New World Notes

Follow These Clear Tips to Get the Perfect Fit from Your Second Life Mesh Avatar Enhancements

Janine "Iris Ophelia" Hawkins' ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style

If you've ever worn specialized mesh body parts on your Second Life avatar, you know how hard it can be to get the perfect, seamless fit. Even if you have experience with these incredibly popular add-ons, it can feel like there's always something wrong with yours.

And everyone can see it.

And they're judging you.

But there's still hope, my patchwork friend, and it comes in the form of a tutorial from one of Second Life's most experienced fashionistas...

Hot Pepper Game Reviews Are Merciless, Just Not in the Way You Might Expect

Janine "Iris Ophelia" Hawkins' ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style

I'll preface this by saying that it's not like I enjoy watching people suffer 90% of the time, but Hot Pepper Gaming fits harmlessly into that remaining 10%. The premise is pretty simple: YouTube gaming personalities review a recently released game... Immediately after devouring a single hot pepper of their choosing. Every episode has a predictable arc: The early moments of calm, followed by the first real hit of the pepper's heat, then the mounting desperation, and finally a soothing glass of milk when the review has been delivered in its entirety.

This week it's congenial science-lover Anthony Carboni's turn, and whether or not you're interested in his thoughts on extreme off-road trucking simulator Spintires, you'll probably want to watch:

Top Six New World Notes Posts from Last Week!

• With Announcement of Second Life 2, SLers Must Consider Embracing Virtual Worlds Unlike What They Know Now
• How to Confirm RL Lawyers in Second Life are RL Lawyers
• Shape Every Side of the Story in Indie Adventure RPG Unrest (For Better and For Worse)
• Here's What the Designers of SL 2's Avatars Can Learn from Second Life's Own Dreadful Defaults
• Graphics Pioneer Ken Perlin on Valve's VR System: "A threshold has been crossed, and I have seen another world."
• VR Expert Explains Max-Planck's "Holodeck" -- and How Poor FPS Plagues Second Life for Oculus Rift

With Announcement of Second Life 2, SLers Must Consider Embracing Virtual Worlds Unlike What They Know Now

UPDATE, 7/25: Post bumped up for weekend reading/discussion!

On June 20, the day when news broke that Linden Lab is working on a successor to Second Life, a subtle but important shift of perspective started among the SL community, and it's crucial we recognize and amplify it. You could see it in social media and SL-based discussion boards, and in the comment threads of news coverage about the announcement, and very roughly summarized, the transition looked like this:

• Second Life Enthusiast, June 19: Yay, Second Life is the best virtual world ever, and no matter its shortcomings, there's nothing else like it!
• Second Life Enthusiast, June 20: Yay, Second Life has a successor, which is great, because Second Life is getting really old and it has a lot of shortcomings!

So in the space of 24 hours, many of Second Life’s most ardent advocates turned on a Linden dime to become SL2’s most avid supporters. (Which leads one to think they weren’t Second Life supporters fully by choice, but also felt there was nowhere else to go.) Now that development of SL2 is public knowledge, and an alternative exists, I also see less zealous defenses of SL from hardcore fans. (Used to be, you'd explain why Second Life’s user interface is horrible and a total barrier to user growth, and you’d be guaranteed die hard SLers appearing in comments to insist no, no, it’s not that bad, it’s the users who are the problem.)

Now, hopefully, we can more openly and honestly talk about all the ways Second Life as a virtual world and a platform has not lived up to its promise -- and point to ways SL2 can and must be better. (Which is why I encouraged Iris to write her great post yesterday, about SL’s failings on the avatar level.)

That means at least two more important things:

When You Realize You're Related to Another SL User

AM Radio just sent me this interesting coda to my profile of him in Polygon: SL fashionista Gabriella Karillion was checking her real life Facebook wall, noticed people sharing the article in which AM Radio's RL name is publicly revealed for the first time, and like they say in Facebook clickbait posts, you won't believe what she discovered next:

I realized a connection that I never knew existed. Little did I know that possibly the most well known artist in SL is related to me in RL.

Just imagine, Gabriella Karillion and AM Radio at the same family reunions and backyard barbecues, not knowing about each other's SL identity. I also like her own explanation for why she keeps her SL activity secret:

How to Process & Socially Share SL Images From Within SL

Caitlin Tobias has a thorough and totally useful tutorial for editing, processing, and socially sharing (to Flickr, Facebook or Twitter) Second Life images from directly within the Second Life viewer. (As opposed to saving screenshots to your hard drive, uploading to PhotoShop or whatever, and then socially sharing them, which as I can personally confirm, is an utter ass pain.

A Taste of the Wastes: Fallout-Inspired Fashions Arrive in SL

Janine "Iris Ophelia" Hawkins' ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style

What's the best way to play a Fallout game? With the music dialed up to 11? Yes. Rocking your Pip-Boy like a particularly bulky Rolex? Mhm. Tearing through the wastelands with a pack of ridiculously stylish corgis? Always. But what about when you're not playing Fallout? What then?

Thanks to FATEplay's latest releases you can now bring a piece of the nuclear apocalypse with you wherever you go in Second Life. Damien Fate posted a set of outfits inspired by the Fallout franchise to celebrate his costume-focussed brands first anniversary, so guys and gals can now roam SL in faded leather dusters or shabby-chic vault jumpsuits, listening to their favorite oldies and shooting any sniping radscorpions from as far away as possible because have you seen those things? They're disgusting.

Visit FATEplay in world [SLURL] or on the Second Life Marketplace for more, and be sure to leave a comment with your favorite SL wasteland destinations for any particularly inspired virtual world photographers to visit.

The Best Things in Life Are Free, Including The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection

Janine "Iris Ophelia" Hawkins' ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style

Just shy of ten years after its initial release, EA announced that they will no longer be offering support or patches for The Sims 2, the second installment in one of the most popular gaming franchises ever. In an interesting twist, they also announced that The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection, which includes all of the games expansion packs, would be available for free to anyone with an Origin account. 

This is good news for a lot of players. For some who bought The Sims 2 on disc way back before digital distribution had gained the foothold it has today, it's a chance to revisit a game we remember fondly. For others who lack experience with the franchise, it's a cheap and easy way to see what all the fuss is about before The Sims 4 is released this September. 

No matter which camp you fall into, here's what you need to do:

Shape Every Side of the Story in Indie Adventure RPG Unrest (For Better and For Worse)

Janine "Iris Ophelia" Hawkins' ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style

Pyrodactyl's Unrest, released this week, tells the kind of story that very few games are willing (or able) to tell... And there's no one thing I can point to to explain how it does this so well. It all seems very straightforward at first glance; an ancient Indian kingdom in the midst of a brought and on the brink of upheaval, where players are faced with moral choices and consequences and also snake people. Just another weekday.

But there's something very different about Unrest. Something that kind of sticks in my throat. Now maybe that doesn't sound very pleasant, but I'd rather play a game that sticks in my throat than one that I can swallow in one easy gulp any day.

So with that in mind, let's break down what makes Unrest stand out: 

Upcoming Oculus Rift VR Game Inspired by Rear Window

Private Eye is a pretty clever looking game in development for Oculus Rift, because according to The New Yorker, it's inspired by Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window -- that is to say, it's the story of a man trying to solve a mystery while confined to a wheelchair. Watch:

The savvy trick to confining the player to a wheelchair is this set-up organically locks the player to a single position, where all they can do is look around and interact with what's right in front of them. Like I wrote before: "For virtual reality to go mass market, we need to abandon the goal of a fully-embodied avatar... the most compelling applications of VR so far seem to be based on a context where the body is believably confined: For instance, clamped down in a roller coaster seat, or in the cockpit of a dogfighter."

Or, as it might turn out, an impaired, mystery-solving detective: