[Opensim-users] Hoping for a fearless comparison of opensim vs unity 3D

Fri Aug 1 22:15:40 UTC 2014

I'm late to the party here, but...wow.  This is the most interesting and
enlightening discussion I've ever seen about the affordances of Opensim and
Unity.  This thread needs to be referenced in a FAQ somewhere!

Fleep already nailed my own perspective on things.

To contribute something of my own, I like the idea of trying to summarize
the most unique and most important affordances of each platform in a single
sentence.  Here's my attempt.

Opensimulator: Collaborative in-situ content creation using atomistic
building tools in an open source client/server environment that has the
potential to grow into an interconnected constellation of mutliuser virtual
worlds.

Unity: A game-focused development environment leveraging industry-standard
content creation tools and programming languages to allow the deployment of
single or multiuser experiences across as wide a range of platforms as
possible.

- Pathfinder

[image: John Lester on about.me]

John Lester
about.me/pathfinder
  <http://about.me/pathfinder>“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up
the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach
them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.”  -Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

On Tue, Jul 22, 2014 at 3:37 PM, Robert Martin <robertltux at gmail.com> wrote:

> what i would like to see in a viewer is
>
> 1 the ability to disable loading of chunks (if i do not use the voice
> parts let me not load them at all)
>
> 2 a way to load the stuff in your sight range FIRST (why are you
> loading the ground texture when im at 20K altitude)
>
> 3 better support for small screens (hint im running on a netbook with
> 1024X600 screen)
>
> 4 this is a wild dream but an embedded "sandbox" sim with a single
> hardcoded account would be grand.
>
>
> i suppose the human kit is nice but 20 gigs?? i couldn't do that with
> SoAS MakeHuman Gimp and Blender without having like 12 gigs of
> content.
> btw are we muggles going to get to play sometime??
>
> On Tue, Jul 22, 2014 at 1:47 PM, Justin Clark-Casey
> <jjustincc at googlemail.com> wrote:
> > I wouldn't agree that people don't want to use virtual worlds as a
> > communication medium.  I suspect it depends heavily on the context.  For
> > instance, I'm currently involved with a student programme where many
> > meetings are held in-world and there don't seem to be too many problems
> > apart from occasional Vivox issues.  In another context, we hold in-world
> > meetings all the time for OSCC planning and that seems to work pretty
> well -
> > for instance I could post up performance report graphs in world without
> > having to direct people to an external website.
> >
> > But I do agree that ease-of-use is a major issue.  I think it would be
> very
> > interesting to see a viewer that provided a configurable way to strip out
> > the features that aren't needed in particular situations (e.g.
> education).
> > I think Firestorm provides skinning that can do some of this, but these
> > viewers are still pretty oriented towards Second Life and so that stuff
> > doesn't have much focus.  Making such a viewer is something I would do
> > myself if I had double the amount of time I do now :)
> >
> >
> > On 22/07/14 09:14, Tom Willans wrote:
> >>
> >> I agree with Justin about a big difference being to persistent metaverse
> >> and longer term social dynamics, formation of identity etc. I suspect
> that
> >> many educational uses think in one off terms eg a collaborative class in
> >> business collaboration even if there is concern about reuse of assets o
> >> reusable learning objects etc. Not the development of university,
> school or
> >> wider social network. Most Unity examples are one off uses eg teach
> >> sensitive sex education, help the emergency services learn to
> communicate
> >> etc. rather than an ongoing world of Warcraft scenario.
> >>
> >> So one question is what is OpenSim used for?
> >>
> >> It is also a fact that OpenSim is tightly coupled with Second a Life,
> and
> >> this is not unsurprising given its heritage and the vast, in comparison,
> >> user base there and technical advice. There is of course the very tight
> link
> >> in terms of viewer technology. It was this link that, in part, made me
> >> choose OpenSim over Wonderland for instance. Whilst I predominately use
> >> OpenSim now it is not on social grounds but as a platform.
> >>
> >> People do not want to use metaverses on the scale of other social media
> (
> >> viewing opensim as a social platform) or remote communication platform
> e.g.
> >> Skype meetings rather than OpenSim meetings.  I once suggested a
> meeting in
> >> SL - might as well of mentioned someone has BO; move on quickly. OpenSim
> >> also shares a lot with virtual reality platforms - I do hate that term
> e.g.
> >> CAVE which like Unity tends to have a one off. The Rift is narrowing the
> >> gap, and OpenSim/SL has been displayed in CAVE environments.
> >>
> >> Technologies such as the Oculus Rift and other potential haptic
> >> technologies may have a impact. I had to halt my experiments for a
> while as
> >> Cybersickness on the DevKit1 caused problems. Still the Rift did score
> >> highly on presence questionnaires despite this, although the
> questionnaires
> >> are only a part of the presence story.
> >>
> >>   The move to using multiple platforms, augmented reality is a
> challenge.
> >> In a social environment I want to communicate wherever I go. I am
> tapping
> >> away on my iPad, checked my emails on the phone and soon will start
> using my
> >> laptop.
> >>
> >> Is it time to pull together these strands about what will make a better
> >> OpenSim?
> >>
> >> I am not just talking about the technological issues, although these and
> >> the formats are vital but also aspects relating to human factors,
> presence,
> >> emotion, collaboration theory and of course standards formats as well as
> >> it's uses above? OpenSim does have a divide between the platform and
> viewer
> >> yet setting aside client/server and technical issues they are intimately
> >> coupled as one.
> >>
> >> Oh if anyone knows has a financial viability/funding wand please let me
> >> know ;)
> >>
> >> Tom Willans  BSc(Hons)  MBCS  CITP
> >> PhD Student
> >> Serious Games Institute, Coventry University
> >> United Kingdom
> >>
> >> Managing Director Bessacarr Publications Ltd
> >> +44 (0)121 288 0281
> >> email: tom.willans at bessacarr.com
> >> skype: tom.willans
> >> Second Life and OSGrid: Tom Tiros
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Sent from my iPad
> >>
> >>> On 22 Jul 2014, at 00:48, Justin Clark-Casey <jjustincc at googlemail.com
> >
> >>> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> I think that OpenSimulator and Unity have some overlap but not by a
> huge
> >>> amount.
> >>>
> >>> My perspective is that the focus of Unity is very much on game
> >>> development.  It gives you a good and flexible set of tools but you
> need to
> >>> do a fair amount of work to plug them together or extend them to
> create a
> >>> high fidelity (ha) product.  The focus is on creating a one-off
> experience,
> >>> though the lines are blurring now that some games (e.g. Minecraft,
> DOTA2)
> >>> are very long lived and keep receiving updates.  The experiences are
> high
> >>> quality because they are quite tightly controlled.  High multi-user
> (let
> >>> alone massive multi-user) has not been a focus area because this stuff
> is
> >>> *hard* and nowadays not obviously a winning formula for gamers.
> >>>
> >>> For OpenSimulator, the focus and much of the raison d'etre is the
> unified
> >>> and persistent virtual world.  Thus, it gives you a high level set of
> tools
> >>> which are much less flexible (inventory, attachments, linksets, etc.)
> but
> >>> because everyone has them it allows collaboration and content reuse at
> a
> >>> high level (e.g. scripted objects, OARs).  Some games blur into this
> >>> (Minecraft, etc.).  It's a free-form environment so there's a high
> degree of
> >>> freedom but a lot that can go wrong (analogous to open-world jank)
> [1].  I
> >>> see it as more web-like because the same high-level software is
> evolved over
> >>> time with the hosted content changing.
> >>>
> >>> Moreover, there's a very high social focus through time.  Because the
> >>> same high-level concepts are shared, there's more scope for network
> effects
> >>> (esp. with the Hypergrid) but the technological base is much more
> primitive
> >>> and relatively unexplored.
> >>>
> >>> So whilst I think Unity makes sense in many use cases, OpenSimulator is
> >>> ultimately much more interesting to me (unsurprisingly) because it
> gives a
> >>> glimpse into something radically new, a distributed, anarchic and
> evolving
> >>> Metaverse rather than a single vendor game.
> >>>
> >>> I think there is vast scope for the OpenSimulator ecosystem to continue
> >>> to evolve with features such as template objects, multi-level
> linksets, more
> >>> intuitive viewers and to adapt to technological evolution as embodied
> by new
> >>> hardware such as the Oculus Rift.  Because it's open-source,
> innovation can
> >>> happen anywhere and without a single company's permission.  I believe
> the
> >>> critical thing is that we arrive at protocols and formats that allow
> >>> evolution by disconnected parties whilst still inter-operating with the
> >>> existing system.  Again, it's a comparison with a web ecosystem that
> has
> >>> extensible formats such as HTTP and HTML (insert a tag that a browser
> >>> doesn't understand and it doesn't (usually) stop your whole page from
> >>> rendering).
> >>>
> >>> However, arriving at these formats and solving other hard fundamental
> >>> problems takes an enormous amount of time and effort, not only through
> >>> writing code but also in discussion and co-operation between parties
> with
> >>> different interests.  My hope has always been that the platform will
> become
> >>> interesting enough to attract the critical mass of academics,
> enthusiasts
> >>> and entrepreneurs who can generate the time and funding required.  To
> some
> >>> extent this happened but not enough (as of yet) to win any significant
> >>> attention outside of this niche.
> >>>
> >>> [1] http://www.giantbomb.com/open-world/3015-207/
> >>>
> >>>> On 21/07/14 16:43, Wade wrote:
> >>>> This discussion has been the most enlightening  I've seen in a long
> >>>> time!
> >>>> Thank you everyone!
> >>>>
> >>>> My experience agrees that faculty don't generally want to learn 3D
> >>>> content creation.
> >>>>
> >>>> Students are an interesting mix, and in high-stress programs also have
> >>>> very little tolerance or capacity for steep
> >>>> learning curves.
> >>>> ===
> >>>> *On simplicity *
> >>>>
> >>>> In terms of students building things that didn't exist,   maybe there
> is
> >>>> a game-principle based sweet-spot,  because
> >>>> it's clear from the numbers that tens of millions of people spend tens
> >>>> or hundreds of hours with Minecraft.
> >>>>
> >>>> That suggest to me that students would love to co-create cool stuff,
> but
> >>>> the interface for doing so needs to have an
> >>>> extremely extremely simple /*starter subset*/.   I say "starter",
> >>>> because gaming-principles also show that people who
> >>>> stick around and pay for worlds like World of Warcraft*_like
> >>>> challenges_*, or "unnecessary difficulties" as Jane
> >>>> McGonigal's "/*Reality is Broken*/ - why Games make us Better and How
> >>>> they can Change the World" book explains so well.
> >>>> (Imagine the interest in golf if the average length from tee to hole
> was
> >>>> ten feet, in a straight line, on a flat course,
> >>>> and the hole was ten feet across.)    This is a great book, by the
> way,
> >>>> and very eye opening and challenging a lot of
> >>>> misunderstood concepts about "games", the nature and type of feedback
> >>>> that works,  and why so many people voluntarily
> >>>> spend so much time on them, that is directly applicable to building
> any
> >>>> learning environment.
> >>>>
> >>>> For experienced builders (or those past their anxiety - resistance
> >>>> stage), yeah,  prefabs in Unity are great!
> >>>>
> >>>> What is even better is that in Unity you CAN build/*hierarchical
> >>>> objects,*/  then mix and match the parts.  In OpenSim
> >>>> and Second LIfe,  once you put the wheels on the car and make a
> >>>> link-set,  all traces of "wheel" are gone, and it
> >>>> becomes absurdly difficult to go back and put different wheels on the
> >>>> car if each wheel has 47 parts like spokes or
> >>>> lugnuts.     You can approximate some of that capacity with "Builder's
> >>>> Buddy" or other tools that let you rez an entire
> >>>> multiobject scene with one click, but those are a true pain to load
> and
> >>>> maintain.
> >>>>
> >>>> So,  whether it's Unity or OpenSim,  I think one thing that is needed
> >>>> that is very hard to still see for Virtual reality
> >>>> natives is exactly HOW SIMPLE the INITIAL interface has to be, so that
> >>>> it is satisfying and rewarding to try to use for
> >>>> a terrified newbie, peeking though the fingers of the hands over the
> >>>> eyes.   So simple in fact that even a faculty
> >>>> member might say "Oh heck, even I can do THAT!".
> >>>>
> >>>> ===
> >>>> *On "weakest links" in collaborative environments*
> >>>>
> >>>> And both faculty and students are greatly upset by technological
> failure
> >>>> where they are used to trivial behavior, such
> >>>> as having voice working.   The collaborative environment is much
> harsher
> >>>> than individual user environment since for
> >>>> voice (or many other things) to actually be useful,  it has to work
> for
> >>>> EVERYONE, not just most people.
> >>>>
> >>>> This is a feature of collaborative environments that I didn't realize
> >>>> till Gary Olsen pointed it out.  A collaborative
> >>>> environment can become a "weakest link" exposer, where everyone's
> >>>> experience is limited by the least capable user.
> >>>> This is one of the issues with, say, Electronic Health Records systems
> >>>> that is underappreciated and distinguishes it
> >>>> from, say,  a cloud-based spreadsheet.
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> _______________________________________________
> >>>> Opensim-users mailing list
> >>>> Opensim-users at opensimulator.org
> >>>> http://opensimulator.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> --
> >>> Justin Clark-Casey (justincc)
> >>> OSVW Consulting
> >>> http://justincc.org
> >>> http://twitter.com/justincc
> >>> _______________________________________________
> >>> Opensim-users mailing list
> >>> Opensim-users at opensimulator.org
> >>> http://opensimulator.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users
> >>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> Opensim-users mailing list
> >> Opensim-users at opensimulator.org
> >> http://opensimulator.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users
> >> .
> >>
> >
> >
> > --
> > Justin Clark-Casey (justincc)
> > OSVW Consulting
> > http://justincc.org
> > http://twitter.com/justincc
> > _______________________________________________
> > Opensim-users mailing list
> > Opensim-users at opensimulator.org
> > http://opensimulator.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users
>
>
>
> --
> Robert L Martin
> _______________________________________________
> Opensim-users mailing list
> Opensim-users at opensimulator.org
> http://opensimulator.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users
>
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