This week I received an invitation for a field trip to vSide, a new online community platform virtual world thingy from a community at my company.
And since I’m always interested in new virtual ways to waste my time I tagged along.
vSide is a new project by Doppelganger focused on the young party crowd, or people that thing they are a part of it. Inside you’ll find anything from shops to clubs, bars, lounges and more shops.
Like in Second Life you can purchase new clothes and accessories at the various shops within the vSide world with the in-game currency. The vBux and the vPoints. vPoints can be earned though interaction in the virtual world, while you’ll have to purchase the vBux using your real life credit card.
After registering a username, password and your email, you can download the vSide client. Currently this is version 6c, and the platform is still in beta. You’ll just have to assemble your avatar and that’s it. There aren’t many options to chose from so, it’s very likely to run into a lot of clones.
You can run through the Gateway, a short tutorial of the world and the controls, to get access to some more accessories or just jump into the world.
There are three zones to explore: NewVenezia, an urban site with clubs, shops and apartments. RaiJuku, and urban site with clubs, shops and residences. And LaGenoaAires, an urban site with clubs, shops and … luxury yachts.
Most probably you’ll start with a small apartment, that can be furnished and colored to suit you’re needs. Not to mention you’ll have to buy the furniture.
Everything you do and who you meet, add to your friends, the ratings for music, that’s played constantly in the background is displayed on your profile page.
Additionally you can add some more info like a short bias and interests. All screenshots taken in the game are displayed as an online slideshow. To broaden the online community the creators have placed a Facebook and a MySpace user.
Let’s talk about the software client. It’s available for Windows XP / Vista and Mac OS X. A Linux client is rumored to be in development. The application window cannot go fullscreen but you can resize it although this won’t change the graphic resolution of the content. Screenshots can be taken with a hotkey combination, but the shot will only cover about 3/4 of the screen.
The controls are a bit odd if you’re used to computer games. You can move around using the arrow keys or CTRL + WASD combinations. ENTER will let you jump while pushing any other key enables the chat dialog. This is the part that nobody get’s used to that knows online games, since every games requires you to push ENTER before typing the messages. But it’s pretty easy to spot the noobs in a crowd of people this way.
The background music changes in genre and volume depending on the venue you’re currently visiting. but the selection seems to be a bit sloppy to me. During my field trip there where numerous tracks clearly tag as “Promo Only” albums, which is great if you want to know what artist album contains a certain track. But you can always rate the current song. Maybe this will improve the music, or set something in my profile, who knows.
So in the end, what’s this vSide all about? If I want to go clubbing, I go to a real club. If I want to go shopping I go to a real shop. And I definitely won’t spend real money on virtual goods. What’s left is another virtual world that’s more like an IRC replacement to me. Sort of like the old VRML Chatrooms that failed miserably in the 90s.
Lets see what happens and how this World develops. Could be worth checking once and a while.
