Second Life

I've been playing an online game called Second Life for about a year and a half now. I'm not entirely sure why I'm still playing it. (By the way, I have absolutely no idea why I'm writing about this, or what my point is going to be)

For those who don't know much or anything about Second Life, I can sum it up like this: it's an online game to go and meet new people, have fun, and waste all your money on a virtual avatar. That is how I see it, anyways. Other people may tell you otherwise, but I'm not any of those other people, so that's the description you'll get from me.

It's a great game, it really is. You've got all sorts of fun stuff to do. For those who like it and don't mind putting money on, you can go shopping, and for those who like shopping but don't want to put any money on (like me) there's even a bunch of freebie stuff that you can sort though and go shopping like that. Actually, it's not at all necessary to spend any money on the game with the amount of free clothes, skins, hair, and shoes spread across the grid (though it is nice to give some money to the designers who made them)

What I personally like doing in Second Life is going on hunts. And tracking down freebie stuff that look nice, but still mostly hunts. I go on a lot of them, even if I don't really unpack any of the stuff until sometimes months later (There was a Twisted Hunt in September of 2012, and I have yet to unpack the majority of the items) And even when I do unpack it all, it takes me sometimes even longer just to sort out through the stuff to see what I like and don't like and keep or throw out. But I enjoy the hunts themselves. The hunts on Second Life are like scavenger hunts: you're shown to a store, given a hunt, and you have to find an object of some sort (unique to each hunt) Some of these objects are big, others are really tiny. Some of the hints are easy, others are frustratingly hard. And some of the prizes are good quality, some are not.

And for those interested, if you have some talent, you can also apply that to Second Life and make money out of it. I'm still trying to figure out how to draw decently with my mouse, since I'm much better using my hand and a pencil and have no tablet, but otherwise I'd already be making clothes. I don't have much of a talent for designing homes, which is what a friend of mine does, and I still need to figure out how to use Blender to use for later projects. You can also make textures and sell them, as well as try and figure out how to make hair or skins, as those seem to make the most money if they're really good quality. Don't get me wrong, clothes are great and all, but there are so many stores in Second Life for clothes. Hair and skins are less frequent, and the higher quality stores can get away with charging a bit extra for their products. Actually, the most impressive thing you could do would be animations. Great high quality animations are a rare find for me (well, free ones anyways. There are a few stores out there) I don't really know how to make animations like dancing and walking and basically anything non-static, but I read somewhere that for the better quality stuff, you need some motion capture stuff.

'Course, I have a pitiful amount of money that I've made without any of that. There are also contests that you can enter. Mostly photography ones from what I see (I don't really look out for them, so there probably are others out there) But those usually require very good computers capable of very high graphic settings, very good quality clothes, skins, hair, and so forth, as well as good animations. Well, poses specifically. And my laptop isn't all that great, so I don't really try to go for those contests. But you also get the small contests at clubs. There are a wide variety of types of clubs to go to, but the one I go to is more...kid-friendly, than others I know of (not that it's entirely kid-friendly...) A lot of them have a theme you have to follow, possibly join a group, and then you have a chance at winning some money. This is how I make most of my tiny money. And it's fine for me, because I don't really buy much...like I said, there's a lot of freebie stuff out there.

Most of the reason I actually go to that club is because of the music. I don't really care about the people there (no offense to any of them, I'm just not a social person) or the contest, even though it does get me a little money, but I like listening to new music.

There's a number of other stuff you can do on Second Life, but I don't know much about some of them. You can look those up yourself if you're curious. It's a fun game to play, once you figure out how to navigate the viewer.

I mentioned that I'm not sure why I'm playing it anymore. This is true, despite the fact that I like the music and freebies and stuff. I'm not much of a social person, so I tend to stay away from the things that normally would make it a lot more interesting for me to play. A lot of the things I do ends up being repetitive and boring. And yet I still find myself playing it most days. Maybe I just need to find some other game to play, maybe there really is something about Second Life that is amazing that I'm just not realizing. I don't know. I'm still trying to find that answer. Maybe it's pointless anyways, who can say?

I actually was debating a while back on whether or not to make a blog of Second Life. But upon seeing the amount of fashion blogs out there, I decided against it. There are so many of them...I follow a good amount of them, and that's only a tiny fraction of all of them. Besides, I still have to sort through all my animations. So then I ended up making this random blog. I think I'm happier with this one than I would've been with a Second Life one. Of course, if I do decide to make a Second Life one anyways, it'd be just about me having fun and all, not about fashion. Maybe at worst highlight some hunt gifts for some of the hunts that don't get showcased in the other more popular blogs.

Anyways, I'm not entirely sure why I wrote this post. Maybe it's because I needed something to do while I'm waiting at a club for the current contest to end, maybe some other reason I have no idea about. I don't really know, and I don't really particularly care either. But I can say that Second Life is a game worth checking out.