This evening is the official launch of a brand-new, officially-sanctioned Sansar experience: the bridge of the Enterprise from the original Star Trek TV series!
Here are the details from the event listing:
John Champion and Ken Ray – the hosts of Mission Log on the Roddenberry Podcast Network – are headed to Sansar! What better place to talk Star Trek than the bridge of the Enterprise? Built by a serious Trekker, you can watch Mission Log Live at 7pm Pacific/10pm Eastern on the main view screen on the original series bridge! Then a few minutes after the show, John and Ken will hit the bridge.
This week: Why are we here and where is here anyway? What sparked your interest in virtual reality? What do you see for VR going forward? Of course, you can bring your own topics as well. We’re just hanging out on the bridge, and hoping you’ll join in.
Dress code: There is none, though free Mission Log and Roddenberry shirts are available NOW in the Sansar store!
You can join this event in Sansar desktop mode too – you don’t need a VR headset!
Lucky chairs are a freebie institution in Second Life. How they work is simple: if the first letter of your avatar name starts with the same letter as the one on the lucky chair, you sit down on it and you win the prize pictured! Sometimes instead of a chair, you have a panel that you have to click (as in the image above). They’re not as popular as they used to be in Second Life, but they are still around if you know where to look.
Sometimes you might have to sit and wait a long while for your letter to show up. It goes much faster if there is a crowd present, especially if the word has gotten out that there are new lucky chair/panel prizes to be had! Sitting and waiting for your letter to show up gives you a chance to sort through your inventory or chat with other avatars who are waiting with you.
Here are eleven of my favourite lucky chair/panel locations in Second Life for women’s fashion and skins. Please note that the links given below are SLURLs to the exact location of the lucky chair section; in some cases, you might have to follow the red arrow to find the right area of the store if the store owner forces you to arrive at one preset starting point on the sim.
7 Deadly s[K]ins (skins; 4 panels are located in the back of the store on the first floor; 3 require you to join the 7 Deadly s[K]ins group for L$225, while the 4th requires no group)
Alien Gizmo’s (clothing; located inside and to the right of the main entrance; join the Alien Gizmo’s group for free to play these five lucky chairs)
Baby Monkey (shoes and clothing; no group is needed; 3 lucky chairs are located inside the central courtyard of the new store)
Belle Epoque (clothing; no group is needed; there are 5 lucky panels on the lawn in front of the store)
Brii Underground Wear (complete outfits with shoes; you’ll need to join the Brii Underground Wear group for L$200 to be able to play these 9 lucky chairs, located at the far back wall of the store from the right-hand side entrance)
Caboodle (clothing; you’ll need to join the Caboodle group for L$50 to play the 3 lucky panels here at the back of the store)
Cynful (clothing; located on the second floor; join the Cynful group for free to play these three lucky panels)
monaLISA (clothing and shoes; no group is needed; these panels are located to the left of the main entrance, next to the group gifts; at least one of them appears to be broken)
Oubliette (clothing; located just inside the store to the right; join the Petite Mort & Oubliette VIP group for free to play these four lucky panels)
Petite Mort (clothing; located just inside the store to the right; join the Petite Mort & Oubliette VIP group for free to play these four lucky panels)
Wow Skins (skins; no group is needed; the lucky chairs and panels are located in the far left wing of the store from the main entrance)
Lucky chairs at Alien Gizmo’s
What are your favourite lucky chair locations in Second Life? Feel free to leave a comment on this blogpost if you know of one that I’ve missed.
UPDATE May 24th: I forgot about the lucky chair location at MODA. (It’s hidden away in the back of one of the three sections of the sprawling store, so use the provided SLURL to find it.) You do not need to join the MODA group to play these 4 chairs for women’s shoes and clothing.
There is yet another good lucky chair location which I had forgotten to mention, that offers both men’s and women’s clothing. It’s at ADN Designs, where you can find 8 lucky chairs and 8 lucky panels on the wall above them. You don’t need to join a group to use them.
UPDATE Sept. 2nd: I also forgot to mention the eight lucky panels located next to the 7Seas Fishing pond at Sn@tch; you don’t need to join a group to use them. Also, Shoenique Designs has now split into two separate stores, Shoenique (shoes) and Ellnique (dresses and gowns), each with their own set of lucky panels (you do need to join the respective groups for free to play these panels). The new stores are rather large and spread out, so use the in-store map to find the lucky panel locations, or just follow the red arrow from the SLURLs I gave you to find the right area of the store. Good luck!
UPDATE Sept. 3rd: Forgot another one! There are nine lucky chairs at Sweet E’s clothing store…no group required!
UPDATE Sept. 11th: There are eleven lucky panels for women’s clothing at Nala Design; no group is needed for 9 of them and the other 2 require you to join the Nala group.
After my recent guided tour of VU, I feel very strongly that this is going to be a successful and popular virtual world/MMO hybrid platform, and I want to be a part of it when VU launches their beta this summer. This is the very first blockchain-based virtual world that I actually feel excited about!
I want you to know this up front: this blogpost is a promotion for VU, in exchange for VU tokens. You can follow on this webpage to see how many VU tokens I have earned by completing tasks in this Partner Program if you wish (right now, I am at number two on the VU Token Leaderboard). There’s nothing stopping you from participating in this Partner Program yourself, and earning some VU tokens!
IMPORTANT: VU Tokens are not a real currency. They are ERC-20 based blockchain tokens intended to permit players of Virtual Universe exclusive access to digital assets within a VR game known as Virtual Universe (VU). They are a form of in-game virtual currency. Virtual value attributed to the VU Token will be as a result of in-game efforts by players, and no future value is represented or guaranteed.
Ciaran Foley, the CEO of Ukledo and Immersive Entertainment, Inc. a Southern California virtual reality software company which is developing a new virtual world/MMO hybrid platform called Virtual Universe (VU), has written an interesting article about the various ways which VR software developers can avoid users experiencing motion sickness and nausea while using their programs.
In summary, those five ways are:
Using high-quality VR headsets;
Developing haptic feedback systems;
Developing a “virtual nose”: Researchers at Purdue University have suggested the mere act of including a virtual nose to the VR headset display can significantly reduce the effects of nausea by 13.5% (small but still significant);
Keeping things steady by tethering the player to a single spot;
Focusing on the environmental design of a VR platform.
Ciaran writes:
There is a slight learning curve to the mechanisms and feel of VR, and it is something that participants of VR will have to have patience with, monitoring their own tolerance, levels of use and ideal comfort settings. Those growing up with VR will adopt it far more easily, much like what we are seeing with Gen-Z having grown up with cell phones. VR has the potential to be just as common as gaming consoles, and people who spend a lot of time around these types of devices will also find it much easier to adapt to VR hardware.
Using what we and the industry as a whole have learned about optimal VR, our VU — Virtual Universe aims to improve on existing models and technologies without detracting from the experience. Instead of restricting core functionality like free movement as in other titles — which can be less immersive and perhaps a bit restrictive — visual tricks will be implemented such as playing with perspectives and field of view to give the environment a smoother feel, improving comfort for the player and helping them keep their lunch in the real world.
Veteran Second Life freebie shoppers know that many stores have a group gift wall, where (if you join the group indicated) you can pick up a free item! Yes, there are many groups that offer freebies to their members through arrangements made with the various stores in SL.
Here are a couple of examples of group gift walls in stores I visited today. The first is at Suna Designs:
And here’s another, this one at Anny’s store:
In this example below, if you join the Mesh Avatar Appearance Maniacs (MAAM) group, you get not just one but all six versions of this lovely dress by Asteria:
So, what are the best groups to join for freebies?
I’m glad you asked! Here are the top six groups to join:
