Are you an explorer ?

How many of you still bother to fly around SL ? I don't mean 10 minutes here and there, I mean seriously fly and explore for hours maybe.

I make a point of doing it at least once a month, sometimes I will spend an entire evening island hopping or traversing the main grid.

Leaving aside my own rather depressed feelings about the state of SL at the moment, I'd really like to know if people actually bother to look around the world and if so what your impressions are.

Obviously most newcomers do this and I'd love to know what you all think, but I'd really like to hear opinions and stories from older "players" too.

I use to fly around and explore when i was new to sl. Then i started using a hover thingie Max Case passed to me. And i explored more. and more. Lately, after finding out about the Tako from Osprey Therian, I have been sailing my way round SL.

So yes Laukosargas, I explore too. I think it is one of my fav ways to pass time in SL.


florenze "serendipity" Kerensky

I try to emerge from my hermitage on Chaos at least once a month to explore. Sometimes it some place I've read about on the forums. Sometimes it's random.

It's been harder since 1.7 because of mainland performance issues AND not being able to pull down regions on the map. I was working my way through the alphabet....now it's hit or miss.

I would love to see a thread where the only thing (and I mean ONLY) were posts with pictures and commentary from people's exploration. I've thought about starting one myself but figured it would quickly devolve.

I still go for a wander for an hour or two to see what new stuff I can find... but then I'm still pretty new! I tend to go to places that Snapzilla users have picked out but often just click around the grid for interesting looking places. I've only just scratched the surface when it comes to private islands.

I used to explore. I have a few hot air balloons I used to float tound in. But these days, it seems that every few minutes, I'm unseated and ejected or teleported home because of someone's precious security scanner... The only way to fly now is over 1200m... and you can't see from up there so it's pointless.

I like Surreal's idea though... but maybe not so much a thread as a travel blog...

Check this out http://www.sluniverse.com/pics/Albums.aspx?Name=Shack%20Dougall

florenze "serendipity" kerensky

Yes I pop around randomly and walk and walk and walk, espcially when I encounter extensive builds like yours or cohesively themed builds that give me a chance to walk around and rate several people. The ratings are for being mature enough to work together as much as being able to build something nice in the first place.

I've done a lot more of this on estates than the mainland over the past year, but am looking forward to being able to do it on the mainland with p2p. The new map is really awesome in helping me find places that seem interestingly different.

I used to explore.

There's no point nowadays because it takes 10 minutes for things to rez.

Yeah, the new map definitely helps. Being self-absorbed, sometimes I scan the map for large circles to find things made with a tool of mine. I'm looking forward to exploring more once P2P is in place. One thing that I would find helpful would be a description of the islands, especially if it were integrated into the map so it showed up when you clicked on one. There's a whole lot of islands. So I explore occasionally, but hope to explore more.

I doubt anyone would remember, but when I started in SL my first big project was a "tour guide". It had a map of SL with each sim as a prim. When you clicked on a sim, a bank of screens would show pics of cool places I'd found, and if you clicked on an image it would display a note about the place and who owned it. That was when there were only a few dozen sims, and I would actually just fly around occasionally scouting out new things. A wee bit different from today!

I've driven just about every road in SL on my Ducati and Dominus Shadow. Out of all the kinds of traveling driving is my personal favorite. Just wish LL would fix the issues with vehicles and sim boarders. I have flown around in vehicles, but I miss too much having to fly above 300m to avoid colliding with rez'ing buildings.

Unfortunately all the good builds are far and few in between because I find more shops and prefab homes in my travels then anything else. Lets face it, there's nothing interesting about a "maximum profit" mall and the one right next to it. Granted some stores seem interesting as a few cought my interest, but nothing else. Just store after store after store. I think I've seen maybe 2 builds during my travels that weren't homes, shops, or stores.

One was a cartoony rocketship launch pad complete with big red cartoony ship. The other was some kind of hobo camp near a river with a colapsed bridge. The "bum town" was my favorite but I forgot to landmark it. The place was empty when I got there and the sun was setting at the time. It felt like a scene from Half Life 2. I was tempted to pull out a gun out of fear of being attacked by zombies and head crabs. I loved it! XD

Wish there were more builds like these though, less profit and more fun.

I'm really looking forward to the combination of P2p with the new map.

Vehicles (with the exception of boats) have never really been my thing in SL, I find them too clumsy on the whole but I know many people love them and I know LL are putting more effort into making them work properly. I like to fly and get down to have a good nose around.

I've found I have to move much much slower these days, things are definately taking much longer to rez. And I hate the new default textures too ! Makes me feel like I'm in a wire frame cage.

Cadroe, I don't remember your tour guide but a few months ago I stumbled across your amazing Cartifex project, is that ongoing ?

And as for Shack , well he's already a legend in his own living room

i try to take periodic explorations of big sweeps of the mainland. I think I'll do more with P2P, because hubs annoyed the hell out me.

snapzilla's album feature makes for nice travel logs... i need to use that feature more.

Laukosargas - I retired Cartifex and later started a new mapping project. The main result was an offline 2d map app called Grid Chart. I've been working on a new generation of map software but I don't really know how far I'll go with it. If nothing else I would like to make a database of sim data available to everyone, probably as a web service, but we'll see. Since I do this stuff for personal entertainment, I'm very unreliable! But it's encouraging to see so many other people doing related things, like ROAM, Landmarker, etc.

I second this as the reason I don't explore much anymore. I used to explore by flying and looking at things as I passed them but now nothing rezzes until you stop for 2-3 minutes at a time which makes it extremely difficult to enjoy.

I did it more before.. The kick away and fences of al kinds made/make me sad..

Rather than randomly roam, I randomly roam people. Look at person's picks, see what they have found interesting, teleport there, see what that creators has found interesting and keep following the chain.

I still spend a ton of time wandering around and checking stuff out. Sometimes walk, sometimes in one of any number of different vehicles, snapping pics all along the way.

Usually it's super late and nobody is around.

It is disappointing to see all the red bars and the security systmes, but you can manage to explore anyway. Interestingly (or not ), just this Friday, I was wandering about and was in a residential sim where ALL the plots were no access. I was astounded and was just wandering around on the road, shaking my wee avie head at the absurdity. A talk with a resident that was hanging about revealed that they have had a rash of griefing lately, love visitors, and were as sad about the situation as I was. Had a nice little chat.

Moral: Book. Cover. Etc.

Keep on exploring!

i try to make it a point to spend at least 2 hours a week in soe sort of wanderings to places i have never been!, i bout a great beat up looking Pontoon boat (have always wanted one RL) and i am floating my way across SL .
it is wonderful to see the builds and the visions people have here. i know that i was gettin jaded and wrapped up in my own lil drama's and not stopping to smell the pixels, but i was lucky enough to have gotten a wake up call and reminder that SL is still a magical place if you let it be, and yanno..after a year here, i am still in absolute awe of the talents and artistry that i find

I love to explore, and try to do it at least once every two weeks. Sometimes I'll just check out stuff from people's picks or places mentioned in the forums, and then explore the neighborhood - sometimes I make a game out of it and set myself a challenge like going by foot from A to B or explore the north continent by Tako and then reach ANWR. The latest challenge is to go once along the perimeter of the old continent, by foot - but I haven't gotten very far on this one yet

I stopped exploring pretty early on due to running into security things (which sometimes sent me home).

Then that - at least the send-home part - seemed to get better.

Now, though, it's no fun because it takes so long for anything to rez to see it. And when things are rezzing in pieces, for no evident reason - a bit here, a bit there, the other part not till minutes later - it is very disconcerting.

coco

Chage McCoy's new Mehve is much more controllable, and yo can fly slow enough to avoid running into rezzing buildings... and the contrails are really cool.

It's been a lot more fun doing this on the preview grid where there's less lag.

I saw what looked like the rocketship from Destination Moon (Adventures of Tintin) on a platform on a huge Anime airfield one time.

Yes.

I'm not sure I've ever seen such a short post that says so much !

I like this idea

I do that too! Curiosity is really useful sometimes