Today Lindens are going to close the grid to change the look and feel of the world forever.Yup, it is one more update. As official Linden's blog says there will be couple of fixes, some new minor features and introduction of sculpted prims. There was some talk about sculpted prims last weeks and if you are adventurous enough to go to the beta grid you could see them live.
So, let's see what's expecting us tonight. One does not need to be psychic to know that grid will be down more than announced and that lot of things will not work when we finally get our new clients and log in. That's the way things go. This time, it will be worth it.
Picture taken from Second Life Wiki under Creative Commons license
- The world will look different. Not in Thursday, not even by the end of the week, but very soon, the world will change forever. That "primy" look, things that looks like they are made of spheres and boxes (as they really are) will go in history. They will not disappear, but they will be out of fashion. New look, rounded, smooth and more natural will be seducing our eyes.
- Non-human avatars will become more realistic. Well… you know what I mean… less like dolls and robots from 60's Sci-Fi. Humans and humanoids will improve too. It seems that everybody agrees that first things that will be made will be new genital and breasts attachments. Knowing how things are going in second life, it wouldn't be surprising at all.
- Things will (hopefully) be lighter for our computers, servers and bandwidth. One of the questions that many residents worried about was "will my computer be able to handle new graphics?" Yes, it will. Actually, it is expected that most of the objects made this way will be "easier" on our computers than similar objects done old way. More details will be achieved by less number of prims. Will the grid behave better then? Let's hope so.
- There will be a nice turbulence in economy. As new nice-looking things are coming on the market, the price of old, primy stuff will fall. Those things will look bad and out of fashion. Many will become freebies. In couple of months newbies will use the things you were wanting so badly but couldn't afford them when you were that young.
- It will be possible to build off-line. I am not sure if there will be in-world editor for sculpties but, to be honest, I never payed attention. Sculpted prims can be done in external 3D modeling software (Maya and Blender for now) and then exported. If you ever tried to build in second life and in 3D modeling software, you know why so many people are happy about this. Your friends cannot hang around and chit-chat with you while you are building, but you can everything else. Blender is open-source, free and cross-platform. There is nice explanation how to export things from Blender to Second Life by Amanda Levitsky. Another nice (and quite simple) tool is Rokuro (windows version only).
So, go on the grid while you still can and get some photos of the world as it is now. In a couple of months, those snapshots will be memorabilia of the good old days.
prva!