When I first arrived in Second Life at Orientation Island, I was overwhelmed by the possibilities in my surroundings. What can my avatar do? Who are all these people? How can I change my appearance?
Thankfully, things have started to settle down a bit for Whymog. I've given him a neat (albeit garish) t-shirt with a photo of a sunset on it as well as some creepy black gloves.
His fashion sense is deplorable, but we've all gotta start somewhere in Second Life.
And where is that place? Why, it's right here, in the middle:
That yellow dot in the middle is me - well, it's Whymog, anyway. That cone-shaped blurry thing protruding from the yellow dot off to the lower-right corner of the screen is called the field of view (or FOV.) It shows what my avatar can see from where he's standing.
Like many massively multiplayer online games, Second Life includes a detailed map that its residents can use to navigate their way through the world. Locations I hear about, either in SL or on the Internet, can be entered and stored here to quickly jump to them.
Doesn't look too intimidating, does it? You can ever see details like roads and bridges on the map.
. . . Wait. There's a lot more than I'd anticipated. Note that I'm still indicated by the yellow dot in the middle. But surely it can't . . .
. . . be much larger . . .
. . . I think I'm in over my head.
I've traveled throughout Azeroth, I've explored much of Norrath, and yet I've never seen anything remotely as massive as Second Life. But in a sense, it's exciting - I'm able to explore a world that's constantly changing, and be a part of that change.
Sounds like it's time to throw caution to the wind and dive in head-first.
