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The VR successor to 'Second Life' is now in public beta
Sansar, the VR platform by Second Life creator Linden Lab, is now available for everyone to explore. The public "creator beta" follows a private "creator preview," which allowed developers and aspiring level designers to try Sansar's building tools. That period was crucial given, like Second Life, Linden Lab is banking on the community to populate Sansar with interesting experiences. Today, there are "hundreds" of places to explore, including museums, theaters and tropical temples. Some are virtual postcards, while others have games and stories inside them. Everything is free to try too, whether you're playing on a PC, Oculus Rift or HTC Vive.
Second Life's creator is building a 'WordPress for social VR'
None of this is real. The rocks, the stars, the enormous transmitter standing upright like a needle. It's all a mixture of pixels presented by the Oculus Rift. As I stand on Mars, I urge my senses to surrender to the illusion. I long to be Matt Damon, growing potatoes in a makeshift greenhouse. In reality, I'm standing in a "scene" created by Linden Lab for Sansar, a new virtual-reality platform. A few feet to my left is chief executive Ebbe Altberg, standing in a dinosaur outfit. His avatar waves goofily, breaking my dream within a dream. I can't help but sigh, accepting once more that I'm just a virtual sightseer.
'Second Life' removes support for Oculus Rift
When Second Life patched in support for the Oculus Rift, Linden Lab was cautious to pitch its online world as a haven for virtual reality. "We're trying not to make too big of a deal out of it," Linden Lab CEO Ebbe Altberg said in 2014. "It's still early." That beta support went through several iterations over the years -- but now it's gone. Earlier this month, Linden Lab removed VR support from Second Life, and the company can't say when or if it will be back. The problem? It just wasn't good enough.
Second Life's second act will be a social network for virtual reality
Eight years ago, I was slouching through my college's required mass-media course and silently groaning while my professor excitedly mapped out the promises of Second Life. That online virtual world, where players create items, clothes, buildings and more for actual sale, would replace the internet, she told us, and render the humble web page as outmoded as the Xerox machine. Her enthusiasm wasn't unwarranted for the time: The first user to earn a million dollars on Second Life had just been featured in Businessweek, and Reuters had assigned a full-time reporter to cover that digital frontier. Ebbe Altberg, CEO of Second Life-maker Linden Lab, admits the press' overblown expectations didn't match up with the early realities of the service. "There was this impression that it under-delivered," he says, speaking from the company's San Francisco office. "It was sort of unfairly overhyped and then got the backlash of the under-hype."
Daily iPad App: Blocksworld HD lets you build and play with 3D blocks
Blocksworld HD from Linden Lab brings creative block building to the iPad and gives it a twist by letting you control the creations that you build. At its core, Blocksworld is a building app similar to Minecraft that allows you to build creations using Lego-like 3D blocks. Blocksworld is an open environment -- you can snap blocks together and build anything you can imagine. Specialized blocks make it easy to build cars, robots, planes, creatures and more. Once you create an object, you can bring it to life using actions that'll make the creation walk, jump, fly, drive or even fire weapons. It's this action scripting that sets Blocksworld apart and makes it extra enjoyable. It's great being able to build a hovercraft, and it's even better when you get to fly it around your world. When you start building, you are given a limited number of blocks and a small number of coins. You can buy additional blocks or specialized block sets using coins, which are available via an in-app purchase. A set of 100 coins costs US$0.99, while block-hungry builders can spend up to $24.99 for a set of 6,000 coins. I started off with a $10 set of 2,000 coins that lasted for about two weeks with very heavy usage from my three kids and me. The average person will likely get more mileage out of their coin purchases than I did, but I would still plan on buying coins as part of the game. There are daily gift blocks and a free bonus block set, but these sets are small and give you just a handful of items. Hopefully, Linden Labs will make it easier to earn bonus coins within the game, so you don't always feel like you are paying to play. Blocksworld ties into Game Center and has a social component that allows you to share your block creations and browse through a catalog of items that others have built. If you find a creation that you enjoy, you can play it and also "like" it. One of my recent favorites was a dart challenge in which you drive a car over a ramp and try to hit a bullseye while in mid-air. Game Center hosts a leaderboard that shows the builders who have earned the most "likes," while the Blocksworld app tracks both likes and views for each creation. Blocksworld HD is for both kids and adults who have a passion for building with blocks. It's basic enough for a 7-year-old to easily pick up, while challenging enough to entertain an adult who enjoys creative building. It is available for free in the iOS App Store and is compatible with any iPad running iOS 6.0 or later.
Linden Lab releases Versu, an interactive fiction system for iPad
Linden Lab is best known for putting together the old social MMO Second Life, but more recently the company has been getting involved in tablet development, releasing its first iPad app last year. Today, Linden has released another app, and like Creatorverse and Second Life, this app is more of an engine than a game -- it's an interactive fiction platform essentially, designed to upgrade the idea of traditional text adventure games into something more replayable and dynamic. Versu is what it's called, and you can download it for free on the App Store right now. There are only a few stories available right away, with most of them based on Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. As you can see in the app, the action plays out like a text adventure: you get a description of the surroundings and the setting, and then can interact with various characters at different moments, either engaging them in dialogue, or performing certain simple actions. The big innovation here is that Versu allows you to play through the same scene or story from multiple perspectives, so you can play once through as one character, and then play through the same scene again as another character, playing out different reactions every time. Unfortunately, what's available right now with Versu isn't very much -- the platform's potential is impressive, but the current content is more of a demo than anything else. But the app's FAQ says this will turn into a content creation system very soon, and that seems like the fun part: users will be able to create their own characters, actions and even stories, and fit them into the Versu system. There have been some really intriguing interactive fiction games showing up lately, and Versu could do a lot to really expand upon and improve that genre -- if it can get those content creation tools out and running. In the meantime, you can check the app out for free, and you should, if you want a look at what Linden Lab has been working on. Hopefully, they'll open the platform for creation very soon, and then we should see some really intriguing uses for this new app.
MV Guide: January 9-15, 2012
MV Guide is a weekly rundown of the MMO gaming events planned on Massively TV. Every week, the Massively staff logs in to play various MMOs live and in person, and we'd love for you to drop by the channel and visit. We have a combination of regular weekly games and new surprises, so you'll find a variety of titles to take a look at. During our streamed events, you can participate in the live chat, ask questions to learn about the game, and simply spend some time with Massively staff and readers. (Of course, streaming is subject to the whims of outside forces like server-side gremlins once in a while.) Follow along after the jump to see what's on this week's schedule!
Alliance: The Silent War possibly shelved due to Second Life
Windward Mark Interactive's first next-gen offering may have been shelved due to their recent acquisition from Linden Lab, makers of Second Life. Last month, Linden Lab acquired Windward Mark for their graphic technologies, reportedly to assist in a graphical overhaul for Second Life. Asi Land, Windward Mark Interactive's president, says even he is unsure of the future of Alliance: The Silent War. "We'll see how it plays with our new roles here at Linden ... we're very much still in love with the project," said Mr. Land. Too early to count it out completely but at the same time, don't hold your breath. It's a shame too, because the technologies acquired by Linden Lab are quite impressive. For example Nimble, their 3D cloud system, is quite spectacular, although its inclusion in a shooter would likely lead to players staring at the clouds more than shooting people in the face. Nevertheless, we hope Windward's new home allows them to continue the project through to completion.[Via PS3 Forums]
Second Life developers say: PS-HOME is very flattering
And for the record, no they didn't ask Sony if they wanted to hook up at a bar that night "IRL" (that's In Real Life for the innocent out there). We've covered the other consoles angles about the announcement of PS-HOME, but until now we neglected to see what Second Life thought of it, since HOME bear a strong resemblance to that... uh... "service".Jeff Luan of Linden Lab (developers of SL) said that "mimicry is the greatest form of flattery for us." For them, yes. Thought the cliché went a little differently, but it's probably just a synonym or something. Luan isn't concerned about HOME taking away any of Second Life's users, since SL is on PC and is targeting an entirely different "market". Absolutely true, but it may create a similar market on consoles that was previously not in existence. Are any of you concerned that the PS-HOME may become something much... hmm... darker, than intended?
Toyota selling new Scions for $1 in Second Life
Toyota held simultaneous launches of two new Scion models today. One at the Chicago Auto Show, the other in Second Life. Both the redesigned Scion xB and brand-new xD are being offered for 300 Linden dollars ($1 USD) for use in the virtual world; a nominal fee toward becoming one of Toyota's virtual "trendsetter" promoters. The cars are being sold at kiosks in Toyota's 'Scion City' district of Second Life, where the automaker hopes to also sell unused real estate to young entrepreneurs. The idea is to grow Scion City into a bustling promotional "cultural" mecca.Last year, Toyota invaded Whyville, a virtual playground for tweens. Scions were peddled to under-agers, with the hope of infecting their lustful minds with the brand name; the payoff coming when the young'ns came of age. Toyota sold about 173,000 Scions in 2006 and is expected to challenge General Motors as the top global automobile seller this year.[Thanks, Matt]
Second Life abuzz with source code release [update 1]
Linden Lab has released the source code for the Second Life Viewer under the GPLv2 free software license, opening up its virtual world's client to a host of potential new features and improvements. The 'open source' announcement comes amidst a period of scrutiny in which the media has begun to debunk the hype and seriously question Linden Lab's reported SL user base; a recent estimate suggests that Linden Lab has inflated user numbers by more than 2 million.Since the source code release has arrived sooner than anticipated, it's no stretch to suggest Linden Lab is attempting to redirect media buzz. Ploy or not, the open source SL era brings with it an opportunity for an unproven developer to generate some needed exposure.Update: clarified that this is a release of the client (not full game) source code.
Comedian Jimmy Carr takes act into Second Life
Irish funnyman Jimmy Carr is set to become the first major comedian to perform stand-up in Second Life. On February 3, as Carr takes the stage in London, his routine will be simultaneously broadcast to a select audience in the virtual world. Will his signature deadpan survive the translation?Carr is giving away tickets to the event through a competition on his MySpace page.[Thanks Joe](Note: the BBC story grossly exaggerates the size of Second Life's user base. See: Analyzing the press' Second Life obsession)
American Apparel opens up shop in SL
Clothing-retailer (and our choice for the Joystiq ringer-tees) American Apparel has recently opened a virtual store in the virtual world of Second Life. In it, Second Lifers will be able to peruse the digital racks and purchase, in true SL fashion, buy clothing for their avatars in addition to the real life counterparts. Of course, American Apparel's simple styles may appear anemic next to the more colorful creations of other Second Lifers. MTV News quotes Raz Schionning, director of Web services at American Apparel, who says, "Everyone else has wings and devil horns and all the rest ... So it'll be curious to see if a red T-shirt makes sense."The real question is, with only 200,000 virtual inhabitants, why does a virtual storefront for a company like American Apparel make sense? Well, publicity of course! Forbes covered their in world presence, comparing it to similar ventures by Twentieth Century Fox and Warner Bros.. American Apparel's fashion-centric approach and socially-conscious sensibility seem to jibe better with the culture of Second Life. Will the attempt net AA anything more than good press?[Via GameSetWatch]Read - American Apparel's Store in Second Life (Lots of pictures)Read - Online Shopping (Forbes)
Second Life publisher sued: Bragg v. Linden Research
Attorney Marc Bragg has filed a lawsuit against Linden Lab, publisher of Second Life, alleging that the company unfairly shutdown his game account, cutting off access to his virtual real estate, which includes several nightclubs. In addition, Bragg can no longer withdraw any of the linden (Second Life currency) he has earned, which if exchanged (in total), would be worth roughly $3,200. The West Chester attorney is now demanding $8,000 in restitution.Linden Lab froze Bragg's account after the attorney took part in a suspicious online auction in which he acquired significant plots of virtual land for far below market price. Bragg indeed exploited the auction interface to snag the land at a discount, but maintains that the onus is on Linden Lab to run their auctions properly and securely.[Thanks, chris]
Second Life secures $11 million in funding
Linden Lab, publishers of Second Life, announced the completion of an $11 million round of funding led by venture capital firm Globespan Capital Partners. The company plans to use the money, in part, to launch an "“aggressive international expansion, ” focusing on Japanese and German language versions of the game. In addition, Linden Lab will boost its staff from 70 to at least 100, with the possibility of a complete interface overhaul looming on the horizon.
