Arcadia Asylum

By Becky "Sha" Shamen

In the article, "Saving Prims," we said, "... Arcadia Asylum, on the Mieville Pond sim.  Be prepared for an adventure there". A conscious effort was made, to keep that sim from taking over the article, because it was worthy of an article of it's own. Returning there, to take notes and pictures, we realized just how understated the line was. It's more than just "an adventure". This sim is a must see, Great Adventure and should be on everybody's to-do list. Aside from the 1,328 free items, there are several fun adventures, to be discovered there.

The landing point, for the sim, is a courtyard, in front of the Cog & Grog Freebie Center. On the other side of the courtyard, we find a teleporter that goes to the various areas on the sim. The areas include; Tropics, Steam Fair, Graveyard, Hobo Town, The Deeps, Space and The Library. Most of the areas can also be reached by walking, flying or just jumping into the water.

The Deep covers as much area as the surface sim and can be reached in three ways. Within the Cog & Grog, there is a stairway that leads under water. On the dock, next to the Chinese Junk, there is an entrance to Cap'n Nemo's Underwater Observatory, which uses tubes to connect to chambers beneath the surface. You can also just jump off any of the docks, to reach the sea floor. In the deep, you will find underwater habitats, plants, sea creatures. You can even get your own whale or even a kracken. One of the most interesting nautical items, the whirlpool, proved to be be a fun ride. I got one to take home, but, unless I terraform, won't get put out from my inventory any time soon. It has a lot of prims, but can be reduced by removing some of the items that circle the top.

 Taking the teleport to the Space area, we find spacesuits, spaceships, planets and asteroids. The most interesting "space" item is found at the courtyard of the sim landing. There, we find a giant cannon, which shoots a bullet shaped capsule to the moon. I had actually been back to this sim several times, before deciding to click on it and see what it does. Next thing you know, the camera switches to an exterior view of the projectile, with your av inside and stars zipping past. We end up on a lunar surface, staring at our crashed ship, with the earth in the distant background. Fortunately, there is a teleport, near by, to take us back down, but, as long as I'm on the moon, I look around for any other interesting things to explore. Sure enough, among the lifeless rocks there is one that has some color to it and there's a large hole at the base, with a churning mist within. Looking in, it seems to go down to a cavern with large gems on the walls. Naturally, Miss been there, done that, had to go into the cavern. All I will say is that, yes, there is an adventure and I went several times, to learn the way out of the conflict with the lunar inhabitants.

Now, safely back home, on my keyboard, I find myself wondering what other hidden adventures are yet to be had at Arcadia Asylum. You can be sure that this writer will return there many times, in the future. 

 

Hope we see you there,

 

"Sha"

 

From "Sha's SL Stories"

Space Frontier Saturn V Moon Rocket Ride (2009)

By Bixyl Shuftan

About five years ago was when one of the most impressive space builds I'd come across: an interactive moon rocket ride. Even though it was incomplete, it was still very impressive, and a fitting tribute to the Apollo 11 Moon Landing forty years before. This story was originally published in Second Life Newspaper on July 30, 2009.

*  *  *  *  *

It was about forty years ago last week that Apollo 11 went to the moon, mankind landing on an alien surface for the first time in history. Many of us in Second Life know of space areas, such as the International Space Museum, but can one find a place where the moon landing is re-enacted?

The answer: Yes, but it’s not quite finished.

In the Space Frontier Workspace (formerly known as the Space Frontier Sandbox) near the Sci-Lands, there is a Saturn V rocket on a launch tower. Built to scale (two avatars at it’s base in the picture can just barely be seen), the rocket stands high in the air, connected to the red launch tower. The rocket is very realistically detailed, and includes a “sound HUD” for audio from the Apollo 11 mission (does not always work) which one gets by clicking an old-fashioned computer on the launchpad’s corner. This grand build was made by Wicked Quasimodo.

One enters the rocket by clicking on the command module, almost at the top of the Saturn V. The huge vehicle launches at 32 minutes past the hour, every hour, with the tower’s gantry retracting just a few minutes before. If you’re outside, it’s a spectacular sight as the great behemoth launches into the air. If you’re inside the rocket, you’re in for quite a ride.

I had the fortune of speaking to one of the people responsible for the sim, Rocket Sellers. “I was just mitigating some space debris here,” he told me, “impromptu erotic photo studio in the sky. ... I’m the owner of record here, and there’s a crew with cleaning powers. I try to clean politely so they do not reincarnate as pesky griefers.”

Asking about the Moon rocket, “It’s still a work in progress. This is Version Two. Wicked Quasimodo had an earlier build, but Havoc 4 broke it. This one is lower prim, and the lunar module is sculpty. It really should be on NASA property, but there’s no NASA region that will adopt it. He first tried on the NASA CoLab Testbed, but the sim was just too lagy, and there was just too much junk in the sky. So he began working on it here, with the idea it would find a home at NASA for the Apollo 11 Anniversary. Instead, NASA put some posters around with landmarks to here.”

“The first iteration did the whole flight profile, including splashdown back on Earth. ... The last time I took the trip (on this rocket), we only got to lunar orbit. ... I don’t know if it lands yet or not.” Rocket Sellers then mentioned a famous name dropping in, “Last week, we had an avatar named ‘Buzz Aldrin’ visiting here. I asked him if he had taken the Saturn V Apollo 11 ride to the Moon yet. He answered, ‘Yes, 40 years ago.’ ... I don’t believe it’s really Buzz, although I can’t figure out how he got the name. ... I guess Linden Labs is not assiduous about protecting famous names.”

Rocket Sellers invited me to go along for a ride on the Saturn V, and so we and one other person got aboard the command module. And at 32 past the hour, the rocket roared and thundered up into the air. The ride is best seen with Environment set to Midnight, and being a Second Life spaceship, the stages shake a little as it travels upward. Eventually, the first stage falls away, and then the second. Soon, the ship comes to orbit a megaprim Earth, “It’s very beautiful from up here” “Approaching New Guinea.”

There is a black square under the Moon rocket at this stage. Rocket Sellers explained, “That’s the work platform, and also when you transfer to the Lunar Module, it keeps you from falling through space.” The Command Module does have windows that you can see your avatar from the outside. But looking inside through either mouselook or panning, the inside is quite detailed with numerous instruments and panels.

Eventually, the faring on the last rocket stage separated, and the Lunar Module, folded up, appeared. The Command/Service Module then rotated, and connected to it. Passengers could then right-click to board it. The connected ships then went into Lunar orbit. Unfortunately, the ride did not progress any further. It had yet to be finished.

Despite this and the tiny flaws, this reporter, can only consider it a great and memorable build, especially if one is a space fan, or otherwise nostalgic for these glory days of the manned space program.

The Space Frontier Saturn V Moon Rocket is at Space Frontier (154, 126, 137).


“It’s good when a rocket or space person finds the place.”

Bixyl Shuftan

Game Review: Borderlands2

The new first person shooter offered by Gearbox Software is an excellent game in my opinion. The first Borderlands is and was a good game as well. The sequel follows from the original where the vault hunters Roland, Brick, Lilith and Mordecai from the first game discovered the vault. The Vault was an amazing treasure trove of weapons and riches on the planet of Pandora. Disappointed that there was no treasure they wandered off not to be seen again. 

The second Borderlands follows five years later as new vault hunters come to Pandora in search of a new vault. There’s an introduction to the plot before you can pick a new character. The prologue explains that a rare element eridium now is on the surface of Pandora and the Hyperion Corporation is now mining it on the planet.  Handsome Jack runs Hyperion from his spaceship a large H covering the moon. The characters this time are Maya the Siren, Axton the commando, Salvador the gunzerker, and zero the assassin. Each character has a special ability. Maya can phaselock a single enemy and keep it from attacking for a short time. Axton can summon a turret to shoot at enemies for a while. Zero can turn himself invisible. Salvador for a short time can wield two weapons of any kind at once. The other three characters are only allowed to equip a single weapon at any one time. Over time you’ll learn to hate Handsome Jack as the main villain in the game as he does atrocious things.

Borderlands 2 allows character customizing like World of Warcraft. For each of the four characters there are three skill trees you may distribute your skill points that you start to gain at level 5 and up. Maybe I’m nitpicking but gearbox soft could have automatically given your character his or her special ability at level 5, but instead you have to use your first skill point to gain your special ability. However it’s a small thing. As an example the Siren character I play as grease711 her skill tree is geared in Harmony. Harmony lets her bring back other characters in a co-op from dying to getting back on their feet by using her phaselock ability. Overall it’s slanted to being a healer player and helping other players by keeping them from death. I even have the option to shoot other players to refill their hit points or health. A player was shocked that I deliberately shot him and his hit points went back to full. I also dabbled in her elemental damage tree apocalypse. My damage improved as I killed baddies quicker but I lost a lot of my healing abilities. Don’t worry though if you want to reset your skill points for your character it doesn’t cost a lot of money.

The game itself has wonderful graphics and fun gameplay. You start out with lousy weapons but as you progress through the game mowing down baddies you gain bigger and better weapons like an RPG game but with black humor along with a western feel of first person shooting. Once in a while you’ll see treasure chests with either meah or something worth your time or something that makes you go wow!

Also like World of Warcraft your character is asked to do quests helping out various npc/s you gain experience and sometimes a new firearm. It’s your choice whether you want the weapon or just to sell it for money in your pocket. 

The color of rarity goes from white, green, blue, purple, and the very best is orange. The firearms are pistols, shotguns, smgs, assault rifles, sniper rifles, and launchers which fire rockets. The weapons have attributes like reload speed fire rate and how much damage the weapon does per shot and accuracy. Also your character uses shields like a smaller version of energy shields from star trek shows. You’re your shield goes to 0 then you’re vulnerable as any attack hits your flesh instead. You’ll see blood splattered when your shield is off when you’re hit.  Launchers are slow to reload but pack a nasty punch. Pistols do their fair share of damage too and fire faster. Right now my commando has a blue pistol off a quest. Also the weapons that you find have different elements. Fire is very effective against flesh. Shock guns knock down shields fast. Corrosive destroys armored or robotic enemies swiftly. It helps to have elemental weapons in store to wipe baddies out quickly before they have a chance to overwhelm you.

As you progress through the game you’ll meet the characters involved in the story. Each time you meet a new character there’s a dramatic introduction of the character and his or her name. One character an npc you can buy guns from is introduced in a very funny way. A good laugh is a woman npc who you do quests for. A man taunts her for being the leader when he is very sexist against her being a woman. Don’t worry she gets him back.

Eventfully at the end of the game you’ll fight Handsome Jack. The boss fight is an excellent medium between easy and hard so long as you work together with your teammates you’ll down him. And there is a lot of treasure when you defeat Handsome Jack in the final fight so it’s certainly worth your while to fight him over and over again if you want to look for better guns.

After defeating the game there’s a “True vault hunter mode”. It’s a much harder version of the normal game and was very frustrating. Every time your character dies you lose 5% or so of your total wealth as you pay Hyperion to create a clone of yourself. If you’re not careful you could lose a lot of money quickly. One thing an npc says which makes sense in the game, “Money isn’t worth a thing if you don’t spend it.” Don’t be afraid to spend money on something that will greatly improve your character like a new weapon or shield. You’re better off buying upgrades than dying and losing your cash. The more cash you have the more cash you lose per death so hoarding your money is counterproductive.  When you have the chance shop around for a better shield or new weapon. The money you spend will help out your character making the difference between dying once in a while to dying a lot.

The plot itself is fun to follow and adds to the gameplay. Even if you beat the game there’s always the option of trying a new character of a new skill tree to make your character very different. There’s certainly replay value when you play co-op with others. Another neat thing is the voices from your character and the bad guys you fight. The bandits in the game will constantly taunt you or npc/s will ask you to go on a quest in a live voice. The voices sounds legitimate no corny voices in this game. My character the siren will say things like “Cool!” or “I love my powers! “When you phaselock bad guys.

I highly recommend Borderlands 2 to anyone who is a fan of first person shooters or an RPG sort of game. Even after beating the game there’s things for your character to do like leftover quests or the boss from the original borderlands that’s only fightable when you reach the maximum level 50. You can choose to fight him below level 50 but it’s a poor idea as he is impossible to fight and you’ll just lose money dying again and again. 

I haven’t reached level 50 yet, but with the game being fun to play and a joy to look at graphically it’s only a matter of time. 

Grease Coakes