Reviews – Page 568 – Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld

Getting Derailed in Second Life

Posted on July 4, 2013April 9, 2021 by Inara Pey

Derailed, located on the region of Crash Boat, is another of those places happily found by chance. Still under construction and the home of HISpose/El Patio Inc, attention to detail and an eye for landscaping already combine to present a place ready to be explored and enjoyed – and which makes full use of the ground space available.

As well as the HISpose/El Patio store, there are beaches, a watchtower, paths to walk, a stream to follow, waterfalls, woodland, a ranch and even an old railway station and tracks apparently long-abandoned and overgrown / half-buried, even though old diesel engines and rolling-stock are present.

The ranch looks like it might be a private house, although I think the residents all live up in the sky. There is a sign at the gate warning you to beware of the dog, so keep an eye out in case ;). Otherwise the place has an open invitation to visitors to roam as they will.

Going from the flags which can be seen, this is clearly a rural / coastal area of the USA: the Star and Stripes is proudly on display for the 4th July, and rightly so. A further hint as to where we might be can be found on the bench of the railway station, for the keen-eyed.

The Destination Guide offers several teleport points – the default central 128, 128 for the region, one for the beach, and the one I’m using here, which delivers you to the custom-made mesh railway station which is a delight to the eye.

From here you can roam freely around the region, visiting the store, following the paths, walking the boardwalks down to the beach – take your pick. I particularly like the walk through the wooded area to the west of the region; this is very mindful of a number of my favourite regions in SL, and very much gives me a feeling of being “at home” when exploring Derailed, even more so as the trees are by Alex Bader, as are a number of other notable landmarks and elements (such as the aforementioned boardwalks) in the region.

There are a number of lookout points around the region which offer good vantage points for those wanting to take photos, including the watchtower / lighthouse on the west side of the island – although the path up to it can be a little tricky to climb; I found myself getting thumped sideways a few times due to collisions. A rain coat, brolly and boots is also recommended for another climb as well – it’s a little wet at the top, although there is a weather shelter provided!

For those who need a break from their wanderings, there are places to sit down and relax – the woods have a hammock for the really tired, while the beach areas off sand, sitting and a chance to soak the UVs.

I’m not sure what else is planned for the region, although the main store itself is still undergoing some work – beware the Under Construction warning signs! As it is, it offers a very pleasant and photogenic environment, and it’s hard to see what else it needs given the balance which has already been achieved.

All told, a superb build, beautifully executed and well worth a visit – don’t forget to sign the guest book in the railway station when you do!

Return of the Silent Peacock

Posted on July 4, 2013October 28, 2014 by Inara Pey

MPC-5c — I was sharing a personal moment with Jack D when the ‘phone rang. It was the Governor’s aide. Another 15 people had gone missing from Room 326 at the Silent Peacock Hotel & the Governor wanted me down there. Funny how I’m always wanted when things can’t be handled through the proper channels. But then, that’s the nature of my work. Bullit’s the name. Traci Bullit, and PI work is my game; you want it found, I’ll find it – for L$100 a day plus expenses. Grabbing my hat and coat and pausing only long enough to pick-up Mr. Redemption on the way out, I headed downtown.

By the time — The Silent Peacock Hotel. I thought the place had been condemned and pulled down after the last time 15 people disappeared from Room 326. But when I got downtown, there it was, like a corpse raised from the dead, the same broken sign above the front doors winking at me through that same hard rain that marked the last time I’d been here. Turning my collar against the downpour, I crossed the street, the strangest feeling of deja-vu haunting my steps…

Room 326 hadn’t changed either. The same fading wallpaper and same tired carpet. The same smell of stale cigarettes and that cheap cologne popular with so many male members of the city’s constabulary. I flipped open the file a local gumshoe had left behind and started reading the notes. Fifteen people missing. All of them from this room, and all of them with the door to the corridor outside firmly locked, and no sign of forced entry or struggles. File in hand, I headed back downstairs.

It was still raining when I stepped outside, so I rolled the file up and tucked it into an inside coat pocket, where it would be safe, right alongside Mr. Redemption, who was cosied in his holster under my right arm. The case had many familiar hallmarks as the last time mystery had roomed at the Silent Peacock. But my gut was telling me that things wouldn’t be a simple open-and-shut retread. Somewhere out in this rain-sodden city were answers, and I was going to find them. And somehow, I knew I wasn’t going to be the only one doing so…

Yes, Madpea are back with another of their grid-wide hunts and this time, for the first time ever, they are re-running a hunt they’ve already featured in-world: that of Room 326, which ran back at the start of the year, and is making a return by popular demand, this time sponsored by NY Healthscape.

With fifteen people missing, it’s time for you to turn sleuth and follow the clues in this point-and-click grid-wide mystery and find out what really happened in Room 326. Fifteen envelopes must be found and collected if you are to reach the final gameplay area where – as the immortal line goes – “all will be revealed” and you will be rewarded with 15 high-quality prizes.

The hunt is open now, and runs through until August 31st. So, if you fancy you can beat “Traci Bullit” in solving the clues, get yourself over to Mad City, and pick-up a game HUD from the entrance to the hotel (L$150) and make your way to Room 326 so that the game may truly be a-foot! Full instructions on using the HUD are available on the Madpea blog.

If hunts aren’t your thing, Mad City offers the in-world shopper with streets to roam and shops to browse, while beyond it lay the streets of New York and the home regions operated by NY Healthscape, all of which offer places to discover and things to do.

Taking a peek at the latest new user experience

Posted on July 2, 2013October 8, 2014 by Inara Pey

In June Rod Humble indicated that the Lab would be evaluating a “new” new user experience in an A/B test against the current Destination Islands. During a conversation I was able to have with him a little more recently*, I asked whether the new experience would include anything of the “personal touch” – getting new users more easily get to the things which interest them. He replied:

We definitely want to make it easy for Second Life users (especially new ones) to connect with the things in-world that match their interests. What we’re testing at the moment is more geared at getting new users familiar with basic controls, so it comes even before the point where they’re ready to connect with relevant content.

Given this, I’ve been curious as to what form the “new” new user experience might take – and today I had my answer.

The sign-up process itself remains unchanged, so far as I can tell. as does the first-time installation of the viewer, which I looked at back in March 2012 – although this does differ significantly to the installation process established users may be familiar with.

As I reported in 2012, when installing from the sign-up process, the viewer includes a series of panels which give various hints as to what SL is and how to get a start in it, such as the use of text and voice chat – although admittedly, the fact that these panels still feature viewer 2.x did raise a couple of eyebrows. Nothing like staying up-to-date, eh?

One of the explanatory text panels displayed during the viewer installation process. note the viewer 2.0 UI, complete with sidebar!

Once logged-in to Second Life, things are now noticeably different. New users are initially delivered to one of several versions of “Social Island”, arriving on a beach. The landscaping here is somewhat more pleasing to the eye than the older Destination Islands, However – and bearing in mind, I have no idea just how “preview” or “work-in-progress” this approach is – it tends to start to unravel from here. Just what do you do? Where do you go? What the heck is going on? There is currently no indication at all.

Well, actually, there are clues. They’re just not terribly obvious clues.

"Where am I? What am I supposed to do?" A plaintive question from a newcomer on the beach at Social Island — “Where am I? What am I supposed to do?” A plaintive question from a newcomer on the beach at Social Island

Up in the navigation bar, alongside the region name is the parcel description “Find the path”. The clue refers to one of two paths off of the beach. The first refers to on which leads up from the eastern end of the beach, under a stone arch, and the other goes through a tunnel to the island’s interior. Taking either results in the parcel description changing to “cross the bridges”. And indeed, there are wooden bridges to cross; although if you went through the tunnel, you’ll need to master climbing the rock face first (up a set of pretty obvious “steps”.

“Social Island” is perhaps well-named. There was a lot of chatting going-on when I arrived. Admittedly it was of the “Help!” variety of conversation – which included comments like, “What am I supposed to be doing?”, “Can anyone tell me what this is?”, and, “Does anyone else here use IMVU? Why isn’t this like it?” (yes, honestly, that is exactly what was being asked) – but at least people were communicating and socialising. Sort-of.

Perhaps the most disheartening thing was – again, my direct experience – trying to help a newcomer, only to have her respond, “I hate this,” before she vanished, presumably logging-off into the ether, never to return.

The Social Islands appeared geared towards getting people walking around and perhaps talking - although much of the conversation might be pleas for help from genuine newcomers... — The Social Islands appeared geared towards getting people walking around and perhaps talking – although much of the conversation might be pleas for help from genuine newcomers…

The path leads newcomers to a single teleport portal which uses the experience tools teleport capability to deliver them to one of the Learning Islands. Here things are, if anything, slightly more confusing – again with the caveat that it may be a work-in-progress.

Continue reading “Taking a peek at the latest new user experience” →

When your curiosity is piqued in Second Life

Posted on July 1, 2013April 9, 2021 by Inara Pey

Update November 22nd 2013: Taka no Sakaru has relocated. My review of the new build is available here.

Every so often you can stumble upon a region quite by chance which immediately captivates you. Whether you’re out shopping in-world or flipping through Destination Guide categories or simply happen to come across an interesting name somewhere, you can never tell when or how it’s going to happen.

Such is the case with my discovery of The Krull Empire. I came across the name entirely by chance and, while I could think of nothing other than the fantasy adventure film Krull which I saw when I was a lot younger than I am now, I felt my curiosity piqued and decided to go take a look. I’m glad I did.

Far from being a fantasy sim, The Krull Empire is home to Taka no Sakura, a Japanese Edo period village created by the Taka no Sakura team led by Misaki Yoko. And it is, in a word, exquisite.

Those who know me know I have a strong affinity with the far east, notably Hong Kong, Singapore and Sri Lanka. While I am no expert in its history or culture, ancient Japan also holds a fascination for me, so it was with a real sense of delight that I set about exploring the region.

The arrival point is to the south of the village itself, with an open market area. From here you can wander into the village – please do be aware that some of the buildings are private homes and respect people’s privacy. At the north end of the village, separated from it by a narrow channel of water spanned by a bridge, is a walled royal household (which I believe is open the to public) and which includes a small, walled flower garden. Alongside the royal house, but outside of its walls is a large pavilion, built out over the water on wooden piers.

Go west from the village, again crossing a channel of water, and you’ll come to formal Zen gardens and beyond them a smaller pavilion again standing over the water, and another formal garden similar in style to one to be found in the royal house grounds. The remainder of the region is landscaped into open spaces which perfectly complement the buildings.

I’m not sure if some of the buildings in the village are intended to be stores – several have that look about them, although they are currently empty. If so, all I can say that they are attractively designed. I’m also not clear on whether the region is intended to be used for role-play; if so, I’d say it’s not set to period, as there is a little boat with an outboard motor available for pootling around the waterways of the region, and the little vending wagon with a wood-burning stove had decidedly un-period setting bicycle wheels and tyres :). These, to me, mean that the village is one which has survived to see modern times.

Whatever the period, this is a fabulous region for anyone who appreciates builds which present an immersive feel and / or who enjoy SL photography. The attention to detail is very good, and the mix of built-up and open areas, together with the considered use of water makes it a pleasant place to simply wander around. The default windlight for the region is Bristol, and I’d venture to say it is perfect for the build. If you have it included in your viewer-side windlights, you can flip over to local windlight and adjust the sun position for a range of lighting options without losing anything of the look and feel of the place in terms of how the Taka no Sakura team intended it to be seen.

To me, this is one of the regions which would really showcase materials. There is already a rich and complementary mix of textures here – wood, plaster, stone – that it is already eye-catching. Add normal an specular maps to some of the surfaces and I can’t help but feel the “wow” factor would be sky-high.

Nevertheless, even without materials, this is a picturesque and balanced region which is well worth the time to visit.

At the point of inspiration in Second Life

Posted on June 29, 2013April 9, 2021 by Inara Pey

A little while ago, I dropped into Inspiration Point and started to grab some snaps. This is a beautifully crafted full region which is home to four stores of varying sizes, and which again amply demonstrates the fact that while the SL Marketplace is a great shopping convenience, it can cause us to miss out on visiting a lot of quite delightful regions.

The stores operating here are House of Fox, Laviere & Tee*fy, The Secret Store, and Kirin, all of which are spread around a cafe sitting towards the centre of the region, and which forms something of a focal / meeting point, which I’ve used here as the default SLurl. All four stores are reasonably separated from one another, and each sits within its own landscaped area, all of which flow together into a whole which in turn both invites visitors to come and spend time exploring, and is itself framed by an offshore sim surround of green hills.

From the cafe, you can follow the paths leading around the island and find your way to each of the four stores and their surroundings. There are direct teleports available to three of the stores, in the form of the store logos pinned to a noticeboard (which is the technique used at each of the stores), but I really recommend that you ignore them and simply follow your nose, or you’ll risk missing a lot of the touches which make this region a really worthwhile visit – and for which I’m not sure the images here do justice.

As regular readers know, I’ve started having some issues with my current PC. Whether the issues are GPU-related or something more serious is proving a little hard to get sorted out (I’m no expert in these things), so the result is the images here (as with the majority in my recent posts) are not actually snapshots, but screen captures. I’m hoping this will change in the future, now that one or two RL issues have been sorted out, but time will tell on that.

For the photographer and artist there are a lot of opportunities here for some creative and memorable shots. The default windlight works well, and the region lends itself perfectly to windlight tweakings. All of the stares are themselves photogenic in various ways – but best to obtain prior permission if intending to use them in any form of photo shoot, etc.

There’s a great balance here between open spaces and buildings, and land and water, which gives the region a very harmonious feel. There are also some familiar set-pieces which the keen SL explorer will immediately recognise and which provide a feeling of comfortable familiarity with the reagion: Alex Bader’s Enchanted Tree Tunnel, trees and Boardwalk; Masomaso Quan’s mesh footpaths, Lilith Heart’s flora, and so on.

With the mix of open spaces, care in the design and water features, it’s pretty obvious why I’m drawn to Inspiration Point. Whether you are window shopping or exploring SL, it is well worth adding to your list of destinations. And of you’re trying to think of a place where you can meet-up with friends, why not try the cafe there? You can meet, chat, shop and explore, all in the one region!

The Drax Files 8: Gaming Second Life

Posted on June 28, 2013August 1, 2014 by Inara Pey

“Second Life is not a game.” How often have we heard that claim? And it’s true in many respects. Second Life doesn’t by default have any of the mechanisms associated with games. There are no levels to achieve, no goals to attain, no objectives to meet, and so on. So to simply dismiss it as a “game” is to both underestimate the potential of the platform and demonstrate a lack of understanding about it, and we’re right to point out that it isn’t, of itself “a game”.

However, there are times when “Second Life is not a game” can be used as a rolling-pin with which to thwack Linden Lab because of changes they bring to the system which appear to be focused on gaming or because of initiatives the Lab takes to reach out to potential users. When I come across this latter aspect of the rallying-cry in forum threads blog comments, etc., I’m actually surprised and not a little disappointed.

True, Second Life may not itself be a game – but that doesn’t rule out the fact that it is a very legitimate platform for game play in a wide variety of forms (of which role-play is perhaps the largest, and possibly the reason why (leaving the sex aside) a good proportion of SL users keep logging into the platform. It’s also a more than capable platform for game development and offering people many and varied means of game-like entertainment.

The fact is that Second Life is a platform which allows you to log-in and say, “OK, today, I will be a pirate!” and go off and sail the high seas,” or, “Time to go dogfight over the trenches of World War 1”, or don a period costume and explore some of the history of 18th Century France where yesterday you logged-in a followed the clues to solve a mystery (and gained some nice prizes and trinkets along the way) before engaging in some combat with friends, and tomorrow you might set-out to kill a few zombies before sitting down and enjoying a few rounds of a board game.

One team of people who perhaps best exemplify the ability of Second Life as an environment which can enable and support games are MadPea Games, the subject of the eighth segment of The Drax Files.

Started five years ago by Kiana Writer (Mari Mitchell in real life), MadPea Games has become synonymous with the provision of immersive, imaginative and genre-leading games in Second Life and stands as a shining example of something Rod Humble recently pointed-out in an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle: that while it may be true that “big business” initially jumping into SL and then deserting SL, this didn’t leave the platform dead. Rather, it left the way clear for “amateurs” and “specialists in it” (the platform) to establish very successful business presences in Second Life – and in some cases, extend their reach well beyond SL.

MadPea Games is an international team. With Kiana leading the operation out of Finland, other team members are based in France, Germany, The Netherlands, the UK and the USA. Over the years they have created a broad range of games in Second Life, spanning the genres of mystery, adventure, horror, cartoons, hunts, role-play – and more.

“I really don’t know why more people are not using virtual worlds like we do,” Kiana states at the start of the video. Looking at MadPea’s résumé, she makes a fair point. Not only have the team produced some of the most memorable games in Second Life, they’ve also worked on a number of SL / real-world cross-over projects as well. In 2009 they produced The Kaaos Effect interactive adventure in collaboration with Orange. A second collaboration with Orange in 2012 resulted in Firefly, described as a “haunting love story”.

MadPea have also worked with Nature Publishing Group and MacMillan Publishers to produce Notes from the Voyage, an educational game about the travels of Charles Darwin, and with Sigma-Aldrich to create Reaction, an interactive means to learn about chemistry. All of these demonstrate the sheer power of Second Life as a immersive medium – and the value in allowing gameplay and game-like mechanisms within it.

Kiana was not herself a “gamer” but more of a storyteller, and in Second Life she immediately saw a new potential, “I came to Second Life and I was, ‘Hey! This is a great place! I could actually bring my stories to life here!'” In describing the uniqueness of the platform compared to other games, she observes, “Immersive storytelling is when you get so lost in the story that you become the hero of the story; you’re feeling the whole environment. This is why our games are working … because with a lot of console games you become a totally different person, but in Second Life, so many people identify themselves as their avatars, so they get to play as themselves, and that’s really huge.”

Of course, there are limits to what can be achieved in Second Life; as a dynamic environment where so much is open to the users themselves in terms of how they develop their avatars, there has to be a number of checks and balances to keep gameplay in line with some of the more limiting factors of the platform, as Kiana notes, “I don’t think many people actually realise how much work it is to make sure the island is smooth. Everything is so optimised that there is absolutely zero lag. And then the crowds come in, (laughs) and then they start complaining, ‘there’s a lag! there’s a lag!’, and it’s like, ‘Yeah, because you are, as an avatar, taking most of the resources of the sim!'”

Explosions! Gunfire! Chases! Elephants! - Unia promises to break the boundaries — Explosions! Gunfire! Chases! Elephants! – Unia promises to break the boundaries

Throughout their time in SL, MadPea Games have constantly pushed the boundaries and repeatedly raised the bar on what they strive to achieve. In keeping with this – and as teased during the show – their next project Unia, promises to do so again, as they work to implement an action game within SL.

Fittingly, this segment of the show is itself a rich piece of storytelling, demonstrating not only the power of creativity within Second Life, but also the way in which it can bring people from around the globe together both as colleagues engaged in collaborative efforts and as friends. It is also one which dives into the complexities of creating immersive, interactive environments not so much by what is said, but by what is shown – kudos again to Drax for bringing together an ideal mix images and scenes to perfectly underline Kiana’s words and views.

And I have to say, I really like the role-reversal!

Continue reading “The Drax Files 8: Gaming Second Life” →

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Category: Reviews

Getting Derailed in Second Life

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Return of the Silent Peacock

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Taking a peek at the latest new user experience

When your curiosity is piqued in Second Life

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At the point of inspiration in Second Life

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The Drax Files 8: Gaming Second Life

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