Computer Graphics World

■ ■ ■ ■ Web/Virtual Reality Virtual worlds are coming of age, and they're getting real...more real than ever. During the past fi ve years, there has been an explosion of sites that off er visitors to persistent worlds a wide range of activities, including playing games, having adven- tures, and meeting people. In almost all cases, the real attraction of 3D worlds is community—the chance to meet and in- teract with people in a virtual space. And, for many who visit 3D virtual communi- ties such as Second Life, ere.com, En- tropia Universe, Active Worlds, and others, playing in virtual worlds is creatively ful- fi lling. People in virtual worlds can create an identity, clothing, buildings, and land- scapes (see Editor's Note, pg. 2). As it turns out, the drive to create is every bit as com- pelling as the drive to blow things up—the standard fare in most computer games. What's especially intriguing about this new wave of interest in virtual worlds is that 3D has the potential to become a mainstream capability—fi nally. Obviously, 3D worlds are not new. ey arrived with browsers and the Internet, and interest reached near-hysterical levels in the early 1990s, during which time enthusiasts asked, why have 2D browsers that mim- icked printed pages when we could have 3D browsers to wander around in? As so often happens, the answer has been a long time in coming, and it's short and sweet: Why not? LucasFilm's Habitat is often consid- ered the fi rst virtual world to use avatars, though they were 2D. e site gave people "an apartment" and served primarily as an animated chat. Habitat started in 1985 at a time when most people didn't have com- puters that could even run it, or Internet connections fast enough to make the pro- cess anything less than painful. e spirit of Habitat lives on in Habbo Hotel, which also off ers denizens their own living space to use as a base. One of the longest running 3D environments is Active Worlds, started by Ron Britvich as WebWorld in 1994, which he ran on the Peregrine Sys- tems servers "after hours." e project fl ew under various company fl ags, and the site was renamed AlphaWorld and, eventually, Active Worlds, its current moniker. It was kept alive by the stubborn persistence of de- velopers who built and maintained a variety of worlds. By the late-1990s, several other companies emerged and got a running start in this arena, including ere, founded by Will Harvey and Jeff rey Ventrella. e path to these online virtual commu- nities was paved in large part by the eff orts of early 3D online content devel- opers, such as Tony Parisi of Vi- vacity. Parisi has been a fi ghter on the front lines of the Virtual communities expand the concept of media and play By Kathleen Maher January 2009 26

• Cover