Posts Tagged "Avatar"

Teen Second Life Review ? Join Millions of Players in a Breathtaking Virtual World

Posted by on Jun 23, 2010 in Articles | 0 comments

The name “Second Life” has come to be synonymous with online virtual world. Launched in June 2003, Second Life boasts over 16 million registered accounts with several million active members. Letting users live out a fantastical version of their real life online, Second Life is easily the most popular online virtual reality simulation in the world.

Teen Second Life is an alternate version of Second Life targeted squarely at teenagers. Previously, a lot of teenagers were lying to get access to Second Life, where they were being exposed to adult content and language. Keeping that in mind, a teen friendly version of Second Life was created in Feb 2005 where teenagers can interact live out a virtual life in a safe and secure setting.

To register for Teen Second Life, you have to first verify your age. This can be done either via a PayPal account, or through SMS activation. This is an essential step to making sure that only those between 13-17 get access to Teen Second Life.

Teen Second Life is as rich in features as Second Life. This means that you can create a virtual avatar from a wide variety of templates, get him/her a job, open a store, buy a house, get a car, shop for clothing and shoes, and interact with other members. In other words, you can live out a virtual existence mirroring (or improving) your real world life.

The economy of Teen Second Life (and Second Life) is complex. The virtual currency is called “Linden Dollars” (after Linden Labs – the creators of the virtual world). Linden dollars can be earned by doing jobs, buying and selling stuff, trading with other members, or even purchased outright in lieu of actual money. A sophisticated economy has built up within the online virtual world centered around the trade of Linden dollars, and there are plenty of people pumping in hundreds of dollars (and earning even more back) into this virtual sim.

Teen Second Life differs from Second Life in its scope and content. Because of age restrictions, all mature or adult content is filtered out. This means that a lot of interactions available to members in Second Life are blocked. A language filter also actively removes any adult or abusive language.

Teen Second Life is much smaller in terms of total players (called ‘residents’) and the size of the virtual world. Only a few adults are allowed in the game after passing a criminal check. So far, only educators and non-profit organizations have been allowed access to Teen Second Life. Their access is limited to certain sections of the game and work as counselors and educators to the players in the game.

The adults allowed in the game form an important part of the Educators Working with Teens project in Teen Second Life. Through collaborations with various Universities and non-profit organizations, Teen Second Life aims to educate its teenaged members about various issues, ranging from career to drugs to environmental issues.

In terms of graphics and performance, Teen Second Life remains solid. Although the graphics can’t be compared to a modern PC game, they get the job done quite adequately. In a game of Second Life’s complexity, this alone is a complement.

Performance wise, Teen Second Life runs on the same excellent servers as its parent game, and thus, has hardly any lag or downtime issues. The game runs smoothly on most modern PCs equipped with a moderately powerful internet connection.

Final Words

Teen Second Life provides a perfect hangout for teenagers on the internet. By employing strict measures to keep out adults, Teen Second Life manages to bring the exciting game play/simulation of Second Life to an audience of teenagers. The virtual world is thriving with millions of members where you can interact with people from around the world. The initiatives taken by the creators to collaborate with different institutions to educate members about various issues is a great feature too. With strong parental controls, a clean, safe environment, Teen Second Life is a great virtual world for your teen.

Aldric Chang is a creative entrepreneur who is at the moment building free online adventure games for kids and running a successful 3d animation studio. His creative accomplishments span across the production of several hundred animation projects, casual games, music compositions, cartoon animated series and a virtual world for kids.

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There Virtual World Review – Create an Avatar & Life Out a Virtual Existence in a Fantastical World

Posted by on Jul 17, 2008 in Articles | 0 comments

Aldric Chang asked:




With the success of Second Life, virtual reality simulations have come into their own in the past 5 years. Promising users an experience that transcends the limitations of real life, a virtual reality sim lets you be whatever you want to be right from the comfort of your own home. No wonder that the number of these virtual worlds/simulations has increased exponentially in the past few years.

There is a virtual world where you can create your own avatar and roam around in a 3D world populated by other There.com members. You can interact with other members, build your own houses, dress up your characters, buy stuff for them, etc. In other words, There aims to create an online identity for yourself that reflects the real you, or, as There.com itself puts it, be “everything you’ve imagined and wished for”.

There is actually a downloadable application (around 500MB in size) that runs on your desktop. The system requirements are quite low and if you bought your PC within the past 2 years, you shouldn’t have any problem running There.com.

There works on a membership model. Basic membership to the virtual world is free, but you have to shell out money for premium features like voice chat, or to buy virtual goods such as houses, clothing, accessories, etc.

Once you install the There.com application and become a member, you will be prompted to create your avatar. This 3D avatar will be your physical representation in the virtual world, and you have access to a wide variety of templates to pick from when making your avatar. You can dress up the model from a few different sets of clothing and accessories. Later on in the game, you can buy different items for your avatar to trick out his appearance.

After your avatar is created, you can basically walk around the various environments (desert, tropical paradise, city, town, etc.) chatting up with other members. If you have a premium membership, you can even voice chat with your fellow There.com users. There essentially works like a somewhat surreal simulation of real life; you will meet a wide variety of people in the virtual world, all dressed as wildly as you can possibly imagine.

Where There.com really shines is in its creation of a living, breathing world. You can buy and furnish your own house (and even put it up for rent), go shopping for shoes and clothing, buy yourself a car (or design your own ride), hold an exhibition of your ‘art’ (which you can later sell for Therebucks – There.com‘s virtual currency), create your own virtual movies, and lots, lots more. The way you interact with other members and the world around you makes for a delightful experience, and it is not extra ordinary to strike up deep and meaningful friendships with people halfway across the globe.

However, in terms of pure features and interactivity potential, There cannot hold a candle to Second Life. Although these are two completely different beasts (Second Life is more of a virtual reality simulation, while There is more chat and people oriented), comparisons to Second Life are inevitable, if unfair.

In terms of graphics, There does not match up to the latest PC games such as Call of Duty 4. Nonetheless, the “game” still looks quite good and runs very smoothly on even old PCs. There’s servers are more than capable of handling the load of several thousand players, and there is hardly any lag while playing the game.

Users concerned about privacy issues will have to just buckle up and go with the flow. A virtual world, by default, does not endear itself to privacy, and There is no different. Although you can block individual users (or groups of users), it is very easy for other members to see what you’ve been up to in the game. Paranoid people should best avoid this game.

In conclusion, There is a great virtual world that excels in its handling of chat and people-to-people interactions. If you are looking for something more complex and demanding, you might be disappointed with the limited features that There offers, but for those of you looking to meet new people without all the hassles of a virtual life simulation, There is the perfect tool.

Virtual Lover
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