Brothers In Blog

At this point in time I think nearly every major newspaper or magazine has done a story on Second Life. Some articles criticize the latest online craze as a wasteland of social outcasts, introverts, and perverts. Other articles praise Second Life as a bold new frontier bringing the metaverse to the masses. If, by chance, you haven’t heard of Second Life (SL as the “residents” like to call it), then please allow me to explain.

Second Life is the hottest Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing Game (MMORPG) on the Internet today. Games of this genre take place in a massive virtual world in which players create a character (a.k.a. an avatar in SL) and then control that character throughout the game.

When it comes to the two extreme opinions of Second Life, I’m somewhere in the middle. Yes, there was a time when I gushed over Second Life: Oh, the possibilites! A creative limitless environment! An ecomony unto itself! I would ramble on endlessly to anyone that would listen until they grew tired and finally blurt out, “Come on! It’s just a game.”

Blaspheme! A game? Second Life is far more than a game — Second Life is a platform!

Time has passed and my insane excitement for Second Life has faded. I still login and wander around, but the endless possibilities that once existed no longer inspire me to login. Why the change? Simple, I finally woke up and realized that Second Life was just a game and I wasn’t playing it.

But wait, how did Second Life change from a “platform” to “just a game?” To understand my transformed opinion consider what it means to play a game.

First, all games have stated objectives:

• Do something
• Acquire points or money by doing that something
• Collect enough points or money and you advance which allows you to do other things and acquire more stuff

Second, all games have rules:

• You can’t do “this”
• You can’t do “that”
• Go directly to jail. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200

These are fundamental principles the help define a game. In Second Life, there are no stated objectives. You can create an account and just wander around; however, at some point in time you will want to buy or sell something — it’s unavoidable. And once you have participated in the economy, you have officially started playing the game.

That’s the unstated objective of Second Life — participate in the economy. But what about the rules? Yes, all games have rules and while Second Life doesn’t have a “rule book”, it does have a Terms of Service Agreement. Fail to abide by this agreement and you are out of the game — Go directly to jail. Do not pass Go! Do not collect $200!

Created by the inhabitants, Second Life is massive, and extremely impressive. Yes, you can let your imagination run wild and create some amazing things in this virtual world; however, while some may “create” with purely altruistic motives to start, the desire for some easy money eventually wins and at that point, even the purest of “residents” does nothing more than “play the game.”

Barry’s 2-Cents:

I’ve heard of Second Life but have never played it, but I can imagine that for many it is a way of escaping the life they live in reality. Let’s face it, Second Life is like going to the movie theater or taking a vacation. It’s all about escaping our normal day to day confines. And just as the movie and the vacation have an ending, one must eventually log off SL and return to the real world.

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