Hellfire Makes Avatars More “Moodie”
by Terra_Cide, HSM Editor-in-Chief
It’s not uncommon to become nostalgic for the past, and Home is no exception to this. Often, it manifests itself in reminiscing over past events or spaces no longer in Home. Other times, it comes in the form of things like glitches and what people used to do with them.
However, I doubt anyone would grow nostalgic over how – shall we say, creepy – our avatar’s expressions were back then.
I mean it – remember how abnormally happy our avatars appeared in those early days? It’s as if the artists responsible for rendering their facial expressions were locked in a room filled with antidepressants and REM’s “Shiny, Happy People” on endless repeat. They were too happy. Regardless if users were carrying on idle conversation about the weather, the death of a loved one, or were having caps-locked rage fits at each other, the beatific expressions on our avatars’ faces remained the same. If ever there was a feature of Home that made users feel detached from its virtual world – at least in those days – that eternal happiness would be it. When we received an update to our avatar’s expressions some two-plus years ago, it was an improvement, but – as been mentioned in the past – only just.
Now, Hellfire has come and added a bit more emotion to our emotes.
If you have access to x7, then there’s a good chance you have already picked Hellfire’s Moodies up, along with their Mood Clouds. If you haven’t, then I highly recommend you check their promotional video out:
Now I know what you’re thinking: why should I buy them? Well, in short, because they’re laugh-out-loud hysterical to watch. Who hasn’t thought about what it would be like if their avatar could walk backwards? Yet there’s more to it than that. While the emotes that were given to our avatars two years ago were a nice gesture, they were rather underused. Hellfire’s new emotive LMOs may just give us all a reason to actually use them.
That these new LMOs will be a must-have for any machinimist interested in creating scenes that tell a story is practically a no-brainer. At last, their damsel in distress trope can be fully realized as she runs off, stage left, with her hands to her face, sobbing in some fanciful melodrama, or their own version of Leonardo Dicaprio merrily strutting along. But it’s not just machinimists – having more options for expression are beneficial for all users.
Why is it important to us that our avatars – these three-dimensional collection of polygons and cell shading – have the ability to display emotions? It’s just as important to us as it it to have our personal spaces along with their respective furnishings to be like those we have in our real lives – it provides us with one of the many connective bonds that is so vital to a virtual social world. We have a connection to this virtual world, an emotional one at that, and if we feel, so should our avatars. And has been proven time and time again, the more a commodity deepens that experience, the more successful it will be.
Whether we admit it publicly or even to ourselves, our avatars are a part of us – heck, in a way, they are us – be it the physical us or the one that lives in our imaginations. Thus, there is an undeniable attachment to them. When we want to express ourselves emotionally, we want our avatars to also share in that expression. Otherwise, what’s the sense? We may as well be back in the days of creepy smiles, or worse, text only chatrooms.
In short, what Hellfire has done is something so simple, so brilliant, that it may change how we socialize in Home in a very lasting way.
August 2nd, 2013 by Terra_Cide | 3 comments
Terra _Cide is the former Community Manager for Lockwood Publishing and Editor Emeritus for HomeStation Magazine.
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Hahahaha! That vid makes Home look like an asylum!!! Yeah, I laughed my knickers off when I saw these for the first time and am very tempted; I’d have gtabbed them yesterday but was waist deep in conversation heh.
I just started watching CAPRICA for the first time last night and the notions of Home behind that were kinda subtle but very obvious to a Home user -- the idea of our avatars actually being us. Does life imitate art, or art imitate life?
Anyway, I held off yesterday because (as always) I couldn’t pull myself away from my friends, today I’ll grab these before I get sucked in again lol!
OMG!!! We’re being turned into comic book/strip characters. LOL
Hey! Look at me. I’m a smiley.
**watches video and laughed my butt off**
SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!