SLWTF - A Second Life travelogue by Garth Goode

I was wandering around Sasebo City when I found this little auto shop. Sometimes, it’s just too easy.

They make up for the Engrish by having what is certainly in the running for Cutest Building Ever.

There are a lot of auto shops in Sasebo City and nearby Nagasaki. Why? Because just beyond Nagasaki is the Skyblue Raceway, a well-designed racetrack, naturally.

While the Skyblue region isn’t lovely, the track itself is just challenging enough to keep you on your toes, with lots of nice twists and turns. In order to keep the track free of random obstructions, you an only rez cars in the pit area stalls.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Sasebo%20City/109/48/24

http://slurl.com/secondlife/SKYBLUE%20Raceway/221/149/23

…you find the funniest things. Seriously, I zoomed out on the map so that I couldn’t even see individual islands, selected a telehub and ended up in Sarah’s Playland. It turned out to be a sex fetish mall. I wandered around for a bit (strictly for research purposes, of course), when I found this cute little bear. He’s just a landmark giver, but he’s also a memorable marketing gimmick. Now if Kinky-O only sold these little ball-gag bears….

http://slurl.com/secondlife/SarahsPlayIsland/70/184/27

I’ve submitted an entry into the Superhero photo contest over at Chillers. The winner will be determined by which photo earns the most L$. All proceeds go to Relay for Life. So come on down and vote if you are willing and able. Thanks!

Hey, you’re supposed to vote fo me, not that half naked lady! Hey! Stop that!

http://slurl.com/secondlife/FOOKERS/195/21/23

If you’re looking for a way to get away from it all, what better way than to go to a carnival? This makes some sense… unless it’s Rezzable’s Carnival of Doom. Oh, it’s a great place to visit. Just don’t expect it to be safe.

You show up and put on a free ticket HUD that lets you enjoy all the rides and games. The HUD has a health meter… well, you know where I’m going here. Make the wrong choices, and your fun little ride becomes an appointment with death. And when you die, you go to… but that woud be giving it away.

Someone at Rezzable has a sick sense of humor. Beyond the games and rides are a hall of freaks and a fortunte teller who won’t tell you what you want to hear.

A lot of the more dangerous rides look like they are still under construction, which was a bit of a dissapointment. Because, in a way, it was kind of fun to find out just how twisted this carnival could be. I guess I’ll just have to keep visiting to see what else they build…

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Carnival%20of%20Doom/184/68/26

Zee wreckage of zee Santa Rosa lies deep in dangerous waters. Naturally, I sent my son Philippe down to explore. I always send Philippe. Zee wreckage was surrounded by a school of poisonous deep sea scrod, and the curious fish moved to examine zis intruder into their realm. Unfortunately, Philippe is a very slow swimmer. Fortunately, I have more sons.

For all the water in Second Life, we don’t spend a lot of time under the surface, probably because there’s nothing much there. Most SL water is for swimming on or sailing on (or, frankly, making for beautiful sunset pictures).

PADI Group is a real-life diving company that would like to whet your appetite for the real thing by giving you that experiance in Seond Life. While a good portion of their Dive World region is taken up by land, there is still plenty of space for some interesting sights under the sea.

Strangely enough, PADI doesn’t offer any freebie diving gear. There is, however, an atoll attached to their island where a variety of vendors can get you suited up. I bought a package from Heps Virtual Divesystems and jumped into the water.

A word to the wise: Read the instructions before you go diving wth equipment like this. Under the water you get nice swimming animation and bubbles, but I couldn’t figure out why I couldn’t just move up and down the normal way. After a lot of frustration I finally gave in, checked my male genes at the door, and read  the manual.

Under water, there is plenty to see. Manta rays, squid, whales, shipwrecks, and strange smoking… somethings. Maybe a information would be helpful here. PADI is very good at placing underwater signs here and there that suggesting that you might want to try diving for real. Whatever.

Back on land, if you join the PADI group you can rent a DPV, a little motorized device that will move you faster under the waves. In theory you can also use a personal submarine just offshore, but that doesn’t work. The same goes for a gear demonstrator in the main building. The buttons you click for information don’t give you information. There’s a very sparse club on one corner of the island. So while the undersea experience is lovingly executed, the stuff on shore is a work in progress.

No matter. In Dive World, what’s under the water is all that matters.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Dive%20World/123/134/29

For reasons of blog space and sanity I try to limit myself to no more than six pictures per blog post. Otherwise I’ll show you everything there is to see in a region, and then what’s the point of you going? I like to leave you a littlemystery. That said, it was damned hard to narrow down the thirty or so pictures I took of Saarpfalz Kreis (Saarpfalz Circle, in English), where the main attraction is a magnificent castle in the sky.

Just outside the gates to the castle is what seems to be a wizards laboratory, but I had to cut that picture. Just inside the gates is one of those nice touches I love. Two skeletal guards in armor watch over the palace entrance. You head up the stairs and then you notice that their heads are always turning so they can keep an eye on you. (Okay, and eye socket on you).

Hey, there’s a table, and it’s round! Hmmm. There are a number of interesting rooms like this in the castle — you just have to go looking for them. I’d have shown you more of them but I had to cut those pictures.

The palace stands on floating rock, and if you find an entrance to the underground areas (underground areas in the sky?) you’ll find yourself in a maze of maze of twisty little passages, all alike. Well, actually, they aren’t all alike. Some are rough stone, others are bricked, and there are huge chambers, as well. But I had to cut most of those pictures.

Down on the ground is a lake surrounded by a village and a forest. This includes what appears to be a church courtyard, but I decided not to use those pictures. There’s also a non-working clock in the lake. I have no clue what that is for.

In one corner of the region is a welcome area where a greeter robot exhorts you in German to enjoy yourself. I agree. The region is decidedly empty, which is a shame. It doesn’t appear to be tied to any roleplay group and there are none of the usual things meant to attract visitors. It just stands there on it’s own, content you please you on the strength of it’s merits.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Saarpfalz%20Kreis/117/44/243

Yes, my minions, kneel before me! Know that I, Garth, am your master. You may be grey, you may be Ruthed, you may be naked, but you’re mine! Bwah-ha-ha-ha-ha!

Okay, they’re not my worshipers. I don’t have worshipers, that I know of. These are a just bunch of particularly well-hidden bots on Echo Island. Usually I see them milling around in a skybox. This bunch looked so dutiful kneeling there that I had to take a picture.

For those of you who don’t know what bots are: Have you ever gone to an island that looked like it had a lot of people on it from the number of green dots on the map, but when you get there the place is empty? Chances are the place is using robot avatars (bots). Usually they’re sitting on poseballs in the sky or hidden in a windowless skybox.

The bots are just like any other user, only there is only one person behind the group of them. Having bots on the land increases the visitor count and thus improves the landowners position in searches. No one thinks it’s particulrly ethical, but people continue to do it because, “everybody does it.” Until Linden Lab finds a way to ban bots, people will keep using them.

This group was especially well hidden. As I increased altitude to find the skybox, I was suddenly ejected from the region by a security system. That’s the first time I’ve seen someone take hiding their bots so seriously.

Not to be deterred, I returned to the region, put on my shield, went non-physical and soon I was gazing at my kneeling acolytes. The owner even went so far as to hide them in a skybox made of invisibility prims, so someone flying casually by at 752 feet won’t see them.

Of course, I couldn’t resist sending a copy of the picture to the landowner, who will just have to be that much more clever next time.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/ECHo%20Island/19/155/752

Estonia is the third nation to build an official virtual embassy in Second Life. As buildings go, the embassy is a magnificent piece of modern architecture. It makes you wonder how they did it.

The only problem with the building is that it is a cold grey and white. Grey carpets, white walls, white furniture. The occasional dash of blue. It’s beautiful and futuristic and reflects the colors of the Estonian flag, but bland.

Luckily the helpful staff and selections of Estonian artwork add color and interest The missed opportunity is surprising: No displays about Estonian history, culture, or why ou might want to travel there. On the other hand, this is an embassy, not a tourism office.

On the top floor is the most interesting piece of artwork. It’s a blue head. Click different parts and a short paragraph is displayed, the imaginative recollections of a person in a distant future. It definitely gets you thinking… “Why not?”

The main attraction is still the building, though. It’ a very complex “real life” piece of work. Just take a walk around inside and you’ll know what I mean.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Virtual%20Estonia/202/135/29

Mazda Nagare Island is Mazda Motor Europe’s virtual showcase for their Hakaze show car. Since the Hakaze isn’t something you can actually buy in real life, the island is more of an image builder for Mazda. While they haven’t gone to any great lengths to build a gathering place or community, there are some nice diversions.

The main atraction is the Hakaze car. If it looks odd it’s because, well, it’s a show car. That said, the model is very well executed and looks remarkably like the real thing, complete with rippled metal and ginormous windshield. While the car is a freebie, you have to drive it around the island-encompassing track and make a successful jump in order to make it yours. You can have the car in any color you like, as long as it’s yellow. There are no gears to shift, yet the car is surprisingly easy to control for a Second Life vehicle.

Hakaze kites and boards

Take a walk to the docks and you can pick up a free board and kite, which you can then kite-surf through a well-marked water course. It’s harder than it looks, especially the jumps. Why kite-surfing? Because the Hakaze concept is supposed to represent the emotional embodiment of wind-surfing, that’s why. Although after failing at the jumps a few too many times, for me the emotional embodiment of wind-surfing is frustration.

The island is named for an earlier concept car, the Nagare. If Mazda is periodically updating the island to include different concept cars, I’m looking forward to seeing what they drop into Second Life next.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Nagare%20Island/185/114/38

Friends don’t let friends SL on Ruth.

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