Day: December 31, 2018

Galaxity: A Brief Introduction

Well, I’ll say one thing for Galaxity, which is another social VR platform available through the Early Access Program on Steam: it’s got cute in spades! It’s by a Korean company called MammoSix. Here’s a brief promotional video:

Here’s what my avatar looks like:

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My feet appear to be sunken into the floor!

The whole world seems to have a chunky, blocky, almost Minecraftesque aesthetic:

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Galaxity offers a variety of things to do: baseball, soccer, sword fighting, watching videos, walking across a pipe laid between two buildings high in the air… but, like most of these new platforms, it’s deserted. None of these are much fun to do on your own 🙁

Also, the controls take a bit of getting used to. One strange thing is that you can choose to walk, or teleport…but you have to pick one or the other; you can’t have both options available at the same time!

Galaxity is cute, but like most of these newer social VR platforms intended for children, it needs more features (and more promotion). I’ll add it to my ever-growing list of social VR/virtual worlds, and I’ll be keeping an eye on it as it develops over time.

Pararea: A Brief Introduction

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Pararea is a Unity-based social VR platform by a Chinese company, the Metaverse Technology Company of Beijing. It’s available under the Early Access Program on Steam, so I decided to download it and give it a try.

Here’s a seven-minute YouTube video showing you what the game looks like:

This is one of those virtual worlds which could use a good English translator (as you might have guessed by the somewhat fractured English of their website). Most of the in-world signs are in Chinese only, which makes it difficult to figure out how to navigate. After a few minutes, I figured out how to modify my starter avatar (a head, torso, and hands only, much like Rec Room), how to teleport, and how to turn around.

I visited a few places but Pararea was, unfortunately, deserted. Let me save you the trouble of downloading and testing this out for yourself: it’s not worth it, unless you are fluent in Chinese. The customer reviews on Steam have been almost universally scathing, too:

Its like VRChat and RecRoom had a child, but the child was ugly…..

Oh, dear. The worst part is, it’s accurate!

Happy New Year! Where to Celebrate New Year’s Eve in Social VR

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Designed by Kjpargeter from Freepik.com

I will be celebrating New Year’s Eve offline, with real-life friends here in Winnipeg. It looks like we’re going to have a cold night! 😉

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Meanwhile, in Winnipeg…

If you are looking to spend New Year’s Eve online, here are a few options on the various social VR platforms:

Sansar

Eliot (Linden Lab’s Community Manager for Sansar) will be hosting three New Year’s Eve events in Sansar in different timezones:

High Fidelity

High Fidelity will be hosting a round-the-clock event at The Spot from Monday, Dec. 31st 2:00 a.m. to Tuesday, Jan. 1st 4:00 a.m. (Pacific Time).

Sinespace

As part of its Winter Festival, Sinespace is hosting a New Year’s Eve party. Check the login page of your Sinespace client for more details.

VRChat

The best place to find out what New Year’s Eve parties are happening where in VRChat is, as always, the VRChat Events Discord server. Apparently, there’s a round-the-clock party happening at Void, according to AgentM83:

They’re partying in every time zone all day long (started this morning).

However you choose to ring in the new year—online or offline, alone or with friends, awake or asleep!—may 2019 bring you happiness, peace, and prosperity.