What Second Life Looks Like With Features on Full (Even If Few Outside Second Life Any Longer Care)

An SLer named Kaya Angel got sick of the poor portrayal of Second Life as depicted in so many of the badly shot SL videos he'd seen lately (the kind that typically show up in troll-ish Let's Play YouTube videos, I'm guessing), and so he shot this machinima, which you should watch right now:

The video is pretty much a promo for Kaya's Angel Manor Estate private Second Life sim, but since it's so beautifully done (both the video and the sim), I say: Well played, sir. In fact: Click here to visit the sim yourself.

The video's YouTube comments are interesting, because they show a key problem Second Life faces now: No matter how great the graphics have gotten over the years, the poor perception of SL having bad graphics is so deeply rooted among hardcore gamers, it's near impossible to refute outside of established SL users. Take this comment from a core graphics geek:

Do not get me wrong, the mesh modeling is great, but the texture... not at all. Specular textures does not work like they should in a video game, black in specular texture is ridiculously shiny when it should not be. Second Life is way too old to keep this going, this will never be well detailed and realistic unless they finally decide to upgrade their Viewer.

For hardcore gamers in general, this video probably seems like a Tesla engine bolted onto a Volkswagen bug from the 70s. And as Second Life 2 rises to replace its predecessor, the final irony may be this: Years after Second Life has been remanded to the Outdated Software category, it's finally ready for its close up.

Thanks to Adec Alexandria for the tip. Please share this post:

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Comments

[John Rockefeller]

Which viewer was this video made with?

When I run any viewer, things take ages to load and it runs extremely poorly. People are correct when they say the viewer sucks.

That said, this is an impressive piece of work. Well done.

[Eddi Haskell]

It looks fantastic! Angel Manor was up to 9 adjoining sims the last time I checked and is a wonder of Second Life. Hamlet, I have my doubts if "Second Life 2.0" (it is not going to be called that of course) will be a replacement for Second Life, or even that complimentary with it. If it is designed to be used around headsets and if it emphasizes interactivity in terms of input devices and hand waving and that sort of thing it will come at the expense of graphics and ease-of-use. Second Life is optimized for traditional computers -- people sitting in front of monitors -- and should stay that way. I for one cannot wear a headset that isolates me from reality for hours at a time -- I have family members to watch. Headsets are going to be fine some of the time but for Second Life users I doubt if they will replace their tradtional desktops or laptops.

[Eddi Haskell]

This is for John Rockefeller -- Any windows desktop running an NVIDIA 760 GTX graphics card (or better) will at least 8 gigs of RAM and using an Intel I5 or
I7 chip (try to get the ones beginning in 4 but older models will work too) will work well for Second Life, and can be had for under $1000 right now. Use a Firestorm viewer and you can have clear ultra-high graphics and little lag if you have a good connection. Second Life does not require untra fast internet speed. Here is a computer at New Egg that will do amazingly well for Second Life. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883101018

[Sweet]

Beautiful...that is all

[Cube Republic]

very nice

[Argo Nurmi]

Just Blown Away!

[Adec]

..its the kinda machinima that wants me to start building again... I've been lazy since Mesh came out, but now I really want to start again.

The only other video that got me out of a dry building spot was World Builder.. but I think I have watched this one many more times than World Builder now... :)

[Adec]

I am kinda curious if anyone wants to nominate a better build in SL .. I'm finding it hard to think of one .....

[Mondy Bristol]

I sat here watching that with a smile on my face thinking "Yes!" We need more videos and builds like that to show what's possible.
At times one little thing nagged away at me,similar to the gamers comment you posted (and I'm not a gamer)...you can't just add specular to everything. Some things just look plastic, especially furniture.
Overall though, the build, the video; totally amazing

[Kaya Angel]

Hello I'm Kaya the maker of the video featured. Its been interesting to read the comments because the idea of the video was to make people think about what can be done in SL and how people see where graphics play a part in a virtual world. I often think and SL structures are used as a means of providing an environment to give a little context to social interaction. So if you go to a ballroom to dance with a friend the ballroom is simply a hint in the back ground for you to then dance and chat. The building its self only plays a small role. I differ from that in that I love the power architecture has to not just provide a context for a social interaction, but if done right a building can enhance social interactions. And bring a whole new level of how you feel in the space. This is my own personal experience. Being a living building that feels real changes how you live in a space and how you use the space when it comes to interacting with people. Its very easy to understand that basic buildings have dominated SL because of the practicalities of prim limits and that complex buildings can often mean more client based lag. I am finding though that more and more people can now see SL with advanced lighting on. Taking into account how old the original base of SL code must be I think they have done really well to add the graphics features they have! And I always feel that they push for the next level even before people have managed to catch up. An example would be "screen space reflections" I love this feature and it only comes on with Ultra setting, but it has been a real visual treat for me. I should add that the comment about Specular being too much may not take into account the context of the theme. The intent is not to be totally realistic. I believe there is a balance that is important in SL. If you make something too real then people compare it to RL which breaks the illusion of SL. If you make something too surreal then the person can't find anything to connect with and relate it to the real world. I always aim for a hyper-reality. Its a balance where you still let buildings adhere to things like the laws of physics and make sure the building looks structurally sound but you don't make is so real and to scale that its not practical for an avatar to move around. The key is to make it so you feel in a real space but your imagination is still free to let you be there in your mind. Angel Manor is not meant to be totally real its meant to be more like a Disney dream palace. There for the amount of shine added is done on purpose to make the place sparkle like a dream. So I think the new Normal and Specular map can really look real you just have to play around with them until you get the level you want.

I do have a lot more video's on that same youtube channel and hope to add a lot more in the near future so that there is a challenge to the many video's which always seem to show the world in a bad light.

I thought I would also end just by giving the specs of the computer the video was made on.
Viewer: Firestorm
Processor: Intel i7-2600 CPU @3.40GHz (8 CPUs)
RAM: 32GB
Graphics: Nivida Geforce GTX 970 (4GB Extra onbaord memory)
Captured with FRAPS

Many Thanks
Kaya Angel

[Arcadia Codesmith]

Beautifully executed, but it reminds me of the palace at Versailles, and the palace of Versailles just makes me want to erect guillotines.

[Wagner James Au]

ROLEPLAY FIELD TRIP!

[Noirran]

What a wonderful video! I never understood the "hardcore gamer" argument. SL is a limitless world with a massive amount of user generated content. In a regular video game, even an MMO, you only have a base number of textures and objects to load. So of course they can do more with graphics. This isn't the case with SL when the number of objects and textures to load can change depending on where you go and who created it. I think it runs great within those parameters. It's the price you pay for unbridled creativity.

[Arcadia Codesmith]

"ROLEPLAY FIELD TRIP!" made me giggle. Viva la revolution!

[joe]

Too bad LL now owns your video and can do whatever it wants with it without remuneration.

I guess someone didn't care to mention that.

[Zaphod Kotobide]

I had all of the settings shoved up to full in the viewer.. (Linden latest) and notwithstanding the fact that it was very slow, what I really went for was to see the more nuanced stuff like specular and bump mapping, but saw none of it. It was all as flat as anything else in SL. Is it just not possible to see that eye candy with a 560TI? The machine is a phenom II X4 940 with 4Gb ram. I'm not very concerned about the performance, but wondering why I couldn't see the materials and maps in the video.

[Wagner James Au]

"Too bad LL now owns your video and can do whatever it wants with it without remuneration."

Citation and specific examples beyond publicity and marketing?

[Adec]

at Zaphod was wondering the same on my iMac with 16GB ram .. can I see it too..

I'm not sure I have my settings correct .. in certain areas I could see a difference .. in certain rooms if i left my AV there for a while, pulled back draw difference .. textures seemed to load ... I'm still playing there trying to get it right.. I just get lost everytime trying to find the damm library! .. its huge!

[zz bottom]

Make sure you set all in advanced graphics to ultra, make sure you check the alm bock, shadows on reflections as well.
Also check on hardware settings, to make sure you have AA and AF16x turned on.
In nvidea control panel you can even, via vga hardware, increase the quality by messing with a few settings.
And more important, change the wind light settings from default to dynamic richness if on LL viewer and using day cycle or if using specific wind light sky, to choose one like fine day or any that makes the sun slide be set in a way that you can see shadows reflected.

[Joe]

It's in that unnecessarily confusing doc called the TOS.

Explain to us where LL clearly can't do what I stated Mr. "journalist".