Touch Life: iPhone App for Robust Second Life Interaction Now Available!

Touch Life is the name of an iPhone app for Second Life interaction which just went live in the App Store, and while I like Sparkle, the iPhone Second Life/OpenSim app from Japan, it's pretty bare bones. (I just use Sparkle for short chat sessions and processing L$ payments.) This new app, by contrast, promises some pretty robust features: a dynamic world map, inventory, and most exciting to me, a feature where you can upload iPhone photos directly into your Second Life account. (Think of all the cool mixed reality possibilities that function will enable!) I haven't had a chance to try it out yet, but Radar Masukami has a detailed, illustrated review of the beta version, and he's pretty excited. As with any third party Second Life app, caveat emptor, but Apple's approval process has a good reputation for weeding out dubious apps (and a bad reputation for taking forever.)

At any rate, here's the link to the App Store page. Amusingly, the $2.99 app has a content rating of 12+, for "Infrequent/Mild Sexual Content or Nudity", among other issues. If you try it out, report what you think in Comments! And be sure to share your feedback in-world with Edward Magic or Robot Core, SL names of the app's developers. Image credit: pocketmetaverse.com

Comments

[radar]

Hamlet,

Not sure if they're still calling it beta, but the version I am using is the release version in the app store.

Cheers.

[radar]

Oh, and regarding the content rating, they do that for just about any app that can get to anything on the internet, it's their way of protecting people from the horrors of the intartubes.

[Aaron]

I've been really impressed with it so far. I love the fact that you can actually move your av in-world with it too - not sure how useful that is though - but it's a nifty function to have nonetheless.

[Pamala clift]

Well of course if you recommend it I went straight there and downloaded it on my IPod touch... hmmm may be that I dont have the mic attached but I have been looking at .."connecting to simulator" black screen now for oh about 10 min...

[Wiz Nordberg]

Well, some bullet items:

It actually appears to work. Login worked, popped me down at home. No crashes so far. 20 minutes isn't enough to tell, but already I can tell this is better than Sparkle.

Immersive, no. The map is nice. Fingering around our sims works pretty well and I can tell whether there is anybody around. What do I look like inworld? Normal to others! That is good. With Sparkle I was just a rezzing white puff, but people appear to at least see me wearing what I had on the last time I was inworld. Also, my MystiTool appears to be working and telling me about people entering chat range, so attached scripts are operating. This is cool and I can easily see developing a HUD just for this environment and managing land, groups, and doing some security checks. I can already interact with Mysti using the channel commands, though doing so on the iPhone isn't quite so efficient.

Fairly good user profiles. I can pay people using my iPhone. I like that. I can see their groups, picks. This is a very nice way to quickly "visit" and check up on things.

Group management features: Listing members, ejecting people, inviting people to groups. When I'm in a hurry and need to get somebody into a group, or check if they're there, this is great.

There will be a lot to learn about this app. There are no voice features. I can see why, but wow that would have made a huge difference.

All in all, first impressions are miles ahead of Sparkle. It is quick and easy to navigate, and as a land owner or "group manager" I can see definite advantages. I'll use this app frequently and just see if it can deliver. But, it doesn't seem by a "fly-by-night" attempt, but some genuine effort has gone into planning and developing this little app.

But, would I "go inworld" this way? Hmmm. No, I don't think so.

I'm dying to hear other comments!

[radar]

I'll use it for very limited things like if I'm at work and I want to pop in to SL to talk to someone for a minute. I can't get SLim to work though my firewall at work, so something on the iphone is my only option.

Not that I have a lot of time generally to be playing in SL on my iphone, but I can't think of when else I'd use it all that much. It will be handy when I'm not home and need to contact someone in SL, and might have to send them an inventory item and so forth.

[Ozimeals]

It's really handy for supporting a business "semi-offline" because you can read & reply to notecards directly without a full client, and directly give your customer a product right from inventory. The fact that it's natively compiled and doesn't go through a 3rd party proxy (hellooo security antipattern?) like Sparkle or AjaxLife makes me actually willing to use it.

It *does* work much faster on a 3GS or higher as stated in the FAQ. http://www.pocketmetaverse.com/support/

But, for the price of a slice of pizza, who's to complain?

[Erica Driver]

I just looked up the Pocket Metaverse Touch Life app in the iPhone app store. Many of the reviews people have posted in the last week (first week of January, 2010) indicate that the app makes peoples' avatars appear naked. Hopefully this gets fixed soon!

[Markle]

Does anyone know what wifi ports on the network TF uses? I couldn't connect until I opened up my IP address without any restrictions.

TIA

[Markle]

DOH! Just answered my own question. Same ones SL uses you dummy.
Sorry.

[ChrisJacobs Theseus (in SL)]

Great App! Please update for iPad by increasing graphics to iPad levels, and most importantly fix the IM to work better with off line comments like Sparkle, and add voice chat - who needs AT&T minutes if you can meet in SL & chat that way! :-) Also add better support for downloading snapshots from inventory into the iPhone photos Camera Roll. Thank you for a wonderful App! & I look forward to future updates! Good Job! :-)

[Kimlisha]

I hate this app can't do nun with it everything frozen for me on my iPhone when I try to us it I miss sparkle app its alot better for me sparkle