MENstuff Hunt

11/11/11 sees the start of another fantastic MENstuff Hunt. With over 150 stores taking part, it's a great way to pick up a huge range of items for your avatar, discover new stores and make friends with your fellow hunters.

The hunt runs until Christmas Day, 2011.

Steamship Pilot

I took the summer off from Secondlife, but now as the nights draw in and the weather turns autumnal I have decided to return.

I picked up a new outfit for my avatar, including a pair of boots, which are prizes in the Sinister Steampunk Hunt.

The Steamship Pilot outfit is the prize offered by Destiny's Designs (use the teleport pad to reach the store, which is above where you land), and consists of a sleveless vest, sculpted jacket, trousers and gloves. There is also an alpha layer provided to make your arms invisible, otherwise they can be seen through the jacket.

The boots can be found at Ziva's Underground Shoes, and are the companion piece to the Steamship Pilot costume. The boots also come with an alpha layer to hide you feet, however I found that when I put the boots on with the alpha layer, it removed the alpha layer from the jacket, making my arms show through the jacket material.

There is a solution though. Both the boots and the jacket come with resizing scripts. I chose to wear the alpha layer that came with the jacket, and resize the boots. This way the jacket remained the correct size for my shape.

The outfit even inspired me to try my hand at piloting a flying ship!

Exterminate!

While on my inworld travels today, I came across a lucky chair in the Archangel Network store and won the Red Dalek Commander avatar seen in the picture above. So I found myself a sim dedicated to Doctor Who and had to snap a pic of my new avatar next to a TARDIS.

It Starts With A Cube

I decided to kit out the skybox I use in world with furniture, to make it feel more homely. I've picked up a few pieces of furniture that were given as prizes in hunts, though I felt that I needed something which reflected my personality, so I decided to make my own.

I ended up making a coffee table, bookshelf and couch, all from prims (which refers to primitives, the basic building blocks of objects in virtual worlds). Here are my efforts:

I still need to design a few more items, a rug for the floor, lamps and a few cushions for the sofa.

The Red, White and Blue

With it being the 4th of July, Second Life has been awash with free beachwear bearing the American flag:

I picked up a free pair of trunks from Bare Rose:

Another pair of trunks (in a pack containing a tank top, sunglasses, high tops, and flag design speedos) from Serenity in the Sun.

The July gift from Vero Modero also contains Stars & Stripes shorts (as well as shoes, a ripped tank, a red shirt and denim jacket), perfect for today's celebrations:

Have a wonderful 4th of July!

Free Gifts From Upper Man and Happy End

Upper Man is giving away a red and grey hoodie to group members this week:

And while you are at the store, Happy End also has a freebie for its group members, this fantastic wine coloured short sleeved top with white shirt:

Complete Avatars From 1st Act

1st Act are offering 4 free complete avatars in their hunt, 3 male and 1 female.

You have to click on the cutout avatar to receive the hunt HUD for that avatar. Wear the HUD and click each of the empty shard spaces to get a clue on the location of that particular shard. The clues refer to objects found in the sim, one shard for each avatar is located in the 1st Act store, the rest can be found in the Edge City Roleplay Area, including the Edge City Wastelands.

Once you have found the hunt object, click it to receive the shard. Once all the shard spaces are filled the HUD changes to a picture of the avatar selected in the store, and you get a teleport landmark back to the store. Once in the store, click on your chosen avatar again to receive the complete avatar.

Here is a picture of the 3 male avatars:

We have the Big Boss avatar on the left, the Solid Snake avatar in the middle, and the Squall avatar on the right of the picture. All three avatars are very detailed, and each one comes with prim attachments as well as skin, shape and hair. (Big Boss and Solid Snake also come with a stealth disguise, but I'll let you find out about that if you decide to take part in the hunt.)

I also had fun wearing each of the three skins with my favourite shape and hair. Here are the results:

Again slight variations in the way a skin is designed changes how a shape will appear inworld. Of course you can mix and match parts of the avatars to get a unique look.

Overall the 1st Act hunt was a fun activity, and once you've found your way around the sim looking for the shards to the first avatar, finding the shards for the other avatars is relatively quick, so you can complete the hunt in an afternoon.

Style Extreme Gift of the Week

Every week the owner of Style Extreme and Upper Man, D2Store Viper, very kindly gives out a free gift to all the members of the Style Extreme and Upper Man Group. For one week only group members can pick up these fantastic jeans for free. So teleport to the store to pick up the jeans, join the group inworld, and show some love to D2.

Vero Modero

Vero Modero have a great June group gift out for the guys, an outfit complete with skin and shape:

 

When worn with my favourite shape, the Vero Modero skin gives my avatar a more "youthful" appearance:

compared with my previous skin:

Just goes to show, the highlights and shading of a skin plays a part in how your shape appears in world.

Super T's

More gifts from the Super Hero Hunt. Here are some of the t-shirts on offer as prizes:

We have a Buffy the Vampire Slayer design t-shirt from Cupcake Clothing,

A Superman logo t-shirt from Herberry, which is a particular favourite of mine, and the one I am currently wearing inworld.

3 t-shirts from Candy Crunchers, featuring the Batman, Captain America and Green Lantern logos respectively.

and 2 t-shirts from Sonic Death Monkey, with vintage Marvel and DC designs. Growing up, I was always more of a Marvel fan, though the DC t-shirt looks pretty good too.

Holding Out For A Hero

I've been busy unpacking the gifts from the Super Hero Hunt. Here's a selection of the superhero outfits on offer as prizes:

We have a Batman outfit from Clobbers

The Flash from Diavilocious

Daredevil from 22769 Couture

Nightwing from Niekras Dreams  (hair not included in the gift)

Deadpool from Rockshop

and Captain Marvel from Be Happy!

Some amazing gifts on offer. A big thanks to the gift providers and to the hunt organisers.

Freebies at Okey

Whilst participating in the MENstuff hunt, I was directed to some freebies at Okey

I picked up two pairs of stylish sunglasses and a pair of boots:

The MENstuff Group

If you are a male avatar, the MENstuff group is great to join. Not only are they hosting a hunt which begins on June 3rd, they have gathered over 60 free male and unisex items from some of the best designers in Second Life, and have put them out in their new lounge for group members to pick up.

So teleport to the MENstuff lounge, join the inworld group, enjoy the free items on offer and take part in the upcoming hunt.

Thanks go out to MENstuff owners Ivy Maverick and Rob1977 Moonites.

Landmarks and hints for the MENstuff hunt can be found here

3 Months Inworld

I've been a resident of Second Life for almost 3 months now. It's an interesting place with many people to meet and sims to explore.

There are some great inworld creators too, designing a range of items for your avatar, from clothing, hair and eyes to furniture, houses and vehicles. There is something out there for everyone.

Many shops will provide free items ,or "freebies" as they are known inworld. Many groups also offer free items to their members, and are easy to join.

Shops have other incentives to increase traffic to their stores. Midnight Mania boards (or MM boards) offer an item for free, provided the target is met. All you have to do is click the board to register, and if enough people click the board before midnight SLT (second life time), the board "locks" and everyone who clicked will get the prize on offer. You can only click once per round, and receiving the prize depends on whether the board gets enough clicks to lock.

Stores also organise hunts as a way of increasing traffic. You get a start location and have to look for the hunt item which contains the prize that store has on offer and the location of the next store in the hunt. You work your way through the hunt teleporting to stores and finding the prizes until the hunt is complete.

Hunts are a great way to obtain free items, explore new shops and sims, and meet new people, and occupy a significant amount of my time in Second Life.

This is how my avatar looks at the moment:

The look accompanies my Demon Hunter persona, since I spent sometime hunting zombies in the Grimly’s Bloodbath and Beyond Zombie Apocalypse sim, as part of the Zombie Killers Hunt.

Newbies and Freebies

As a new player to Second Life, it can be hard to know where to get started. You start with a chosen default avatar. I chose the Goth type:

But it didn't really reflect my personality, so I went on a freebie shopping spree.

Freebies are items in Second Life that are, well, free. There are dedicated stores which house freebies, and many commercial stores will offer a freebie as a promotion. I typed freebie into the search window and went shopping. The result I ended up with was:

Much better. I cherry picked items from the different freebies available, a shape from one freebie, a skin from another, until I ended up with an avatar I was happy with. All without spending any Linden Dollars (which is in world currency)

I guess over time my avatar will evolve, but its not bad for a first attempt.

Hello Avatar!

Hello, and welcome to my blog detailing my adventures in the online world of Second Life as the avatar Ethaniel Resident.