New World Notes

SL Usage: Median Daily Concurrency Up 13% Since "Pandemic Boost"

Here are more solid figures to back up reports that Second Life is currently experiencing a "pandemic boost" -- via Tyche Shepherd, keeper of the best data on SL outside SL the actual company.

"Second Life concurrency shows a significant uplift since 10th March 2020," she tells to me. "Underlying trend in Median Daily Concurrency begins to grows from that date and has been 13% higher on average than the previous 9 weeks."

As you can see above, median concurrency reaches up to around 46,000 in mid-April, then starts steadily decreasing to a point where it is now around 41,000.

Which is pretty decent! To put that in modern terms, VRChat is now reaching peak concurrencies of about 15,000 on Steam -- so  its total is probably 2-3x that number of people launching VRChat from other platforms. I.E. SL concurrency is still competitive with VRChat.

The next question is why usage starts slipping in May:

Last Day to Shop at Stand for Justice to Benefit Black Lives Matter Orgs!

Click here to directly teleport to Stand for Justice, a month-long fundraiser, which added its offerings of SL style and houseware offerings in the new upstairs wing, including new additions from top brands like Kratwork and Veechi, not to mention original art. The event ends tomorrow at Noon PT, so this is the last chance to buy premiere content for an awesome cause:

 All virtual content sales will be turned into real money donations to Black Lives Matter, Black Visions Collective, Campaign Zero, and the National Police Accountability Project, along with a bail fund for jailed protesters nationwide. Over $10,0000 in Linden Dollars have been raised so far, but hopefully we can hit another milestone before another Noon.

Top 7 Posts Last Week Including: Journey's Origin as an MMO, and a New Listen to Philip Rosedale's Audio-Based Virtual World

 

• Watch: STÖMOL Sneak Peak, Epic Full-Length SL Machinima With Brilliant Premise Premiering In July
• Black Woman Under Pressure To Keep Her Opinions To Herself In Real Life Expresses Them Through Her Second Life
• Viewfinder, Brain-Melting Indie Game In Development, Adds "Turn Paintings Into Reality" Feature To Further Melt Your Cerebellum
• Journey Director Jenova Chen Shares His Original Vision Of The Masterpiece Game As An MMO -- And Its Inspiration From Joseph Campbell & Confucius
• Listen With Headphones: Demos Of High Fidelity's 3D Spacial Audio-Based Virtual World
• Cajsa's SL Flickr Pick: Prophet Produces Fantastic Slice Of Virtual Life Pics
• Watch: Amazing Cyberpunk Scene Illustrates Democratization Of 3D Graphics

Watch: STÖMOL Sneak Peak, Epic Full-Length SL Machinima With Brilliant Premise Premiering in July

Turns out Christopher Nolan's Tenet won't be playing in theaters in July after all, so your best bet for a cerebral sci-fi action thriller could be STÖMOL, the feature-length SL machinima from Huckleberry Hax and crew.  Mr. Hax just shared with me this teaser scene, redolent of cyberpunk noir.

Here's Hax to explain the scene:

"The scene features the film's protagonist, Epi Stömol (Huckleberry Hax), picking up a case from wealthy socialite Verity Certain (Ylva). Certain hires Stömol to track down her adopted son, a gifted coder able to retrieve and decode old media files rendered unreadable by the ruling government's 'digital hygiene' policy."

(Yes Hax is both the writer, director, and star of STÖMOL, which seems a bit much, but then again that's what they told Orson Welles. So, you know.)

The premise of feature, as Huckleberry puts it, is pretty Nolan-worthy:

Core Launching Contest to Create Scenes in Style of Sylvain "Tohad" Sarrailh

Core, the Unreal-based, user-generated project from Manticore Games (think Fortnite meets ROBLOX) is just about to launch a theme-based contest with $3500 in prizes:

When creating a scene in the style of Sylvain 'Tohad' Sarrailh, you'd want to aim at having something that feels alive. To achieve this, three elements are important: colour, light, and depth. To match his style, you should emphasize the variety of shades and search for a wide colour range. Pay attention to shadows and light, as lighting is a fundamental part of Tohad's work. Combining these elements will help you to produce good image depth and lively scenery. Check out more of his work on his Artstation.

Starts July 1, much more details here. Creating scenes based on an existing artist as opposed to original works seems a bit odd, but it could at least be a good exercise using the Core tools.

Fashion Friday Find: Kim Chica’s SL Style Blog, Show/Tell

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

Hot Pink is a recent post at Kim Chica’s Show/Tell blog. I love the casual style and the look of the turban with the earrings. The whole outfit and the backdrop all come together perfectly. 

• .N X GENUS PROJECT MEI APPLIER UPT (HONEY) (on genus classic)
• [MERCH] OffShoulder Denim - Med
• EVIE - Bliss - Ripped Booty Jeans [Maitreya] @ Anthem
• LaGyo_Ines Earrings FATPACK @ FaMESHed
• LaGyo_Aurora Headbend - FATPACK
• Sintiklia - Hair Kimberly - Fatpack+Tint
• [VALE KOER] BAMBI HEELS FATPACK
• Gaia - Emelia Crop Top FULLPACK/maitreya @ LEVEL
• Vibing -- Elizabeth Necklace -- Gold
• BTTB london backdrop - fashion street
• <K&S> ~Katya 10~ pose1

Kimchi’s next post might capture what most of us are thinking.

Black Woman Under Pressure to Keep Her Opinions To Herself in Real Life Expresses Them Through Her Second Life

Emuna Zamani, a warm and chatty virtual world YouTuber, recently posted this moving video where she starts by talking about her anxiety and anger over recent real life events -- first the pandemic, and then the international uprising over the killing of George Floyd and other Black people, along with the systematic racism which contributed to their deaths.

African-American in real life, she expresses her unvarnished opinions on all this through her Second Life avatar, who is also Black. In real life, as she explains, she is under pressure to keep those opinions to herself:

"I'm very angry," as she puts it. "I'm glad I'm working from home because if someone [in the office] said the wrong thing... man, lemme just tell you, I don't know. That's how fed up I am."

One day, she tells me, her YouTube channel may emerge from behind her avatar.

"After I leave corporate America," as Emuna puts it, "I want to record my Being Black in Second Life videos as myself. My current career doesn’t give me that freedom."

The video is devoted to the Virtual Black History Museum in SL, a place she just discovered and explored by happenstance. Her tour was so powerful, she records this video in near tears:

Viewfinder, Brain-Melting Indie Game in Development, Adds "Turn Paintings Into Reality" Feature to Further Melt Your Cerebellum

Photos aren't the only thing you can explore in Viewfinder #madewithunity #gamedev #edwardhopper pic.twitter.com/iLKS8eMWmb

— Matt Stark (@mattstark256) June 21, 2020

Remember Viewfinder, that cerebellum-straining indie game in development by Matt Stark featuring some insanely cool recursion effects? After some delay , Matt is still tinkering away it and adding new mechanics -- including this one above: 

In Viewfinder, you will be able to "capture" paintings from off a wall, and turn them into real objects in the 3D game world. (A 1929 Edward Hopper painting, in this case.) Here's roughly how Mr. Stark does this:

Cajsa's SL Flickr Pick: Kobo Barracuda Photographs His Macabre Second Life

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

The SL Bare Face Challenge has taken over Flickr, revealing the uncovered, unmade up faces of many avatars. This may be one of the most intriguing of the entries in that particular challenge, taking bare to a whole new level. It is also very typical of the sideways-minded Kobo Barracuda whose photostream reveals a love for roleplay, steampunk, and drama - the good kind of drama. 

More uniquely Kobotacular photos ahead!

Journey Director Jenova Chen Shares His Original Vision of the Masterpiece Game as an MMO -- And Its Inspiration from Joseph Campbell & Confucius

When game developer Robin Hunicke told me about Journey, the acclaimed 2012 game she produced that's finally available to play on the PC via Steam, she mentioned an interesting origin story: It was conceived at first as a kind of MMO/virtual world experience. I just heard from Journey director Jenova Chen, who shared these amazing images he created, from when Journey was first conceived:

"It's 2006 I did these paintings imaging an MMO where nameless, genderless, and ageless characters are all searching for the promised land that is unknown," Jenova tells me. "You can see many of these robed figures are traveling in pairs and groups, which later influenced Journey and Sky: Children of the Light." (That's Chen's new game; more on that another time.)

I've long had a pet theory that Journey's gameplay, in which the player must travel up a steep mountain, was inspired by Philip K. Dick's Mercerism in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? I.E.: 

The trend of increased empathy has coincidentally motivated a new technology-based religion called Mercerism, which uses "empathy boxes" to link users simultaneously to a virtual reality of collective suffering, centered on a martyr-like character, Wilbur Mercer, who eternally climbs up a hill while being hit with crashing stones.

Chen says otherwise, when I ask if that was an influence: