Category: Exploring Second Life

A  year ago, we visited Somewhere Else BKLYN, a region designed by Littlesquaw and ToXxicShadow and intended primarily for Second Life photography (see Somewhere Else in Second Life).  Now Littlesquaw is back with a another take of a city setting with Midnight in Paris. Once again, it is a region offered as a photogenic setting that presents numerous opportunities for avatar photography – and for those who were in the BKLYN group, that same group is used for rezzing rights in this build.

As the name suggests, the region presents a view of Paris at night – a length of the Seine, in fact, with its familiar bankside roads on either side and steps descending to public walks just above the river’s waters.  A barge is chugging its way along the river, passing under one of the arched bridges, while town houses and business places stand to attention along the roads on either side.

The majority of the buildings at little more than façades, although a small bistro towards the middle of the north bank of the river offers an interior setting alongside a cobbled courtyard, beyond which lies a small park.

This may all sound simple – and in a sense, it is – but there is beauty (and care) in this apparent simplicity. The beauty is in the night-time setting, the use of lighting (you really should have the viewer’s Advanced lighting Model active  – Preferences → Graphics → Advanced Lighting Model).

The care comes from things like the inclusion of static NPCs that add a sense of human presence along the streets, the use of weather to offer a sense of change: rain is falling still on the south bank of the river, whilst on the north, some the the streets still have puddles from the recently-passed shower, whilst here and there cobblestone glisten in  the wake of its passage.

Further life is added by the presence of one or two little side streets of the kind that can so often be found when exploring a city like Paris; streets that carry you away from the familiar cosmopolitan bustle and into places where family businesses can still be found.

Quite where this scene might be in Paris isn’t important. While the Eiffel Tower forms a backdrop to the setting, whether or not Midnight in Paris is actually based on a part of the city simply isn’t important: the atmosphere created within the region is more than enough to carry you there – and have given those who have visited the inspiration to offer their own interpretations of Parisian life via the region’s Flickr group.

SLurl Details

• Midnight in Paris (Marion, rated General)

Seaclaid is a place that appeared in the Destination Guide under both the Recently Added and Editor’s picks category. Described as a fantasy role-play region, there was something about it that caught my eye and had me hopping over to take a look – only to find an intriguing mix of settings, ideas and design that is brought together in the most aesthetically pleasing and attention-holding manner.

Designed by KitKat (KatieLuna), the region welcomes all creatures of fantasy – fae folk, dragons, lycans, vampires (but *no* Bloodlines HUDs) – and even us mortal, ordinary (but nonetheless pesky!) humans too – offering all such folk a warm welcome via the accompanying website:

The fae have returned home. The long abandon isle springs back to life. Light, laughter and magic abound in the air, the water, the very ground beneath your feet. Come find a new home among friends in our role play community.

– Seaclaid website

Surrounded by mountains and sitting under a night sky lit by a mix of the blinking eyes of stars and the flash of coastal lightning, the island is veiled from the world by both. The landing point lies a little off-centre, sitting on a cobbled street tucked under the shadow of the castle that dominates the landscape. Aligned along a north-south line, the great hall of the castle looks out over the enclosed harbour of the town beneath it.

The street itself runs south towards the castle on its raised table of rock, the maw of a tunnel appearing as if it might provide access to whatever lies beneath the castle proper – but as you approach it, baleful red eyes glare outwards from the tunnel’s depths, suggesting that venturing into it might not by a good idea.

Whilst at the landing point, people have the opportunity to follow links to join the local group, find the region’s Discord server and website  and – for those just visiting rather than engaging in role-play – obtain a visitor’s tag.

The town, with European and colonial style buildings and cottages and paved piazzas, offers a curious mix of time frames that is engaging. Arranged around the small harbour with its cosy little beach, both of which are protected by the span of a broad bridge, there is a sense of enormous age within the town that mixes well with the modern cosmopolitan air it wraps about itself in the form of the bicycles racked next to the magazine stand, the little bistro café, the pub on the corner of the piazza and so on.

The town’s businesses also offer a curious mix of the ordinary and extraordinary: again, the café and the pub, together with an art gallery  sitting in the former, while the waterfront apothecary’s coach and the strange blue light spilling from an upstairs window of one of the waterfront houses hint at the potential for magic and mystery to be had here.

From the harbour, cobbled roads flanked by footpaths meander outwards to point the ways that might be taken through the rest of the region. Eastwards, one of these curls between a narrow second bay that cuts into the rocky uplands and the mist-shrouded churchyard with its neighbouring manse. Twisting again, the road runs along the side of a manor house shrouded by trees before turning south and then west, rising to pass by the imposing entrance to the castle to reach the western side of the region and that high, broad bridge where lighting flickers and thunder rumbles.

To the north-west of the town sits a little village of quaint cottages. It can be reached by following the road noted above or by heading due west along the landing point street, passing through another tunnel in the process. Take this road north from where it leaves the tunnel, rather than following it into the village, and it will take you to the wilder parts of the land.

Following the rugged coast, this road uses a humped bridge to leap a gorge that feeds water from the surrounding lake through to where the east side bay cuts into the land. Beyond the gorge, the road runs to an end and an enchanted woodland begins. Within this lie turf-roofs cottages overlooked by a flatted-roofed structure with an otherworldly feel (reached by climbing the green slopes to it or by finding the stone stairs that rise to it from the back of the town). In turn, the cottages and woodland looks down on a the misty stone of a henge hiding from the rest of the region on the north-east corner of the land.

Many of the cottages and houses around the region are available for rent at a modest fee for those who wish to make Seaclaid their role-play home (so please keep this in mind when visiting the region to avoid intruding on people’s privacy), while the role-play itself marked by minimal rules and has a focus on creative, community storytelling.

Rich in detail, sounds and ideally suited to its environment settings, Seaclaid lives up to the idea of being an immersive, atmospheric fantasy role-play setting, and those interested in joining in with activities should contact KitKat in-world.

SLurl Details

• Seaclaid (Fantasy Forest, rated Moderate)

Bisou Dexler recently announced an addition to his extraordinary region design, The Outer Garden, a place we’ve visited a number of times over the years (see Return to the Outer Garden in Second Life (2017) and Timeless peace in The Outer Garden (2015). The new addition to this Full region (which includes the private region land capacity bonus) is called The Farthest Light.

The new build is reached via the teleport mirror located at the main landing point at The Outer Garden. For those who have not rich in the fantastical and whimsical, and if you’ve not previously visited it, I recommend taking a look around before progressing onwards, as it will set the tone for an onward visit. However, while talking teleporters, I would that at the time of my visit to see the latest additions, a couple of the mirrors in the network didn’t appear to have been set to public use.

The Farthest Light comprises two parts; the first and larger offers a night setting (although the surrounding shell can be de-rendered for alternative looks to the setting   should you wish), and is visually stunning in its presentation.

The arrival point sits within a lighthouse sitting atop a slender pillar that rises from what appears to be cresting waves a far distance below. It stands alone from the rest of the setting, which is dominated by a floating castle hanging in the night sky like an ice palace.

The “land” before this castle is, to say the least, chaotic. Resembling a draught board, it undulated as breaks, mixed with water-like clouds that pulse and swirl like waves caught amidst the rocks of a coastline. A bridge spans one of the undulation in the landscape, but is canted wildly, while telegraph poles march along one of the waves of the tiled land, whilst beneath it, what appears to be the façade of a collapsed building lies, forming a new face to the setting. Fish circle and swirl in the air above and below this strange landscape while the most whimsical of flowers rise up from the cloud waters.

All of this only scratches the surface of what its a most unusual world. As well the columns supporting the lighthouse and the castle are other, shorter pillars rising to decagon tops. Many of these are empty; some are home to further objects of interest: stage curtains here, a broken trampoline there – you can even take a turn as Schroeder and try your hand at playing a miniature piano – or play the full-size own outside of the lighthouse).

These pillars and columns stand within a setting of its own, presided over by a Moon rising over the cresting waters from which the pillars rise, whilst more moons hang in the black sky.

But how does one reach these various points? There are no obvious paths or stairways, visible or transparent, to be found. The answer is given in a sign just outside the lighthouse where visitors arrive: take to the wing and fly. Whether this means physically wearing any wings you have (which would be fully in keeping with the setting), or just taking to the air is up to you. Whilst flying, be sure as well to check the floating rock with the large lit window fronting it. I also understand there is a tour system that will fly you around the setting, although I confess I failed to find it.

The castle, when reached is mostly empty; but find your way to the great hall and you will find more worth seeing and photographing, together with another of the teleport mirrors. This will carry you down to the second part of The Furthest Light, a watery scene complete with a sinking vessel.

A  third build element, one I hadn’t visited previously, can be reached through at least some of the teleport mirrors is the Travelling Carnival, less complex setting where a gondola is making its way through a sea of plants and moons towards a walled gate with the promise of blue skies beyond.  

Admittedly, how you get back to the other platforms from here is a little difficult to work out – at the time of my visit there was no teleporter – however, walk far enough, and you will find your way down to the ground level of the gardens. Although again, this was one of the locations where the teleport mirror that was available had apparently yet to be set to public use at the time of my visit.

SLurl Details

• The Outer Garden (main landing point, rated: Moderate)

Exactly a year ago, we first visited Nostalgia Falls, a Homestead region designed by Noisette Haller. At the time I noted the region was both photogenic and also the kind of place those who prefer Halloween themes that have a lighter touch might also enjoy.

Given it is the first anniversary of that visit (and given the region has a new home), I decided to hop back and have a look around, and was both surprised and please to see that the region offers both a familiar look coupled with more than enough changes to give me a comfortable sense of recognition  whilst also presenting a lot that is new and ready to be discovered.

The sense of familiarity is born from a number of aspects: the region retains a similar L-shape to the one it sported in our first visit, with the north-south arm the home to a railway line hosting the Polar Express steam train by DRD as it sits at a station, a single railcar in tow. However, the landing point is now in the station building rather than on the train.

Across the tracks is a waterfront area complete with a trawler moored on one side – although the growth of reeds around it suggests it may not have seen open waters in some time, given rotating propeller blades would likely cut them down to size – and a carousel sitting on a broad terrace, a wall separating it from the buildings beyond.

One of these houses sits ablaze. Quite why is unclear, but perhaps it is the result of a gas explosion, as appeared to be the case at our last visit. However, this time around, the blaze is given a new twist: the wreck of a 1930’s ear car and the threat of an unexploded bomb amongst the fallen brickwork suggest the house has fallen through time from the period of the Blitz.

Beyond the burning house lies a relatively open space – albeit marked by trees to one side. It is the home of an aged and broken plaza topped by a broken rotunda.Home to a winged angel, the rotunda is being circled by a murder of crows that, together with the aged dead tree next to it, set a darker tone than the angel’s presence would otherwise offer.

An avenue of trees to one side of the rotunda shelters a horse-drawn hearse heading towards the tall, slim form of a 3-storey mortuary that has some strangeness to be found within it, a ghostly figure awaiting the hearse outside. Opposite the tree avenue, steps climb up a short slope to the imposing form of a grand house complete with cemetery behind, suggesting it is a family home of some age – although it and its grounds have clearly seen better days, with the interior of the house in particular a statement in mouldering age  – and more than a little taste of creepiness.

Beyond this ageing house, and also reached via the carousel-bearing waterfront, the land opens out into a brighter, happier setting rich in the colours of autumn. Horses graze here, having doubtless been brought down from the barn that sits up on the flat head of a promontory that – again, like the time we last visited – extends southwards out into the waters surrounding the island.

A sandy track winds out from the barn to drop down to the western finger of the land, where sit three little houses, all cosily furnished and set out with lamps, jack-o’ lanterns, pumpkins and more in readiness for Halloween. Even the crows sitting along the telegraph lines overhead have entered into the spirit of things – although eyes might inevitably be drawn to the the fact that a witch has apparently come to a sudden telegraphic halt whilst testing her broom.

With mist hovering out on the waters between the island and the region surround, and the lightning flickering around the old house accompanied by the rumble of thunder, this iteration of Nostalgia Falls carries a rich sense of atmosphere. However, the open spaces, with their horses, deer and places to dance, together with fine dining on the train (albeit serenaded by a sax playing skeleton!) together with places to sit, Give this iteration of Nostalgia Falls a further touch of romance. And of course, it remains a richly detailed, photogenic region in which to spend time.

SLurl Details

• Nostalgia Falls (Lost Darkness, rated Adult)