Have you ever tried counting up your circle of friends? Now ponder the amount of people you don’t see on a regular basis, but are still friends. How many do you know? Hundreds? Thousands even?

Okay, now count up the amount of people you know online. Are you a gamer? Do you travel in Second Life? Do you have a few more friends than you should via the Internet?

Whatever the case is, there are so many avatars floating around that it’s been declared there are more virtual people than inhabitants in the United States. A rough number then? Well, roughly over 301,139,947. That’s the reported population of the United States. Shocked?

We are.

It’s no question that having an online presence is part of daily life. You could be on Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, Orkut, or whatever else suits your fancy. You may log in daily. But we’re talking about actual virtual avatars. Alternate personalities that people seem to like to take on.

Every day people across the world are seeking some sort of escape from reality and virtual worlds have offered that (for better or worse) better than most hobbies. It’s now commonplace for an individual to be known to more than a few people by a name other than the one they’re given.

It’s really something to ponder. As we write about costumes we find out more and more that the purpose of the costume is to get into something and be someone else. Virtual worlds offer this in a semi-private kind of way. In a world where we clutch so hard to the “musts” we all need a place to let go of them. With each new technological advancement we slowly integrate ourselves into the virtual arena bit by bit.

It’s crazy enough to note here on our blog and hopefully we’ll see more people emerge with opinions on the matter. However there is one thing you can’t fight. There is more to yourself than what you wear outside everyday. Who knows, maybe one day we’ll be known equally as our virtual selves as we are our real selves. Anyone frightened for that day?

Otaku? Who, us?

Stumbling across a blog post about the socially ostracized life of a typical “otaku”, I couldn’t help but read. The obsessively otaku fanboy spends so much time in their own interests (and bedrooms), that they manage to cook up some pretty crazy fan-fueled goods for the equally maniacal.

But before the mother ship calls us home to reality (and we convince ourselves we’re not that bad) we have to recognize two important things about this kind of geek obsession.

1. Geek culture is not so wrong these days. Sure, it’s not the way, but it sure has its share of respect and honor in the modern pop culture setting.

2. Costume lovers are no more than a few degrees of separation away from being totally otaku, and only one away from geek sheik. We turn to Wired Magazine for more validation.

The Wired Magazine Geekipedia Tells All…

It turns out that costume fanboyism shows its face more than a couple of times in the Wired Geekipedia. This lovingly crafted tribute to the education of blatant nerdery really pins down the culture, and some of these words just may be familiar to a costume lover.

Cosplay - Wired says “Donning a costume offers shy geeks an anonymous mode of self-expression and fun.” It’s not all that inaccurate nor is it shameful in any way. Cosplayers have seen a huge boost in numbers since big events and imported anime films make their way westward.

Machinima - Some people are costume lovers of a different sort. They like to mount their alternative image in a virtual setting. Machinima is the practice of making films out of characters and animations extracted from video games and virtual worlds. Any Second Lifers know exactly what it is. Ultimately, it’s the practice of the virtual costume.

(weird, no?)

Manga - Manga is basically printed anime, and it’s also gaining attention in the western world. As a huge fuel for cosplayers, Manga is easy to recognize these days.

Otaku - If you have a tendency to be otaku, you already know it. Although, the connotation of the word in the English language denotes more of an obsessive love for something, it’s actually quite derogatory in Japanese. Watch who you call otaku, especially if the finger should be pointed at you. We all saw your sketches for your next costume…

True Otaku…

Social Networking - Yeah, this is a bit more geek sheik since, well.. you know… EVERYONE is doing it. Significance to a costumer? Well, have you ever signed up at a costume forum, joined a costume chat or group, or been on a social network specifically for costumes? Yeah, you know who you are.

Tokyo - It turns out a lot of the costume related entries in the Geekipedia surround the cosplay culture. That doesn’t mean other forms of costume love don’t belong. However, it would be silly to not mention Tokyo as a huge influence in the culture.

Viral - A great term that has become easy to grasp in the last few years. Denoting the spreading of a trend in a viral manner, this type of attention is nearly all costume lovers get. If you heard of a great DIY project, a fun costume event, or a clever party that you want to throw… it’s likely you didn’t find the information advertised in the newspaper. Word of mouth love sustains the community of costume lovers.

The best part about the list is that it’s just not done. They’re adding more every day. Should we submit DIY? Anyone??

We’ve talked before about virtual worlds, and the value we see in them. Since we are into costumes, and all things pertaining to them, it’s no surprise that virtual worlds prove an interesting concept to us. Costumes and virtual worlds are means of escape. They’re means of taking on a new set of skin for awhile. Some of us do it for fun, others more seriously, still others for competition. Ultimately, the point is to get away from the drudgery of life and be something else for awhile.

I caught an anonymous tip of an article on Massively.com about the lamenting for a Halloween gone by. As I read it, I noticed that the writer was specifically referring to the Halloween she spent online. Come again?

A further read revealed that she misses the Halloween she celebrated in City of Heroes, a popular superhero online role playing game. I’ve never really experienced at full the concept of celebrating a holiday online, but thought I’d dig a bit deeper to find out what it’s all about. In my research, I found out more than I expected.

Popular games like World of Warcraft, Everquest, City of Heroes, and even the brand new Hellgate: London all represented the costume obsessed holiday with great detail. Each world takes on a different feel, and therefore has it’s independent story about how the holiday is incorporated into their celebrations. For example, in World of Warcraft, the holiday is actually called Hallow’s End. According to the website’s description of the Holiday.

Observed by both the Horde and the Alliance, Hallow’s End is the celebration of the break between the Forsaken and the Scourge. Adventurers can speak to innkeepers to get silly masks to wear during their adventures, and much more. This is just one way to celebrate Hallow’s End. Read below for more things to do during spooky season on Azeroth!

The dwarf city of Ironforge in World of Warcraft, all prepped up for the festivities.

Well, yeah it’s kind of a bunch of Warcraft mumbo jumbo if you’re not a player and don’t know the story. But what’s great is that there are stories that serve as launch points for these holidays that mimic the real life versions.  Each holiday is accompanied by specific lore that incorporates the holidays for the players. As stated on the website players receive rewards, participate in unique games, and experience accented changes in scenery to give the proper ambiance for the games they’re playing.

An important quality of these online worlds is that they cost to play. Gamers pay an initial price to acquire the game and then pay monthly, quarterly, or even yearly fees to keep having access to the game. The reasoning is because the games typically don’t have any defined end and tend to be regularly updated with new content. Players pay the fee for access to the game’s servers and developers can continue to deliver a living breathing world that changes with time and progress.

There’s one thing that virtual holidays do better than us. A typical online game like those mentioned earlier celebrates these holidays for often weeks on end. This gives players who may not have a chance to attend the celebration as much or on the actual day the chance to experience the events in their full glory.  In a perfect world, we would join this tradition, but a virtual platform is a great way to squeeze a bit more out of the holidays and see just how to keep the spirit of our favorite holidays alive.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be going into the ideas behind celebrating holidays in virtual worlds. More importantly, we’ll take a look at the relation to costumes and these virtual celebrations. With any luck, we’ll get some chances to pop in as well and see how it goes for us. In the meantime, stay tuned to the site.

-collinevan

In Everquest 2, players get to earn masks and candies that give them special powers for fun.

You can’t really ask for much more in terms of costumes with City of Heroes, but they manage to put on a great Halloween celebration.

Today, October 19th, marks the first beta release of VastPark’s new virtual world. Not a full release though, people who signed up for it will get access to their 3D modeling systems used to create the in-world objects.

VastPark so far looks to be the only real competitor to Second Life in terms of similar features that have been upgraded. They’re also communicating to businesses and organizations from the get-go, so you can be sure that they hope to develop a robust user generated economy. We have yet to see much as to what the client will look like, as the browser has yet to be released. There’s also speculation as to whether VastPark will run even a bit smoother than Second Life. If it does, Linden Labs sure has a handful of work to do.

So far, the beta of the creation tool is available to those who signed up early. As such I downloaded my client today and will be tinkering with it. However if you truly need to scratch the virtual creation itch you won’t have to wait long, as they will issue invites once the signed up individuals have been served.

Hop in and let us know what you think of these tools? Goodbye prims and third party 3D software? Hello, VastPark

Rendering like nothing that’s been seen before.Virtual World can typically have a hard time offering lifelike imagery with real performance and open creation tools. Even Playstation’s Home has limits with creation.

A look inside of a house in VastPark.

(images via VastPark website)

For awhile now, competitors to the virtual world have been cropping up and stealing a bit of the market from Second Life. However, there has been more of a specialization in the space, bringing up titles like Habbo Hotel, Playstation’s upcoming “Home“, or the popular Club Penguin. Being so, Second Life has seen little in terms of direct competition.

Well, enter Vastpark. After anxiously submitting a beta invite request, I looked around to find out more of what Vastpark claims to be. More importantly, I wanted to know just what the rest of the world was thinking about it.

I hesitate to grasp the concept of Vastpark for a few reasons. My primary complaint is that it doesn’t really sound like it has anything special or with purpose. Is that my problem? Well, maybe. As fun as a virtual sandbox world is to me, it has a short lifespan before I lose interest. Second Life provides a lot of interest in terms of what the people have done with it and how it relates to MyDisguises, don’t get me wrong. But for my buck, I need a goal and a reason.

Vastpark enters the stage likely with a few things on their minds. If they want to succeed, they’re going to have to improve upon what SL doesn’t do so well. Primary to these issues is performance. If they can somehow manage to make the Vastpark experience a seamless and entertaining one without choking users into massive upgrades on their machines, then maybe they’ll capture the good of SL while improving upon the bad.

They do seem to boast a robust development toolset, and frankly this will be the first virtual world to be in direct competition with SL on this front. In the pre-sculpties days, prims ruled the roost and Second Life was still the best thing out there. It’s hard to see exactly what else Vastpark could have planned that would revolutionize the tools of creation set by SL. Maybe they’ve truly hit a spark.

The business model sounds much like one you see when registering a website. Here’s the info via Kotaku:

In case you’ve tired of your virtual self in Second Life, VastPark is coming (for some people, at least - the first new users will be given access soon): it promises “a virtual content platform featuring free tools, revolutionary distributed content syndication and enables you to deploy your own virtual world or online game within seconds royalty free.” Metaversed explains:

It’s free to use and purchasing a “Pro Creator account” allowing 1Gb of storage and bandwidth will be US$19 for 2 years. One can still publish using a free “Basic Creator account” allowing you to try it out, and they were giving away three year Pro accounts if you were among the first 250 people to publish content.Once you’ve created your world, you can open portals to worlds other users have created. Content creation tools include basic 3D building functions and texture mappers, as well as scripting tools. There’s also a built-in syndication system where content developpers can allow some things to be used in other people’s worlds and easily update that content system-wide from one place.

Sounds interesting in theory, we’ll see if it pans out. Perhaps the media can find a new darling and the New York Times can start writing out-of-touch articles about VastPark instead?

Keep your eyes here and on Kotaku for more information. We’ll be following. Oh, and I seem to have just gotten my beta invite!:) I’ll let you know how it goes!

collinevan