Ryan Schultz: New Sansar Default Avatar More Barbie-Like, Less VR Friendly

Left, right: Sansar default avatar 1.0, Sansar default avatar 2.0 photos by Ryan Schultz

In case you missed it, Linden Lab updated its default avatar recently, and the change was so drastic, Canadian virtual world blogger Ryan Schultz just went into a very non-Canadian rant:

What the hell was wrong with the much more realistic proportions of the default female Avatar 1.0? Why did Linden Lab fuck this up so badly?? What were they thinking?!?? Let’s do a direct comparison, wearing the same outfit, between Avatar 1.0 and Avatar 2.0. [See above] Avatar 2.0: Way too tall, hips too narrow, too thin, hands too small, looks like a Barbie doll.

If you can’t see that there is something seriously wrong with the default female Avatar 2.0 just by comparing them side by side, then I give up. There were clearly drastic design decisions made that were NOT communicated by Linden Lab effectively to the users. This is NOT what we asked for. This is NOT what we wanted.

The Barbie archetype switch is surprising to me, but perhaps most surprising is this: If Ryan is right, where Linden Lab once promoted Sansar as a VR-facing product, this avatar doesn't play well with VR at all:

I put on my VR headset and looked down myself as Vanity Fair [his avatar], and I was HORRIFIED! My forearms look like toothpicks, and my hands are much too small! I look like someone with a wasting disease or a small child, not a grown woman! The difference between Avatar 1.0 and Avatar 2.0 is so jarring that it is immersion-breaking. It’s also a complete deal-breaker for me. This is just a truly horrible default female avatar and at this point, I don’t think I will even bother to design clothing for it until it is replaced or improved. I’m that unhappy with it.

I sympathize with Linden Lab here, as there's no way to create a base avatar in such a way that everyone is happen, especially if it's a big change for longtime users. But before making the right changes, maybe they should first read Ryan's in-depth post.

Comments

[Snark]

Sounds they just pissed off the 5 users that actually log into Sansar

[Ryan Schultz]

Hi Wagner! Thanks for the shout-out!

Yes, I'm not happy with the new default human avatars in Sansar. I think it is highly unlikely that Linden Lab is going to roll us back to Avatar 1.0, but I really disagree with the direction they decided to go for the female avatars. Landon Linden reported from the official Sansar Discord in response to this blogpost, saying:

"We’re working to get body morph in before the end of the year. It is a top priority for us, too."

And this is a bit of comfort. I keep forgetting that this is a beta, and that things like this will happen. We all take part in the beta knowing that something could come along and break everything for us, and we have to start over again. That’s just part of the deal.

Once body deformation will be added to the new facial deformation abilites (which are frankly awesome), I will feel a lot happier with the avatars.

[seph]

They shouldn't have created a base avatar at all. No one asked for it. The want for VR hands and whatever else that convinced them to create avatars of their own again should've never outweighed the lessons learned with Second Life that consumers want custom skeletons, custom avatars and the ability to tailor created avatars to individual communities.

Sansar has just become a set for Draxtor podcasts, with random Marvelous Designer and occasional other weird brands like Intel mixed in. It won't succeed as is and everyone at Linden Lab knows it. It's being made for no one, so no one will use it except those paid to be there.

It's getting towards the end of the year where Linden Lab usually shakes things up at the CEO position and product offerings. I can't imagine they'll let Sansar continue to fail another year while Ebbe hike's fees on Linden Lab designers to pay for random stuff like this.

[Ryan Schultz]

Also, MARKET FORCES TO THE RESCUE! As in Second Life, crafty content creators are seeing a market opportunity and pursuing it!

https://ryanschultz.com/2019/09/05/sansar-users-are-you-unhappy-with-the-new-default-avatar-2-0-female-avatar-market-forces-to-the-rescue/

[Clara Seller]

Even though she does look kinda like a hot dog, I still respond better to the new avatar than the old one. The old one makes me want to keep a can of Mace handy.

[Chic Aeon]

While I think the new female avatar could use a bit more "poundage", please remember (this partly to Ryan) that some gals are actually BUILT THIS WAY -- yes really. So going off the deep end over "their" shape is probably not the nicest way to complain LOL.

I am fine with the new gal avatar. The facial feature tools are fun to work with and I got my gal looking pretty --- wait, going to quote Ryan " WORK it, girl! You look fabulous!" (see the SL forums or my blog post tonight for a shot).

We lost a LOT of avatar inventory and indeed much that remained in the MD category as well as attachments (jewelry and glasses and the like) don't transfer over as usable even though LL didn't take them away from us. I ended up with three colors of glasses I had made and one bracelet that work. Add a few tops and skirts, some overalls and some dresses that I really don't like and that is my wardrobe of the moment.

BUT, Linden Lab gave us BACK OUR MONEY on the items that are no longer viable (the rigged ones anyway like hair and custom avatars and the like). A very nice gesture and one that will help folks update their new avatars WHEN more content becomes available.

I definitely appreciate the ability to make our faces look different than one another. The skin is less than stellar (honestly even "I" can do that well and I am not a texture artist) but I am hoping someone will make new skins now (I am thinking that is a possibility).

And to the person that said a new avatar wasn't wanted? Well they obviously haven't attended any product meetings in the last year.

I thought it was extremely funny that someone listed add on breasts (she really IS flat) and buttocks on the store today LOL. I don't care. My new avatar will be skinny until the sliders appear as the new year rolls around (fingers crossed).

It is also good to note that the Nexus is impressive and Sansar Studios deserves some kudos there.

[tankgirl]

They still have those terrible big black spots on the breasts with which the Linden Lab men indicate how offensive and dangerous they find the female body, right?

[JohnC]

Do The LL people really ever look at SL. I mean, no offence to the poor Avatar, and being English, unaccustomed as I am to being arrogant, all my avatars look infinity better than this poor thing. My Avatars are beautiful, sexy if I wish, realistic even, although in a fantasy world this is not the ideal. Truth be told this is ugly. But it is not even beautifully ugly. It is just plane old badly made, Sh...t forsaken, Ugly. When will they realize that all that matters to the client of a virtual world is how good they look. If you cannot provide a beautiful avatar, even if the user eventual decimates it, then who cares about how great your world looks ? Only those who think that they are some kind of artist for creating these Virtual throw away worlds. Now I admit that Minecraft defies this. But it does so only because it allowed firstly, those who have no talent to to compete in the virtual world, and secondly for those who think a Virtual world is a mathematical challenge, to register some input when faced with the the impossible task of competing with the best. It is a leveler for the average man. As even SL once was. SL more than any other virtual world company should know by now that the avatar is all that matters.

[Orcsibaby]

"What were they thinking?!??"

A question I'm asking pretty much since my first day in our pixelworld in early 07. While the questions are piling up, answers are hard to get by/not available.

[Amanda Dallin]

JohnC is right. Avatars are by far the most important component of a virtual environment to a majority of users. LL has always catered too the sandbox builder crowd but that is a small minority.

[JohnC]

The Avatar is all the average person has to express themselves in a virtual world. Like in reality, how you appear to others matters,if, it is the way in which you express yourself. When I meet another Avatar I see two things, either an Avatar that creates beyond the "look" and those who create with their look. There are of course those who do both, but they are rare. So the creator of a virtual world must give the “people” as defined by the average user, the chance to be something very special in this world, this is all they have, and virtual worlds are supposed to be about, amother life, something “more” than what they have in the real world. If not then it is just a game, and will never be anything more. In the real world I am what I am and I except it, I am old now and happy with my self “warts and all”. But in a virtual world I want the ability to be as beautiful as I can be, or as beautifully ugly as I wish. Now understand this. A virtual world is not a chat room, where how you look does not matter. Or where the same RL restrictions apply, I post an RL pic of me that kills dead all competition. A virtual world is where my f..cked RL self is given wings to fly, to be free.

[Adeon Writer]

Nothing meets jumping into VR, and looking down at your hands and feeling like you've been put into another body and world...

...Until you notice you have creepy trump-sized hands.

[Clara Seller]

JohnC is talking to the heart of what is failing both Sansar and SL. The importance of an avatar can't be stressed enough. LL has strayed so far from their foundation of "Your World, Your Imagination" that they don't know who they are anymore. Unfortunately, I think they've also taken a good portion of their remaining customers with them.

Sansar, the content creators kingdom, is and always has been lost to everyone but a handful of people who come off as intolerable narcissists. It was such a flawed, self-serving concept. While customers sometimes might find amusement in acting like sheep, it's insulting to only expect them to be sheep.

LL isn't completely to blame. We, the customers, have just dumbed ourselves down to a SL that is barely recognizable any more. It's just short of a Borg Cube filled with specimens that mostly look alike, gather on command, and speak with one acceptable forum voice. Yes, the appearance has improved, but it's becoming a very formulaic landscape that celebrates it's diversity in terms of color-pickers and resizing tools.