Back in March we had our first in-depth preview of Life by You, the new life simulation game by ex-Linden Lab CEO / former EA/Sims lead Rod Humble, now here's a granular look at its avatar customization features -- bodies and clothing above, more below (with an emphasis on facial characterization).
It's a great look at a modern avatar experience with a clean, bright, easy-to-use UI that's still highly granular, where pretty much any appearance can be achieved. Many Second Life users have called for Linden Lab to update its avatar customization so it's closer to this.
But as Humble himself might say, it's far too late to change the SL avatar system: There are too many user-made hacks and add-ons that would be broken by an upgrade, literally putting thousands of community content creators out of a job. (For instance, the whole attachable SL hair industry is built on the Second Life default hair UI being so limited.)
One alternative is to offer SL mobile app users a new avatar UI that's closer to the Life by You version, even if that means creating a kind of class/social divide between mobile and PC users. But that's probably inevitable anyway, since it's almost impossible create an equal experience across multiple devices.
Anyway, more on Life by You avatars and art below:
Why start worrying about a "class/social divide" thing? LL has pretty much done that already with the whole mesh system in general.
Posted by: Robbi Nova | Thursday, July 13, 2023 at 03:01 PM