Chess at the Welcome Area

I'm sorry, I've reached my "no more than 25 posts within an incredibly stupid thread" limit. It's apparent to me now that you weren't looking for answers to your initial questions, but rather were simply asking the questions in order to argue a point*, so I'll leave you to do so alone, as I'm not needed for that.

Thanks,

Taco


*The point being that you're a lot better at typing than you are at reading, I think.

I am baffled at this hostile response.

Taco is nowhere near the 25 response limit he mentioned.

Questioning whether the game building if being used to best advantage is not stupid.

I have no point to make other than to see if there might be some better games to be put in the game building.

It is really sad to see the senseless hostility that results from a deliberate attempt to start a non-hostility generating thread in the General forum, which I was inspired to do by Cristiano's post about the rancor level in the General forum of late.

Wha'ts it matter? How many newbies frolic in the meticulously planted bushes? How many newbies sit on the big rocks outside the WA? How many newbies notice the vines growing on the pillars? How many newbies look through the glass roof?

Do we need to quantitively analyze every prim at the WA?

LF

If it were my Welcome Area that I was paying for it would certainly matter whether the resources where being used to best advantage. A quanitative anaylyis of each prim might not be feasible or sensible, but somethng like that would be a good direction to head towards.

I ran into a new user who says he plays chess and he wanted me to post his name here in hopes that someone will contact him about playing a game inworld.

His name is jaroslaw Flasheart, he just started today in response to an article in USA today.

Sigh, too bad there is no way for someone at the chess game to find someone to play with, like a waiting list.

A problem I've found with chess in the WA is, o, it's hard to concentrate with so much going on. And then that part of the WA goes down due to a crash, ending the game prematurely. It's nice to have chess in parks and leisurely settings, but something quick-to-set-up-and-quick-to-end may be more appropriate.

But, come to think of it, I haven't seen that many play Prim Attack in recent months either. I remember when that Prim Attack board was used like the boondoggles in the old Ahern-Morris "classic" Welcome Area.

Yes, Torley, I haven't seen much Prim Attack use either - and it makes a noise one might hear even if one is not watching.

Part of this not seeing people playing the games as much as one used to see people playing prim attack may be that the Welcome Area is too big to see all at once now; you can be at the fountain area and not see what is going on in the buildings enough to know if anyone is playing a game or using the items in the other buildings as they were intended to be used.

Philip Rosedale appeared in the Welcome Area a few months ago asking the specific question of what could one have to be seen by new arrivals that would make them want to stay. Questions about the game buildings contents stem from concern about the same matter.

Sigh, too bad there is no way for someone at the chess game to find someone to play with, like a waiting list.

If the Chess Club doesn't already have this, I'm sure they'd like the idea of an in-world player matching service. Surely somebody could create such a thing, and talk to LL about getting it in something like Pathfinder's Picks...

"See a need, fill a need!"
-- Big Weld, Robots

I am appalled at the response to Suezannes post here. if you read carefully, you will see that she is not making a single negative suggestion, yet she is being crapped all over by Taco et al for even talking about this???

I am a mentor and spend a great deal of time in the WA at times, Suezanne is *always * there and is a tireless supporter of the area. She is just trying to make it a better experience for the newbies. If I was a Linden and wanted to get an idea of what works and what doesn't in the WA, Suezanne is one of the first people I would ask.

My opinion, based on many many hours in the WA, (where I never saw Taco rubio show up once!), is that chess *is* too dull of a game for the new players. All the action is at the fountain, and other than mentoring, very little goes on in the buildings at all. The times I have seen people playing games there, it is hardly ever chess because the solitary play thing doesn't really work.

This is nothing against chess which is a fine game, its just about what is best for the area. When you have half-naked girls paying silly songs and various other colourfull characters doing who knows what at the fountain, playing chess 50 metres to the side in a building is *not* necessairly an exciting alternative.

Thats like trying to sell copies of Pride & Predjudice inside a Las Vegas casino! Sure its a good book, but how many people you think are going to be a bit distracted by the blinking lghts etc.?

Everything Suezanne said is true, including her rather polite comments on the idiotic response to this thread.

so there!

The game scripts could of course monitor the usage to see how much they get played, for the purpose of seeing if one is getting their money's worth out them. If they aren't they ought to be.

I notice there are little things next to the video panels in the instruction building which look just like common avatar counters, i wonder if that is what they are being used for?

Remote control cars might be a fun thing to have in the game room.

I know this thread is a week or so dead now, but I had to comment..

If, when I joined SL, I had not found the Chess board as quickly as I did, I would have left and never returned. Chess was a game I already understood in a world I could barely interact with filled with people speaking in low-internet [lol ur teh funny] and dressed like streetwalkers with serious drug abuse problems.

Slingo or Prim Attack or anything with the word 'Texas' in it would not have held me. Checkers might have, or perhaps backgammon, but chess was perfect.

I can play chess anywhere, but learning I could play it in SL is what made me want to see what else I could do in SL.

There's chess at the WA?? Is that the unrezzed table standing squarely in my way after arriving and trying to walk over to the fountain?

I enjoy a good game of chess on occasion, though I'm not very skilled at it, and will try and coax someone into a game.

Heh, I go to the WA so infrequently now I didn't know that there was a chess game there. Very cool if you ask me and I will have to check this out. Greedy Greedy and On a Roll would be good additions as well as possibly Dominus Skye(sp?)'s Hearts or Spades. Matter of fact I may have to take my spades table to the Help Island.

Taco reports he played, oh, eleven hours I think he said, in the last week, so that's good. He's played at a time when I would hopefully be asleep.


I'm glad you enjoyed the chess at the welcome area Casey. How many hours have you played in the last week?

Suppose that three games were to be added to the game building, not disturbing the ones that are there, what three games could one add that would get played at least 6 hours a day and produce an audience?

See my post above.

I remember seeing a game-matcher service at one of the gamedev sims - I don't remember who made it, but it was the same who had built the giant Go boards there, and the service was being used to match people to opponents for a Go game.

Jonathan Shaftoe. Haven't heard from him in a while, but you should ask to see how far he got with that.

While not perfect, my first reaction to seeing that board was "OMG you can do this in LSL" and it let me know that even though most examples are very "script-like" that full applications could be made.

The Welecome area itself however has been a slow downward spiral, there in now a chessboard on Help Island which I feel is perfect, in fact one noob asked "hey anyone want to play chess which I dont' see happen in the in the crowded, laggy, WA anymore.

Given the length of time a chess game takes to play, and the need for people to do things like go to work and the store, and the possibility of sim crashes, perhaps it would be good for a chess game or other long duration game to be able to save the board position and recall it later. Is that something that could be done without too much problem in LSL?