Why SL For Corporate 3D microworlds?

What is the benefit in using a system designed for an open ended, user creatable VR like SL for a closed, limited duration, no building or scripting allowed, narrowly focused application like Wells Fargo did with Stagecoach Island?

Wouldn't a conventional "download the whole professionally designed world's set of data" approach offer better performance for such an an application than one that uses streaming data in order to allow user performed changes to the virtual environment?

This provided them with a very rapid prototype.
It's also incredibly extensible.

Also, you can hire excellent developers, builders and artists for Lindens (cf. peanuts).

Muney

Shh!! LL needs the money...

It's a lot cheaper to generate good press and pay "amateurs" peanuts than it is to hire an extensive development team (up to 100 people) to build an application (with limited uses) from scratch.

I bet with all expenses said and told, they're spending less than $150,000 on this project. An application from the ground up would cost at least $1 million.

LF

Who said anything about building anything from scratch?

I believe there are other 3D engines that handle the basic task of presenting a 3D world, with the details of building and terrain design extremely customizable, am I wrong about that?

Yes, something like Sauerbraten. It's always fun to 'accidentally' frag a co-worker.

But you still have to scrounge for, hire, organize, and pay extravagent sums of money to "professionals" to do it.

Whereas in SL they can wave piles of relatively small amounts of money at us and we chomp at the bit.

LF

I actually think the "hire for peanuts" theory doesn't hold water. I do professional consulting in SL and charge normal prices. Business realize you get what you pay for. Do you think Wells Fargo really needs to save a couple thousand bucks by hiring amatuers? However my 3 man team can do things a lot quicker in SL than we can using say the HL2 or Unreal engines. The overall cost tends to be cheaper because we don't spend tons of time in 3DS or Maya making intricite models. Also the fact that we can do it as a 3 man tends to bring down the overall cost of the project.

One of the big reasons for using SL as a platform is it's inherently social nature. If your games require people to interact, talk, play simple games then it is a no brainer platform. Not to mention you don't have to manage any server code.

I can sorta see that Sue, but I can also see SL being much cheaper no matter how I float the numbers around.

Like if it was done in unity or torque... there is not a "city designer" for those that can work cheap.

But the way it was set up didn't exactly take advantage of all SL could do. And yet strangely the way they didn't bother to shut down or clean up stuff. *shrug

But the idea of SL becoming a "browser" for worlds written in a common way might be a serious seed for the growth of a Metaverse.

Seems like I read today that there are user mods for games that have been very successful, with the CounterStrike version of Half-Life being an example. Might something like that work for a corporate Virtual Park?

A company like Wells Fargo has plenty of money to throw around and aren't afraid to spend it to get the best possible solution.

Lots of games have Mod Communities now, even GTA. However SL has a more serious feel than the rest of them. Also it tends to be difficult to create new game types or things unimagined by the HL developers.

If your corporate Virtual Park was all about grabbing a gun and blowing stuff up, then yea, Mod'ing an FPS is the way to go. I'd like to see someone build a mini-economy Mod in HL2.

A company as big as Wells Fargo didn't get big by "throwing money around". They find the best cost-effective solution, and run with it.

See: SL.

LF

A company like Wells Fargo doesn't become a company like Wells Fargo by throwing money around when they don't have to.

It would, but it would be unwieldly. Load up the map editor. Make some polygons. Compile. Test. Write some code. Debug. Crash. Close map editor. Open up debugger. Fiddle. Open up game. Test. Goto beginning.

Plus, SL allows instant collaboration; Developing in other dev kits requires everyone working alone, and then combining it at the end.

Unless you hire a studio to do it, in which case it's more expensive than just doing it in SL...

LF

I love crunchy tacos.

~Ulrika~

I agree with all this. However SL isn't a one size fit all solution. If your project inherently requires a good frame rate and advanced physics, there are other ways to go. But for a corporate park or some other virtual world... well SL is actually a really nice virtual world.

I find it interesting that they didn't use the "There.com" platform. (www.forterrainc.com)
That's all they do now. They sold the virtual world part and are just focusing on the platform. I'm certainly glad they used SL, though. It came out great.

The fact that "There" didn't spring to my mind as an alternative may say something about my memory but it may also have something to do with There just not impressing me at all favorably.

What other choices would there be? There's the old active worlds type, Croquet for starters.

I've never even seen Half-Life or CounterStrike, and have no idea of what degree of user customizaton is possible in game engines like such games use.

there's a French web site that might be of interest. I don't speak French so it's hard for me to judge.

http://www.i-maginer.fr/

the screen shots look ok.

Banks are cheap, anyone who has ever worked at one knows...

I played with Dark Basic for a little while - minutes - and it looked real interesting a like it might be fun for some people but it crashed so much it wasn't worth pursuing. That was a good while back, I think they improved the interface some.

I didn't fiddle with it enough to see if it had in-application building tools at all.

That website mentioned above does look interesting but I don't speak French either.

I would really like to see a program like Turbo-Cad, for example, a full featured 3D design program, add chat and physics and avatars to the normal sort of CAD base.

Are there any advertising 3D multi user worlds on business sites? I've seen 3D viewers for high resolution images that will let you look at a product from all angles. But I don't remember any 3D cartoon looking multiple user places like Second Life.

If there aren't any, maybe that means that a flexible system like Second Life is going to be too difficult for the idle passerby to bother making use of?

What is the target market for the Wells Fargo thing anyway, I saw "young adult" mentined somewhere but is it getting pitched in schools for 18 year olds or in schools for college students or is it something offered to anyone who looks at the Wells Fargo web site?

Off topic, I seem to remember seeing that "Loomis Fargo" had replaced "Wells Fargo" or something like that.

Don't forget that LL also probably hosted the grid. In a single controllable place.

SL is a "thin" client so that little is sitting on your computer so that changes are easily made for all users simultaneously *COUGH*ATM