
Second Life players party in Palia (pic via Gogo)
Palia, a recently-launched, free-to-play MMO described by developers as a cozy community simulation game (read my 2021 post on it here) has seen a notable growth of one sub-community of players in particular: Second Life users.
"All of my SL friends who joined, we're addicted," as famed Second Life blogger Gogo puts it to me. "And it's only been two weeks. What we do is farm, hunt, mine, level up all of these skills and more to access different goodies. It's all FREE. you can farm and sell your crops or mine and sell the mineral or melt it into gold bars and sell. With that gold, you can go shopping just like in SL, but the content is all created by the company."
So instead of Second Life events around, say, new brand launches or discount fairs, the social fun in Palia is around collaborating together. And unlike standard MMOs, it's not about grouping to raid dungeons or kill Yet Another Boss.
Instead, there's... cooking cakes.
"So we make like 50-100K [in Palia gold] per cooking round (cooking like 50 cakes in a team) everyone gets 50 cakes even though we only use ingredients for 50. So after we get all the cakes, we sell it and go raid the furniture store or the markets/black market. And make mansions, it's hilarious!"
Gogo counts at least a dozen Second Life players in her Palia network, and has seen many posts about it across SL-themed social media channels. Part of the appeal, she points out, is offering a break from the cash-driven creator economy of Second Life:
"I think for people that DON'T have money, they would really get into this MMO. The only time you have to spend money is to buy special outfits or hair etc, but the company provides a nice variety."
Sparkle Skye, creator of amazing SL wedding dresses -- listen to this podcast we did about that topic -- is now also a passionate Palia player: