Surreal world of Second Life massive, intricate

User-centric experience defies conventions

March 19, 2007 —

Second Life, for those unfamiliar with it, is a freely accessible virtual world which has taken the philosophy of user-created content to the extreme. It accomplishes this by allowing the entire Second Life world to be constructed by users. A & E Editor Pat Herald and Staff Writer Alex Kohut set out to explore this world and reveal their experiences.

Alex: Since I barely seem able to manage my own life, doubling up and creating a new one within Second Life is like the recipe for the perfect storm. I thought perhaps I could take a few lessons learned within this virtual 3-D world and apply them to the one I actually inhabit. But I would probably spend most of my time feeling like I was playing World of Warcraft, only without whatever the hell serves as the obstacle in that game.

Pat: The implications of a virtual world are, given the nature of people, especially those people who spend significant amounts of time online, at once compelling, frightening, and hilarious. Based on what I had heard about Second Life, I was looking forward to seeing how all of its ideas played out.

Alex: Before you can get wandering about in Second Life, you need to create an account, complete with fancy fake name and snazzy avatar. You can make your first name anything you'd like, but must choose from a field of unique last names. To the credit of the game's creators, "unique" is an understatement when it comes to the last names. I don't recall ever meeting anyone with the last name Barthelmess or Fimicoloud in my life. Maybe I just need to venture outside of the tri-city area more often.

Pat: Creating a character was an amusing and complex step in and of itself. I made a first name, and then chose from the list of surnames, one of which stood out to me as the immediate and obvious choice. And so, Dandelier Swindlehurst strode forth into the Second Life world. You can modify your character's appearance extensively right from the start, and change it again whenever you please. I chose a suitably bizarre look, and soon I was controlling a gaunt and gangly figure well over seven feet tall, unswervingly stern in expression, with a jutting brow a mantle for his bulbous nose.

Alex: With this bloated list of oddball names, you'd imagine finding one not already in use would be a synch. It could be my habit of making everything more difficult than it needs to be, but I spent a good 10 minutes trying to make a match that didn't absolutely suck. At that point, I conceded that dream for the sake of my sanity and Pops Oppewall was born. In the end, my guy probably looked pretty generic when stacked against Herald's freakish creation.

Pat: As I wandered into the world, I noticed a clear difference between Dandelier and the rest of the Second Life denizens - Dandelier was the only ugly one, and the only unique one at that. It seems that most everyone chooses to control either a man layered with beach muscle, or a woman who would fit in with Victoria's Secret models.

Alex: Before you are granted access to the mainland, you must complete a series of tasks like finding yourself on the map. Despite there being no real objective to the game other than to live as you would in real life, there's a bit of a learning curve to this. I found myself asking aloud if I'd ever make it off Orientation Island.

Pat: Another striking characteristic of Second Life is just how big it really is. The current total number of "residents" listed on the Second Life Web site is 4,637,917. Of that, generally around 30 thousand of those users were online when I logged in. Not only are there a lot of people using Second Life, there is a tremendous amount of virtual space that they occupy.

Alex: There's no shortage of things to explore in Second Life, as you're able to teleport yourself to countless lands that have different things to offer. Traveling to the different areas it became clear that Second Life is about two things: walking and sex. Both seemed to be involved almost anywhere I went.

Pat: Wandering about randomly, I had some interesting experiences. One thing that it seemed unavoidable to be exposed to was sex. I was exposed to mature content on many occasions, encountering everything from strip clubs to a very disturbing and massive environment resembling a sort of sex dungeon ran by a woman claiming to be a succubus. It was amusing to approach people in these places and try to proposition them from behind Mr. Swindlehurst's agonizing countenance. There were no takers, despite Dandelier's apologies that he was born a wretch and couldn't help it. He did force slow dances on two separate users, though.

Alex: The economic element of the game is perhaps the most interesting. You rack up currency through your travels that can be used to purchase things like property. I guess some take these Linden dollars pretty seriously, since you can actually use real money to buy ultimately worthless Linden currency. And here I thought Chuck E. Cheese's was the only establishment getting away with that scam.

Pat: The most interesting experience I had in Second Life was when I randomly teleported to a property that was only occupied by three users. Dandelier approached them and they struck up a conversation. One of them ended up giving me a tour of their home. Explaining that she had just recently moved the house atop the hill it was now on, she apologized for the moving boxes and the mess. There was everything one would expect to find in a real house, and this experience really felt like getting a tour of someone's home.

Alex: Not being much of a gamer or one for walking, Second Life became a bit dull after a while. There's a bit of a learning curve to it; one I wasn't able to fully master in the time I spent wandering through the game. But I did rack up a whopping dollar in my journeys and you can bet it's going in the sex fund. The Second Life sex fund, that is.

Pat: Second Life is a strange, huge, and intimidating place. Users really can go wherever they want, and do nearly anything they want. To really make progress, it was obvious that making Linden dollars was important, so as to buy property and thus be able to construct buildings and more. I didn't make any, but I still had some fun, and definitely experienced some moments of incredulity.