Competition?

Not sure. It might be for LL's developer contracts, but I doubt for SL in general.

It's too soon to tell.

RUR RUR RUR, this is why I like Bartle:



I'm curious to check this out, but admittedly, just about every time one of these articles come out, they tend to make bold, pronounced statements while being kinda vague at the same time. Kinda like giving someone a hardcover dust jacket and saying "read the book"!

Second Life has come to accumulate so much Resident-created content over the last few years. That's a wealth in time that can't be bought by dollars alone, as much as some will try in vain.

I think it's not ready for primetime, so to speak. I just signed up for early developer status, just to see if I can get a kit. I haven't even gotten a response yet (likely because I'm a hobbyist developer, I guess). Their test MMOG isn't even up yet, and I'm not sure whenever they'll open their beta. It seems too soon to be releasing press releases, IMO, but I guess that's what they learned in the dotcom boom.

Kewl to hear... I wonder how it will go. I don't see anything about their test MMOG yet that's unique or compelling to me (i.e. offers a culture of its own) but it's going to have time to grow.

A similar approach is happening here:

http://www.kaneva.com/create/create.kaneva

Just make sure you comeback!!!

Its not as accessible as Second Life, but still quite interesting. The nice thing about Second Life is that it doesn't come with a manual. That's because its so damn user friendly that it doesn't really need one.

Makes you realise how far ahead of the pack SecondLife is.

Signed me-self up for a dev account early today just to take a peak. One advantage SL has over other mmog "game engines" is you don't have to be a professional developer, designer to make compelling stuff in SL.

Here's another interesting tidbit illustrating another possible approach with similarities to some of Second Life's features.

Yeah, I had a look at it earlier.

It just looks like they're giving away netcode that may or may not work well. I'll believe the "free MMOG to dissect and mod" when I see it.


Personally, if I wanted to put all of that together I'd still use Torque as the foundation, but it's nice to know someone else is trying.

Can't get that image out of my head, for some reason.

Yeah, this point rings true a lot.

So if we can upload meshes and more advanced scripting and things to this other place, does that make SL the user-friendly but dumbed down metaverse? Don't get me wrong, I love SL and pay a silly amount of tier too...

Well, depends on how static the content is.

Personally, llRezObject is anything but dumbed down.

I think some of the stuff people do in SL is far from dumbed down.

I think a better way to look at it is, in multi-verse there will be dozens of content creators... in SL there are thousands.

Yea the scripting and modelling of multi-verse may allow for more complex interactions, but it certainly will lose the rapid prototyping. Also you won't find ad-hoc groups of people to work with, you'll have to find your team before development begins.

In the Multiverse, you own the world.

In Second Life, the world owns you.

competition?

it could certainly be -- but the website looks like crap and the press release came before the beta.

Prospect?

You know the clichee. If it's too good to be true?

Yeah.

While SL is cool and games can be developed for it -- it's turning out to be more of a social platform. It would be neat to see something like "the Multiverse" (or another iteration of it later on if this one flops -- like it probably will) take up the space for indie games developers and their fans to have a REAL platform for developing games on.

Merh... I edited this post just thanks to the initial "that would be so cool if..." wearing off.

In reality, my second-first-impression is simply, "Meh."

Hmmm. Build Your Own MMORPG... It's not SecondLife, but something you can really sink teeth into. I personally wouldn't mind something akin to the Nights Dawn Trilogy (Minus the final book, of course).

But alas, all we have is text and tiny screenshots at best. It would still require a dev team, and funding, etc, etc. If anyone has about US$20k that can front me, I'll get started on something. Depends on if they have good vehicle Physics.

I used to really be into "game construction kits". One of these was Adventure Construction Set from Electronic Arts, and another was Shoot 'Em-Up Construction Kit from Access. At times, I'd use Virtus VR to make a house of sorts, or Spectre VR to design my own tank battlefield (I made one boss who was an insane spinner, rocketing off splinters of weaponry at every conceivable angle). Spectre VR also has the distinction of being an early title that allowed QuickTime displayed in a 3D way. I don't think it was quite true 3D, but when I see movies on parcels now, I'm reminded of it.

All in all, as great as they could be, they felt lonely.

Part of what has appeals to me so much about Second Life is, if I'm having an experience, I can share that with others, and we can both react to it and become emotional. That's powerful, and to me, it's transcendental.

Gah. I remember Spectre VR, was the roxxor.

I keep seeing this allegation. Someone please point me to these amazing websites that shine like holy radiance that you folks are using for comparison...

I don't see anything wrong with their site. Now, the Kaneva site pissed me right the hell off with its "come back when you have javascript turned on" thing.

"How about I come back when you get over the "This site requires ___" 1995 mindset, hmm?"

I like javascript. Javax anyone?


Anyways, I wonder when the impeach bush signs will move in.

If you're a devotee of big online games like "World of Warcraft," there's a good chance you've wished you could easily move from one title to another without having to load an entirely different piece of software each time.

Needless to say, at least for now, such fluid border-crossing is impossible with anything outside of the Sony Online game universe (which includes "Star Wars Galaxies" and "EverQuest".

I disagree - what could be more fluid than stepping over a sim boundary? Themed sims in SL provide exactly this experience -and many more will develop as SL progresses. With Multiverse you seem to be limited to developing enclosed games - with all of their linear content - and although you can move between them the lines sound very definite (I could be wrong on this as I - like everyone else - have yet to see the Development Kit). If it's a fluidic transition between experiences you're after SL still sounds like it wins hands down - at least for the foreseeable future.

Has anyone made SLego yet?

http://www.blockland.us/