On Hold

June 12, 2018

I'm in a bad situation and have to find a new home immediately.
The Excelsior Station Project is on hold, though it shouldn't be for long.
I'll post updates as things progress.
At the moment, there's more resources for people in my situation in Vancouver, BC, so I'm heading there in the morning.

Quick Update

June 6, 2018

Started experimenting with streaming, getting some of the "paperwork" done.

Got a Patreon account and page started. Just the minimum at the moment. Still some thinking to do. If anybody has any ideas, let me know.

Got OpenSimulator listed on Player.Me, which is a huge games directory that streaming sites use as a library of some kind. Anyway, that means that people can stream OpenSim to Twitch and other sites. I'll be going with Mixer for the time being.

I would love to be able to have a sim started at month's end, but, we'll see how things work out. At the moment, I'm going to work out the bugs with the streaming/recording part of things. Look for The Excelsior Station Project on Mixer.

Returning

June 4, 2018

Wow, almost exactly two years since I did anything here.

Recently, I've been thinking about relaunching Excelsior Station. Over the past two years, I've tried my hand at making mods for Skyrim and using UnReal Engine 4. Not to any great success, mind you, but no matter how steep the learning curve, it can be climbed.

The thing is, with UE4, I kept approaching things with something like the OpenSim and HyperGrid in mind. Create a game that players would install and then be able to visit each other's world. With Skyrim, I tried to answer the question of what to do between quests.

In the end, I was still working out the idea of MMO-style RolePlay across the HG MultiVerse.

The biggest barrier to my returning to OpenSim has been the drama and the politics. And those I can deal with by simply not getting involved in them.

To that end, Excelsior Station is planned to be a standalone, independent, HG-enabled, 8x8 varregion world. It is intended to be a meeting and gathering place for Role Players and their Groups. Like a Hub, but more. I've been calling it a UN for RPGroups [ cred to Han Held :-) ]. While there will be a Hub, that will act more along the lines of a public transit interchange. It will not be the main feature of Excelsior Station.

That will be the venues that RPGroups can use for their organizations. Rather than simply reading a description of a Group, a Player would be able to go to an "office" to get greater details and information about a particular Group. Groups themselves will have space for them to setup a headquarters, recruitment office, guild hall, whatever they might want, within reason, of course.

Of course, there will be Residential, Social and Commercial areas. After all, Players need equipment and a gathering place for Players and Groups should make for some good business opportunities.

All that sounds fairly standard, of course. Its a proven model for those grids that have been operating for a lengthy period of time. And each has something that makes them the different. Language, ethnicity, genre, theme, all the grids that have shown their viability all have "Something".

Excelsior Station's "Something" will be its focus on supporting RolePlay by being a part of that RolePlay. I'm not interested in building a Hub or a shopping mall. I want to create a community of and for Players and their Groups.

~ Sarge

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