Shockwave Yareach’s Valentine Maze

By DrFran Babcock

 Do you know Shockwave Yareach, or Shocky, as his friends call him? Recently, he became the object of some controversy when his suggestion for fixing problems with SL land ownership were highlighted by Hamlet Au, and tons of comments ensued. (http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2013/01/second-life-land-solution.html ) This hunky wolf has been in Second Life for many years, and has become renowned for his scripting skills and diabolical mazes. I can understand confounding everyone on Halloween, but Shocky doesn’t even let up for Valentine’s Day. I was informed that the maze was up the other night, and figured I would go take a look.

First things first, I am not a gamer. My skills at Second Life took ages to evolve, and the thought of a maze—even one with such a loving theme—filled me with fear. I was not disappointed, nor will you be, if you take a trip to Shocky’s Valentine Maze at: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Sunweaver%20Space/191/136/61

When you land at the teleport point you will be greeted by a riot of red roses, that make up the walls of the maze. Spend some time inside and you will become completely disoriented, as the walls pass around you, red and seemingly unending. However, the first thing you need to do is grab a HUD from the box to the left of the entrance. After you apply that to your screen display you will note that is ready to be filled with gems that represent the qualities of love: Strenth, Adoration, Faith, Wisdom, Respect, Patience, and Dedication. Aaaah, but how does one find these gems? Of course, the answer to that lies within the maze, and the wicked candy hearts that are traveling along through the maze, each heart corresponding to a colored gem. The goal is to find all seven hearts and touch them as you do. This will light up the gem on your HUD. One of the sophisticated features provided by our fearless furry is that the gems stay on the HUD, even if you log or teleport elsewhere. This means that you can finish the maze in more than one visit without any penalty. Sounds easy? Well, Shocky says: “Love sounds easy, too. at first (grin)."

This is such a perfect activity for couples. Run through the maze, search for hearts, and discuss the qualities of love, as identified by Shockwave. There are no prizes beyond the joy of completing the gems on the HUD, but who cares. Love is the greatest gift.
I caught up with Shocky as I was putting the finishing touches on this article and we spoke about his mazes and his love for Second Life. I had forgotten the famous Easter Maze in which you had to shoot the Alien Eggs before they killed you. Shockwave plans to run that again this Easter. “It’s a good excuse to shoot up the place with your favorite gun,” he adds.

I asked him what he liked about Second Life, and he replied: “Second Life is to me a graphical version of a Muck— a user created world where you can do anything, be anything, and push away all the limitations of distance. (http://en.wikifur.com/wiki/MUCK ) “My friends and my group keep me here.  I love these loons and I enjoy building fun stuff.  I build in Real Life, too, so the LEGO aspect is just as important to me as the socialization.  But honestly, it's my friends that keep me here.”

The geeks amongst you will understand this next part, even though I don’t. Shocky’s mazes are computer generated, and when he had a full sim to work with: “My gear can make a maze that covers an entire sim. You put a prim down at the Southeast corner of the sim, drop in a text file, and it rezzes the walls as needed. I could change it hourly if I wanted.  It's very fast.”

Thanks, Shocky, for your genius, and for what I know of you as a gentleman wolf and fine builder and scripter. Go visit the maze, and maybe you will be lucky enough to run into Shocky. Say hello for me!

DrFran Babcock