Blue Mars beta

I'm a content creator for BM, and I'm not professional.

Rock

Yay, I was also accepted into their early independent developer program.......

Wondering why any one would move over to BM, other than developers? From the recent youtube actual inworld vids, BM is pretty to look at, but to achieve that look, the developers have compromised [limited] user interaction.

For example:
The end-user gets as a starting point a room which has visual LMs used to tp to a pre-determined location.
Walking to a destination is by point and click. [no one was flying]
End-users must be happy with what is created by approved developers.

Others nit picks:

Objects still pass through each other.
Textures disappear when camming around.
Buildings are equal to SL, though I am sure the quality of builds will improve over time.

But to maintain its superior graphics quality, which by the way are equaled by Havok, user interaction will remain restricted.

You can have SL with lots of user interaction and compromised graphics, or play in BM with better use of the graphics engine but restricted play options.

This will not change until everyone has super-duper computer/graphics card.

As a friend said, some people are happy in that controlled environment as it affords predictability.

For me, I'll stay with SL to enjoy freedom of movement, the ability of anyone to build, and the unpredictability.

As a BM developer i have to say:

Wrong in all points.

And when did Havok do graphic stuff? I thought it was a physics engine...

You have no idea what BM can do. The possibilities turn SL on its head.

And this is coming from the person that started off not-very-pro-Blue Mars.

SL is great. But BM can go way beyond it. There are limits, and oddities and things that will never be like SL, and because of that, BM will not get many SL residents. But i can assure you that there are a few communities that will go orgasmic when their SL community branches out into Blue Mars, a world where you can put the equivalent if 137 SL sims into 1 Blue Mars region.

Each virtual world will have different aspects of virtual life to offer their residents and after Blue Mars goes live...People will make their choice. I do not think SL will die because of it, but i do think SL will get fewer residents as some people will choose BM to live their virtual life in.

Haven't you heard? Unpredictabilty is being legislated out of SL.

Can I be a ferret in Blue Mars?

Nah, it is just being pushed in to the viewer instead

Well, I certainly have been put in my place. Any particular reason for the attitude that dismisses everything I said?

Setting aside my obvious lack of knowledge about graphics engines, the problem then, that I am wrong on all points, is that my opinions are based on the youtube videos and the BM website.

Avatar starts in a room with graphical landmarks.
Point and click walking.
Textures disappear during camming.
Objects bleed through other objects.
No flying.
Additionally, and correct me if I'm wrong again, building is limited to approved developers.

I never slammed its pretty graphics.

And, user interaction will be compromised to effect the better graphics, and that will not change until everyone has the super computer that can handle the demands of both intensive user interactions and graphics - unless the graphics processing power is off loaded onto the BM servers. Is it?

So, again, what is the appeal of BM for the every day user? So far, the posts here just sound like BM has a lot of wow factor [nice], is great for developers, but rather hollow for the rest of us.

Do I want to know what they're gonna charge for that?

I suppose I'll come out of the closet and admit I've the SDK and am making assets for Blue Mars. I was invited in, so I can't really give any advice on how to become a designated developer. I will say I'm not precisely a RL professional, as I'm still in school studying 3D design. So, the bar is not insurmountable in terms of what skill level is required.

Yes, one of the draws of SL for me was the "anyone can build" ethos. In fact, it still is. But Blue Mars seems to be aiming for a middle ground between that ethos and that of most other games in which only company employees will do asset creation. I think the results will be interesting--remember that a lot of SL lag issues have to do with poorly designed assets (shoddy scripting, overuse of large textures, etc). Meshes are direct import, and don't rely up artificialities such as prim count. Just playing around with horses, I can actually make more realistic ponies than I can in SL-- with lower polygon counts (I'm working on a few other projects, but forgive me for keeping mum about them )

I'll try to answer some of Paracelsus' questions, but please don't take me as the final word on this. I've just had access to the Beta version and the SDK, I'm certain in the end things will be different in some ways, but I've no idea how



There is an opening "page" in which the player can decide which city to visit. One clicks on that and it takes you to a designated "spawning point". Think the old hub system in SL. Teleporting is possible within a city (one example had phone booths for that).



Or using the arrow keys. I found it nice to click on a distant landmark of interest. My avatar would walk towards it, then I could cam around while on "auto walk".


Haven't seen this, although like in SL, when you walk into a new area (such as a room), the textures can take a few seconds to appear. Unlike SL, you do not see mile after mile of grey buildings half rezzed in the distance. This may have to do with the planned aspect of things.


Never seen this.


Well, the vehicles work much better. This seems to be a deliberate decision to encourage people to actually walk about and explore the environment. I understand that there was some talk of being able to cam to a new spot, then teleport to where the camera is. I like that idea-- it has the advantage of SL flying without all those floating people.



You're correct. But you don't have to be a professional to be one.




Well, you won't be able to run it on a five year old Best Buy laptop. But there are desktops in the 600-800 range that can run BM fairly well. To a certain extent (MY opinion, nothing they've said), the idea is that Blue Mars will be for the typical gamer today, and the everyman in another year or so. I think that's a better idea than making a product that will be obsolete by the time it becomes popular.



Beyond the wow factor, I think that it offers a great place for city owners to really be able to explore their visions. Bottom line, the tools are better for that. And it will be up to them to make that vision one that others will want to visit and perhaps call "home". That's going to require work and imagination. And you're right, no amount of shiny can replace that.

But I'm really looking forward to seeing what happens!

"Avatar starts in a room with graphical landmarks."
True, but for the beta only. It was just the quick way of getting people to the three types of city. A beach city, a beautiful landscape type city, and a game. That will not be the way that avatars will get about once the world goes live.

"Point and click walking."
True, but also first-person (mouselook) walking, and running.

"Textures disappear during camming."
True, bug reports have been filed. Not present in Crysis, so should be fixed.

"Objects bleed through other objects."
True, bug reports have been filed. Not present in Crysis, so should be fixed.

"No flying."
Partially true. I am developing a city, where people can fly. It is up to the developer. You can fly in less than 1% of SL.

"Additionally, and correct me if I'm wrong again, building is limited to approved developers."
Partially true. It is limited to approved developers during the beta (but there are lots of amateurs approved, myself included). Once live, city owners, and their tenants can build and upload their builds.

AR are also asking developers for ideas to improve the experience of BM (as well as bug reports), so what you will eventually get may be very different to the Youtube videos, which to be fair, have been taken during the first week of a beta test. I wonder what SL was like during its first week of beta, and LL charged people for that, US$200 or US300 I think it was.

Rock

Say *what*?

When I find a place that has flying turned off, it's always a surprise. Flying is turned off for such a vanishingly small percentage of SL that the rare place where it IS turned off and you have to walk a few meters to an adjacent parcel to take off (let alone override the parcel parameters) are definitely the exception. Have you been exploring some alternate SL where everything's turned on its head?

However, it is possible to be rejected.

Do you know that Yumi? I was told by a BM staff member that as far as he knew everyone who applied during the application window either has or will be accepted.

Rock

You may be forgetting how high the Z-axis goes (see other thread on the maximum height in SL), and the maximum height for unaided flying. If you do the sums it is way below 0.01%.

Wear a flight feather or some other flying aid, and you can fly up almost with no limit, but the same is true in BM.

Rock

They require you to be a "qualified developer".

I don't think they ever defined 'qualified'. No-one was asked for any portfolio. I have never made a thing in any 3D program (other than SL) before, and I told them that, and was accepted. I don't think you will find one person who applied and was rejected.

Rock

*nods* But there are quite a few SLers I've spoken to who were effectively rejected, because they decided not to apply due to the use of the word "qualified" on the requirements. Saying that you will require qualifications and then not actually doing so is decidedly misleading IMHO.

Even if I were going to accept whatever rationale you have for counting by volume rather than area... anyone can override the flight limits in SL at least four different ways, AND...
...anyone can create a flight feather in Second Life without having to have approval from the city manager or Linden Labs, or paying anyone any money.

I suspect that the number of people who can work out how to create a flight feather from scratch, without being told something about how by somebody else, is relatively low. And in that case "being told how" becomes analogous to "approval".

I did it, and then I made sure that anyone else could do it as well. I couldn't do that in Blue Mars.

That means that until you gave your approval, others could not. (And by the way, I don't know how to make one - although I've never needed to - so your making sure attempt failed. )

Fact of the matter, I am not a builder but do enjoy puttering. Also, for me, one of the great joys of SL is to employ and meet builders whose wonderful personalities match their talents.

Seems as though the BM avatars were more realistic in appearance and movements. Did not see any animals. Your ponies alone may be the reason to visit BM.

What was shown in the video was this page, what I referred to as a room. What happens when there are thousands of cities to visit? Is there an alternate way of locating a city you'd like to visit? The visual landmark is a neat idea, btw.

OK, that helps explain movement in more depth. Click and point works for some games, but it seemed very limiting in an interactive virtual world.

As mentioned, this is from youtube videos. Honestly, the posting date was of June this year, but the actual video may have been shot in earlier interations of BM and these graphical artifacts may not exist in the current version.

Vehcles work better? Sim boundaries not being such a barrier? Hmm, you may be winning me over.

Quite so, and there is always a balancing act for developers between what is feasible and the reality of the consumer market.

Thank you for the constructive insights, as these have been helpful in better understanding BM beyound the hype. I will visit, and expect to find some wondrous horses to ride.

People do not fly in 2 dimensions, they fly in 3 dimensions, in a volume, what is hard to accept about that? You are not going to redefine 'flight' now are you? You cannot fly in 2D, in an area. Flight is when you lift off from the ground, ie up, aloft, in the air, above the ground, in the height axis, in the Z-axis (SL). Unless you want to define flight as running on the ground.



Same in BM. Come in, I'll give you one.

Rock

Aw, you're sweet

Suppose I'd best get back to working on the rigging for the little beasties then.....