I didn’t make it back to Blood Letters Thursday. So, I was catching up Friday, Saturday, and today, Sunday. Day numbers here are NOT game day numbers. They are the days I’ve gotten to play. The previous posts are here; Blood Letters My Day 2 – Second Life and Blood Letters Play – Second Life.
This set of posts is not so much about clues to help figure out the game as it is tips about the wackiness of Second Life and the viewer problems that can make playing Blood Letters frustrating.
The Letters and Places
Day 4 (Friday) – Letter 13: A new letter took me to Pouncival where NanTra, an animation/pose shop, is located. Again LoD is a problem in finding the clue. I missed the business card on my first pass through. The hint got me to the right place. The Rich Daddy turns out to be Michael Greene and his state is probably no surprise.
Pay attention to the animation names.
I have yet to find the cookie…
I also had a hard time clicking the Mysterious Letter once I found it. It wasn’t region lag. Nor was I standing too far away. I don’t know why it was such a problem. I finally got it to realize I had clicked it and open.
Day 5 (Saturday) – Letter 14: We are off to the correctional facility in Metropolis City. I will point out that you arrive in the region in a theater.
This is the second region where I have not found a cookie. That doesn’t mean they are not there, just that I haven’t found them.
Day 5 (Saturday) – Letter 15: This one can be tricky because of the problem LoD issues. Read the clue, think, and zoom in closely. There is no need to search the whole store for it, but there is some neat stuff there. I saw a lot of people walk away from the clue after being right there and looking where it is. I think they were a little too far away for it to rez.
Cynful has a lot of stuff and there were a lot people around today. The viewer got jerky.
The cookie here is not consistent with how I think cookies were located, basically nearby or in a similar position to the main clue. There is no rule I can think of that helps with finding the cookie. You may have to search the entire store.
Day 6 (Sunday) – Letter 16: Today our murderess tells us to watch TV. The one in our office is broken, but it gives a hint. So, we are off to find a working TV. In the quest we find the shops around our office in R3VOLT. But, in this case R3VOLT is not what I was thinking they meant.
I found the region difficult to play in today. Because the clue is in the region with our office, lots of people are there. That makes it laggy. Plus today the region is WAY slow rendering, slow loading textures. Mesh was slow too. With SL Viewer 3.7.21 (296729) Nov 10, I can park the cursor over an item and get it to render the texture. I have to select an item to get a mesh to complete loading, but in most cases they will load on their own. But, this cursor trick doesn’t help with finding the cookie, which will remain invisible or a tiny yellow triangle if it doesn’t render. Fortunately it was not too far from the TV.
Over All
Catching up has been fun. Also, I’ve accumulated a lot of demos to try on. That will give me something to do until the next clue comes out.
I am finding I’ll go for standard size mesh if I don’t have to change my shape much and they don’t make my butt look big, which unfortunately for me seems to be a style. (Kim’s Fake Butt Pics)
I now make a shape for a brand and use it with that brand’s clothes. Save a lot of time. Even if they say they use the standard sizes, there seems to be lots of variation. I suspect many clothes designers are unaware of the changes that happen on shape export and import. See: Second Life Shape Export.