New World Notes

Things We Lost in the Flood: A New, Massively Multiplayer Loneliness Simulator Where Players Can Only Share Messages in Bottles With Each Other -- And If Enough Players Win, Self-Destructs

Things We Lost in the Flood is a new, free-to-play indie MMO with a brilliant twist: It's a massively multiplayer "loneliness simulator" where each player is set adrift on a boat in a post-apocalyptic world that's been flooded over. So instead of forming into groups or communicating via chat or instant message, players can write and send messages in bottles for other players to find. Some of those messages can advance the game (more on that below), or simply just be personal expressions, anonymously shared and set adrift into the pixelated sea.

Created by indie developer Dean Moynihan of Awkward Silence Games (who also created the acclaimed, deeply moving game One Chance), Things We Lost was first conceived to be massively multiple storytelling game: 

"The original idea was for players to find notes that I had written, to tell a short story out of order," he tells me. "However, I'm no writer... Once I figured out a way for the players to be doing all the prose work, it was smooth sailing from there." 

That decision enhanced his intent to simulate loneliness: "The only thing that could feel more lonely than floating in the middle of the ocean by yourself," he explains, "would be floating in the middle of the ocean by yourself -- and reading notes from other living people."

Though the game has only been out for a short time, players have written over 6,000 notes to each other, running the gamut of useful to the game, to creatively discursive, to surprisingly profound:

Psychedelic Zebra Sex, Alien on a Stripper Pole: What's Your Strangest Second Life Experience?

Reddit's /SecondLife has a fun thread on "the Wildest/Weirdest Experience you've have on SL", including some that are just horrible and disturbing (i.e. racist roleplay) while others are refreshingly zany:

Long time ago I was in a sandbox and suddenly a lamp avatar started talking to a toaster avatar. It got a little NSFW. The light got turned on and the toaster ejected burnt toast all over the sim.

Well OK then! The thread inspired blogger Meri to go into further detail in a post, including the time a Linden staffer showed up as an alien (above) which danced on a nearby stripper pole.

All of which reminds me that I've never got around to telling my story of Psychedelic Zebra Sex:

Cajsa's Flickr Pick: Artful Screen Captures Created in Assassin’s Creed Origins

Cajsa Lilliehook covers the best in virtual world screenshot art and digital painting

Essovius captures lovely landscape and action photos from several games. I particularly like the photos from Assassin’s Creed Origins. This untitled capture is active and exciting with a lot of movement, particularly as the ground is at such a steep angle, making the horse’s ride feel much wilder.

Libra Has Promise, Says Virtual Currency Expert/Blockchain Skeptic Adam Frisby, But Faces Adoption, Trust & Storage Challenges

Everyone in tech is talking today about Libra, the new blockchain-related cryptocurrency initiative led by Facebook in association with many major companies and organizations. (Read this detailed summary from Josh Constine on TechCrunch.) Assuming it isn't regulated to death by concerned government officials, can it live up to the utopian promises made in its promotional video (see above), while becoming a functional alternative to existing currency system?

"Biggest hole is just whether or not people trust it," virtual currency expert Adam Frisby tells me, in a chat today. "I think some will. Honestly, if it was anyone but Facebook pitching this (even if their stake is a minority one), it'd be way more likely to succeed."

As longtime New World Notes readers know, Adam has been involved as an entrepreneur in virtual world economies for over 15 years, and recently wrote a much-shared VentureBeat essay detailing his skepticism for blockchain. Libra, however, has promise, because (in his words) "it [s]olves a lot of the issues with blockchain, by not really being one."

One interesting point he raises: The industries with the greatest incentive to use Libra now are on the edge of the mainstream economy -- for instance, gambling, online gaming, porn, and the burgeoning legal pot industry in some US states. In my view, their rapid embrace will likely turn Libra into "Vice Coin" -- a brand association which might hamper Libra's adoption by the wider mainstream. (Which is probably not what Facebook and its partners were going for.)

On a technical front, Adam me, the heavy storage requirements may prevent Libra from becoming decentralized. Other challenges remain. For more detail, here's our lightly edited transcript:

Low Grav, Social VR Version of Ultimate Disc Game Launched in Sansar

Sasnsar is still in early beta with very limited consumer usage (as Linden Lab's CEO readily admits), but we are starting to see some interesting and fairly robust, and quite possibly fun applications emerge: Take Ultimate Disc, a new, low gravity version of the cult amateur sports game:

The Ultimate Disc arena (by @C3rb3rus & @EvoAv), a game loved by millions in its RL version, is now available on Sansar. This is a team based sport where the team with the most points wins. Organize a game with your friends and play a game with up to 5 vs 5 players. The game starts and entrance blocked once there is at least one player on each team, so have your players ready at the entrance before joining the game.

More on the Atlas page. If I'm reading the description there right, a lot of the playing rules of the Sansar version of Ultimate are not hard coded, but based on the honor system -- which would be similar to Ultimate the RL version:

Cajsa's SL Flickr Pick: Evie Heights, Master of Angles & Intense Colors

Cajsa Lilliehook covers the best in virtual world screenshot art and digital painting

I love “Big Picture” by Evie Heights. It is very representative of her entire photostream which is full of pictures that appear casually captured in the moment. There is an artful unstudied effect. The thing is, we know what it’s like taking a picture in Second Life. It takes a lot of work to make a picture look so spontaneous. But look how her body angle mirrors the angle of the flowers. I also love her use of color, of using the purple/yellow complementary colors. There are so many thoughtful choices made that mentioning she also centers the subject using the Rule of Thirds feels redundant.  

SL Should Adopt VRChat's Avatar Rankings -- And SLers Should Be Less Like Barbie, More Like Elizabeth Warren (Comment of the Week #2)

Great conversation in this post praising VRChat's new avatar optimization rankings (from Excellent down to Very Poor, for avatars over 70,000 triangles) -- including this great comment from reader "Finni Graves", who agrees with reader "Cake" that Second Life should adopt these rankings:

I've invested a lot of my SL esteem in the whole crazy avatar adornment scene. Then one day, after trying to navigate a horrible shopping event, I've got to stop being so selfish and hogging so much resource. What's the point of looking good, if I don't feel good? These ridiculous mesh bodies, heads, hair. clothes, and accessories are literally sucking the life out of our SL. We must simplify ourselves because this whole hamster wheel isn't working.

Cake is right. All of us need to be graded harshly and it is our duty to ask ourselves, " do I really need this?". It's also the duty of content creators to make consumers aware of the optimization of their products and to guarantee it. They should have to be graded too, at least on Marketplace. 

Finni says SL's many fashion bloggers should advocate optimized avatars and stop promoting resource heavy avatars which degrade the performance for everyone around them. And then, notably, likens these reforms to the plans put forth by the US Presidential candidate who's leading the charge to reform the American economy by penalizing people whose greed hurts society and the environment:

Linden Lab Needs a Prominently Placed FAQ for Second Life Users (Comment of the Week #1)

My interview with a famed YouTuber turned Linden Lab staffer Strawberry Singh provoked some reader complaints that the company is not very responsive to SL user feedback. As reader "Mac" points out, there's an easy way to partly address that problem:

People need context to understand. Just as important, however, this context needs to be accessible and available.

My suggestion: Have Linden Lab make a bullet point FAQ list. '20 Top Misunderstandings Explained' -- something like that. Put this list up on the Forums and PIN IT, so it stays up there and people are forced to see it. Pinning it will also help with (formerly answered) questions that keep coming up, such as "Why won't LL tell us the exact time when they're going to do big maintenance?" [Linden Lab community forum staffer] Grumpity (I think), has answered that several times, but without a pinned answer, her attempts have vanished into the ether. Add to, and update, this list when necessary.

One great thing about having a prominent FAQ is it encourages oldtimers to point to it, when noobies ask a basic question. It's why RTFFAQ is a commonly used acronym. And as Mac continues, it helps convey more transparency:

Top 7 Posts Last Week: Oculus Quest Sales Estimates, Strawberry Singh Interview, Pokémon Problems, SL Protests, and VRChat's Thing With Mirrors

• Strawberry's Second Second Life As A Linden: Check-In With Famed YouTuber
• Nylon Pinkney Is Online: The Problem With Loving Pokémon As A Millennial
• Watch: Syrmor Interviews A Man With ALS Reflecting On Life While A Talking Mushroom In VRChat
• Great Idea: VRChat Ranking Avatars By "Excellent" To "Poor" Optimization
• Petition Against L$ Processing Fee Increase Slows, Draws Some Skepticism
• Oculus Quest Likely Sold Low 6 Figures Of Units In First 2 Weeks Of Launch
• Why VRChat Players Love Looking At Themselves In VRChat-Based Mirrors

Strawberry's Second Second Life as a Linden: Check-In With Famed YouTuber

It's been a couple months since Strawberry Singh, Second Life's most popular YouTuber, joined Linden Lab as an employee named "Strawberry Linden", making videos like the recent one above for the company's official YouTube channel. So I just checked in with her to see how the transition has been so far:

"I'm learning a lot and enjoying myself," she tells me. "I have full control over what I want to cover and how I want to cover it. I've started with the basics and plan to move into more intermediate and advanced tutorials soon. I haven't had that much interaction with Residents yet, other than just running into them when I'm bouncing around on the grid. Everyone's always very nice. They keep asking me for a Linden bear though, which I haven't had a chance to make yet. I promise that will be my first project as soon as I learn how to build!"

The most surprising thing she's learned since becoming a Linden? It may surprise many SLers: