Where I Hang! Best Places to Live in Second Life

[Pussycat Catnap]

Aesthetics: I live on a double prim land sim in Zindra with exactly 5 parcels on it, and I have the big one (but it's actually small). Basically the sim is wide open with roads, river, and even a bridge. When my neighbors last sold lots the cheaper one went for 200,000, and I think is a 1024 plot. Personally I think in the Aesthetics department I won the Zindra lottery. Got it super cheap too (got it in a swap, but the original price was 30,000).

Community: The downside. 3 of the neighbors are completely quiet. 2 I think are somewhat absent actually. The last, number 4, runs some kind of RLV bondage shop / adventure spot that is chock full of temp-rezzed prims. As in when I turn that on in the minimap the whole plot just spams them flickering in and out in the dozens to hundreds... The avatars that tend to visit that place tend to be extremely high on script time usage (often over 1ms)... and we've got drama over this as my lag meter was spamming them to cut it out until recently...  Their plot is also all prims and sculpties. Mostly pre-mesh, as is their avatar. Probably why the place needs temp-rezzers... and I suspect that is they're holding onto one old tech, they might be holding on to others, as in using older scripts - this might explain why their stuff always spikes the lag when people use it.

Amenities/Infrastructure - Yeah, protected road, protected river, protected bridge, and a small protected park. Oh, also a protected dam that you can go inside of to find some hidden monsters and such... The moles did a great job with the place. This is also a part of Zindra where the road is NOT on the sim border, so you can drive it without needing that wall in the middle that protects against sim crossings. Basically a very easy to drive on roadway that goes on for many sims beyond here.

Neighborhood - It's Zindra... so basically porn everywhere, and the odd violence themed build. A few sims down you get into a gender-bending clubs and such, a few sims further the Zindra downtown that was one full of tacky shops but MarketPlace has cleaned most of that up. Basically Zindra these days is pretty nice, and you can run around naked or even 'bounce on the poseballs' right out on the road if so desired. These days Zindra has a lot of small very posh spots if you explore around. There is still some tacky stuff... but not that much.

Cost of Living - mainland tier on a 2432m plot. So not much. Got it from someone who got it for 30,000L. The plot I traded had cost me maybe 36,000L and was also a double prim Zindra lot elsewhere.

Safety/Security - It's mainland so no... Anytime a neighbor turns on rezzing and forgets to turn on auto-return we have to call in the AR-patrol squads. But it's actually been a long time since that happened. In theory the lace is easy to grief. But also easy to clean up from griefers... I own the land so I can do anything with access. But I don't own the protected land around it or the other 4 plots... Griefers though - they're really only effective against people that are afraid of them. They're about psyching you out. If you're patient you can just get the Lindens to remove bad actors after a bit of time and block people who bug you... I think griefers have moved on from a lot of Zindra as these are low activity residential sims. What's the fun in griefing a spot if in the course of a whole week only 3 people will be effected, and 1 of those has good odds of not even logging in for the whole lifespan of your efforts...

Freedom of Movement - It's mainland so I'd wager it has the second highest rating possible for this. I'd give the highest to that area between mainland and estate where Blake Sea falls. So basically, mainland is only beat by a specific niche of mainland where it cooperated with estates.

 

[Callum Meriman]

1 hour ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

I did naughtier things in wheat fields than Ms. May. ... I entered/exited on homemade stilts.

How do you know Ms May didn't wear stilts in her wheat field? XD

[Scylla Rhiadra]

32 minutes ago, Pussycat Catnap said:

It's Zindra... so basically porn everywhere, and the odd violence themed build. A few sims down you get into a gender-bending clubs and such, a few sims further the Zindra downtown that was one full of tacky shops but MarketPlace has cleaned most of that up. Basically Zindra these days is pretty nice, and you can run around naked or even 'bounce on the poseballs' right out on the road if so desired. These days Zindra has a lot of small very posh spots if you explore around. There is still some tacky stuff... but not that much.

It would not have even occurred to me to think of Zindra as a "community" in this sense -- but that's obviously a reflection of my own very out-dated ideas. I've been to Zindra within living memory, but mostly just visiting people, and not really getting around. When I did explore it, a half dozen years ago or so, it was indeed a pretty different place than you describe. Sort of like a seedy, rundown strip mall with, well, porn in every second shop window. (I particularly seem to remember a residential high rise built in the shape of a d**k.)

It's obviously changed. And I do know a few people who love living there, which is presumably not merely because of the convenience of having a bukkake bar within an easy walking distance. I'm going to have to visit soon and check out what it's like these days!

43 minutes ago, Pussycat Catnap said:

Griefers though - they're really only effective against people that are afraid of them.

Oh yes. Griefers these days seem to be a pretty unimaginative and uninteresting lot, and not very effective.

Now, when i was a kid . . .

[Pussycat Catnap]

13 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

It's obviously changed. And I do know a few people who love living there, which is presumably not merely because of the convenience of having a bukkake bar within an easy walking distance. I'm going to have to visit soon and check out what it's like these days!

I have a millionaire friend in RL who paid I think $4 million to have a home within walking distance of a Bukake Bar... ok... well... lives in San Francisco in SOMA, I don't think the bar was the selling point, and is actually a porn shop with 'cinema rooms', but it did come with the purchase and their children get to see it everytime they look out the window. And I'm like... "I'll stay over here in the "ghetto" if that's what rich people hoods look like."

So... that actually -sort of- IS a thing... 😲

Now... when I moved to Zindra when it first opened... yeah it was a mess of tacky porn builds. As in... not even the quality porn, but the folks who couldn't even line up the walls of a building to touch or be at proper angles (*)... But Marketplace has left 'inworld shopping' to mostly either the places wanting to create brand identity or the malls of accounts that haven't logged in for years... And when all that cleared out - people who wanted to make builds that were "their thing" mostly took up the vacancies.

Nowadays you can explore Zindra and easily come away either fascinated, disgusted, or both - depending on where you choose to focus.

* That's OCD for you... I can deal with porn and giant prim anatomy... but if you can't line up the angles and put stuff on the coordinates... it's freak out time.

Edited December 28, 2018 by Pussycat Catnap

[Scylla Rhiadra]

12 minutes ago, Pussycat Catnap said:

Now... when I moved to Zindra when it first opened... yeah it was a mess of tacky porn builds. As in... not even the quality porn, but the folks who couldn't even line up the walls of a building to touch or be at proper angles (*)... But Marketplace has left 'inworld shopping' to mostly either the places wanting to create brand identity or the malls of accounts that haven't logged in for years... And when all that cleared out - people who wanted to make builds that were "their thing" mostly took up the vacancies.

Yes,  I have dim memories of the great land rush when it first opened, and of the agonizing over who was getting access to prime waterfront. A source of paranoia back then, as I seem to remember, was the unsupported notion that LL was ghettoizing sexuality, and that soon Zindra would be the only place where anyone would be able to get off, so possibly a lot of creators who really shouldn't have been given licence to deface public space felt they needed to move there?

But even early on there were some lovely builds. One of the people whom I used to visit occasionally in Zindra was Jig Chippewa. Her place was basically an art gallery, and it was a really pretty attractive space, I think. Not sure it needed to be built in Zindra really: it was Jig rather than her house that was pornographic.

I miss that girl.

17 minutes ago, Pussycat Catnap said:

I can deal with porn and giant prim anatomy... but if you can't line up the angles and put stuff on the coordinates... it's freak out time.

Yeah. I can handle porn. It's ugly that annoys.

[Madelaine McMasters]

1 hour ago, Callum Meriman said:

How do you know Ms May didn't wear stilts in her wheat field? XD

That's a very good question, Callum. Although Ms. May admitted that farmers were not pleased by her antics, those antics were to "run" through wheat fields with her friends. I was fairly agile on my homemade stilts, but running was difficult. Modern running/jumping stilts were not invented until the early 2000s. Whether she went running in the 1960s on homemade stilts or in the 2000s on modern gear, you'd have to think differently about May and her Brexit battle. Or you could believe she didn't use stilts and that Brexit really is a mess.

Edited December 28, 2018 by Madelaine McMasters

[Love Zhaoying]

34 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

That's a very good question, Callum. Although Ms. May admitted that farmers were not pleased by her antics, those antics were to "run" through wheat fields with her friends. I was fairly agile on my homemade stilts, but running was difficult. Modern running/jumping stilts were not invented until the early 2000s. Whether she went running in the 1960s on homemade stilts or in the 2000s on modern gear, you'd have to think differently about May and her Brexit battle. Or you could believe she didn't use stilts and that Brexit really is a mess.

Trying to remember who has a house on stilts..Baba Yaga.

[Elora Lunasea]

1 hour ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Yes,  I have dim memories of the great land rush when it first opened, and of the agonizing over who was getting access to prime waterfront. A source of paranoia back then, as I seem to remember, was the unsupported notion that LL was ghettoizing sexuality, and that soon Zindra would be the only place where anyone would be able to get off, so possibly a lot of creators who really shouldn't have been given licence to deface public space felt they needed to move there?

But even early on there were some lovely builds. One of the people whom I used to visit occasionally in Zindra was Jig Chippewa. Her place was basically an art gallery, and it was a really pretty attractive space, I think. Not sure it needed to be built in Zindra really: it was Jig rather than her house that was pornographic.

I miss that girl.

Yeah. I can handle porn. It's ugly that annoys.

Jig's place was wonderful. I enjoyed browsing through it - she was very gracious about allowing visitors. 

[Claireschen Hesten]

I've habitated a few places in SL but spent the most time on mainland

• Aesthetics --  I wouldn't really call my home sim beautiful 
• Community -- There isn't much of one everyone keeps themselves to themselves which suits me having spent many years not having neighbours though any interactions i've had with my neighbours have been pleasant
• Amenities/Infrastructure -- My home sim is sandwiched between a welcome centre and sim with linden roadside rezz zone/pod stop so there's always something near by if i get bored never had any issues getting around my parcel is rented from a guy with a mainland rental estate i've been very fortunate to have been renting it for close to 10 years never had any issue
• Neighborhood -- A lot of the land around me is either abandoned or empty at ground level the last neighbour of any note in the surrounding sims was a rental community and i think they reduced their landholding not too long ago 
• Cost of Living -- I would say what i pay every week is reasonable the cost has never gone up in all the years i've been renting when i compare to my time on a private estate i am paying less to get twice as much land
• Safety/Security -- Being mainland you can't really stop yourself getting griefed from objects on other peoples land and i have been victim of someone using particle spam emitters. Intruders i don't mind as long as everything is left exactly as i left it. if someone does something to make themselves unwelcome from my property i can add them to the ban list 
• Freedom of Movement -- Never had much if any issues getting around i think the only time i've ever seen ban lines on my home sim was when a parcel was in the process of being abandoned and cleared by LL.

Overall i'd give it a 7.5/8 i've spent so long on mainland and become accustomed to having the freedom of stepping out of my parcel and being able to wander across  many sims that i don't think i could go back to private estate living 

[Scylla Rhiadra]

13 hours ago, Claireschen Hesten said:

i've spent so long on mainland and become accustomed to having the freedom of stepping out of my parcel and being able to wander across  many sims that i don't think i could go back to private estate living 

Really, I should be trying this -- the sort-of-wandering-around thing. In the stone ages, I used to have (and suppose I must still have, in my inventory somewhere) a scripted prim/sculptie Vespa that I loved, and I did use to go for road trips, generally with a friend, using it. But I haven't tried that for ages; maybe it's time to take advantage of the one thing that the mainland really does have to offer that you can't really get on an estate.

It's been fascinating, if perhaps not really surprising, to read the different priorities that people place upon various criteria for what constitutes a "nice place to live." There is some enormous diversity and variation here in terms of "likes" and "dislikes." This is probably a good thing to remember whenever we start talking, as we tend to, about how to "fix" or "improve" SL. There is not going to be any one-size-fits-all solution. Maybe that, in fact, is an important part of the glory of SL?

[Bree Giffen]

I guess I can rate all the sims where I've rented before because they were all mainland sims and mostly the same.

• Aesthetics -- Pretty ugly. I always use a skybox so I never needed to rent in a beautiful sim. The rental prices are usually cheaper for ugly sims! 

• Community -- I never really talk to anyone on the sim but after months of living in one place I see green dots that appear regularly. I learned that simply visiting a sim for one hour does not tell you anything about the community on that sim. A lot of residents log in at different hours or different days. I look at the neighbor's profiles and tend to see "married" residents bumping green dots with a resident that is not their spouse. When the other spouse appears, I am tempted to tell them something, but I don't. 
   
• Amenities/Infrastructure --  Is it even possible for sims to have these? Unbelievable. 
   
• Neighborhood -- The other sims either had a lot of residents or some kind of hotspot that had too many visitors. Once I found a store in the marketplace, went to it's mainland location, and found myself back in the sim I lived in. It was in a skybox on the other side of the sim! I never saw it there before. I do try to visit all the stores in the sim I live in (that I can find). 
   
• Cost of Living -- It was cheap. More money for clothes.
   
• Safety/Security -- I usually get a parcel that gives me all land rights. Most residents on the mainland seem to know how to lock down their parcel so the sims are usually well protected.
   
• Freedom of Movement -- I never have a problem flying around. Granted I put my skybox well above ban lines and at an altitude where no other skyboxes are sitting. There is no reason to fly around in the sim though. Cause it's ugly. 

[Asylum Habilis]

yeah, the wheat field is a lot smaller than I remember.

As for my recently rented apartment: 

Aesthetics: It's got a slummy chinatown feel. It's not for everybody but I'm digging it. There were some same-priced nicer looking places in a different spot on the sim, but they were too close to the main road, you could see it from the front door, which has the typical SL aesthetics so it ruined my immersion. I went with the dumpier place deeper inside.

Amenities/Infrastructure: That is not a thing. There are some shops not far, but that's about it. Most of the buildings around me are empty shell deco objects with a projection I'd describe as 'dirty building.'

Neighborhood: The neighborhood is AMAZING. I love everyone who lives here, we're all best friends. I...am the only one who lives here.

Cost of living: Very cheap. Cheapest rent-to-prim ratio I could find, and it's still a decent size.

Safety/Security: The doors don't close or lock, definite points off there. I do wish I had that. I don't like asking for things or bothering people so I just found some cheap locking doors and popped them in the doorways.

Freedom of movement: There's a parcel down the alley a bit from my apartment that's ban lined, going in that direction leads you to other ban parcels so if you take the wrong turn you end up stuck. Walk the other way though, smooth sailing through the rest of the sim and onto the main road. 

[Lindal Kidd]

...points diffidently to her signature.

[bebejee]

On 12/28/2018 at 5:18 AM, Elora Lunasea said:

• Once I got home to find someone rezzed a giant yacht on my property waters lol - not sure how it happened but no worries just sent it back piece by piece HAHAHAHA. 
•  

Quote

My mind automatically goes to someone was trolling me lol. Hence why I returned it in hundreds of pieces 🤣 It was probably the largest boat I've ever seen in SL.

Took time out of my day but the glee I felt was worth it.

How was it inconvinient for yacht owner?  I have such yachts and some houses that I myself at times have had to take in or delete piece by piece as the hud was not working due to something or it had timed out or I had taken in the rezz box so I could not derezz the whole thing at once.

One time I had rezzed a small furnished skybox over someones water and they started returning it to my inventory piece by piece, was it a problem for me or did I have to put it back together piece by piece, no, just rezz the box and click and voila, not just that all the parts went to lost and found folder, simply delete that or just let it be, so she was the one inconvinienced all she had to do was to tell me to go trough the hassle of removing it, which again would be piece by piece if hud or rezz box wouldnt do it as a whole. Even auto-return sends such things back piece by piece.

More than likely the yacht owner got logged off while sailing and the boat  continued till it landed at your place on its own, I saw this happen a few days back, usually they get auto-returned, you should set that up too.

 

Edited December 30, 2018 by bebejee

[Marianne Little]

I had many chances to log in this Christmas, but I barely did it. I will have to seriously consider downgrading what I pay for premium since I got a not so nice financial message just before Christmas.

The downside of having much land, is that I am not sure how to handle going back to a lower land impacts number. One side of going premium that I didn't think about.

[Fionalein]

@bebejee this makes no sense, if it was returnable in pieces it never was meant to move - you cannot unlink stuff before returning.

[bebejee]

I forgot to mention my yachts though fully furnished and drivable have some bits that need to be attached to the avatar.

[Elora Lunasea]

3 hours ago, Fionalein said:

@bebejee this makes no sense, if it was returnable in pieces it never was meant to move - you cannot unlink stuff before returning.

Exactly.