Linden Lab Unveils iPad-Based Creatorverse & 3D Sandbox Game Patterns, Two of Four Non-SL Products for 2012

After a year of company hints, speculation, and insider info, Linden Lab has finally and officially announced two of the four new non-Second Life products the company will launch this year: Creatorverse, an iPad-based, physics-enabled creation toy, and Patterns, "a new 3D creative environment to explore and shape", which sounds a lot like the Minecraft/ Little Big Planet-type game I was hearing about last Summer. But first, here's a look at Creatorverse, as introduced by Linden CEO Rod Humble:

Much more on the official site here, where you can request an alert for when the app is available in the Apple Store. From the brief demo, Creatorverse looks a lot like other physics-enabled creation toys -- "Your creations come to life as you play with different joints, forces, motors, teleporters, and more. From the simplest bouncing ball to an elaborate pinball machine, the possibilities are endless in Creatorverse" -- but there's some tantalizing suggestions that this could work on a larger scale:

In the demo, Humble mentions something about the ability to build and share games made in Creatorverse, and for several people to work on the same project together. I'm very curious how this will be possible through an iOS app, where any changes to a game usually have to be approved by Apple, but we'll see.

As for Patterns, a trailer is promised soon, but you can click here for early access. (For now, here's a thumbnail of the game ganked from the company site; looks a lot like Minecraft.) In any case, as I noted last week, Linden Lab has been taking much of the profits earned from Second Life and plowing them into new game/creative platforms. We're finally going to see how that investment has paid off -- whether it can build a new audience beyond its existing userbase of SL, and even more key, new revenue streams for the company.

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Comments

[shockwave yareach]

OMG!!! LL is using my tier to build... that?!

Sell it to Leapfrog. They are the only ones who could possibly accept such horrible graphics that 5 year olds make. Crayon Physics Deluxe was put out about half a decade ago.

[Metacam Oh]

Looks like something aimed at kids. Good luck to them. Hopefully they sell a lot so they can stop milking Second Life to the grave.

[Dousa Dragonash]

Aha! Felt men made digital.

[Joker]

There were a few "physics" based drawing 2d games/activity programs back in the cdrom days... patents?

Patterns is minecraft plus some other forms/tools...

iPad ...another platform to revive the cdroms of the 90s. and pretend its "new"

[Metacam Oh]

You forgot to mention the app will cost 295 a month with a $1000 installation fee. :) I kid I kid Linden Lab.

[Pathfinder]

Creatorverse looks a lot like this:

http://ca.ign.com/articles/2009/01/15/crayon-physics-deluxe-review

[Seymore Steamweaver]

When I saw the comments counter at 5, I just knew that there were far too few comments so far for even one of them to be positive. Hopefully some of your are roleplaying the part of the cranky NWN reader and not genuinely angry.

This is a great idea folks. I don't have an iPad, but my mother in law does and I just know my 4 year old is going to have a ball drawing rockets and making them blast off or whatever else. Very cool, LL.

[shockwave yareach]

@Seymore - and LL is going to make money off of your 4 year old, how exactly? Sell the program once for $2.99? How many copies of this have to be sold to make up for 1000 lost sims in a year, hmm?

1000x295*12 = 3,540,000

3,450,000 / 2.99 = 1,183,946 copies in a year to equal 1000 sims lost in the year.

That is, the number of sims lost so far...

[Hamlet Au]

"LL is going to make money off of your 4 year old, how exactly"

Actually I just interviewed the CEO of Toca Boca, an iPad developer that makes sandbox games for... 4 year olds:

http://tocaboca.com/

Money-wise, they're doing *extremely* well.

[sirhc DeSantis]

Looks like a nice little venture to get in to - only take a half dozen people (max) to keep it up and running (and looks like its got the support of the Boss - always a plus), no ongoing heavy overhead and once you've done one, knock out variations every few months..... == cash coming in. What, they are using the rent I pay to do this????
Good

[Ezra]

Creatorverse doesn't appeal to me personall. Patterns probably would as I currently like playing Minecraft a lot.

As a Second Life user I of course wish they were focused entirely on Second Life, but if they're going to stretch the fabric that is Linden Lab I'm glad it's still the same cloth of promoting shared creativity.

[Jason]

Apple? Nobody here uses Apple anymore. I want something for Android.

[Hitomi Tiponi]

I think it is good that we are getting more creativity products from Linden Lab - and it can only help to improve Second Life's image. I am particularly interested in Patterns, but if it is done right I'm sure that Creatorverse could be quite successful.

[Mike]

Hi Previous Commenter Jason… nice to meet you. Please don't speak for me. I'm Mike and I use an iPad (oh, I happen to have a Nexus 7 and a Transformer Prime here too, but the iPad is my go-to tablet to get anything done on).

Now that that's out of the way, I'm not sure what Wagner means when he says that changes to games usually need the App store's approval. That's only if the game is published as a self-contained entity. If it's simply a save-game file that you load into another copy of Creatorverse, then there's no reason you'd need Apple's approval to redistribute the save file.

[Iggy]

Jason needs a lesson or two in market segmentation. My wife's school system is gradually ditching Dell and Apple laptops for iPads.

You can bet that this app will come out for Android, too. As for what it does? If it works as advertised, K-5 teachers will love it for being able to create interactive games linked to the state's Standards of Learning.

I look forward to trying it.

[Chartist]

""LL is going to make money off of your 4 year old, how exactly""

I have a 4 year old. I buy things for my 4 year old.

See how easy that was?

[foneco zuzu]

As i'm one of the few that didn't believe that Steve Job was a GOD but remember well the fruit that was given to Adam and Eve i know that none of the ones at my charge will use these tools!

[Dizzy Banjo]

Well its finally public.. I guess its too interesting to say if this is interesting or not yet. But I think that its good they are trying it.

I agree with Hamlet there is significant potential for money making, especially with in app purchases for addictive experiences in the app store. However both of these feel much more like open ended sandbox type environments ( which I personally love ) But I'd guess there will need to be some kind of incentive to purchase, perhaps social status, creative possibilities, distribution of creation, creative levelling?

Most of the games which achieve very high levels of IAP are normally achieving this with extremely manipulative game design. I would love it if Linden could find a way to monetise this without making it suck in that way and keep it creative and open.

[Rpbizzle]

Lovely.. another wibsite that deletes my messages when it comes to exposing the truth about the lack of control Linden Lab has over griefers in Second Life.

[Hamlet Au]

It's extremely off-topic for this post, but you're welcome to discuss it in posts where it's more appropriate, such as this one:

http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2012/04/second-life-needs-a-user-to-user-karma-system-like-reddit.html