £6.95 ($9.95) for unlimited access and if you choose that route you’ll get the 7 day free trial anyway, which means you should have ample time to decide if you like it.
The inworld option costs 650 Linden dollars a week, you can read more about that in this blog post from Onlive : SL Go – Now, Pay with L$.
SLURL : http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Sunny%20Dream/230/147/22
This is quite a coup for the Firestorm team and proves that their hard work on creating a client that Second Life users enjoy is very much appreciated. However let’s also not forget the hard work Linden Lab put into their clients too, because without their hard work, the Firestorm team and other third party developers wouldn’t be able to make leaps and strides with their own clients in the first place.
That is a nice feather in the cap for Firestorm, and makes me consider using this service more strongly, although I am still pretty happy with Lumiya for a light mobile client. But using this service would allow me to do much more while on the road, and I am on the road a lot. It definitely makes me go hmm. Being to use it when I need it for 650L/week is a good deal.
The weekly option is ideal for people who are happy with Lumiya most of the time but if they are on the road and want to do a bit more.
SL go said nice things about Lumiya when they launched SL Go, but pointed out SL Go is more feature rich in many areas.
Being able*
I could have used this today and gladly paid the 650L… except I had no way of getting inworld to pay it! They need to add the L$ payment option to Marketplace.
That’s a really good point when you consider that one of the times you may want to turn to it is when you’re out of town and can’t get inworld easily.