Special: Patch Linden on the new Linden Homes release process

Update, June 25th: Patch’s forum post is now an official blog post.

Update: Patch has now issued a forum post on the new Linden Homes release process.

Since their launch in April 2019, the Linden Homes, available to Premium subscribers, have proven exceptionally popular. The first release of the houses – offered in two types: land-based “Traditional” homes and houseboats, each available in for styles – were snapped up in the first couple of days following their release, with the houseboats going within hours. Similarly, a special release of regions with houseboats was completely allocated in just 27 minutes.

For the last several weeks, the Linden Department of Public Works – LPDW – and the Lab’s Land Team have been work on a further development across a number of regions in Bellisseria, implementing new infrastructure as well as more Traditional homes and houseboats, all under the watchful eyes of curious residents. As Patch Linden, Senior Director of Operations Patch revealed on Monday, June 24th during his Meet the Lindens event, this open development of Bellisseria is part of a deliberate change in strategy.

Ahead of that event, I had the opportunity to hear from Patch on what would be happening:

We are going to try and change our release strategy for a little while to see if a particular process works better for everyone involved, including many of you who have been very patiently waiting for one of the new Linden Homes. Many of you have already been witness to the new process unfolding in front of you whether you knew it or not. 

Those regions that have been called out in various places such as. New Hamsterdam down to SSPE120 (soon to be officially named).  We did this for multiple reasons, mostly in an effort to show all of you the process we go through in real-time to make these beautiful new regions come to life, and give a glimpse into the time-line involved.

In particular, and starting with this development, the Lab will be increasing the cadence of Linden Home releases, as Patch went on to explain:

Starting Monday, June 24th we’re going to try to release a region’s worth of new Linden Homes on a regular cadence.  We’re aiming to try for a region per every other day, so Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, but as we cannot control all the factors involved in the lengthy process, such as QA requirements, we may have some gaps which could last anywhere between a day to several days and especially on the weekends.

This means that development of Bellisseria is going to be on more of a rolling basis as individual region are readied, rather than large-scale releases with extended period between them. Nor will the roll-out be restricted to the current Traditional houses and houseboats; other types of Linden Homes will be made available, including the upcoming trailer-style homes, which will initially come in a larger release (I’ll have more on these in a follow-on post to this one).

And just as a reminder – the place to obtain one of the new homes as they are made available is via the Linden Homes registration page, not by queuing up inside Bellisseria (as has been done). Just check the page and look for Bellisseria in the drop-down list (arrowed below left), and the available house option(s) – Traditional house and / or Houseboat – and click on the image.

Nor is this all in terms of development. Again, as many have already seen, there is a new island development within the arms of Bellisseria. Marked by the continent’s second airstrip, this 2-region island is to be the Bellisseria Fairgrounds, with Patch explaining:

Our vision for this space is to grant communal access to an area that is clear and ready for set-up of an event.  We have supplied the outlying basic infrastructure which includes water taxi access to the main continent, an airstrip and landing pad.  We will have a scheduling calendar and process in place where the space can be reserved in advance.  The first events already in line for use of this space will be around the 4th of July holiday coming up.  More information to come about how the reservation process will work in the near future.

Note that the Fairgrounds aren’t an amusement park (or similar) but are designed to be used for a wide range of events.

It’ll be interesting to see how things go with the new cadence of releases – and the order in which they are made; given the idea is to release on a region at a time, and given regions tend to be split between land houses and houseboats, will the releases alternate between the two, or will it be more a more orderly release, proceeding region-by region along and down through the developed regions before moving on to the next set that are developed? I suspect the former, a this would give more of a mix to things – but the next week or so will show!