"Watercolors In The Rain"

By Gemma Cleanslate

When I arrived back at the LEA Welcome Center from "The Bridge," one poster really intrigued me so I went over to Lea29 to check out the installation there. It is "Watercolors in the Rain," and I am so glad I did. This is a wonderful demonstration of real-life work rebuilt in such a successful way in Second Life. "In the real life novel, 'Watercolors in the Rain' (which this sim is based on), a tale of suspense, intrigue, fantasy and mystery unfolds.  As they say, "Art imitates life" and why would it be any different in Second Life? In the book, Watercolors in the Rain, Sorsha, is a very special, mysterious, and rare, white raven from Russia. She and her twin brother, Sasha, are an inseparable team that may not always get along, but come together to help their friends, Moxxie and Crud, solve the mysteries put before them,” is the back story of the sim. 

When you arrive you will be in an outer courtyard where you can just walk across a bridge into a part of the story, or you are offered a tp to various venues all of which you will want to visit. A story tree in each area will help you understand the theme going on there. One big plus to your visit will be a hunt going on. You look for a white raven and by clicking on it will get not only a gift but also a clue to where the the next white raven is found. I came home with a cartload of stuff even though I am not good at hunts.  I will let you follow the story boards as you go along. I went first up and down Main Street checking out the quaint shops, bookstores, kiosks along the street and looking for the raven. I took a carriage ride that offers you tours in that area, to the farm, the top of the hill where a  raven also await you. There is a balloon ride that will take you to another venue. Each has a story tree and its own charm. 

At the last venue I was lucky enough to run into the real-life author who goes by the Second Life name of Surreal Skytower. His name is David J. Lavigne in real-life and he wrote the novel "Watercolors in the Rain." He told me a team put up the installation : 5aba1 Resident ,55aaa Danick, Mollie Tison,  Gearboxclock and himself.  Of his real life book he says, “My novel was published earlier this year. If you are into vampires, werewolves, shapeshifters, Victorian London and Jack the Ripper, this may be the read for you. If not, thanks for checking me out anyway! “ You can find it on Amazon and it looks like it is not his last! I hope you enjoy your visit as much as I did mine. 

The courtyard:   http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/LEA29/128/128/26

Gemma Cleanslate

The Queen of Hearts' Farewell

By Bixyl Shuftan

It's always a little sad when a club closes down. Each represents an idea and a dream, to provide others with a place to have a little fun. Many last less than a year, sometimes just weeks. One, however, lasted for about sevreal years. For eight years, the Romance-themed sim of Mystery entertained visitors in Second Life, with the Queen of Hearts riverboat club as the main area of events for most of this time. It's owner Tygeria Mirabeau and it's manager Amythe Moonlight kept it going year after year through many happy times. But in late June, Tygeria announced to her staff that problems in real life were making her unable to keep up the sim. Friday June 27 would have the last events. So it was with heavy hearts that the staff prepared for one last day of music and dance.

10AM SL time was the start of the "Memory Lane" event, a "come as you are" party, with Amy herself DJing the music. And people came in, not just the regulars, but people whom hadn't been over for a while, including former staff whom had moved on. "Black, I missed you." But they still took things with a little humor, "Aim better next time." Moria the hostess called out, "TP your friends, your man, your girl, your eye candy, and anyone in between."

Amy told everyone, "We are having some dedications to the club and the family we have here tonight ... how I feel about what we build and have built - it's the journey where you meet all the people and help them on the way- that's what makes it special. ... The Queen has been a home to many of us for a long time and some of us for a short time but it's the YOU the people that make it special. ... TONIGHT IS FOR THE PEOPLE!!!!"

The normally 250 Linden prizes for best male and female were raised to 500L each. There was also a jar of candied gummi frogs for anyone to take one. Once in a while, fireworks were placed on the ground, to lauch and explode near the ceiling.

At 12 Noon came the second and final show, and Amy turned over the music to DJ Mac and hostess Aislinp for the "Best in Red" event. There were all kinds of outfits in theme for it. Mac wasn't showing any red at first, so someone joked that it was his underwear that was red. The playful banter continued, between two ladies, "pour some sugar on me." "If you pour sugar on your underwear dear it will not be nice at all, though it will be sweet." "Sugar on underwear....yikes."

Eventually, Mac closed things off with the Club's adopted tune, the last song for an official event here.


Miiiiidnight,
and I'm a-waitin' on the twelve o' five, 
hoping it'll take me,
just a little farther down the line.

And moonliiiiight,
you're just a heartache in disguise,
won't you keep my heart from breaking,
if it's only for a very short time.

Playin' with the Queen of Hearts,
knowin' it ain't really smart,
the joker ain't the only foo-ol,
who'll do anything for you.


"Thank you Mac for a wonderful send off!" Amy told the DJ, then she turned to the crowd, to both the staff and the regulars, "Keep your eyes peeled for notices and IMs. Just give me a couple of days to sort things! We have the staff meeting on Sunday and maybe there will be news then. On Monday we will go to my sim Condunrum as a temporary home."

"Thank you everyone. Look after yourselves and I'll let you all know soon what's happening."

And so ended the last event at the Queen of Hearts riverboat club. As of the day I was writing this, the club was still around, just with no one aboard. It has seen much over the past several years from live music events by a number of singers to costume balls, and of course the scene of romance as couples came for parties both while dating and committed. Then there was the "masked lover" whom for months pursued the object of his affection while still keeping his identity hidden.

The Mystery sim remains up, for now, and there is much to see across the place from the "Alice in Wonderland" exhibit, to the train ride, to the little village tucked away in the valley. But eventually it will fade away into the virtual nether, leaving nothing behind but memories.

For now Amy's sim of Condunrum will take over as the new home for the Queen of Hearts staff and fan group, the Cape Hope club at Conundrum (213, 10, 22),  But for the fans, there's only one true "Queen of Hearts," and she will be missed.

Bixyl Shuftan

LPP Neo: A Place of Floods and Mystery

By Becky Shamen

This location seems to be a real paradox. On the one hand, it is one of the newest sims around, and yet it looks like a civilization, left in ruin by waves of rising sea levels. The Destination Guide gives only a brief description.

"From the fallen lighthouse to the marooned submarine and flooded railway, this house of steampunk style survives amidst a drowned region that is well worth exploring."

At first sight, our eyes tell us that almost all of the three connected sims are covered in water, leaving little else to be seen. Soon, our sixth sense begins to draw us in deeper. Perhaps the water is telling us that there is a great mystery to be found and solved, hidden from our eyes, just beneath the surface. We will need to focus our eyes and look for subtle clues.

A picture is worth a thousand words. This article has been richly illustrated, to assist your preparations in your quest for the truth.

When given a map view, in Destination Guide, we see only the three sims of LPP, Studio4D and Club Zain. When we spot this local map, titled "Water Lost World Project", we have to ask where the lost sim is. Calling the phantom real estate "Endless" doesn't fit either. Endless implies always was, always will be. What premature pralaya has removed all but the idea of this, so called, Endless sim?

When we arrived, on a dock in LPP, there was a submarine moored before us. Before it could be examined, it sank beneath the water. Our original plan included using a boat or sub, to explore the area, but further research revealed this U-boat occupies the only channel, deep enough for a ship, and it is blocked at both ends and too narrow to turn around in. It is truly marooned, but still has some life left to it.

Near by, we find the remains of a fallen light house. It's beacon still shines and rotates, telling us to look around, to learn more of the story. The scene hints at how the land became covered by water. Only a fool would blame this on global warming. Melting ice caps would take years to cover the island with water and allow residents time to build higher. A tsunami could destroy buildings, but the ground water would all drain off in a day. If real life geology can be applied to SL, we must conclude that this sim has been the victim of an earthquake, which has lowered the land (subducted), perhaps by 10 meters, leaving only the hill tops.

If you keep to the paths, between the sparse attractions on these sims, you'll keep your powder dry. Stray a bit and you'll wish you had worn hip boots or a wet suit. There are almost no shopping places here. The main shop has clothing for women and a black ops suit or two for men, but the prices are high, so even Sha would avoid going there. This shop, for Cyber Dolls, has some unique and well textured outfits. It's worth a look, even if you don't buy.

We head North from LPP, along the flooded railway, to Studio4D. The sim is almost entirely covered with a shop that sells dance animations. We tried a few, but at more than twice the price of most, quickly headed for the last sim in the group. The largest structure on the Club Zain sim is called the Main Floor and seems to be built, on stilts, to accomodate for the water. Inside, it's like a mix of dance club and TV studio. It reminds one of the sort of place where shows like "Soul Train" or "American Band Stand" would be recorded.

Just North of the Main Floor building, there is another postdiluvian structure, called the Stadium. It has a large dance floor, made of clear glass, flanked by enough bleacher seating to accomodate all the people that have visited this site, since it's beginning. Music is provided by a state of the art DJ booth, with a crate of vinyl albums and more CD titles than Walmarts stocks. In the center of the dance floor, there is a group of blue and green prims, which, at first seem to be a senseless clutter. As we pan our camera around, we begin to see that there is some planning involved in their placement.

 

A Puzzle

Moving the camera up, for a birds-eye view, we can see these prims have been arranged to form a symbol which is communicating some kind of message. The prims are placed on three levels, which we can study, in an attempt to decipher the symbol. At ground level, 15 blue triangles, all pointing the same direction, are arranged into a large triangle, broken up by progressively smaller ones, all pointed in the same direction. We don't know, yet, which of three directions our attention is being pointed in. About one meter above the floor, three green triangles sit above the blue ones on the floor. This way of "highlighting" tells us to look in the direction of the DJ booth. Higher still, we find 12 green bullets, arranged in a circle, all pointed to it's center. Had they been spaced equally around the circle, they might suggest a clock face or time. These bullets have left a gap from 10:30 to 12:00, which could mean either the time has not arrived or has been cut short. We are being given a message about this DJ, or perhaps DJs in general. Either their time has yet to come or it has been cut short. We will need more clues, to get the whole story.

The thing is, everywhere you go, there are odd things, found strewn about, that could be another clue. In writing this article, we returned many times to see things that we had passed before, thinking them odd but unimportant, but now that the puzzle was being pieced together, they began to fit and fill in more detail. The return visits also turned up new things that hadn't been seen before. In SL, when you click on a door, it opens. We found two doors, one on the ground and the other on the base of the abandoned bridge. They should not have opened to anything, but when clicked gave the message that we were not allowed to enter. Knowing that there were no others on the sims, we used the cam to pan around to the backside of the doors and find a chair or pose ball to sit on and poof, we were inside forbidden areas and finding more clues. At the base of the bridge, this technique got us into the "Stray Sheep Diner". This is one of the most developed spots yet. It is very detailed and full of possible clues. It is difficult to understand why the doors are locked. We can only hope that entering doesn't get us banned.

We could tell you much more about this adventure, but our goal is to tempt readers into having adventures of their own. Test your Sherlock Holmes skills and solve the mystery of TPP neo.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/LPP%20NEO/183/88/22
 

 Becky "Sha" Shamen