I was so impressed by the amazing ballgowns on display at the recent Formal Royal Music Event in Sinespace that I was inspired to write up a blogpost showing you just a few of the beautiful gowns available to purchase from the Sinespace Shop, either in your Sinespace client or via the website. Time to trot Vanity Fair out for some more modeling!
First up are a couple of absolutely stunning ballgowns from ELL. The first dress is called a wedding gown, and obviously it comes in various kinds of white, but it also comes in this stunning black colour with gold bodice accents!
Here’s a second look at it, under a different light, Isn’t it simply gorgeous?
All this luxury for only 100 Gold, from the Sinespace Shop, so it’s not only beautiful, but it’s also affordable! The dress comes in black as shown here, and in six different white versions, each with different colour accents: gold, plus black, blue, green, pink and red.
The second gown from ELL that I wanted to show you all is called Trina, and it is a showstopper! Trina comes in two versions, plain and glitter, and the best part is, they are tintable! You can also adjust the glossiness to go from a plan fabric to an almost latex gloss. Here’s what they look like on Vanity:
The plain (non-glitter) version of the Trina ballgown, tinted red, and with the glossiness turned all the way downThe truly stunning glitter version of the Trina ballgown, tinted gold and with the glossiness set to 50%
Check out the glitter effect in this video I shot in Sinespace! You will definitely turn some heads at your next elegant party! (Vanity is wearing a body light to enhance the effect.)
Both versions of the Trina gown can be tinted in the Outfit tab as shown (see the green arrow):
The Trina gown is available on the Sinespace Shop in both plain and glitter versions for only 200 Gold each.
But the Allegro gown is special in that it features working in-world cloth physics. Yes, you heard that right! The skirt of this dress drapes and flows naturally with the avatar as she moves, in much the same way as real-world cloth! Here’s a video showing you what that in-world cloth physics looks like on Vanity Fair, wearing the cream colour of the Allegro gown:
Mighty impressive! The Allegro ballgown by BlakOpal Designs comes in 10 different colours, for only 199 Gold each, or you can purchase the complete set of gowns for 1,399 Gold. You can purchase this dress from the Sinespace Shop, or from the in-world BlakOpal store (more information here).
This blogpost is sponsored by Sinespace, and was written in my role as an embedded reporter for this virtual world (more details here).
Heads up on a Sinespace event taking place this evening, Sunday April 18th, 2021 in the virtual world of Sinespace: a Formal Royal Music Event starting at 8:00 p.m. EST/7:00 p.m. CST/5:00 p.m. PST.
Second Life (which I still consider to be the perfect model of the mature, fully-evolved virtual world that the companies creating the newer social VR platforms would be wise to study) has two levels of membership: Basic (free), and Premium. How Premium membership in Second Life works: for US$99 a year (or $32.97 quarterly, or $11.99 monthly), you get a set of benefits and perks over free, Basic user accounts:
VRChat is another platform that decided to offer a comparably-priced paid premium membership level last December, called VRChat Plus (which I first wrote about here). Now, upon first reading of the perks such a membership would offer me (see below), I was less than impressed (probably because I have been spoiled by all the goodies Second Life Premium memberships offer me in comparison).
Among the (relatively) small number of features for VRChat Plus users is the ability to set a user icon to display in a circle next to your user name:
But in conversation with Voices of VR podcaster Kent Bye last night via Zoom, he raised a point that I had hitherto failed to consider, Given my well-documented, one-man, scorched-earth campaign against Facebook and Oculus for, among other things, forcing Oculus headset users to get Facebook accounts and their toxic advertising-based business model which scrapes and strip-mines users’ personal data, why would I not support an alternative way for VRChat to earn a profit?
I stopped to think of what VRChat would be like with Facebook-like advertising, and I positively shuddered in revulsion. So this evening, I pulled out my credit card and ponied up for a VRChat Plus membership (US$99.99), so I now have the familiar “red Ryan” logo displayed next to my username in world (which has sort of become an icon for my brand, as I use it everywhere else, too). If it helps other users in VRChat recognize who I am, then I think it’s worthwhile.
My familiar “red Ryan” user icon
So, I have decided to do a quick survey of the major social VR and virtual world platforms, and find out whether or not they offer a paid premium service, and if so, what you get for your money.
Second Life
My alt Moesha Heartsong, sitting on the porch of her lovely Victorian Linden Home on the continent of Bellisseria (one of the many nice perks you get with your Second Life Premium membership)
Second Life Premium membership (currently priced at US$99 a year) offers you the following benefits:
A weekly L$300 stipend (basically enough to buy a nice outfit or pair of shoes for your avatar every week)
A L$1,000 sign-up bonus for first-time Premium users (can only be used once)
Priority entry when regions/sims are full of avatars (in other words, if a Basic user and a Premium user both try to get into a packed sim at the same time, the Premium user gets priority; this comes in handy at crowded shopping events, and I have made use of this perk often!)
A 1024m² virtual land allotment for use towards a nice starter Linden Home or a parcel on the Second Life mainland; this is another benefit I do take advantage of!
Expanded live-chat customer support (which I have used on occasion!)
Premium virtual gifts (frankly, kinda useless to me)
Exclusive access to Premium areas and experiences (such as building sandboxes)
Increased cap on missed IMs (which I never use)
Increased group membership limits (I make use of my groups ALL THE TIME! A freebie fashionista can NEVER have too many free group slots for store groups, freebie groups, etc. Basic accounts have 42 group slots, but Premium has 70;)
Voice morphing (never used it, myself; most SL users never use voice, anyways)
UPDATE 11:36 p.m.: Animesh (animated mesh) creator Medhue tells me that SL Premium members can attach two animesh items (e.g. pets such as Medhue’s delightful animesh cihuahua), while Basic members can only attach one.
Basically, I have three Premium accounts, with two lovely Linden Homes between them (which I think is the major benefit of a Premium membership). More group space and priority access to overcrowded sims are also perks I tend to use a lot.
A 45-day free trial of the Marvelous Designer software (used to create avatar clothing in Sansar)
Purchase discounts on Marvelous Designer for when you do decide to buy it
An increase in the number of Sansar worlds you can create (frankly, I’m not sure most people bother beyond the free Basic account, which lets you create up to 25 worlds)
Premium users can create larger regions/worlds, have a larger number of regions active at one time, and get priority support and user-created content processing and approval, among other benefits.
AltspaceVR
Surprisingly, Microsoft-owned AltspaceVR doesn’t seem to offer any premium accounts (that may change in the future, though).
VRChat
VRChat Plus offers you the following perks (with more promised soon):
A nameplate icon: With VRChat+, you can personalize your nameplate with an icon you create! Snap a pic in VRChat or upload your own image on our website.
You can send a picture with an invitation to a friend to join you at your location
Free slots for up to 100 favourite avatars (as opposed to 25 for basic users)
“A limited edition VRCat Badge to display on your profile” (Really? Really?!??)
As I said up top, this list is a bit sparse, especially compared to what Second Life offers (and yes, you can be an anime girl in SL, just as easily as you can in VRChat!), but of course, there’s zero VR support in Second Life.
Rec Room
Rec Room offers something called Rec Room Plus at US$7.99 a month, which includes the following benefits:
You get 6000 tokens (r6000) monthly, delivered in installments of r1500 per week
One four-star gift box per week
A 10% discount in Rec Room stores that accept tokens
Exclusive access to the RR+ section of the item store
100 saved outfit slots
The ability to sell premium inventions/keys for tokens
NeosVR
NeosVR uses Patreon levels to hand out perks to various levels of paying users (more info). For example, at my current “Blade Runner” level ($6 per month), I get:
Access to private channels on the official Discord Server
Patreon supporter badge in Neos
Early access to Linux builds
Early Access to Patreon only content (exclusive experiences, work in progress experiences before they’re public)
A Neos Mini account with 25 GB of storage
Your name in the stars! (your name will appear in the sky in the Neos hub)
The ENGAGE educational/corporate/conference social VR platform offers a free, “lite” version, and a premium, “plus” version for €4.99 a month, which gives you space to save your presentations, among other benefits. (They also offer enterprise and educational rates on request.)
Blockchain-Based Virtual Worlds (Cryptovoxels, Decentraland, and Somnium Space)
Of course, the various blockchain-based virtual worlds sell everything using whatever cryptocurrencies they support (for example, a custom, non-randomly-generated avatar username in Decentraland will set you back 100 MANA, Decentraland’s in-world cryptocurrency (which is about US$36 at current exchange rates). It’s just a completely different model than the “freemium” ones offered above.
Thanks to Kent Bye for giving me the idea for this blogpost!
Do you have a question about the ever-evolving metaverse of social VR platforms and virtual worlds? Ask Ryan!
Maribeth asks:
Hi Ryan! My name is Maribeth. I am trying to use virtual worlds to help diabetes patients and others with chronic disease/chronic stress. My colleague and I are thinking about jumping ship from Second Life and it’s really confusing to know which way to turn. Your blog is so amazing! I’d love to pick your brain. I really respect your deep and vast knowledge on the topic. If you’re at all open to chatting, please let me know. Thanks!
—Maribeth.
Ooh boy, did you ever come to the right place to ask this great question! 😉
But, instead of charging you $25.00, Maribeth, I’ll let you pick my brains for free this time, provided we do it publicly on the RyanSchultz.com blog…after all, I am the Freebie Queen of Second Life, plus quite a few other platforms, to boot! 😉
And, in this case, I have an easy answer for you. If you are getting tired of Second Life and are looking for something similar to replace it with, but with all the latest bells and whistles (like a webcam-based avatar facial animator), may I recommend Sinespace?
Sinespace is based on Unity, which is a cross-platform game engine used to develop both three-dimensional and two-dimensional video games and simulations. This is a different approach from Linden Lab’s Second Life, which built and maintains its own engine from scratch (which means, at the ripe old age of 17, it is getting a bit long in the teeth). This also allows Sinespace to take advantage of the work that is done by countless other Unity developers on other Unity-based apps and games, such as the extremely cool Archimatix tool, which allows you to automagically resize highly complex mesh items in-world (which puts the rather simple move, rotate and stretch in-world building tools in Second Life to shame!).
Even better, male and female avatar fashions are designed to fit EVERY male and female avatar body, respectively. You don’t have to check to see if apparel or footwear are designed for a specific brand of mesh body, like you have to do in Second Life (e.g. Maitreya Lara, Belleza Freya, Slink Physique, Belleza Jake, Signature GIanni, etc.). Also, you don’t have to fuss with a HUD to make parts of your avatar body invisible under apparel; the clothing fits perfectly, and it adjusts if you make any changes to the body sliders! Another advantage of basing Sinespace on Unity.
Oh, and did I mention that Sinespace has workingin-world cloth physics on skirts and dresses? Check out the videos to see it in action here and here! And Sinespace supports both desktop users, and users in virtual reality headsets! There’s also a web browser-based client. You can even run Sinespace on your mobile device!
Oh, and also, while Second Life struggles with lag when over 50 avatars are in a single sim, Sinespace has already demonstrated that its worlds can handle up to ten times as many avatars (the latest record achieved in testing, Adam tells me, is 499 avatars in a single region). And those regions can be mind-bogglingly large, too, not just restricted to 512 square metres. In fact, Adam tells me that the largest Sinespace region to date is a staggering 8 km by 8 km in size, with an 8 km vertical space! Think of what you could do with all that virtual real estate!
Unfortunately, the pandemic has also delayed Sine Wave Entertainment’s plans for an splashy official launch of Sinespace, complete with a advertising blitz, until 2021. Trust me when I say this: Sinespace is going to attract a lot more attention from SL folks (and other quarters) next year. And if Second Life should ever stumble in future, Sinespace is perfectly positioned to welcome the refugees. In fact, many SL content creators have already set up shop in Sinespace, such as Abramelin Wolfe of Abranimations.
However, if you are loath to work your way up a new learning curve, may I suggest you investigate the incredible myriad of OpenSim-based virtual worlds? (Ironically, Adam Frisby of Sine Wave Entertainment was one of the founding developers for OpenSim, before he started his new company and focused on Sinespace and Breakroom.) Much of what you already know about Second Life can be directly transferable to OpenSim, and the prices for things such as land rentals are often significantlycheaper.
Another advantage of Hypergrid-enabled OpenSim worlds is that you can even take your avatar from one grid to another! However, one disadvantage of OpenSim is that platforms tend to rise and fall with alarming regularity, so stability is an issue (witness the sad saga of InWorldz/Islandz for an example of what can happen). Also, the network effect means that no single OpenSim grid will ever rival Second Life for its sheer reach and (relatively) massive audience.
So, the executive summary of my answer is: if you don’t want to work your way up a new learning curve, go with OpenSim; otherwise, go with Sinespace.
