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There Inc - Propagating the Bad of Society?
An anonymous reader writes "A former beta tester has written up a negative, but interesting, review of the 'virtual world' MMO title There. While it mainly contains sarcastic remarks directed at the game mechanics (or lack there-of), near the end it also claims that There is 'a mirror of the shallowest possible view of American consumerist society.' It concludes by saying that There is missing anything that would classify it as a game, and that as a chat service it capitalizes on 'our society's tendency to believe that being attractive is a prerequisite for being accepted by others.' Should developers try to be aware of whether their game will reproduce negative trends already present in real life?" We recently ran a story on the official launch of There, a game that has its fans as well as its detractors.
The author mentioned Second Life on page three, which is also where the crux of the review lies.
I haven't played Second Life (though I have been accepted into the beta), it seems to offer a lot more gameplay than There does, and looks to be a more innovative title, offering users the ability to edit their world, and create any object they can imagine, given they're adapt and patient enough to work with their rudimentary 3d modeling tools.
- colin
I was a beta tester near the very end of the beta. I thought this "game" was really shallow and boring. There was just nothing to do but stand around and talk to people, unless you wanted to pay another $10 to play a game in this "game". "There" was very bad from a technical standpoint, it uses internet explorer as a major engine component and refused to run while Mozilla was my default browser. Then there is the cost of "There". Looks cheap at first, and it is if you were a beta tester (all of the stuff about to be mentioned costs a total of $30 for beta testers). But if your the average player the costs will shoot through the roof before you even play. $20 to start, $30 for sound, $50 for a graphics pack. Then $5 bucks a month. Then the fees to get anything done in there, $5 bucks to buy virtual shoes, $5 more for a shirt, $5 more for a buggy ride. This is all real money. Then your limited to 640x480 res and the poor graphics make a GeForce4 TI 4600 and P4 2.4GHz chug. It's the most lacking and expensive online "game" I've ever seen. Even the notoriously buggy anarchy online played better at launch than There does now.
If you want a good online gaming experiance stick with everquest, anarchy online or dark age of camelot. Heck, diablo 2 or even just something like UT offer a better online experiance. There just isn't worth it.
Second Life looks to be a much better "game." Stephenson's Metaverse is often refrenced. Second Life looks to be closer to a Metaverse then There.
Second Life seems to encourage player content and player control. It is interesting how players are rewarded for makeing good content. Players are able to charge other players fees for products, land, and access to land (services). There are monthly stipends with bonuses for high, player generated, ratings. There are tools for radically altering a characters apearence, and building almost anything. The scripting language looks to fairly powerfull. Players can even alter terrain.
I find it equally interesting that I was able to learn about Second Life through there own online documentation. Second Life seems to be quite open about what there "game" is. Whereas most links on the There website require an account to access.
Second Life looks to be a very ambitious project. It will be interesting to see if they can pull it off. I am quite interested if the balance of player control will work, or if Second Life will degenerate into a trollfest like some many other services online.