Athena’s Second Life: Part Two - The World at Large

When I originally decided to embark on Second Life, I didn’t quite expect I’d be still finding the finer details of the game out. Generally when you start up a game, you peruse the instructional book and then toss it aside and learn the rest as you go through the game. However, Second Life (”SL” as it’s referred in-game.) is a cruel monster if you’ve got the patience of a hamster and not enough time on your hands to really dig in and get dirty. (Trust me, I got plenty dirty — that part comes later.)

At the beginning, my character and her skin was all that concerned me and I was fine with that. Play dress up with the electronic doll and move on, you know? Then things started to change and I was lead into the big, bad world of the hideous scabs that were patched all over Second Life - and those are the Freebie shops. While some of them are essential for beginners, they’re always in the middle of nowhere and completely overrun by boxes, crates and newbies. I couldn’t judge though as I was a newbie myself, so after hours spent logging on to seek out freebies that I could use on Athena - I buckled down and decided to buy things. The rate of exchange between Lindens and actual US currency is quite interesting. For under ten dollars, you can have two-thousand Lindens. Not everything requires pay, but as most of these things are created by other members of Second Life - they expect at least something, even if it is minor morsels of scratch.

In every place you visit via the Map, the Search function or from the different SLurls (Websites that go through a system where you click the link on your PC and it teleports you to that place in-game.), you can usually find some wandering people or complete cluster-fucks of individuals. A few keyplaces that I sought out (And if you have Second Life, check these in your Search Engine.) were Key Oro, Eventide, Luskwood and Sumos Playpen. A few of these I found at the beginning but through meeting various people and introducing myself and my journalistic cause - more came piling in. Now, be warned that you can’t visit a single place in Second Life without running the risk of nudity and people either breaking the rules (Griefing, as it’s called in SL when you annoy people mercilessly - shooting weapons, smacking people and running into them repeatedly.) and so it’s generally a good rule of thumb to know where you’re going. If you’re easily offended, Second Life probably isn’t a good place for you anyways.

Within the first hour of gathering my resources and setting off into the world to explore and delve deeper, I met Parker. When he noted my profile, he then told me that he’d love to tell me more about Second Life and give me a grittier view on how the world ebbed and flowed around it’s users. I sat there as his avatar spoke, jotting down notes on my pad of paper and tilting my head every so often at some of the terms. I had a lot to learn and thankfully a lot of very patient guides through my stay. Before too long, Parker had introduced me to the idea of stripping at local clubs and Athena was all over the place, shaking her “groove-thang” so to speak and gathering up tips in Lindens. The rate and desire to explore and take in every item that Second Life had to offer turned Athena into a story-seeking journalist geek into a sexy siren, hellbent on sucking men and women dry when she danced.

Quite a huge difference from what goes on over there in World of Warcraft land, isn’t it?

Next week: “Athena’s Second Life: Part Three - A Roleplayer’s Dream”.