Virtual World Developer's Visit to Linden Lab Hints at Big Updates to Sansar and Second Life Coming Soon

Will Burns, Vice-Chair for IEEE's Virtual Worlds Standard Group, recently stopped by Linden Lab's headquarters in San Francisco for a visit, had a good long chat with CEO Ebbe Altberg (pictured here with mandatory hoodie, next to Will with bonus Deadpool T-shirt) and got a tour of upcoming Sansar content. What exactly Will saw in Sansar he cannot say, since he signed an NDA at the door, but reading between the lines of what he reported afterward, it looks like Sansar and Second Life will see some pretty big updates soon (or soon-ish).

"I’m not telling anyone what they’re doing exactly," as he puts it to me, "but rest assured they didn’t drop the ball with Ready Player One. It’s really mind-blowing. I think people will be in awe and pleasantly surprised."

Will is a longtime Second Life user and content creator, where he's known as "Aeonix Aeon". And having gotten this first-hand, full-blow demo of upcoming Sansar content at Linden Lab, sees the two this way:

"When I want high-end mind blowing, I’d dip into Sansar with a headset for a half hour. Then come back to Second Life for the rest of the evening. Best way I can find an analogy for SL users is this: Imagine Sansar is Disneyland. Second Life is the everyday after that. You pop off with the family and friends to Disney for a fun afternoon or vacation, then come home. In the same manner, Sansar is Second Life’s Disneyland. It’s fun, impressive with the right hardware, and mind blowing. Then you come home and while home isn’t as exciting or high end packed with thrills and wow factor, it’s home and you spend most of your time there. Each has a legit purpose.

 

"Now, could I see everyone running out to get a headset for this? Of course not. It’s still niche audience at best. But I definitely recommend a proper engagement with it if you get a chance.

Long as you keep in mind it’s Disneyland to SL, it’ll make sense."

Other dedicated SLers have made the theme park/home analogy for Sansar. Speaking of which, here's the notes Will posted to a private Facebook group after his visit to Linden Lab which hint at updates for both:

1. Unlimited groups. Prolly not likely. I imagine the load on servers would kill it.
2. Reducing Lag: We actually discussed a way that could help do this substantially and bring other benefits as a side effect. Can’t say what, but it’s on their mind (and whiteboard) now. If they actually run with it or not is a totally different story.
3. Flexi Bento: No summoning C’thulu
4. Land costs: Sounds like it will be addressed. How, I’m not at liberty to disclose. Be patient.
5. Inventory mess: Can’t help ya there.
6. From Wagner James Au’s post concerning Ready Player One: Prepare to be amazed.

Ebbe showed me around, we hung out, then he strapped me into an Oculus Rift for a private demo of Sansar. Some was user-generated scenes, others were scenes made by Linden Lab.  Of the latter, I have this to say: Sansar is actually incredibly impressive so far. Still couldn’t deal with the headset longer than twenty minutes. Still has a ways to go for desktop users. For short term experiences, treat it like a theme park. Second Life is still my choice for longer term engagement. When I want to be blown away for half hour, Sansar is where it’s at.

Wildly speculating from those notes, I would not at all be surprised if Second Life users see some kind of virtual land discount... and, say, a playable version of the OASIS from Ready Player One deployed in Sansar. (Spielberg and author Ernest Cline wouldn't do an in-person visit just to see an Intel cross-promotion demo., would they?) But we shall see!

Comments

[Medhue]

well, I'm not sure where he went, but I'm in Sansar daily. It's more like a museum than Disneyland. At Disneyland, you don't go there to just walk around. The Sansar avatar itself is still in alpha, with ZERO customization, outside of clothing. Sansar has a very long way to go. SL, on the other hand, is a mature, fully featured world. Sansar's important feature can be counted on 1 hand.

[sirhc desantis]

This Will Burns ?
https://twitter.com/darianknight/status/964986023221456896

Well then Foxtrot Uniform to any of its opinions mate;/

[Chic Aeon]

It is important to note that in most all companies with R and D that the "little folk" never know what is going on until things are unveiled (this in regards to Medhue's comment -- and simply in general).

There was an official statement in a blog post lately that could EITHER be interpreted as doing something with the glytches OR a new game all together. Maybe the glytches are still happening on a small scale. Once you get the canon, there really is no place else to go.

With many tens of thousands of items lost to the database over the last decade I have given up on "security". I buy very little of course and have backups of all of "my stuff". In my mind the best way to keep something is to REZ IT. Much less loss there (although it still happens). I am at least happy that the old "oh nothing is ever really lost, you just need to clear your cache" mentality is disappearing.

These days when something is no longer there, I just say to myself, "well I guess I lost that". Now losing my store logo after seven years (it disappeared completely from the database) was NOT fun. I found a copy over in Opensim and got it back that way.

But we move onward -- sometime in a winding path, but hopefully forward.

[Jaimy hancroft]

i don't know what they are trying to do , when it comes to VR ,VRchat is the place to be currently for gamers that own a VR set, it's allso on steam where all the gamers are, I spend alot of time gaming as an SL resident (i'm in game communities etc, i spend a lot of time with gamers ) and mostly they care about just derping around in some avatar in a room (think garry's mod), acting like complete idiots xD , just like PUBG's lobby, they dont really care about looks and creation when it comes to 'games' like this.
the gamers that do care about artistics/looks/creations, and they want to have an 'experience' will go play games like firewatch, what remains of edith finch , life is strange etc , the gamers that enjoy building within a game will go play builder games.. they will never move into somthing like SL or Sansar. this "looking at art someone made' - platform is very niche and not a lot of gamer 'youth' is remotely interested.. which is most of the playerbase on this planet.
I started in SL when i was in my 20s (when it was derpy fun too), i'm 30+ now and a lot of my friends in there were older which means they are now 40+,50+ , maybe there are some younger people but i'm sure it's not a whole lot, a lot of residents now have been 8yr+in SL aswell and wont even move completely to Sansar cause of comfort and 90% not owning a VR headset.

This is my opinion and everyone can disagree but: Sansar will never completely be a success since it's catered to only a very small demographic plus its highly incorperated with VR, something not everyone owns. as long as they cater to that audiance it's not going to go anywhere super huge, sure it wil be a 'visit this art museum'-simulator or whatever it is right now for a few people that appreciate these things but it's not going to be enough.it wont ever hit the steamcharts and have 30.000 concurrent players .

as for SL i fear it's going to hit a bump in the future with it becoming more and more expensive for creators, right now the economy is 'ok' but i can't say with full confidence SL has another very succesfull 10 years in them.Unless they suddenly found a marketer that knows how to perform miracles.
-end rant
Anyways, SORRY FOR THE DOWNER lol .
Positives: i still love creating for SL ,it's like one big disfunctional fun family .
and I'm very curious to see what Sansar will pull out of their magic hat.

[Debby Downer]

I just turned 40 while having been in SL over a decade, running a store is too unpredictable as a source of income for myself as a creator while too many BS things have went down over the years by the lab and residents ruining my fun.

This whole Sansar thing is BS, it should have been SL2.0, a supercharged version of the original running side by side with it.. having all the dream features users ever asked for.

Disneyland? WTF! that's someones vision, lets be original here instead.

Ebbe Linden stopped talking to residents on the Official Forums and SLU Forums a few years back but has no trouble talking to those insiders who will pimp his agenda.

[Medhue]

@Chic Aeon - Yeah, that's what they keep saying, but when are we going to SEE it. I've been told about their whole plan for the avatar, but here we sit, still waiting. IMHO, LL needs to seriously improve their development speed. It's like molasses.

[YourTheir Sometimes]

@ Debby
Good luck getting Ebbe to pay you peasants an once of attention now that all this time has went by ..'unless your last name is Chung.

[Mike]

The first "positive" change was just announced, they cut back on Live Chat, another hour saved there ... on monday it will be open from 9am to 6pm (9 hours), before it was 5am to 3pm (10 hours) ... one of the Concierges once told me they no longer offer full 24/7 Live Chat because there is "very little to do" at night but that would change if they could figure out how to get more european users attracted. And then - if there is so little to do, why does it still take days to deal with support tickets? If the concierge on duty is bored, why not letting him deal with those?