Here's a handy guide for growing user numbers and engagement in virtual worlds by veteran game designer Alexia Mandeville (High Fidelity, Facebook's Horizon, Niantic), who was last seen on New World Notes offering tips to Linden Lab on growing Second Life. Her specific focus here is the value of collective experiences which start on 2D platforms:
Intent to enter into a virtual world starts on flat surfaces. A phone, a messaging platform, a social media platform, a website. How do we get people to dip their toes into the virtual world from these surfaces? We can increase information sharing and acquire new users to join in by implementing some of the following tactics:
Create a rabbit hole. This is a piece of information that entices the player to explore and work with other people to find and spread information. For instance, imagine seeing an image for a new hat every Wednesday on social media with a virtual location (like a specific locale in a virtual world) tagged. It takes you to a hat shop within a virtual world, where an NPC is available only on Wednesday and Thursday at 1PM PST. In this case, you’re inviting people to become involved in a timed event that could lead to other information and narrative within the world.
Read it all here. Many of her tips are applicable not just to creators of virtual worlds, but to people who create content for these platforms (VRChat Second Life, IMVU, ROBLOX, etc.). She also sent me additional advice for these creators in particular:
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Virtual World Concerts Aren't Ideal for Acts With Great Real Life Stage Shows
Protip: It's not a great idea to announce "X in virtual worlds is the future of Y" before checking to see if there are instances of Y successfully happening without X.
For instance: "Live performances in virtual worlds are the future of music concerts." It's part of that future, we can safely say, but as reader "Mint" reminds us, it's definitely not the only one:
Yes: Top bands are making quite a lot of money just from selling tickets to oldschool video streams of live shows, without the added addition (and time, and money) of creating a whole Travis Scott-in-Fortnite-type virtual world experience on top of that. As Minty notes, fans of artists like BTS will probably prefer watching the live real world stage act that's core to the BTS experience. Where virtual worlds will probably shine most is by elevating shows put on by performers who don't have a lot of dancing and other choreography in their stage acts. (Off the top of my head: my neighbor* Billie Eilish has a great stage presence, but a virtual world performance which turns her dark and moody songs into interactive 3D animation would be amazing.)
Which isn't to say there's no place for amazing stage acts like BTS in virtual worlds -- as a matter of fact, they mocapped some of their dance moves for avatars to buy and use in Fortnite:
Continue reading "Virtual World Concerts Aren't Ideal for Acts With Great Real Life Stage Shows" »
Posted on Monday, January 25, 2021 at 03:14 PM in Comment of the Week, Making the Metaverse | Permalink | Comments (1)
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