Building Trees?!?

I have mentioned this a thousand times now, however I will mention it again to save people from having to rummage around in my Blog. I play this game called Second Life and in the game I run a store. Now, I used to run a fashion store, where I would design clothes for men and women to wear in this virtual world, however recently I got bored of it, and have since shut the store down.

Instead, I have decided to use my break away from fashion designing and instead open up a new in-world store brand. This new store focuses on creating Medieval creations, Everything from water wells, to thrones. Pretty much a whole variety of medieval stuff. The items are geared mainly toward Gorean Role Play but is also suitable for most any medieval style Role play setting.

Anyway, enough rambling! The main reason for my post was to mention my lastest creation. It’s a sculpted tree! I think it came out rather well considering it was my first attempt at tree making. Here, let me show you the boxart for my tree.

See? Pretty nifty huh? I call it the Forked Dogwood tree. In case you are wondering, as far as I know, there’s no such thing as a Forked Dogwood Tree. It was a name I made up for the above pictured tree.

Here there be dragons

Image via CrunchBase

I’m sure most people interested in on-line gaming knows about Dungeons and Dragons Online, Also known as DDO. Most of you may have even played it, at least the trial. A lot of you might not have really cared for it either. Especially when there were games like World of Warcraft and Turbines other hit MMORPG Lord of the Rings Online. With games like those, perhaps you just couldn’t see yourself plunking down a wad of cash for your monthly DDO fix.

Well, things have changed a wee bit as of late. To begin with as of this month, DDO has changed its name to Dungeons and Dragons Unlimited. However, the biggest change is the fact that the game is now FREE to PLAY. That’s right, it doesn’t even require a credit card!

However, to experience the game in ALL its splendor, it might be a good idea to invest some cash. They do charge to unlock some things, or to buy more character slots. Yer basically getting the core game free, and if you want to add something..plunk down a few dollars here..want to add a little more? plunk down a few more bucks.

The idea is remarkable, and it’s a great idea if executed PROPERLY. It will give people the chance to actually PLAY the game, beyond the couple of days free trial. Allow them to meet new people, interact and build friendships and in doing so also give them a chance to get incredibly addicted to the game so that they will want to keep adding to their game and expanding their enjoyment.

See how this could work in their favor? Secondlife already employs a similar business strategy and it works incredibly well for them. This is however the first time an established commercial MMORPG has decided to take this route, and I am REALLY excited to see how this will work for Turbine. If it proves to be successful this could change the face of MMO gaming. If their sales and income increases greatly, could they then consider to use this strategy in their already wildly succesful LotRO? Will other companies decide to experiment with the idea, or similar ideas?

Either way, for the gaming public it’s a sweet as hell deal…so, go start playing Dungeons and Dragons Unlimited…Free of charge!

One ring to rule them all

Lord of the rings Online is a great game. In fact, it’s one of my favorite MMORPGs to date. It’s got some good voice acting, epic storylines, and most importantly it takes place in a world that I am familiar with. Even when I was just starting out, I didn’t feel like a TOTAL noob. Some of the characters were familiar, The locations, the background storyline and even some of the monsters. Though i was new to the game, i still had a basic idea of what was happening, and was able to thrust myself into my character a lot more easily, than say if it was an unfamiliar setting that i had to learn every single thing about.

Anyway, so I have been trying to get my friends from Secondlife to play LOTRO as well. Why? because as good as Secondlife is, it does get boring after awhile, and im at that point, where the games a bit boring. The only reason i continue to log in, is because of my friends. If not for them, i would probably have abandoned Secondlife months ago. So, it would be nice if they were as interested in lotro as they are in SecondLife.

While on the subject of LOTRO, I purchased the expansion pack “Mines of Moria” advance order just last night, and im still not exactly sure why. my highest level character isn’t even 30 yet, so reall..the expansion pack won’t really benefit me for awhile. I have had that character for over a year….Thing is i don’t play as much as I would like to….so it’s not fast leveling. That being said, it will probably be another year before I even see any benefit from the expansion pack…but at least I get a spiffy title and (Hopefully) spiffy cloak.

Second Life Fashion critics

You all have by now heard of Second Life, especially if you have read my blog in the past. Second Life is actually quite a big thing, and has been featured in numberous television shows, and has so many movie/Television Tie-in’s, you would not believe.

If however you are one of the few people who don’t have a clue what Second Life is, I suggest you either read a bit through the Second Life section of my blog OR visit the official Second Life website, maybe sign up for a free account and experience it all for yourself.

One thing I haven’t mentioned about Second Life, is that one of the big things in the virtual world much like the real world, is fashion! The Internet is filled with a plethora of SL fashion sites, where they discuss the looks that are all the rage, what Second Lifes top designers are doing, Also many where they throw together outfits and tell you how to achieve their glorious looks! Many, if not most, if not all are NOT actually professional fashion critics in their real life, some have horrible taste even, but thanks to the glory of the ‘net, anyone can attempt to be a fashion critic!

One interesting and unique website/blog is called Second Life Fashion Police, and it’s even a blog hosted on the same server as my blog…Good ol’ WordPress! Now, this site is fairly unique, however unique doesn’t mean GOOD. What this blog does, is take screenshots of people who dress odd in Secondlife, and then they begin to ridicule and make fun of the outfits, shapes or whatever that the person is wearing. Some of the “Contributers” haven’t even a clue what they are talking about and unable to name pieces being worn by the avatars, and just come up with creative names like “Blingy thing” and “whatever that is.” Please note, those are not actual quotes, just examples of the naming styles they use.

Granted many of the people shown there DO have their avatars dressed quite outlandish, however in all fairness that might be what they are going for. Perhaps they want an off the wall crazy look. Perhaps they want their avatar to be fat, or a mannly looking female avatar. If that’s what they are wanting, congrats! Pay on the shoulder, desired look achieved. It’s Second Life…a world where its not odd to see someone running around naked, wearing slave silks and a collar or even to see a bipedal wolf walking around smoking a cigar, wearing a leather jacket, chaps and a cowboy hat. Fact of the matter is Second Life fashion is not cookie cutter fashion. People should wear what they like, what they feel expresses themselves on their virtual character…Not what some pencil pusher from michigan who has an avatar that someone said “Wow, nice shoes” to once and all of a sudden started thinking he was gods gift to fashion.

Be your self…That simple.

Will I still go to their site/blog? Yea, probably…it can be funny….even if it’s just ridiculous! heh

CSI: NY – Second Life?

some of you may have read a recent entry of mine where I went on about the Second Life based game for the movie I am legend? Well, it has happened again, this time however instead of it being for a movie, it is for a television show. The TV show is CSI: Ny, and they apparently have created an MMO based INSIDE the world of Second Life.

The game is interesting, and actually quite fun. The premise is that you travel through the virtual “Mean streets” of new york and investigate odd murders. New ones are supposedly going to be added regularly. To help you investigate and solve these often times strange cases of foul play, you can use the nifty handy dandy forensic lab!

The virtual new york however doesnt look very dirty, in fact it has more shine than an Imperial battle cruiser from Star Wars…Or even Darth Vaders armor! In fact unless you search and scour, you won’t even find any graffiti..I have only spotted one, and that was nicely tucked away.

The CSI:NY – Secondlife project also sports a new client for playing in Second Life..I can’t say if that’s any good, since I didn’t feel the need to grab it. You don’t NEED it, if you already have a SL client, and I didn’t want to bother with the Download, and then have to figure out where everything is.

Apparently though I am Legend wasn’t the first one to do a SL tie-in…and CSI:NY wasnt the first to do a TV show Tie-in. I recently discovered that Gossip Girl has their own little thing. I have no clue what the Gossip Girl areas of Second Life are like, or even what the show is about, however I just felt I would mention that in case somebody was interested.