Massively Overpowered points to an article at Rock, Paper, Gun that mentions Second Life™. See: The Declining Magic Of MMOs.

A gathering of angels can enlighten the whole world. by Kaelyn Alecto, on Flickr

The author, Richard Cobbett, is writing about the declining audience for MMO’s. He thinks that is due to a lack of magic. He makes a reasonable point and I can see his point at work in a number of places.

With the onetime best selling game Myst, the magic was the new level of imagery possible with the advent of CD delivered games. With World of Warcraft it was the magic of being the first MMO to interest a large audience or said another way: have LOTS of players.

Second Life is mentioned as never making it because of complexity, cost, and clunkiness. In other words too hard to learn. Minecraft overcame those problems and became a larger success.

I suppose if this idea of magic is true, the next big success will be virtual worlds that support virtual reality and do a good job of it. That places Project SANSAR in a good position. I think it is a matter of whether or not Linden Lab can remedy the complexity. I am pretty sure cost and clunkiness will get handled. But, the Lab is likely to have to decide if they are going to build a Minecraft easy thing for kids or a more adult and complex world for advanced hobbyists and professional 3D modeling types. Can they come up with a way for type to use SANSAR aka SL 2.0.