Cloud Party, the web-based user-generated 3D virtual world backed by Second Life co-founder Cory Ondrejka and Cryptic Studios vet Bruce Rogers, has a huge update today -- first and foremost, as company CEO Sam Thompson tells me, "[W]e're opening the Marketplace up to full actual sales for Cloud Coins, including cash out, all done directly in the app... The marketplace also includes the royalties feature we mentioned before, as well as some new features like category listings, purchase and sales history with CSV download, and a return system." (Which already seems to me more robust than what Second Life's Marketplace has now.) There's more updates, including increased concurrency and graphics enhancement -- full geek details after the break.
It's been about seven months since Cloud Party launched in early beta, and since then, it's generated a small but pretty passionate user community. "We've been consistently impressed with how dedicated our core community is," says Sam, "as well as surprised by their creativity. We have been trying to make all aspects of Cloud Party user-customizable, and our users have come up with interesting new ways to take advantage of that, such as building wearable vehicles or cool rides that take advantage of our physics engine. You can see some examples of the rides at Misfit Toy Island, and interesting items all over the marketplace."
Now that it's possible to make real money from selling Cloud Party content, Sam Thompson speculates the world may change: "We've had many content creators express interest in adding their mesh content to Cloud Party, but they were waiting for the full marketplace to be ready. So, hopefully we'll see lots of new and interesting content added to the marketplace soon!"
As for other updates to Cloud Party, read on, read on:
Cloud Party's Misfit Toy island
- "Player attachment to moving objects. You can walk around on or sit down on moving and rotating objects like vehicles or platforms.
- Post-processing FX like light scattering, depth of field, colored shadows (through colored glass), soft particles, and more. These have to be turned on in the graphics settings menu.
- New script features such as external http-request support and loops.
- Costume level of detail system which allows us to increase the island limit to 50 concurrent players (before automatic instancing).
- An Orbit camera for viewing and rotating around objects or people."
So there you go. What this does to the world itself, we will soon see.
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Worked fine last time you posted about it. Now... stuck in molasses? Wondering if it has to do with this message I get on login:
[RenderShader] Failed to link shader for material type "particle.material_type":
(245,8): warning X3571: pow(f, e) will not work for negative f, use abs(f) or conditionally handle negative values if you expect them
(221,17): warning X3206: implicit truncation of vector type
(222,17): warning X3206: implicit truncation of vector type
(105,8): warning X3571: pow(f, e) will not work for negative f, use abs(f) or conditionally handle negative values if you expect them
(197,16): warning X3571: pow(f, e) will not work for negative f, use abs(f) or conditionally handle negative values if you expect them
Posted by: Seph DaSilva | Tuesday, December 11, 2012 at 06:40 PM
But you still have to have a Facebook account to do all this?
Posted by: Saffia Widdershins | Tuesday, December 11, 2012 at 06:45 PM
@Saffia
Yeah it's still Facebook only for now with the exception of anonymous logins which aren't permanent and are limited to no building.
The reason they still give for not allowing other sign-up and login methods is that, at present, anyone can upload, rez or list on marketplace anything.
There's still no ETA on when they're going to allow regular accounts, but I'd guess it'd be when they either start charging for uploads and marketplace listings like Second Life, or link those privileges to something else other than having a Facebook account.
I can understand them wanting to protect the beta from griefing while at the same time allowing unhindered creation for beta users, but it's a shame they haven't figured out a way to extend the beta to those that don't want to bother with Facebook. Hopefully with these new round of updates this isn't a problem for much longer.
Posted by: Ezra | Wednesday, December 12, 2012 at 12:36 AM
I'm watching this with interest.
Posted by: Cube Republic | Wednesday, December 12, 2012 at 02:55 AM
To be honest, I'm not.
A grid that started by using some i really don't advise to nobody in need to login is not in my interst list!
Posted by: ZZ Bottom | Wednesday, December 12, 2012 at 03:52 AM
Hmmm great ..a step forward again! ;-) looks wonderfull.
Posted by: JoJa Dhara | Wednesday, December 12, 2012 at 04:09 AM
I tried it with an anonymous login, and guess who the first person I ran into was. A Greifer!!! Guess they crop up everywhere.
In any event, Cloud Party ran well for me, very fast and no lag. It was easy to use and looked pretty good. I'll be interested to see how it progresses. The one noteworthy lack was an easy way to report abuse.
Posted by: Ravik | Wednesday, December 12, 2012 at 05:19 AM
I would enjoy trying this out. But until they allow people who aren't part of the Facebook collective to enter, forget it. I do not need facebook changing a privacy setting without notice, and all my kids and family getting updates from Cloudparty that "Your father like Mama Sweaty's House of Ill Repute, where the customer always comes first" or whatever other place I happen to walk past.
It's an exaggeration, I know. But Facebook tends to err on the exaggerated side, so I'm not too far off the mark. What games I play and what I do in a video game or a VR world is nobody's business but my own. We no more need Facebook announcements of "User crossdressed in pink panties from Slinky's Lingere" than we need "User killed his 500th boar in WoW". If I want to tell people about $accomplishment, I'll do so.
Posted by: shockwave yareach | Wednesday, December 12, 2012 at 07:24 AM
I am watching Cloud Party very attentively, albeit from a far distance, waiting to hear the news that Cloud Party no longer requires real-world identities to use.
However I'm starting to become jaded, slowly realizing that they quite possibly have no intention to do so.
Posted by: Adeon Writer | Wednesday, December 12, 2012 at 07:53 AM
I am a real fan of Cloud Party, and we collected a list of some cool places in cp:
http://web-3d-virtual-worlds-news-blog.berlinin3d.com/2012/09/cloud-party-3d-facebook-link-list.html
It runs great and all directly in the browser. This is the 3d web tech i am dreaming of since using Second Life!!!
Posted by: january | Wednesday, December 12, 2012 at 07:54 AM
It's a real shame about the Facebook restriction, I said the same when Kitely launched and some of the reasons for Facebook logins on Kitely were the same as Cloud Party, small team, helps solve a problem, but Kitely moved on and allowed other logins, until Cloud Party does the same, I won't spend much time there.
Posted by: Ciaran Laval | Wednesday, December 12, 2012 at 11:14 AM
Hi, as you have seen these days, Cloud Party is no longer a Beta.
All the changes and also the ones said in this article, involve a ready version
Posted by: Cloud Party France | Wednesday, December 12, 2012 at 11:37 PM