Metaplace has gone into a limited beta, which I’ve been checking out for a few days. I was impressed, after the alpha screenshots I had seen. The concepts here are all good: fast, simple interface, and you won’t need the latest/greatest hardware to run it. The professionally created artwork looks nice, but for those of you I can already hear asking, “Is a Second Life competitor?”, it is not.
A view from inside Metaplace with my FlipperPA avatar.
Metaplace’s creator, Raph Koster, was the lead designer of Ultima Online. To be honest, I think Metaplace does a great job at what it is trying to do: create an immersive environment that is simple to use, that is streamed, with a similar feel to Ultima Online. Metaplace feels very 2.5D; the graphics are clearly scaled back, however, it makes for a much more simple interface for the new user. Much like with a browser, I didn’t have any learning curve to speak of, everything was completely intuitive.