What do SimCity Societies and Second Life have in common?
by Tateru Nino 
Dec 25th 2007 at 3:00PM
Filed under: Second Life
Over on Computeractive.co.uk, Anthony Dhanendran has a capsule review of SimCity Societies, where he calls Simcity Societies "the game's answer to virtual worlds such as Second Life."
You might wonder just how deep the similarities go. We've played SimCity Societies, even though it isn't actually an MMO of any description, and - of course - we're all over Second Life. So, what does Dhanendran base his comparison on, and is it really valid?
"In the Second Life vein, the buildings are all customisable, so players can make the city look like they want," says Dhanendran - and that seems to be about it.
Actually the similarities between SimCity Societies and Second Life are easily and immediately apparent. Firstly, they both begin with same letter (that's the letter 'S' for those of you not paying attention). Second? There really isn't a second. The similarities end there.
The SimCity franchise has, of course, always been about making functional cities, and SimCity Societies blurs that boundary by putting more direct control of buildings in your hands rather than just zoning. It's fun and feels a bit like a combination board-game and card-game in various ways. It certainly has a lot of the feel I associate with the board-games that were around in the heyday of Avalon Hill, SPI, Chaosium and Games Workshop.
Second Life on the other hand, is a global communications platform and content creation/publishing system that represents itself as a virtual space as a metaphor to simplify more complex underlying mechanics of assets and network communications, and just plain doesn't have much of anything to do with the foci in SimCity Societies.
Thumbs up to Tilted Mill, who make interesting and creative games. As for Dhanendran's Second Life references, they seem both impossibly spurious, and misleading to anyone familiar with the virtual world. We can't even figure out why they're there - it seems an embarrassing sort of mistake to make.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
roxxxo said on 11:41PM 12-25-2007
they both suck?
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barb dybwad said on 5:32PM 12-26-2007
insightful...
Ghen said on 8:13AM 12-26-2007
The comparison is:
Both games appeal to people who like to create.
Was that so hard?
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Tateru Nino said on 8:44AM 12-26-2007
Not necessarily. SL's creative population is only quite a small percentage. The majority aren't particularly interested in creating or modifying things.
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Kestheba said on 8:48PM 12-26-2007
I've noticed that the SL bloggers on this site like to find little bits like this, insignificant references to Second Life or another virtual world, and then politely rip into it.
This is not Second Life news. This is a complaint about an unimportant quote. You guys are way too defensive of SL, and too eager to point out its superiority. Let SL speak for itself, and report about something that residents would actually care about.
No offense intended; I like reading this blog. But sometimes it gets old.
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Tateru Nino said on 9:04PM 12-26-2007
At least we are ripping into it politely. :)
This isn't about SL being superior or inferior to anything. It's about understanding.
The main reason you see these huge hype-cycles surrounding Second Life at the moment in the media is that - in the main, it is portrayed to be something it is not.
You tell everyone the cat is a dog, and then complain later that it doesn't bark or fetch.
The piece in question was woefully sloppy in its comparisons (like comparing an iPhone and a microwave oven - both very useful and worthy, but quite different) and a number of people thought we should address that.
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