Virtual World

For my virtual world, I chose Second Life. After watching an episode of The Office where Dwight created a Second Second Life, I thought the game might be worth checking out. When you start Second Life, you can customize what your avatar looks like right away, along with a semi-custom name. Unfortunately, there is not much to choose from when you start, there is a list of last names to choose from, I picked the most brutal one I could find: Hammerer. (Erek Hammerer sounds pretty brutal, huh?) I spent a good deal of time trying to make mine look similar to me with terrible results. After getting acquainted with the controls and some other people, you can leave the starting island.
Once you land anywhere within Second Life, you immediately notice the mass amount of information within the game when it takes a few seconds to load your surroundings. Once you come to terms with your surroundings, there is quite a similarity between real life and Second Life. Just like real life, the economy runs everything and the Linden Dollar is king. Although, this may seem annoying to anyone on a budget (especially me, why else would I play a game that requires a $0 startup cost?) there are many things for free within the world of Second Life, you just have to know where to look! I found jeans, Nike Air’s and a Limbonic Art (Norwegian Black Metal band) tee shirt. I even managed to find a Diamond chain that sparkles so much, it almost blinding. There are free Pope Rings, Lord of the Ring rings, and various other pimp rings, even a blinged out pimp cane!
Controlling this madness is the same as any other game, WASD are directional keys and the mouse allows you to look around, the Home key activates flying and End deactivates flying. Communicating with others can be typed out with instant messaging, or use a headset and talk. I only used instant messaging because I did not care to have these other people hear my voice. Second Life has its own version of Ventrilo, however, it works like a real voice would in the sense that the further away you get from the avatar speaking, the less clear it gets.
This game is pretty easy for beginners, but I do not see the appeal for many players. Sure, there are there are X-rated areas, but even in virtual reality it seems disturbing. Aside from playing here and there to mess around and see what kinds of antics you can get away with and hear reactions from other players, there is not much to do without spending money. By using a credit card, you can purchase land and build a house using Second Life modeling software which would allow others to come in and have a virtual party. Some users like to make their houses open to the public and you can walk right into their kitchen. The most disappointing fact of the game is that there are no health meters and no way to die. To test this out, I had my avatar fly up as high as he could and disabled flying. While in is free-fall towards a real-life death, he starts flailing to make it a bit more believable. When he hits the ground, there are no repercussions, not even a bounce; he simply stands up waiting to do something. After about an hour and a half, I had seen enough in the Second Life world and got back into my real life. I will have to get back into this world eventually and see what kind of trouble I can start for free.