Posts Tagged "Virtual World"

So you would like to join Second Life and see what all the fuss is about. It is actually free and easy to join. I will explain here exactly how to join step by step, just follow these simple instructions and you will be on your way to an amazing virtual world.

First you will need to meet these requirements in order to play Second Life. The current minimum requirements are a high speed internet connection such as DSL or Cable.

For Windows systems you need 2000, XP, or Vista, a processor at least 800 MHz Pentium III or Athlon, or better, 512 MB or more memory, an NVIDIA GeForce 2, GeForce 4 MX or better OR ATI Radeon 8500, 9250 or better OR Intel 945 chipset graphics card, and the latest drivers.

For Mac systems you will need Mac OS X 10.4.11 or better, 1 GHz G4 or better processor, 512 MB or more memory, ATI Radeon 9200 and above OR ATI Radeon X Series OR NVIDIA GeForce 2, GeForce 4 OR NVIDIA GeForce 5000 Series and above graphics card.

For Linux a reasonably modern 32-bit Linux environment is required. If you are running a 64-bit Linux distribution then you will need its 32-bit compatibility environment installed, 800 MHz Pentium III or Athlon, or better processor, 512MB or more memory, and an NVIDIA GeForce 2, GeForce 4 MX, or better OR ATI Radeon 8500, 9250, or better graphics card.

Next go to the official Second Life website and click on the Join link. You will be presented with an option of areas to start in. Read through them and choose which one you prefer. Many of these areas have free items set up as gifts for new players. You will also find tutorials to help you learn how Second Life works when you are able to log in.

When creating your account you will be presented with your choice of first names and pre-set last names. Make your name good, this is how you will be known in Second Life. You will also provide your email address. This should be a valid email address that you have access to, not a fake one. Remember to save or write your name and password down so you do not forget them, but do not ever share them with anyone! Not even with someone claiming to work with Second Life, they do not need passwords!

Next simply download and install Second Life to your computer. The installation should prompt you as needed. Once Second Life is downloaded and installed you will see an icon of a hand on your desktop this is how you log in. Double-click on it to load SL.

Then enter your avatar’s first name and the last name you choose when signing up, your password which is case sensitive, and hit connect. You can also save your password by checking the “Remember Password” box. You may not want to save your password if your in an office, or if your children or other family members access your computer.

So that is all there is to it! Enjoy your Second Life and remember that there are so many possibilities in such an open and sculptable world.

Tips & Warnings
Remember to save or write your name and password down.
Check computer requirements are met before downloading.
Never share your account information!
Do not check “Remember Password” if your computer is used by others.
Use a valid email when signing up for an account

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Second Life is the brain child of Philip Rosedale, CEO of Linden Labs out of San Francisco, CA, USA and it is a virtual world where all that you see is all made by the Residents, what the “gamers” are called, but is it a “game?”

That is what we are going to explore in this article. Is Second Life a game? If so, then why does it reflect First Life or Real World so much? But before we can decide if Second Life is a “game” the question begs to be answered, “What is Second Life?”

Most people who are on the Internet now days have been exposed to chat rooms. Either because you have children who are in chat rooms, or you have chatted in chat rooms yourself, or perhaps both. The best description that I have for Second Life is that it is a giant, 3d chat room, on steroids and kicked up a notch by having avatars that walk, run, make love, laugh, cry, play jokes, dance, fly, explore, build, script, and hug. There are the pre-requisite chat boxes both open chat and private instant message boxes where your can either talk to one person, a small group, or and large group of people in Second Life.

Daddy Linden (what I call Philip Rosendale) does not build anything in Second Life; everything you see from a small flower to a giant skyscraper is built by a Second Life Resident. The only exception to this is Basic Help and Orientation Islands where an avatar or avies are born and go to learn how to interact with their new world.

A new avie or newbie as Residents call the newer created avatars are born on Help Island fully grown, you need to learn to dress yourself, fix your hair, choose what you will look like, learn to walk, run, fly, navigate with your camera controls, walk up and down steps, take pictures, collect free stuff, and teleport to Orientation Island.

Orientation Island was a fantastic experience for me, I collected all the free stuff I could, met three fantastic friends, and learned the basics of building and at last a friend and I decided it was time to venture to the mainland. We found a “helper” and she took us to many places we since named, things like the Ninth Depth of Hell, That Weird Place, and finally landed on Svarga. A peaceful and not so densely populated place as the places we had gone previously.

From there, a friend who had gone to the mainland a week or so before me teleported me to my first **** resort, that was not so overwhelming and then I went on a two week-Real Life vacation. Upon my return I found myself with friends at the Edge and its surrounding shops trying to decide if anything was worth purchasing with our meager funds from Daddy Linden’s weekly allowance (and you only have this if you are a premium account holder). Some of the newbie purchases that I made I still have but I shake my head.

Since we didn’t own land we couldn’t drop our purchases anywhere but at sandboxes, all public sandboxes are overwhelming as anyone with a yen to script or build can go there and most do not pick up after themselves so you have animated and scripted things chasing you all over the place.

So far it looks like a game, smells like a game, and even talks like a game and most people are going how do you play this game? What are its rules?

I had an epiphany when my friend and I rented our first home together; this wasn’t a “game” where there were preset rules, or even a preset destination. This was a world where you could make up your own rules, live life by your terms, and do anything you could in First Life and stuff you wouldn’t dare in First Life.

You can meet vampires, drows, elves, furries, cartoons, and demons and I have probably missed a good bit of “other” worldly characters. So having this stuff in Second Life must make it a game, right?

There are cities and communities called sims on these sims you can shop, build, rent, sell, dance, and spend our local currency Linden Dollars on just about anything you can imagine and build.

For the “gamer” there are sims where you can go role-play and “game” within someone else’s rules and regulations, on these sims, you can die, kill and be killed and if you die you are teleported back to your home landmark.

Throughout the summer I met wonderful people, who enjoy the same things I do in Real Life, I became involved with lovely people whose avies interacted with mine. I lived and breathed Second Life and abruptly it no longer was a “game” to me, my emotions were involved with the people I interacted with, falling in love, being hurt in love, and eventually becoming an independent spirit, and discovering really who Atlantis Jewell is in Second Life.

It has been a fantastic journey, one I am intending to continue and to see where I end up. Is Second Life a game? To some it is, to me its a new way of life, I can buy, sell, build, interact with friends from all over the world, making new friendships, exchanging ideas, consoling each other on Second Life’s highs and lows, we love, fight and stand together a new community, new possibilities, where dreams do come true.

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