Deadly sleepers

A few weeks ago, the citizens of Eve Online were confronted with a change on a, literally, world shattering scale. The first planet of the Seyllin system was destroyed when a natural wormhole opened. Pretty soon these wormholes started appearing throughout known space:



The first few daring souls who entered the wormholes reported ending up in uncharted, new solar systems, where they encountered natural phenomena unknown in New Eden, causing equipment to malfunction, making it difficult to navigate.



On top of that, the wormholes are unstable, meaning that, if you don't return in time, you may find no way back as your entry wormhole has collapsed in the mean time. And finally, the wormhole solar systems are occupied by the fearsome Sleepers: huge, powerful drones still watching over their long gone masters' posessions. Their instructions are still active, even though the programmers who created them have been dust for thousands of years: protect our assets, destroy any object perceived as a threat!

This is what happened yesterday evening too. An expedition of five of my corporation members entered a wormhole from the Jurlesel system. On the other side we encountered the much rumoured sleepers and we engaged them in battle:



We were able to defeat some of them, but in the end their superior firepower proved too much for us; after losing several expensive drones and, more importantly, two of our ships, we retreated back to normal space - but not without looting the defeated Sleepers' wrecks and salvaging anything useful from them. In the end, the gains from the loot and salvage were not enough to cover for our losses. Obviously, we won't stand for that, so next time we'll bring better, more powerful ships, that's for sure.

For those interested: larger sized specimens of the snapshots above can be found at my Koinup site!

Twinity: Brandenburger Tor

Twinity: Brandenburger Tor, originally uploaded by seredwoollahra.

The 'Send Postcard' functionality in Twinity is actually easy to use, but doesn't allow you to hide the interface yet. But, so far, it's well done. A valuable addition to Twinity, in my opinion.

Eve Online: evaporating the rocks

Eve Online: evaporating the rocks, originally uploaded by seredwoollahra.

I usually don't mine, but sometimes you just have to. Here a small asteroid almost vaporizes under the intense beams of my mining lasers.

embedded reality

It's obvious to many that gaming is here to stay. For instance, the most popular Dutch news site has a gaming section these days, and the gaming industry involves billions of dollars and euros.

And yet, games are, to many, 'just' games. It's not real, it's just a game! Well.. not entirely. It may be true for many games out there, but it's not true for MMO environments. Whether they be sandbox games like Eve Online, virtual worlds like Second Life or kid's adventures like RunEscape (which my not-yet-teenage-kids love btw), there's a human element in those games that sets them apart, elevates them from other games. It's not just you sitting behind your PC or game console; it's you and your guild members, your corporation, your enemies, your opponents and allies. There's politics, spying, buying and selling, trade and combat; there's madness, love and war, marriage and divorce, and the emotions all of these generate, the feelings involved are very real - and sometimes the monetary losses or gains are too.

This brings a human element to these environments which cannot be discounted too easily. Of course the MMO environments in which all this takes place is computer generated, and as such not 'real' in the common sense. But, more and more, I have
come to realise that there's a lot of reality embedded in these virtual worlds.
They are a canvas, upon which very real, human stories are painted.

Virtual conferences, again

Funny how, at the end of the hype cycle, stuff from the earlier days seems to return! One of the reasons for me to become a Second Life resident, was IBM's involvement; more specifically, the IBM Lotus guys seemed very active there. And again it's IBM and IBM Lotus people who pick up where they left off a while ago. A few weeks ago we noticed the IBM and Linden Labs case study on conferences in Second Life. And now, via Massively, we get the Beyond Blogging conference, organised by IBM's Jo Grant a.k.a. Jaymin Carthage. This conference is about..

..Wouldn't it be great, I thought, if we could do a conference where we could talk about what was important to use: how we use virtual worlds in our work and personal life.

This event is slated to take place on April 7 and 8, and it looks like it's going to be an interesting event. I plan to spend some time there, if I can! Tateru said, in her Massively writeup, that non IBM people who wish to attend, need an IBM sponsor, but, having read Jo's blog entry, I do not think that she's right. Non IBM people are free to attend, they just need an IBM sponsor if they want to present or speak at the conference.. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong!

But IBM isn't alone. The Clever Zebras are at it again, too: the third vBusiness Expo is planned for May 2009. I visited a lot of the sessions at vBusinessExpo 2008, and I still regard it as a changing experience, where the power of conferences and meetings in virtual worlds became obvious to me. Keep an eye on this one, and register if you can!




IBM:

Patching is always hard

We've been through this before a dozen times if not more, on all sorts of games, platforms and virtual worlds: a patch upgrade initially often leads to instability, lagginess and other weird stuff. Today's massive Eve Online Apocrypha patch isn't any different. It works, but the universe is so laggy it's almost impossible to fly. Some of the new visuals are good, but CCP has some ironing to do before calling it a day. Meanwhile, that's exactly what I'm going to do. Good night!

Eve Online - Yashunen

2009.03.01.20.07.19, originally uploaded by seredwoollahra.

A ship jumps through a stargate in the Yashunen system.

IBM rediscovers Second Life?

Tateru Ninu writes about a Linden Labs case study on how IBM successfully used Second Life for conferences and meetings, late last year. It's an interesting read, but somehow it feels out of place in 2009. It's like an echo from two years ago; this report could have been written during the 2006/2007 SL hype, when IBM Lotus even had a virtual LotuSphere conference (snapshot above). Yet, this report deals with events that happened in late 2008! It seems another part of IBM is only just now discovering what's possible in virtual world environments? Anyway it's good to see new initiatives coming from IBM, once again. A few quotes:

“The immersion [in Second Life] resulted in a very strange, yet compelling psychological effect, where part of me really felt like I was physically there."

And:

“When people woke up the morning after the virtual meetings and thought about the day before, it wasn’t like remembering a webcast or a phone conference. We truly felt as if we had attended a real-time meeting, interacting with others and carrying home practical information.”

This is something I recognize from last year, when I attended the Virtual Business Expo. It may seem unlikely for those who've never tried it, but Second Life really is a good place to hold a conference.

Star Trek roleplay coming in Second Life

Star Trek roleplay coming in Second Life, originally uploaded by seredwoollahra.

Speaking of social space, via Hamlet, we get to take a look at the Star Trek roleplay environment being prepared in Second Life.

Social space

Many hardcore gamers have had difficulties in classifying Second Life, as it is not really a game. It’s an MMO of course, but without any gameplay! This is, incidentally, why always cringe a bit when someone says they "play" Second Life.
One of the categories that has been devised to classify Second Life and similar worlds, is ‘social world’ which nicely describes Second Life’s main attraction: interaction with other residents.

Eve Online is nothing like that, at least not yet. It’s a real game with gameplay, goals and rules, where pilots make a profit, get shot at and occasionally even get podkilled (not a permanent form of death, luckily).

And yet, Eve Online is not like the average MMORPG either. Eve’s single shard universe and it’s open design allow for interaction between all players online on any given moment, and a freedom of (career) choices and things to do that is really unique. There is almost no grind and, apart from some specific missions, there are very few linear paths you must follow. You get to do what you'd like to do within your possiblities, it's really up to you! In this regard, Eve Online shares the openness of social worlds like Second Life.

And I think will get even more social in the foreseeable future. For years now, there has been talk about "ambulation" or “walking in stations”, which is the ability in Eve Online to dock your spaceship at a station, leave your spaceship, walk to a bar or your captains' quarters and interact there with other avatars like the one depicted here. This is quite a big development, given that there has never been a true avatar in Eve Online! I have never seen more than my avatars' mugshot, which is on the login page, but this is set to change with “walking in stations”.

In development for years and repeatedly demonstrated, this development could potentially alter the way Eve Online is inhabited by it’s pilots, as it is truly a social innovation in the game, liberating the avatar from the spacecraft and allowing for more social interaction than already possible now. Certain parts of Eve Online – for instance the bars to be opened at the promenades of high security space stations – may soon resemble Second Life more than some of Eve’s hardcore pirates may find appealing. I wonder if that will lead to new usages of Eve Online? Will there be business meetings at a space bar, somewhere in Eve's near future? It's certainly possible, even though the current subscription structure prevents irregular casual use and makes such scenarios unlikely.

We don't know when "walking in stations" will hit Eve Online. I'm hoping for the first post Apocrypha expansion, which is set for late 2009, but CCP hasn't made any official announcements yet.

Master the game: your attitude helps, too

For any MMO game or virtual world developer, attracting sufficient numbers of paying customers is a crucial part of running their business. There has to be a critical mass of players to keep the game going, and these players also have to foot the bills. After all, these developers are in it for the money, or at least they need enough of it to stay afloat!

That'ss why game developers keep a keen eye on user retention: what percentage of new users decides to stay?. It is often difficult enough to attract new players with free trials and such, and of the few people who come to give a product a spin, even less decide to spend money and stay around. Hence the interest in any games' new player experience: if it's too difficult to master the basics of the game, user retention will be low. For example, a friend of mine decided to try out Second Life, but after bumping aimlessly into trees and other dazed newbies for about thirty minutes, he just gave up, never to return.

Linden Labs has been struggling with this for years, but apparently they are not alone. CCP, Eve Online's creator, is ramping up an expansion to Eve which will feature a completely revamped new player experience, mostly to counter Eve Online's reputation as being notoriously hard to master.

To be honest, I didn't find Eve Online that hard. I didn't have any MMORPG experience at all, so I blamed the difficulties I encountered on myself, thinking it was my problem instead of Eve Online's! Perhaps this attitude allowed me to appreciate the game more than others, who might have expected an experience similar to games they played earlier. Being a total n00b sometimes does have it advantages!

But I think it's more than that. It's also an attitude thing! It's about a new players' willingness to accept a new game as is; it's about having an open mind to the new environment and it's possibilities or problems. It's also about having a certain curiousity and persistance, which helped me overcome the first hurdles in more than one environment. Perhaps something to keep in mind, the next time you try out a new game?

Unfortunately for game developers though, they can't expect the average user to be so forgiving. Hence the need for exquisitely honed and perfectly balanced new player experiences..

Shiny new hardware

Last friday, I picked up my old server from our local computer shop. They helpfully transformed it for me into a new family pc, complete with ATI HD3800 gpu and a 19 inch widescreen monitor. And yes, it does make a huge difference when compared to the laptop I used before! Especially the Eve Online graphics are much better. Unfortunately I haven't been able to enter Second Life on it yet; each time I try, the graphics driver crashes. Any hints would be welcome..

Meanwhile, here's a shot from Eve Online. It shows the shark fin or mohawk on top of my Myrmidon battlecruiser, which reflects the dust and gas clouds surrounding it, complete with the greenish colour of the skies in this particular system. The level of detail is really stunning, especially when viewed in large format of course!

Twinity: homebase lounge

This is Twinity's Homebase Lounge in Berlin, where some of the Berlinale film festival activities take place. Unfortunately there's no activities planned for tonight; hence it remains quiet here for the time being.

Twinity goes mixed

In a couple of days, Berlin will be host to the Berlinale Film festival, and Twinity's virtual Berlin takes part in several activities. There will for instance be live streams from events, but also a mixed reality panel discussion which will, in both worlds, take place at the same location! Mixed reality events have of course been done before, in Second Life and probably some other venues as well. But, as far as I know, it's a first mirror mixed event for Twinity. The fact that it's not only mixed but also mirrored is quite interesting as well; I wonder if this a first, for virtual worlds in general? Good for Twinity, as an event like this a natural fit with their mirror world philosophy! Here's a quote from a press release they emailed to Twinity's citizens:

"A particular highlight of these exclusive Berlinale livecasts is the 'Akademie Breaks' panel "Because they know what they are talking about – How first hand film teaching inspires!" with Michael Ballhaus, Thomas Binotto, and Peter R. Adam. This panel discussion will be held on 11 February in the real and the virtual HomeBase Lounge in Twinity simultaneously. The Twinity 3D community can catch the entire 'Akademie Breaks' program, organized by the German Film Academy from 09 - 12 February, and the event series 'DigiDays' live in the virtual HomeBase Lounge. "

Even though I'm not much of a film fan, I plan to take a look next week to see how it works out. See you there, perhaps? If you plan on visiting, make sure to start on time; installing Twinity and getting used to the interface isn't that hard, but it takes a while to load the virtual Berlin environment if you go there for the first time.

amoderia

amoderia, originally uploaded by seredwoollahra.

A planet in Amoderia, a low security system in the Verge Vendor region.

Lost Body

Lost Body, originally uploaded by seredwoollahra.

There's something eerie and artistic about this Twinity snapshot.. this poor fellow lost several bodyparts in Twinity's virtual Berlin. He didn't respond to my enquiries, so perhaps he lost his tongue too :)

A carebear with claws

Tonight I had a little bit more excitement in Eve Online than I initially bargained for: someone very nearly destroyed my Myrmidon. If that would have happened, I wouldn't have survived either.

But first, let's go back a bit. I bought this ship a few days ago, because the Vexor cruiser I was flying just didn't have what it takes for some of the more heavier missions. The Myrmidon is more resilient and has more options, so I bought one, fitted the modules I was allowed to use or saw fit, and did my first level 3 mission. That mission happened to take place in a 0.4 system, which makes every pilot there fair game for pirates, griefers and other scum. Between 0.5 and 1.0 systems are reasonably safe (with 0.5 as least safe and 1.0 as the safest) because Concord provides a certain degree of protection against these guys, but below 0.5 that's no longer the case.

After this mission I returned to this 0.4 system and even though I knew it wasn't secure, I was still quite shocked when another pilot locked on to me and opened fire, completely unprovoked. I tried to warp out but that wouldn't work; the other guy used a warp scrambler which effectively disabled my engines. I was dead in the water! There was no option but to fight and as fast as I could I enabled my damage control and armor modules, while simultaneously returning fire and launching my scout drones. So the battle was on and initially it didn't look good for me, as I lost shields and armor in a quicker pace than he; I just couldn't match his firepower. It seemed to be only a matter of time before I lost my ship and lots of my possessions. Then I remembered to enable my armor repair units and that seemed to turn the battle; my armor held steady, while his was quickly blown away.

In the mean time, I completely lost control over what was going on around me. Our ships, our drones, and then to my surprise someone elses ship and drones circled one another, exchanging rapid fire at only a few thousand meters apart. I couldn't figure out who the third ship was, or who exactly was firing at whom, but I assumed I had a whole gang of pirates blasting away at me - and yet my armor held, while the assailant's didn't!

After two or three agitated minutes, the enemy exploded, which broke the warp scramble, so I attempted another warp at the nearest stargate. Ordinary, after a kill, one would try to loot and salvage or at least take the other guys' drones, but I was happy to be alive and completely unsure about the third persons' intentions so I just tried to get out as fast as I could. As luck would have it the third person didn't scrable my warp and I got out - in one piece. I survived a PVP encounter!

Later, while checking the Battleclinic killboards, I found out that the third person was not fighting against me, but with me. He was the one who destroyed the enemy; he inflicted significantly more damage. I don't know why he sided with me, but he saved me, and for that I am grateful.

A little while later, I returned in a fast and small frigate to see if there was anything left to loot or salvage. I found the enemies' drones still flying around, so I quickly scooped those to my cargo hold and flew back home.

I've learned a valuable lesson: trust no one in space if you're in low sec sectors - i.e. anything below 0.5. And, even when you're a carebear, remember to bring your claws.. they may save you one day!

Twinity: Mirrors

Twinity: Mirrors, originally uploaded by seredwoollahra.

This Twinity room looks a lot bigger than it actually is, because of the large mirror on the wall in the back. I'm in there too! I can't remember seeing mirrors in Second Life, by the way. Do those even exist?

Been there done that? Nope

I just read up on Jeran Tek's epic trek across all of the EVE Online universe - yes, all 5000+ systems. A great achievement, for which he got a nomination for the E-ON Magazine Award 2009. I never quite realised how big this place really is! Here's the map of the entire EVE galaxy; the grey dots are systems I haven't been to yet. Still lots of room for exploration!



I can't imagine something like this in Second Life, though. In SL, the map changes continuously as islands are added or vacated; buyers change the names of the regions they just bought on a whim. But then, Second Life isn't intended for travel or exploration, even though there are some really nice places to explore.

Koinup

I have, for quite some time, been publishing snapshots of all sort of virtual worlds at Flickr, and I'm quite happy about the service there. The tooling is sufficient for me, generally it's not too difficult to get things done, and there's a sizeable (potential) audience. Yet, something is missing: an audience!

Flickr is not really geared towards the virtual audience; it's aimed at real world photograps. At Flickr, you're welcome with your Second Life snapshots, but it's not what Flickr is really about. For a while I was wondering if I should stick to Flickr or if I should look for another service, and in response to a blog item about that dilemma, a reader of this blog pointed be to Koinup. After checking it out I decided to give Koinup a go, and so far, the results are positive. The audience at Koinup is specifically interested in virtual worlds, meaning there's quite a bit of interest, even in non regular virtual worlds like Eve Online where I am currently quite active. In plain language: my snapshots get more eyeballs, and I am happy with that.

An added bonus: one can automatically have the snapshots uploaded to Flickr as well, so even when I'm not really paying attention to Flickr, my pictures still end up there too.

So for those of you who have an interest in sharing visual impressions (pictures, but also movies for instance) of virtual environments: give Koinup a try!