Thanks to an unusual set of influences (namely: Noted author and Internet Jesus Mr Warren Ellis, my fellow Something Awful Goons, and most notably my best friend the lovely and talented kai_loi) I have been tinkering around with Second Life. In fact, I’ve just signed up with a premium account.
Like most human endeavours, a lot of SL is total shite. However, there’s some truly excellently creative stuff going on in it, and I’m having a BLAST tinkering with the creation and scripting stuff.
It’s truly a psycological goldmine, however. 95% of the occupants have an avatar that looks like a hunky, buff, underwear model with a cool haircut (if male) or the female equivalent which is of course a human barbie doll avatar in a revealing outfit. Is this really how most of humanity wants to present itself, given a BLANK CANVAS to work with? My own avatar looks as much like me as possible – though it’s actually quite tough to create a fat beardy weirdy in game – there’s no “Beer Gut Size” slider bar in the Edit Appearance section – a critical oversight.
It’s big big fun, though the learning curve is steep when it comes to handling inventory (which includes shapes, animations, sounds, etc, as well as objects).
It’s CERTAINLY the closest thing we have to a Snowcrash-style metaverse. And even in it’s current primitive form, one can see the kinds of things that form in a malleable digital universe.
Fascinating stuff! I intend to play around with it a great deal more.
March 23, 2007 at 12:22 am
Is it possible to build a stinky crazy homeless person avatar which wanders randomly, muttering obscenities to itself, while you’re not in active control of it? Because that would be cool.
March 23, 2007 at 1:07 am
Well, you can make a Dalek which meanders about aimlessly saying “EXTERMINATE!” every now and then…
March 23, 2007 at 3:31 am
Yes.. yes it is.. I ran into one of those in a japaneese zone the other day… he fell down alot and threw up on my shoes.
March 23, 2007 at 3:38 am
Hrrm…. maybe it’s time to upgrade my video card. After all, building a stinky crazy vomiting weirdo with Torrets is as good an excuse as any for getting new hardware.
March 23, 2007 at 4:07 am
Yep. In fact, that’s a worthy project. I’d be surprised if someone hasn’t already done so however.
March 23, 2007 at 1:59 am
I wrote an article on Second Life a good couple of years ago now, and since then I’ve heard a lot of bitching and whining about the game, all of which seems to me to boil down to ‘you get out what you put in’. Well, that and the whole making money issue.
March 23, 2007 at 2:12 am
When you’ve finished building the black sun, I’d like to come hang out in it, I do have an account, now that I can buy prezzy cards I may sign up for some land myself.
I currently have a neon green and black spaceman suit it is excellent.
March 23, 2007 at 4:15 am
I was actually giving some thought to donating some land to Seth(op) for a virtual ROI bar project. Since, back in The Day, that’s what we pretended the ROI was – a big bar where everyone could come and hang out and drink. In SL, you could actually _build_ it.
March 23, 2007 at 4:46 am
That could be kind of fun — and my strait-jacket head-thrashing guy could so easily be turned into a neon sign 🙂
March 23, 2007 at 3:27 pm
BAR ROI – with your host, Mr Spasm
The bar would need an ascii lake out the back to feel right though.