Virtual Yosemite

Wandering around SL the other day, I was informed of a place called Virtual Yosemite. It is touted thusly: "Enjoy the natural scenery of Virtual Yosemite. This virtual version of the famous national park in the USA is an example of a whole new generation of sculpted off-sim environments by Sominel Edelman (Landscapes Unlimited). More info at http://landscapesunlimited.blogspot.com."

I don't know what I was expecting, but when I got there, whatever original expectations I'd had were quickly shattered. This is one of the best sims I've seen on the grid in a long long time, and the effort really shows. It's a pretty open sim, surrounded on all sides by off-sim mountains representing the area around Yosemite. There's a little campground, a store to buy the off-sim mountains and environments, a little wooden lodge, and... well, that's it, really, but no one ever said a sim had to be full to bursting of prims to be attractive. I looked around and then got in touch with the creator of this wonderous landscape, Sominel Edelman, to talk to him about his masterpiece of Virtual Yosemite.

Sominel Edelman, "Hi, welcome!"

Xymbers Slade, "This is quite the landscape. I haven't seen many, if any at all, better than this one in a long time. (smile) How long did it take to design all of this and put it together?"

Sominel Edelman, "It may very well be unique in SL; about a month, perhaps even a bit more. I've used a new technique on this one. That's why it takes so long, the first one is the hardest."

Xymbers Slade, "Was it a difficult process? Or do you find generating landscapes comes natural to you?"

Sominel Edelman, "The technology can be difficult, but the process of sculpting itself is fun. Nothing but fun (smile). I'm a geographer myself in real life. I studied landforms like these."

Xymbers Slade, "What got you interested in landscapes specifi... well, I guess that answered that, then. Heh."

Sominel Edelman, "At first I did jewelry, but I didn't find that very motivating. I'm not a jewelry type of guy (grin)."

Xymbers Slade, "So you go around looking at landscapes all the time?"

Sominel Edelman, "No, I don't go around that much. Except in real life, I love to travel there, visit new places. in Second Life, I'm mostly just busy making new things."

Xymbers Slade, "I guess I was expecting to see Old Faithful or something here. I don't see it included... didn't want to add the most famous part of the place?"

Sominel Edelman, "Uhm... Old Faithful is part of a different park (grin). That's Yellowstone, this is Yosemite."

Xymbers Slade, "Shows how smart I am, I have the direction sense of a brick and the geography sense of a bag of apples."

Sominel Edelman, "This is what it should look like: http://www.yosemitedistrict.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/yosemite1.jpg "

Xymbers Slade, "What do you use to make these kinds of wonderful landscapes?"

Sominel Edelman, "A few 3D programs and a couple of scripts. I won't be very specific about that.... I'm sorry."

Xymbers Slade, "Ah, ok, no problem. I can understand not wanting to 'reveal trade secrets.' Is there something you want to do landscape-wise but can't, due to limitations in SL or something else?"

Sominel Edelman, "Well... The amount of detail you can get in off-sim builds is not that big. It would be great to be able to use mesh, but meshes can't be that big."

Xymbers Slade, "I wasn't aware meshes had a limit but then again I don't build."

Sominel Edelman, "The waterfalls, for example, I wish I could make a more natural shape. They can just be 64x64x64 meters... this is 1024x1024 so they [mesh] would be way too small."

Xymbers Slade, "What's your next planned project? I find this hard to top off the top of my head."

Sominel Edelman, "I do have the Grand Canyon high on my list, but... there are not that many trees there, and I do love the off-sim trees."

Xymbers Slade, "Heh. Maybe add a little creative artistry then and add more trees (grin). I've never been out there so I don't have a clue (I live in a major city, so)."

Sominel Edelman, "I have a couple of other environments that I want to make, I think they should all be on the Unesco World Heritage list."

Xymbers Slade: "You mean the Grand Canyon isn't?"

Sominel Edelman, "I want to go all over the world (smile). It is, this is too, but it should be special to people, and well-known all around the world."

Xymbers Slade, "Ok, last question in this little rapid-fire... do you do commissions?"

Sominel Edelman, "How do you mean, commissions?"

Xymbers Slade, "Like if someone asked you for a specific landscape or skybox (off the top of my head I know a dragon looking for a new lair, so to speak)."

Sominel Edelman, "No, in general I don't. I did that for a while, but it made me go off-track. I want to keep my focus."

Xymbers Slade, "I know what you mean (smile). Keeping focus is definitely a skill in Second Life when there is so many things to see/do/create and whatnot."

Sominel Edelman, "And, it's hard to create something someone else has in mind. They can almost never show me a picture, and that makes it hard."

"That's great, thank you Xymbers! How did you find this place?"

Xymbers Slade, "Honestly, my editor mentioned it to the rest of the reporters and went 'who wants it?' --- I haven't done a piece in months, so I said I'd take it on. (smile)"

Even as a big open space, it's a wonderful quiet spot for when you need to unwind from the hustle and pixel-flavored mayhem of SL. Without a doubt I'm giving it 5 Dragon Hoards out of 5, and I'm not even a huge wilderness buff!

Virtual Yosemite can be found at the Landscapes Unlimited sim: Landscapes Unlimited, (99/143/22)

Xymbers Slade

The 8-Bit Area

A few weeks ago, I got hungry for cleaning out my landmarks folder and went to visit some of the oldest landmarks I had to see if they were still up and running. One of these places was the "8 Bit Area", over in the Leiter sim. Originally it was a place where you could walk around in a floating 8-bit land, complete with [?] Blocks, coins to pick up, a chain chomp bouncing around, and a small store with various 8-bit items inside. There was even a "death" function, where if you fell off into the water, or got crushed by a Thwomp, you'd "die" and thus get teleported home. Anyone got a 1-Up handy?

So on this trip, I found that the place had been regulated to "archive" status. No longer active and down what appeared to be about half its land, now there was a "landmark block" sitting in front of the store. This led to a place called Electrobit City, on the Electrobit City sim.

Teleporting there, it was quite the surprise. Decked out with a Super Nintendo (well, Famicom) as its centerpiece, the place has what appears to be a club inside it, and various nooks and crannies to explore. Wandering around, I found what seemed to be a tutorial "pole" that when touched, created a little "buddy" that showed you around the place and explain a couple of things to do (like climb the pole, or stand in certain areas to make "!" symbols appear that you can click on).



Then, there was the "VR Node" in the corner. Clicking on the picture on its side activated it, and when the "!" appeared to click on, I was whisked away to a REAL 8-Bit area. There are many pipes to jump into and around (some with "!" you can click on to go from one pipe to another)... there are Goombas to squish, Thwomps to avoid, coins to collect. If you're hit by a Thwomp it sends you down a long shaft of death where you're sent back outside to the front of the Famicom at the start of the sim.


I'll say this right now. Five Dragon Hoards out of five, immediately. The effort put into this really shows and there are a lot of things to see and do. I'd known the original creators had been wanting to do a LOT with the original 8-bit area up in Leiter but after so many years of being in "stasis", I'd thought the place abandoned. It's really good to see that it was not given up on and that something like this now exists on the grid... with a lot more to come, I expect. There are two "lands" right now, but I figure there will be more as time progresses.

I'm currently in the process of tracking down the creators for an interview, and when I have it, I'll post it here.

Xymbers Slade

Random Ride Through the Stargate

On a particularly boring day last week I decided to simply fire up the ol' Stargate and see where a series of "/d Random" commands would take me. As the Stargate is pretty old technology on the grid, I figured the only places I would end up at would be older-than-dirt abandoned areas long forgotten by the pixels of time and barely worth a mention.

Boy, was I ever wrong.

/d Random

First stop took me to the Grayling Army Airfield (Grayling Airfield sim; 13, 128, 29). It's a nice little military base sim, with planes, bombers, and things of that nature. As I prefer the medieval past instead of that which is technologic, I only stayed for a short time and did a once over at the maximum range of my camera. The effort shows in the building of the sim, and appeared to be anything -but- an "abandoned place forgotten by the pixels."

/d Random

Stop #2 on my list of ten took me to Trinity Products and Defcon 1 (Amella sim; 34, 29, 128). After emerging on the floor above where the stargate was (not even the stargates are safe when you route teleporting to a set point), I had a look around to find that it was full of transformers and Star Trek things... mostly starships (some of which appear to be flyable versions).

The building also had a lot of barren land around it, making me wonder just how often it was visited. The sim itself looks barren on the world map, quite a bit off the nearest major road. Makes me wonder if they couldn't move it closer to the road so it could be seen by people who have the $L to spend, because they're -not- going to see it from the main road unless they're looking right at it.

/d Random

Off next to "Earth" (Dreamworld Gem sim; 83, 84, 22). It looked to be an office with a pretty neat teleporter effect they set up. But I ran into a dead end as the only way out seemed to be blocked by a large prim, so it was back to the gate after a very brief stay.

/d Random

Chronotis Sec at New Gallifrey (New Gallifrey sim; 161, 71, 3273) was by far the most impressive place I found on my travels. It looked like a bit of a Dr. Who museum, with a couple of doors off to one side of the landing point declaring "Beware of BOB." Naturally, I went straight for the doors.

Bob's a dinosaur. A Triceratops, to be exact. Unfortunately, I encountered him in a bit of a spot --- he'd ended up with his nose to the door I emerged from, and one of his hind legs had gotten caught in the rocks behind him... such is the fate of objects left "physical" in SL, I suppose.

I was VERY VERY impressed by the amount of work done on the area I did explore. The textures were amazing, and I smiled to myself as I found I'm not the only one to retexture both the outside -and- the inside of the "anywhere doors" used to get from one place to another.

5 Stars, hoards, or whatever. I would suggest going to see this build.

Dr. Who isn't my thing, so after about 20 minutes of looking around...

/d Random

My next stop was Fisher Island (Fisher Island sim; 192, 118, 3002). As it was 3000 meters in the sky I figured it was going to be some sort of hidden base or something just as interesting.

It wasn't. It was a flat featureless megaprim with a stargate. NEXT!

/d Random

I didn't stay very long at Vico (Vico sim; 200, 78, 701). I ended up on someone's build in the sky that was currently in progress, and they'd set a stargate out to accept random wanderers on the network. A quick hello, a quicker goodbye, and it was off again on my trips through the stargate network (double-checking my co-ords for these locations, I went back a few days later to find only empty air, resulting in a 700-meter skydive). Whee!

/d Random

It was off to the Rizzo sim (Rizzo sim; 48, 40, 501), which ended up a tiny shop in the sky, appropriately named the "Little Shop". This one had TWO stargates in close proximity to each other, so when I next triggered one, I'd trigger them both. The shop itself had a couple of vendors, but as they seemed to be Dr. Who vendors... yeah, time for me to "choose a gate". Triggering the stargates, one of them was about three times as slow on the rotations. I don't know why that is.

I tried triggering my home gate before hitting a random one --- only one succeeded, the other one shut down as "gate not found".

/d Random

I wound up at the campsite of the "civil barbarian" Aaron Kukulcan (Adeo sim; 20, 84, 38). This DID seem like an old spot to me and just had that "empty" vibe going. On the world map the area looks mostly undeveloped. It's on a small set of three private islands though, and who am I to judge... perhaps they wanted it mostly undeveloped wilderness as a nice and peaceful place to relax in.

Another two stargates, but the first choice lead directly into a packed sim (as in, 20 people near the landing point) with a sim name that sounded like it was a den of vampires. Not wanting to end up fed to the undead, I picked the second of the two gates.

/d Random


The result was the Destiny Isles, a solitary wilderness sim (Destiny Isles sim; 69, 153, 22). I laughed when I did a search a week later to find there is not only a Destiny Isle sim, but a Destiny Isles sim (with an s) as well.

It carried the "old" vibe, as if it hadn't been used in a while. Nothing spectacular to see here, unless you count the terraformed box canyon as part of "not being spectacular". It was the most creative use of terraforming I'd seen in a while and for a brief time considered doing it to my dragon cave and layering a megaprim over it as its roof. But since I have changed the appearance of my home four times in the last 5 weeks, I thought... nah.

Still, a very good job to the sim owner. The effort shows.

/d Random

My final stop ended up being a private residence, so I'm withholding the location.

Let me just say two words. Murphy's Law.

After that, I knew it was time to stop warping myself through space, time, and the grid, so I did a quick "/d wyv" and headed home.

So it does seem that not only is the stargate network not an abandoned piece of technology as I originally thought, but it is in fact thriving. You can get a free modifiable stargate at OS Labs over in Eternal Calm (210, 49, 22). It's about 125 prims though, so you'd better have room for it.

Xymbers Slade