Second Life

Good
  • Huge virtual world available for free (premium subscriptions for extra features)
  • Real world economy allows you to profit from your game time
  • Endless possibilities with a range of sandbox mechanics built into the game world
Bad
  • Large learning curve for new players can make it hard to get established in the game economy
  • Aging infrastructure with the game being over a decade old
9

Second Life is a free to play online life simulation game designed to appeal to fans of the virtual world genre that want to go a step deeper with enhanced customisation and a real world inspired economy. Developed by Linden Labs Second Life has been online since 2003 for Windows and Mac with regular core releases occurring on 6 monthly cycle.

With the added possibility of turning your game time into real world dollars Second Life has been able to maintain a thriving community of nearly a million users amongst many attempts to dethrone Second Life from the top of the genre. The game is intended for an older audience with a recommended age of 18 or older although younger gamers (above 13 years of age) can create a Second Life account and play with some account wide constraints.

second-life-gameplay-social

With this Second Life account creation players are able to customise their own Second Life Resident. With the impressive creator tools available its extremely easy to recreate yourself within the virtual world or opt for a completely new look and persona.

These creator tools go beyond just avatar customisation though and are a key pillar to the Second Life experience with tools to bring your creativity into the virtual world. This includes the ability to craft beautiful 3D content and embed it into the game world, the ability to add scripts or simply create clothing items for people to purchase for their avatars through the virtual marketplace.

These virtual items are one of the unique features of Second Life compared to similar games as while the marketplace for these items uses the Linden Dollar (L$) this currency has a real world value tied to it allowing you to cash out your economic prosperity from Second Life into the real world and vice versa. If you’re not creatively or coding minded though there are a wealth of Second Life wiki resources and forums to assist along with the building tools being fairly intuitive.

second-life-gameplay-building-customisation

If creating virtual content isn’t your intention though Second Life is still a social game at its core with thousands of players populating the clubs, cities, island resorts and other in game locations. Live music locations are particularly popular with live music from real people played across the Second Life universe with themed locations for chart topping music, electronic, country, hip-hop and blues. Other social settings include roleplaying (vampires, fantasy, pirates, medieval), gaming and events.

While the majority of this content is accessible for free to play Second Life players there are quality of life benefits to the premium membership (currently $11.99 billed monthly or $8.25/month if paid annually as at July 2019). This includes a generous sign up bonus, weekly stipend, priority entry to locations that are full, a private home, extra support and a number of enhanced limits on game features.

second-life-gameplay-bike-riding-horses

Ultimately whichever path you choose to take in Second Life you’ll find the amount of content and the size of the community to be unmatched in the 3D virtual world space. The success of Second Life for over a decade is no accident and down to the sheer size and breadth of activities that the virtual world has to offer.

Summary:

  • Free to play virtual world experience with paid premium memberships for additional benefits.
  • Convert your in game currency into real world dollars and vice versa to create a virtual income stream through your talents.
  • Endless activities and places to explore with real world inspired beaches, cities, clubs mixed with fantasy out of this world locations.
  • Meet new people from around the world and engage in games, music and fashion.
  • Create virtual objects and items with the range of building tools and scripting utilities to make your own experiences for sale and consumption by other players.

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Review Platform: PC

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Written by
Samuel Franklin
Samuel Franklin is the founder and lead editor of the Games Finder team and enjoys video games across all genres and platforms. He has worked in the gaming industry since 2008 amassing over 3 million views on YouTube and 10 million article views on HubPages.

Games Finder is a Steam Curator and featured in the aggregate review scores data of MobyGames and Neoseeker.
11 COMMENTS
  1. The only reason I still have a second life account is cause it makes me enough RL money once in maybe 6 months to buy another game or something :P

    You know how real life has stress and problems? Second Life is a second life full of stress and problems. Play at the risk of your mental health!

    Reply
  2. I had Second Life, I enjoyed it very much. I role-played often, and had a lot of fun. There are some glitches, but I’m not so sure if I should download it. I want to, but I don’t want any viruses, can someone reassure or assure me?

    Reply
    • Second Life comes from Linden Labs which is a hugely reputable company, I’ve never had any issues with anything from them and I’ve played nearly every game/virtual world they have produced over the years. Just make sure you’re downloading it from the official website and you won’t have any problems whatsoever.

      Reply
  3. This is a good game, but the bad it is hard to get:
    -Good Stuffs
    -L$
    -Many Places or more natures (should need 3 cities wich are New york, London or Berlin.

    Good things:
    -A lot of people and more social!

    Reply
  4. and that I like this game and that it is fun

    Reply
  5. This game s just…I DUNNO WHATTA SAY ITA SO GREAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Reply
  6. One more thing:
    You may find people who agree with the creator of SL, Philip Rosedale, in not seeing SL as a game.

    Reply
  7. I have an account but I can’t download anything to play so I won’t use Second Life anytime soon. Still, it sounds interesting!

    Reply
  8. this game is fun and all but they need to fix how they walk its weird and there faces are creepy I liked IMVU a little more then this game sorry to say

    Reply
    • KattyMeow, there are things you can get (some free, some not) that change how you look and walk. It’s been a couple years since I’ve played so the name of the thing that you use to make your avi walk “normal” eludes me.

      Reply
  9. Second life has been dead since like 2012. I used to play before the 2010’s ad it was BOOMING! Now it feels very stagnant, with a lot of the users being middle age people, and a lot of places being abandoned. I’ve had my account for 3 years and have never made a friend there, everyone there has been playig the game since like 2012, and aren’t so welcoming to outsiders. However, if you like exploration games or walking simulators, and have a beefy computer this is a great game. Everything is user created, and there is nothing that doesn’t exist in this game. NOTHING. You know, I was wrong, it’s not completely stagnant. There is a very inappropriate NSFW side to tumblr that is very popular, and very hard to get away from if you’re not interested in that kid of thing.

    Reply
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