Second Life – Page 32

January 22, 2016

Project Sansar Looms Large But Second Life Is Probably Still The Best Virtual World Out There

Project Sansar Concept Art

Project Sansar is widely being dubbed as the Second Life of Second Life. This makes it sound as if Second Life has gone away, if you read the headlines, but when you read the articles then you discover that Second Life is not only healthy, it’s arguably still the best virtual world out there.

We’ll take a look at a couple of articles to demonstrate this point, the first is by Annie Gaus and published on Silicon Valley Business Journals : In virtual reality, Second Life prepares for its second act. The article talks about the virtual reality boom, the fact that Linden Lab have a new product on the way and dives into the hype machine that is currently in action regarding VR :

Now, the makers of Second Life are preparing for a new life of their own in the fast-developing virtual reality market, which Deloitte analysts estimate will hit $1 billion for the first time in 2016.

However, before we can move forward into the new virtual reality, we have to step back and the article acknowledges that Second Life was a successful early experiment, so successful that the article also points out that Second Life’s longevity makes it ancient in Internet years.

The article also contains some quotes from Ebbe Altberg, many which have been heard before but one really stands out from the crowd, especially when people seem to feel that the end of the Second Life virtual world is nigh :

It’s still the best virtual world out there today. We’re profitable all thanks to Second Life.

People should bear this in mind, Second Life is still paying its own way for Linden Lab, Project Sansar is still some way off from being a polished product and even when it is a polished product, it won’t be Second Life, which means that Second Life may still have a home. The article does of course delve into Project Sansar, which is seen as the future, but the future isn’t here yet.

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January 22, 2016January 22, 2016

Crystal Delights Move From Virtual To Real World Gathers Pace With New Store Opening

Virtuallyabout LLC dba Crystal Delights doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue as a company name, but it’s a company with interesting roots because they have made the leap from the virtual world to the real world with a range of adult products.

The leap from the virtual world to the real world hasn’t just happened, as we can see from the about us section of their website :

Virtuallyabout LLC dba Crystal Delights began in 2008 as a successful line of digital toys in the virtual world of Second Life. Along with the “Crystal Delights” virtual adult toy product line, we launched virtual sales kiosks that allowed Second Life avatars the ability to purchase real-world pleasure products using Lindens, Second Life’s currency. When Second Life began to pursue different avenues, and restricting adult commerce, the idea grew to create a real-life “Crystal Delights” pleasure product.

The above also explains why I stumbled across news of the company, because I was searching for articles on Second Life at the time and found this article at PTLeader.com : Retail store offering adult glass pleasure products opens. That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it. The reason the company are in the news now is because their new store is opening on January 23rd.

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January 15, 2016

Kidnapped By Elves

So there I was, wandering around Second Life, minding my own business when an Elf leaped out of the bushes and ordered me to stop. I decided to do what I always do when I encounter Elves, never trust them! Unfortunately this Elf was far more cunning than I expected.

He invited me to a party, fed me copious amounts of food and a strange liquid. Initially everything was fine, I felt rather merry and many more Elves arrived. We danced, they sang, I forgot my suspicions and then awoke, my memory mysteriously erased.

“Where am I?” I pondered.

“Azeroth, land of people with yellow exclamation marks above their head“, came the reply, from someone who identified as a Rogue.

“Noooooo” I cried, “This can’t be happening, how will I ever get home?”

“Hearthstone?” suggested the Rogue. Unfortunately that just returned me to a strange location with lots of odd looking characters.

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December 18, 2015

Snow Wars Episode I’ve Lost Count – The Snowball Awakens

A long time ago in a virtual world far, far away ……

Linden Lab have announced the date and the time of the annual Linden & Resident Snowball Fight. The date and time for those who may not be paying as close attention as they should is Monday December 21st at 10am SLT.

The blog post bills this as :

Come one – come all to the Snowball Arena for a friendly ice battle of epic proportions! We’re bringing back the Official Snowball Showdown – where you’re free to pelt your fellow Second Life Residents and Lindens with a bevy of sparkling snowballs!

These battles can indeed be epic.

Do not fear if you think you will be walking into a trap, there’s no need to be unarmed and not very dangerous because there is free weaponry available from the vendors in Winter Wonderland.

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December 18, 2015

Project Bento Greeted Enthusiastically

On Wednesday December 16th Linden Lab announced; Introducing Project Bento – New Bones Added to Second Life Avatar Skeleton. The project is designed to add extensions to the Second Life skeleton in terms of bones, these bones :

11 extra limb bones for wings, additional arms, or extra legs.
6 tail bones.
30 bones in the hands (all 10 fingers!).
30 bones for facial expressions.
2 other new bones in the head for animating ears or antennae.
13 new attachment points associated with the new bones.

The blog post describes this as :

While we want to make improvements, we also want to maximize backward compatibility. Get ready for the biggest thing that’s happened to avatars in years …

Ever wish you could incorporate a tail, wings, or second set of arms into your avatar? How about having animations for facial expressions and finger movements? Yes, we know that there are some incredibly creative workarounds that give you some of these, but they can’t leverage skeletal animation, so they have been very complex, often fragile, and very expensive in performance and resources both in your Viewer and the Simulator.

The biggest thing that has happened to Second Life avatars in years is a bold claim but looking at the reaction from Second Life content creators, it seems that this bold claim has some merit.

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