State of our Union: Second Life

I wanted to post here basically a question to all those out there who are builders scripters animators texturers etc.

What is the State of our Union? Recently LL introduced sculpties and Windlight. Yes we have issues with lag and thieves and crooks...adfarms and illegalities as with any society..but on the more technical side of things..are we headed in a positive direction in the "content creation dept."?

Here's my thinking. I recently viewed a webpage for an up and coming mmorpg and was struck with comparing SLs current abilities to what this game was advertising as new and improved.
"A living, breathing world"(we have this with AI fish and butterflies and birds...flags that sway in the wind and have a doplar effect..beyond these things..most everything is controlled by the user.))

"Dynamic shadows and lights" ((The lights we have with windlight...very nice feature but how hard would it be for LL to implement shadows? I have seen some people who went to the extent of making shadows for three different times of day for LL trees and then placing a clock script in those shadow prims to change the direction that the shadow was cast. but nothing from LL?))

"Realistic day and night cycle."We have this..even though its not so special because alot of times we control it ourselves.))

"Detailed and lush enviroments"( we have this..Straylights is an awesome example but unfortunately most of their stuff is so high primd its really not prim cost effecient))

"realistic enviromental effects" ((I'd like to see more of this..maybe LL trees have built in particles or spores of leaves falling...even a random dust wind in a sand sim would be nice..some3thing a little more dynamic and less creator forced.))

"full dynamic weather systems"(Ive seen this made by residents..they don't travel but they do dump rain and snow and also add lightning effects. I'm sure a touring script of the prim that emits the cloud could be includde to make the weather system seem more random))

"Realistic water simulations" ((this is a kicker..windlight offers the wonderful reflections and water disortions but a resident had to make an AO for swimming in the LL water.Too bad that cant be incorporated into their engine))

"Flowing rivers and dynamic waterfalls"(Yea we can make them..but they're not dynamic..none that i've seen..if anyone has seen a river that acts as a push script down stream I would love to see it. LL gives estate owners the ability tpo drop or raise water level but why not in specific places?))

"Epic scale and view distance" ((Can draw distance be increased beyond 512?...would love to be able to see 5 or 6 sims in a row..and see all the builds in that distance))

"Detailed bump mapping and specular highlights" ((I've seen the specualr highlights I "think" with the glow effects in windlight))

"advanced artificial intelligence" ((Surprisingly enough..what seems would be the hardest thing is actually being done with bots and swarm scripts for nature))

"Next generation motion capture system" ((I think it would be nice for default walk animations and even some new ones like swimming and or running should be implemented))

"soft particle effects" ((I guess we have this... ..what makes a particle soft in comparison to one thats hard?))

The reason I posted this was I wanted to find out how many creators out there had the answer to this question. Whats the point?..whats the end game? Are we all creating and trying to get better just so we can sell more?..or are we ultimately trying to recreate reality..and if we are trying to recreate it..have we lost our focus?

I know creators of combat systems who would do well to team up with animators and particle creators that would make their combat systems "the best"..but they don't..they seem to be happy focusing on their corner of the universe...never intending on sharing their work or brainstorm with other people.

Same goes with builders etc. I just see our work being stolen..exported out to other platforms....and we dont seem to mind....was wondering if maybe there was an end game to SL

~Lana

Did they have anything on vehicles and scripting?

I assume a mount would be considered a vehicle..and just like in SL you're unable to ride a mount into an instance without being dismounted. SL seems to have have covered the vehicle problem..Im just wondering if LL will ever try to introduce a newer stronger engine.

~Lana

In my opinion, the end game has only ever partly been about commerce. Why would so many spend so much valuable time making items that sell for such a tiny RL amount? Only a few hundred people are making a full time living from SL, the rest of us make some extra cash that in no way compensates for the efforts that we put in. Our content creation allows others to live out their second lives however they choose. Because of craftspeople who were designing and building their own dreams, anyone who wants to be a Samurai warrior can find an avatar and accessories readymade. Anyone who wants to roleplay an elf can find likeminded individuals and gear. Whatever anyone wants in SL they can find it because someone dreamed it and created it – and if they can’t find it they can build it themselves or hire someone to build it for them. Content creation is about dreams; the fact that commerce exists just helps it along and allows content creators to own bigger sandboxes for making more dreams.

It would be nice if cars could have decent throttle control, by analogue joystick and cross a sim boundry without locking up or going through the ground.
IS IT SO HARD TO HAVE A WORLD WHERE CARS WORK?
That feels better, just spend an hour trying to lap the northern continet, spent more time filling out support tickets and abuse reports for trees in the road and sims that vehicles can't enter than driving.

I think the only way they could control better loading issues into a new server would be to simply place up a telporting screen.....loading...Ive placed double prims down..linked a set that was in one sim..and then a parallell set flipped that was in the other sim..going slow..it helps..to prevent that lag into the ground...I guess thats a problem all servers will have just like the alpha bug where the engine can't differentiate distance between two alphad objects that overlap each other.

~Lana

Unfortunately we are stuck with Havok.

When I saw the video ad for the Cry2 engine on the Entropia homepage I almost did cry! There was only one word for that engine, breathtaking, truly breathtaking.

You shoot a gun in a forest, and the trees splinter, fracture and fall as in RL. A tank crashes into a building and the building disintegrates and really does get destroyed, just as in RL. Shadows, bump-mapped flooring, et al, et al. Breathtaking.

Havok 4, uhm, well.

*sigh*

Rock

yes I wanna check that out..I think I may...just to see the engine in full swing. The game i was refferring to uses an engine called dreamscape?...dont know how good it is..but it really made me wonder why we don't see more things that are made in SL..implemented into their engine.

I think if creators knew that their skin might be good enough..their combat system might be good enough..their build might be good enough..that LL would actually hire them or buy the build or script or skin for their use.(i know LL has "contests" and will use the winners build in whatever sim they happen to be developing .... but to be honest I never hear about these "contests"..until the contest is over.)) that maybe creative content would be a little more focused.

~Lana

We do.

I produce particle effect commisions for a number of different weapons/combat systems; as well as different live performers and other build or art installations.

These are collaborative efforts of different talents contributing to a final creation, usually as a one-off project.

However, I understand your point but these things do happen and it seems to me that this is increasingly so.

One project I am currently working on has brought together 10 different builders/scripters/artists/sound techicians/video stream technicians. Most likely, now we know each other and are on each others Friend List, we will work together again at some point in the future...and this will cascade.

That's wonderful to hear. I've seen a few builders work in concert with some musician types and artists in Princeton and the like..I just rarely see it I guess.

~Lana

If they have epic draw distance do they also have the ability to ignore that which offends with object mute?

hehe well it's funny..the euro version isn't allowed to show blood...and the USA version isn't allowed to show nipples..so i guess they would have seperate servers so euros didn't see our blood and we didn't see their nipples.

~Lana

What if you had bleeding nipples????

All that stuff is great, but where does it leave the vast majority of users? Most SL users aren't running the top end rigs that can take advantage of those options. And trying to convince the wife or the hubby that the household needs to drop 2-3 grand on a new computer to play a "game" isn't going to fly.

And I see no mention in your list of user created content in your other mmorpg. User created content opens an entirely new can of worms. It is one thing to shape a world and an engine around content created by 100 creators. Would it work for 1000? 10,000? I really doubt it.

You'd become a religious icon and millions of people would celebrate your birthday even though it really isn't your birthday...........and maybe sell your undershirts on EBay.

Yeah Chris is right. A pretty world without user content is shackled right from the start. Just ask the TSO guys about that one...
Not to mention that most of these other game engines like crytek, quake, halflife, unreal, etc.. rely on PREcomputed environments to achieve those breathtaking effects. They aren't live... yes once set down in an unmoveable spot they look great when you see or interact with them, but thats all you get. You will never seen an online user dragging trees around, or buildings, or anything really because those engines only work on precompiled data. It's why they all come with offline build editors. I'd say of the ones that are true online live engines, SL is in a pretty good spot atm.. for how long though, who knows..

I agree that CryEngine, or something similar, isn't suitable for SL (in part because of the formidable hardware requirements) but the content creation argument is honestly getting weaker and weaker as SL evolves. Once, when SL was starting up, the majority of users created their own content, but now the majority don't. Many of the content markets are becoming saturated, or entrenched leaders are emerging.

Now many people will say, that's just the natural process of capitalism, but the problem is that it could lead to a dangerous point. Because if we (for example) say that people can log in to an existing fantasy RP continent (you could build your own, but it needs to be 4 sims big to attract much interest, US$8000 downpayment please), and buy the beautiful outfits and items provided there (you could create your own but they would take months of work and not look as good), and then fight other people with an excellent scripted combat system (you could create your own but again it would take months of work and no-one would use it because everyone's happy with the existing one), then that sounds like a fantastic evolved SL experience.. except that everything that makes SL into SL has been stripped out of it, so it goes into direct competition with WoW and loses.

I mean, after all, just because WoW doesn't have a build button doesn't stop anyone from building their own WoW, they just don't, because it's a huge amount of work and it would probably turn out to be a bad idea (because everyone's happy playing WoW). In other words, content creation in SL isn't just a matter of having a build button there, it's also a matter of making it be a good idea to click it.. and for more and more people it's not one.

SL, in its earliest incarnation, did have weather, and an ecology (plants and animals that interacted with each other).

The weather was dropped somewhere along the way. As I hear it, the main reason was that LL couldn't find a way to keep the rain out of the buildings.

I would definitely like to have weather, and a working ecology.

I'd like some measure of text chat soundproofing with the thickness of prims and distance.

Well, even though I've been experiencing remarkable success with my creations, I just recently announced I'm closing my store. Why? Because I spend more time with people's SL issues than I do creating. Until SL can significantly stabilize the infrastructure, I won't be selling anything directly to anyone. I'll be content to stay in the background, making others look good with my remarkable scripting and building goodness, and let them handle all the grief that SL has to offer currently.

LL is heading in the right direction with things like Sculpties and Windlight, and there are a long string of other significant changes coming down the road, such as Havok 4 and Mono. But Change brings pain and turmoil. Many are going to have to significantly rethink their approach to SL in the coming year I suspect.

Really? Was that ever part of Second Life, or was it just in the LindenWorld "alpha version" (where every avatar had an in-built grenade launcher to use for terraforming)?

The Lindenworld video was where I saw it, Yumi.

where in the world do you buy your computers??I bought top of the line and paid about 1300.00(and SL Paid for that)

Most MMORPGs in general have user creator content but its not as "hands on" as SL. I agree that SL has a lot of unique functions that we prolly will never find in any other mmorpg.

When i first came to SL the grass trees..suns..water...lights..were all the same as roughly 3 months ago..in what 5 years?I've seen user content creation improve dramatically but not the sand box we create in called "SL".

~Lana

You can see several sims distant.

Set RenderFarClip to 2048, I think it is. And tell everyone to brace themselves...

...ever tp into an area and then turn your avatar into a black-hole vortex of asset-server hell?

Hold onto a tree or something when anyone with RenderFarClip set like that ports in. Eeeeverything for several sims around streeeeeeeaaaams into them... they suck down it all, and their client slooowly renders it all...

...it's really pretty tho, for panorama shots.

Caledon was the place I was thinking of with that feature..where it would really count anyways...I bet thats nice when using fraps for a movie..if the lag isn't too bad

~Lana