Nobody goes to the Community Exhibition in WelcomeHub.

[rasterscan]

52 minutes ago, Zalificent Corvinus said:

What do they want a house for on day 1, when they don't even know if they want to stay at all yet, let alone spend a couple of hundred bucks on premium and furniture and a mesh body and head etc.

You are so right. I stand thoroughly corrected. 😒

Edited February 18 by rasterscan

[Qie Niangao]

There's no practical way for the Virtual Railway Consortium to do anything about what's available at the Welcome Hub, nor anywhere in Bellisseria for that matter, where the newbies are at the tender mercies of Lindens and Moles. On the "real" SLRR, however, we have free locomotive givers across from major Linden stations, all of which have rez zones. They're ancient and look primitive (emphasis on "prim-") but they're still fun as an introduction to riding the rails and exploring what's involved and what's to see along the right-of-way.

Yeah, border crossings are a pain, which is why the VRC scripts basically stop dead before slowly crossing into a new region. There are other, more sophisticated approaches to the problem, but it's something. Also, actual rail excursions rarely involve more than a single locomotive (or handcar, or whatever), with multi-car trains more to exhibit 1337 h4x0r skillz.

[Love Zhaoying]

2 minutes ago, rasterscan said:

You are so right. I stand thoroughly corrected. 😒

Don't give up so easily (unless you were pretending)!

At least letting them SEE a house gives them a clue of what is available / possible. 

Finding a way to let them see "mainland chaos" would be a good idea, too.

 

[Persephone Emerald]

26 minutes ago, Love Zhaoying said:

At least letting them SEE a house gives them a clue of what is available / possible. 

Have you been to the Welcome Hub?

There is already a whole region of demo Bellisseria Linden Homes, including a furnished one right in front when folks first step into the region.  From the opposite end of this demo region there is a very long bridge into the Log Home regions. Newbies can fly or walk over the bridge to see what is on the other side of it. (They can't ride the rails or a boat because they don't have a train and probably haven't picked up the free sailboat at the Welcome Hub.) I did see one newbie riding the Linden horse from the Library into my north coast Victorian neighborhood, though, which I thought was very clever of her. 🐴 

[kaahupahau]

Okay, as of writing this I am walking around the Welcome Hub:

Design is nice. Welcome video is...  It uses the youtube video symbol , so most people should be able to realize that there is a video to watch. The Videos content is covering the atomic basics, which is okay in my opinion.

"Play Games to Earn L$!" is... Aggressive advertising. Looking at Temu and Farcebook, I guess such behaviour is normal these days, but like the comments regarding the "Buy Linden$" kiosk, it leaves a slightly bad taste.

The TP Gate to Paleoquest is a nice touch, but, as also mentioned already, I , too, think that at least one portal to Portal Park with its many links to various game areas would be good.

Also, I do think that TP Gates to to community gates - as far as they still exist, would also not hurt at a later stage, but give that a low priority. If it were for me and brutal market value, obviously we'd need a number of TP Gates to many Adult sims. But I doubt that that would make people happier, even though I guess it might improve retention rate. A bit. Especially shareholders might throw a fit in case there are any.

 

Thinking about it:

As an avid OpenSim user - my groups homebase moved there - I think that beside a stronger "What do you want to be tomorrow?" vibe (that I think might be a good thing) references to SL's uses for education, live music and corporate fields of use might be worth a lot. 

The OpenSim grid "Kitely" from Israel for example focuses heavily on educational use - and it works for them!

 The use value of Translator utilities, which I , so far, saw in no other platform, might also be worth showcasing.

 

[Love Zhaoying]

24 minutes ago, Persephone Emerald said:

Have you been to the Welcome Hub?

Yes. Guess I should have remembered!!

[JeromFranzic]

On 2/17/2024 at 6:26 PM, kaahupahau said:

The OpenSim'ler of OSGrid have it, in my opinions and maybe unintentionally because of having smaller userbases than the monolithic block that is Second Life, better: Their newbie arrival location contains, like Newbie Island, a basic instructions parcour - so total newbies have a chance finding a living being to ask for help when they have issues - and there is a general social meeting area, so it makes sense to go there to meet other people anyway.

Not only OSgrid... most of the better known hypergrids in Open Sim do have tutorials available in world. Kitely has one, Alternate Metaverse, Wolf Territories Grid... but one can name almost any HG in Open Sim, and in general it's not hard to find an in world tutorial in the Welcome areas.

*goes off to Open Sim for a while...  *

[lovestofu]

 Well, for one, the Community Exhibition isn't placed over the spot on the map that gets most traffic.  Ideally, they should move the Social Plaza over to the Community Exhibition. They should overlap, even, so that experienced users don't feel like they're ditching their friends in over to look at the exhibition. This would have the dual benefit of encouraging new users to wade through the tutorial in their quest to find real people.  I notice many new users head straight for the Social Plaza where everyone is standing, because they want to talk to real people in SL, not trudge through tutorials. Right now, when they do that, they short circuit the entire tutorial (and Community Exhibition).

On top of that, the tutorial is stupid. It barely teaches you how to pilot your avatar. Once it does, you're prodded to buy Linden dollars and learn how to shop. It makes SL feel like a Gacha game for clothing. The tutorial should paint a more exciting picture of SL. As it stands, it makes it very clear to the user that they are the product.

[Extrude Ragu]

19 minutes ago, lovestofu said:

it makes it very clear to the user that they are the product.

What I noticed is that, when the new welcome hub was first introduced, all of the 'play games to earn L$' signage etc wasn't around.

They seem to be a later addition. It makes me have the sneaking suspicion that whoever did the 'level design' for the welcome hub knew it wasn't a good thing to bother a user immediately after the tutorial with, but a higher up has later demanded that it included such elements and thus it has been retrofitted.

It has to be said. I've played games in the past that have tried to nickel and dime me immediately after the tutorial, and in general I personally have just quit them. I don't think it's very wise placement. There should be some fun activities to reward the user for completing the tutorial more than anything.

[Rowan Amore]

24 minutes ago, lovestofu said:

 Well, for one, the Community Exhibition isn't placed over the spot on the map that gets most traffic.  Ideally, they should move the Social Plaza over to the Community Exhibition. They should overlap, even, so that experienced users don't feel like they're ditching their friends in over to look at the exhibition. This would have the dual benefit of encouraging new users to wade through the tutorial in their quest to find real people.  I notice many new users head straight for the Social Plaza where everyone is standing, because they want to talk to real people in SL, not trudge through tutorials. Right now, when they do that, they short circuit the entire tutorial (and Community Exhibition).

On top of that, the tutorial is stupid. It barely teaches you how to pilot your avatar. Once it does, you're prodded to buy Linden dollars and learn how to shop. It makes SL feel like a Gacha game for clothing. The tutorial should paint a more exciting picture of SL. As it stands, it makes it very clear to the user that they are the product.

Your solution still has the new users going THROUGH the tutorial to get to.the people.  They aren't going to necessarily stop and use the tutorials.  The way it's set up now, if they walk straight ahead, they run into people who can direct them left into the tutorials OR they can ask questions of the people in the social area.  Nothing anyone can do can make people RTFM.  I didn't.

[lovestofu]

11 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

Your solution still has the new users going THROUGH the tutorial to get to.the people.

That's exactly my point. Sure, they don't have to read, but right now they are very easily misled and walk straight toward the mass of people in Social Plaza. Argue all you want about arrows on the ground, they still do it. It's natural to want to approach other people and interact, and this guts the tutorial entirely.

[Extrude Ragu]

I think another problem is that completing the whole tutorial can be overwhelming for a new user.

One way video games teach players how to play is a Message of the Day (MOTD). The messages usually appear during loading screens, and display a random tidbit of helpful information.

My own sim, Kokoro Academy, displays a random MOTD via an Experience each time you teleport in.

Examples of MOTD Messages from my own sim.

Perhaps LL could be utilizing teleport/login loading screens to display small, easy to digest chunks of useful information like this in teleport/login screens to help players passively learn the game over time.

 

 

 

Edited February 19 by Extrude Ragu

[Rowan Amore]

10 minutes ago, lovestofu said:

That's exactly my point. Sure, they don't have to read, but right now they are very easily misled and walk straight toward the mass of people in Social Plaza. Argue all you want about arrows on the ground, they still do it. It's natural to want to approach other people and interact, and this guts the tutorial entirely.

As I mentioned earlier, they come out and say hello and we often direct them to.the tutorial.  Some go, some don't.  It wouldn't matter where you.put the Community section or the Social section as some people just don't care to read/listen to tutorials.  I certainly didn't trudge through them when I was new 15 yrs ago.  There's not a thing you or I or LL can do to avoid that.  I do agree that the Community section should be nearer the Social Plaza.  

The one question I get most often there is...where can I meet some people who (fill in the blank).  

[lovestofu]

33 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

As I mentioned earlier, they come out and say hello and we often direct them to.the tutorial.  Some go, some don't.  It wouldn't matter where you.put the Community section or the Social section as some people just don't care to read/listen to tutorials.  I certainly didn't trudge through them when I was new 15 yrs ago.  There's not a thing you or I or LL can do to avoid that.  I do agree that the Community section should be nearer the Social Plaza.  

The one question I get most often there is...where can I meet some people who (fill in the blank).  

It's great that you get a kick out of meeting newbies, but it still guts the tutorial. As it stands it's not even obvious that it's a tutorial. Newbie logs in, and sees two paths, one has people having fun (Social Plaza), the other has usually nobody except a lost newbie and a mentor ignoring them (tutorial). It's a terrible design unless the design is meant to make tutorials look stupid.

If you want to meet newbies, you still could if they put the tutorial in the way, and they would still walk up to you to receive your wisdom. The tutorial is extremely short and takes no more than 5 minutes of reading to complete. Or, delete the tutorial entirely.

Either would be preferable to the current situation where those who choose to go through the tutorial are split off from the Social Plaza. Both tutorial readers and tutorial skippers should end up in the same place. And the Community Exhibition should be right there too.

[Arielle Popstar]

1 hour ago, Rowan Amore said:

.  Nothing anyone can do can make people RTFM.  I didn't.

When there is a prize or a few Lindens for RTFM the rate for reading the manual goes up significantly.

[Jaylinbridges]

I've been to the Welcome Hub at least 50 times, and I still get lost there. It's more like a maze that pulls you in the wrong direction.  As a kittycat I should have a good sense of direction after running thru those circles just once, but this place seems to have been designed by aliens.  

There is a portal to the Linden Realms game now, which is one way to earn a few lindens.  The catch is, you need to spend about $5 to get PIOF status to cash in, even in the Realms with a Basic account.  A newbie isn't' going to send them cash to buy lindens, before they can cash in crystals for lindens.  There is also a portal inside the Realms to take you back to the Welcome Hub.  I find that's the easiest way to go there, and not be told I am too old a cat to be in whatever circle I landed. 

Newbies are also forced to enter SL for the first time with the "beta" PBR SL viewer.  Depending on the default settings, all that white can be blinding in the welcome hub, and the text often is fuzzy as well.  Not the best place to be introduced to SL if you don't have a gaming class computer.

Edited February 19 by Jaylinbridges

[Zalificent Corvinus]

6 hours ago, rasterscan said:

You are so right. I stand thoroughly corrected. 😒

And so you should...

 

Lord of the Rings Online.

There are houses you can rent, in instanced suburbs.

You start the game in a noob only area, which one depends on your toons "race", you leave that somewhere between level 5 and level 7, and start in the "real" game world, there are still tutorials for stuff like farming and cooking and crafting.

You don't get sent to the housing parks until you reach somewhere like Bree, at between level 15-20.

 

Assuming that shoving a belli house in a noobs face, and saying "you have been here 5 mins, you can barely walk, have trouble dressing your self, and haven't decided if you are staying yet, but PAY US $99 NOW to claim a house like this but empty and cold and boring" is NOT a good "first 15 mins in the game" sales pitch.

 

It's like the tourist signs at the gates of Ankh-Morpork, trying to direct barbarians to the Dwarf Bread Museum, when all they want to do is find the purveyors of Negotiable Affection, and exchange some cursed temple loot for a good time.

 

[animats]

1 hour ago, Extrude Ragu said:

My own sim, Kokoro Academy, displays a random MOTD via an Experience each time you teleport in.

 

 

Examples of MOTD Messages from my own sim

 

And good art, too!

[Love Zhaoying]

2 hours ago, lovestofu said:

Newbie logs in, and sees two paths, one has people having fun (Social Plaza), the other has usually nobody except a lost newbie and a mentor ignoring them (tutorial).

* changes "Dark Side of the Moon" lyrics from "Loonies" to "Newbies" *

Got to keep the Newbies on the Path

[Dune Ravenwood]

I think a first time "noob" should automatically recieve 500 free Lindens to hook them into the experience of shopping and keeping them a little more interested rather then expecting someone new and trying out the "game" to buy Lindens with real money right off the bat. In 2007 when I first rezzed into the old orientation islands there was no push or talk right away of buying Lindens. It was more based on exploring and learning and fun. Last thing on my mind as a noob was houses, cars and land.

I also did not read many tutorials but just wandered around looking. It took me at least a year to learn how to fly. I hung around orientation island for at week or two until I tried a landmark. I did not know about TPing and thought you walked to places on one big continent lol. 

Edited February 19 by Ziggy Starsmith

[Extrude Ragu]

36 minutes ago, Ziggy Starsmith said:

In 2007 when I first rezzed into the old orientation islands there was no push or talk right away of buying Lindens. It was more based on exploring and learning and fun. Last thing on my mind as a noob was houses, cars and land.

Maybe one of the overlooked things about SecondLife now is that as the game got older, there became a lot of services for older residents and marketing is naturally trying to show all those services. But really the needs of players who have been playing SecondLife for 10+ years are very different to those who signed up an hour ago.

[animats]

51 minutes ago, Extrude Ragu said:

But really the needs of players who have been playing SecondLife for 10+ years are very different to those who signed up an hour ago.

Yes. LL needs a major push to fix every SL bug a new user is likely to encounter in the first hour or two.

Otherwise, the reviews when the mobile viewer comes out will be really bad.

Short list:

• Clothing not rezzing quickly and reliably.
• Breakage in areas with crowds.
• Teleports not working reliably.
• Voice not working reliably.
• Crowds of lost bots in the welcome area.

What else? What are the top 5 SL bugs new users hit in the first few hours?

[Gabriele Graves]

• Their avatar *still* looks like crap and when they ask how they get it up to the same level as those around them, there's no easy answer.

[Midnoot]

26 minutes ago, Gabriele Graves said:

• Their avatar *still* looks like crap and when they ask how they get it up to the same level as those around them, there's no easy answer.

Hard work and many regrets !

[xDancingStarx]

On 2/17/2024 at 11:24 PM, animats said:

• [...]
• Some people are so lost that they never make it out of the landing circle.

 

On 2/17/2024 at 11:24 PM, animats said:

That's the Second Life new user experience.

No, that's what YOU perceive as the new user experience. How many of those "some" people who were so "lost" that they never made it out of the landing circle have you talked to to actually find out what's going on with them? You actually have no clue what's really going on in these areas. You don't know who is an alt and who is not. Who is a bot and who's not. Who is currently being talked to by a mentor or helper. Who is having network issues and who is not. And this isn't your first negative thread with those kind of "observations" and YOUR interpretations about the welcome area. You could at least start talking to people so we get some more substantial information to discuss next time.

Edited February 19 by xDancingStarx