Blue-News

Happy Halloween!

// October 30th, 2009 // No Comments » // Updates

Zombies Greet Any and All Who Have the Patch!

Blue-News would like to wish you all a safe and happy Halloween, whether you’re out trick or treating, at a party, or in Blue Mars being attacked by the zombies!

In order to enjoy this last minute surprise, you’ll need to download a small patch to take part in the festivities.  You’ll be greeted by the zombie bots in a darker, murkier environment than the usual welcome area.  Some of the pumpkins float up and down, while some of the obelisks fall over and right themselves.

Atmosphere: Something Sometimes Lacking in Blue Mars

We did notice on a pumpkin or two that the stem was untextured, but we’re willing to look past that since the update is just for fun and a welcome change from the drab and boring welcome area we’ve all grown accustomed to.

First Look: Soswaewon Garden

// October 30th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // Cities

Soswaewon Garden

Soswaewon Garden is another new “city” in Blue Mars, yet it’s not exactly a city.  Apart from the masses of trees in the surrounding landscape, Soswaewon isn’t exactly a garden either; there aren’t any flowers or ornamental shrubs; the garden landscaping is somewhat lackluster (no gardening going on here!).  If anything, it most resembles a Japanese garden, though there aren’t any of the typical garden furniture or garden statues associated with those types of gardens.

Soswaewon is more like a museum for sculptures, an art gallery of sorts, but there are no paintings here, just a sculpture or two and some architecture.  The garden sculptures are all loosely grouped in the arrival area,  and the architecture is in a somewhat typical traditional Asian style.  Of course, the artwork on display isn’t traditional at all; it would better classify as abstract art, maybe even modern art.

One thing about Soswaewon Garden is that the garden design is a little difficult for the uninitiated to navigate; the landscaping definitely needs work in order to enable an easier and smoother way of viewing the artists work.  However, considering the short amount of time the space was created in (six weeks)  and the creators themselves (students unfamiliar with the Blue Mars workflow) it’s actually an early testament to the power and accessibility of the Blue Mars platform.

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First Look: Gridrock City

// October 29th, 2009 // No Comments » // Cities

View of Gridrock City from Mountains

Gridrock City has been accessible for about a week now, giving everyone a fair chance to explore and have fun checking out the various places around the Gridrock City valley.  While it’s in an early stage, it’s still a good place to check out with many easy to remember landmarks to help guid friends to your secret meeting place.

The theme of Gridrock City is based on a colony created by descendants of Nikola Tesla.  Though you won’t see any stray bolts of raw electricity anywhere in the city, it still has an interesting, science-y feel about it, and the tower above the city proper resembles a Tesla coil.

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Blue Mars Down for Several Hours, Update Coming

// October 19th, 2009 // No Comments » // News

As we expected, the next patch will be released tomorrow.  The news was announced in the forums earlier this morning explaining that Blue Mars would be down for several hours in preparation for tomorrows major update.  All that has been said is that “new content and new features” are coming, so we can’t confirm everything we’ve been expecting.

Next Patch Coming Next Week

// October 17th, 2009 // No Comments » // Rumors

The long awaited patch is coming next week! Though not much has been confirmed, we do know that there will at least be a new city to explore; Gridrock City.  It was announced on the forum that there will be two more meet and greets next Wednesday and Thursday in Gridrock City.

Given that at present the only method to get more cities in world for everyone to enjoy is through patches, it’s certain that the next patch may be even coming by next Tuesday, or even Monday.

We’re still counting on all the other goodies we speculated about in our last post about this upcoming patch, such as individual profiles and more robust messaging, the banishment of the dreaded chat bubbles, the introduction of the official in world currency (the BLU) and maybe a few more surprises!

We’re also convinced that there will be other cities introduced with this coming patch, notably the Qin Tomb being developed by VSE in partnership with National Geographic.

Meet & Greet: Beach City

// October 14th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // Rumors

Hey everyone, just a friendly reminder about todays meet & greet in Beach City!  If you missed the last one, this is a great opportunity to get connected with other people in the Blue Mars community, hang out and just have fun!  If you’d like to go, be sure to be there in one hour (9:30 HST, 19:30 UTC). The last one lasted about an hour/hour and a half, so plan on staying a while and help build the strength of the Blue Mars community!

Insight: Bettina Tizzy

// October 13th, 2009 // No Comments » // News

If you’d like to read a great article about Blue Mars and how it’s evolving into a more fascinating and wonderful virtual world, Bettina Tizzy has written an excellent in depth article with some fascinating insight and thoughts about this new, emerging platform.  Throughout her post, Bettina does a great job of pointing out that it doesn’t matter what virtual world or platform one decides to use and admire; what matters is that there are more and more options every day to enjoy the wonderful places we call virtual worlds.

Bettina’s article can be found here.

Showcase: Wild West Games

// October 13th, 2009 // 1 Comment » // Showcase

Next stop: Blue Mars!

Blue Mars is shaping up to be a gateway to many avenues of creative expression in their new virtual frontier.  Though the name has the word “mars” in it, it can be anything, really.  Wild West Games happens to be in the process of developing a city with a wild west theme, which would host a space for western role play and an historically accurate exploratory space.  The core group that makes up Wild West Games has been in Second Life for quite some time, where they supply historical western themed items and land for all the western enthusiasts in Second Life.

Gus Castaneda is heading up their development team and is still looking for fellow developers to add to the Wild West Games developer team.  They’re already cranking out content, but still would appreciate some more help, as their project is quite large.  Here’s a taste of what they’re making for Blue Mars:

They’ve also been so gracious to give us some sneak peeks on some other content they’re developing, such as this bank, bakery, and night stand with detailed picture frame:

If you’re interested in hopping on board with the development team over at Wild West Games, send them a message here.  They also have their own forum that you can check out over here.

New Poll, Check it Out!

// October 12th, 2009 // No Comments » // News

Hey there, we’ve posted a new poll, located conveniently on the right sidebar.  We would love it if you participated, and it’ll help all of us (yourself included) understand the Blue Mars community.

Thanks,

The Blue-News Team

Where Blue Mars is Coming From

// October 12th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // News

Beautiful Blue Mars

There are many people all over the internet that are predicting Blue Mars to be a complete and utter failure.  Most of these people seem to think that they will be somehow excluded and that Blue Mars is going to be a “rich person’s game”.  We, however, understand that these ideas aren’t true, and firmly believe that Blue Mars is here to stay, and that it’s going to be wildly popular.  Why do we think this? It’s because of the people that it’s coming from and their track records in the gaming industry.

Here is a review of the management of Avatar Reality, the company bringing Blue Mars to us. (more…)

Showcase: Pixel Bunneh

// October 10th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // Showcase

A dress designed by Pixel Bunneh

Here’s some more evidence that people are already creating things for Blue Mars, and some evidence that these same people are helpful too!  The helpful person we’re particularly referencing is Pixel Bunneh.

Why is Pixel Bunneh so helpful, you may ask?  Well, she’s already created a couple of informative how-to’s over at her website.

These how-to’s should be especially interesting to those of you out there who are thinking about maybe putting some time into making things for Blue Mars, but aren’t quite sure about the processes.  Though these tutorials need a little bit of prior knowledge, Pixel seems more than willing to address your particular questions about the procedures.

The two tutorials that she has so far are one for using the cloth editor and one for using the item editor.

We’re hoping that she expands on these and creates new how-to’s on other topics in the near future.

- Edit -

Here’s a related video by Corey Evans on using the cloth editor:

Blue Mars Cloth editor walkthrough from Corey Evans on Vimeo.

Under the Venezian Sea

// October 9th, 2009 // No Comments » // Updates

A Tale of Two Cities

We’ve heard word that there will be an underwater city of sorts coming to Venezia, and it looks like it’s taking shape already.

The submersed portion of the growing locale is very different from the topside.  Whereas the buildings on land are very classical in design, the undersea quarter is very futuristic, almost alien.

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