In collaboration with Josie at Avatar Reality we have installed a fun new quest in the city. It is partially in world and has some puzzle solving elements linked through the tesla's Diaries book you may have clicked to open this home page. This one is not part of the quest, but scattered around the city you will find 10 others, each taking you to a new puzzle to be solved and with BLU$ prizes to be won!!

In other news we have nailed down an issue we were having that was causing some lag and crashing, happy to report that its fixed now and lag appears to be very low, especially since we have done so much optimization chasing this 'bug' that the cause of performance issues. It turns out a couple of our shop interiors were causing an infinite loop or rezzing shop entities. These were actually some of the first user created shops ever in blue mars and somewhere between early editor and QA failing to catch these problems we had some entities that were seriously dragging down the city.. Now fixed, thanks to AR QA for their help in tracking down the problem!

Hope you enjoy!

-C

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Our shops are renting fast at the marketplace!!!

http://dev.bluemars.com/land/shopblock/search_shops.php

We are shifting our focus slightly to slow down on land rentals for GRC. This will allow us to focus on developing new scripts and storyline to make the experience in GRC more interactive and entertaining with a focus on activities, plot and fun. It was never really our intention to have many shops and blocks available as we are committed to breaking new ground with this wonderful platform in terms of art, expression and technology. It is natural progression now that we move on to new things and breaking new trails.

I feel it is very important for us as developers to group together and work with a common goal of making environments that are compelling and with replay - value.

We are toying with the idea of copy/pasting our content at GRC to Capitalantis in an effort to band together to prove a point, that the success of Blue mars depends on having large, busy cities. We have been in close communication with the team at Capitalantis anyway since the very start behind the scenes and it would be a natural transition. Rest assured any current renters would be supported and brought with us if this were to happen.

Oh and to clarify about our team here at GRC, when I say 'we' although we have had several contributors at one time or another, at the core of development it's just Romsey and I. I've read some posts that seem to think we are this big shop or such. but alas we are just a couple of hacks from Second Life, just like most of you folks ;)

-C

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Things are moving ahead much faster now, we have successfully implemented shops where we have begun selling our first clothing items. Response has been great so far with a total of about 10 fashion items for men and ladies avatar now available in the shop in Nebula West Club.

Also we have a streaming music channel now so you can enjoy tunes while you are exploring the city, and this will permit us to have DJ hosted events in the very near future!! stay tuned pun intended :)

We have a batch of shops that will be on the market very soon for rent, these are premium shelves right beside out spawn point for maximum visibility. If you are interested, please send an email to info@gridrock.com to reserve.

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Here are some statues that I made for Second Life, now trying to get them uploaded into Blue mars. It may be easier just to make new ones :) Is it worth it? let me know what you think of these statues..

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The snow is melting here outside of Toronto Canada, and spring is in the air!! I hope this message find you and yours well and full of optimism as I am about this shiny new virtual worlds platform.

Some remarkable progress at Avatar Reality in the past month!!! Shops are opened and clothing sales are now implemented with several designers; digital goods selling well in this environment of scarcity.

Are you interested in merchandising your digital wares in our city? Later this month we will be releasing our first clothing shop in Gridrock City, 'Elysium'. This is a high fashion shop for futuristic avatar dress and accessories. At this time we are making several shelves available for you to sell your Sci Fi or modern themed creations.

In April we will be opening 10 more shops in our main landing area for lease, for around 4000 BLU (approx 15us/mo). These will include full support for getting your creations game ready and implemented into the commerce system.

Initially the sale-able goods will be fashion and avatar related, to be moving into shapes, animations, and furniture later in the year.

If you would like a spot in "Elysium" let me know ASAP, we already have shelves filling up. Ideally this would be for 1-6 shelves of clothing items, sci-fi or modern styles, that you could change out via your developer MyPage interface.

Here we go folks!! This year is going to be big for Blue Mars, join us now and be part of the pioneering group of innovators.

As always I am open and available for questions and comments, either here or email to info@gridrock.com

-regards

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Hello members and guests, thanks for staying tuned in!

We have been ever-so-hard at work the last month with Blue Mars development, installing shops, making clothes, scripting vehicles and the list goes on.

In developing virtual spaces (like all art) there comes a point when you can add too much and mess it up. IE the primary school teacher who takes the painting away from 6 year olds before they mess it up resulting in works of genius from the tots.

Is GridRock city development done? Not by any means, but as it stands we are at a comfortable milestone and looking forward to more releases from Avatar Reality before we can proceed in several key areas.

On a personal note, I will be returning with family to Toronto from our expat adventure in France from the last 4 years. I will likely not be able to support a land rental market in the foreseeable future, I have contacted you individually who have arrangements with GRC in most cases will go forward with limited support. Some of the side projects I may have discussed with you, please speak up now if you might like to get some content into the city with the next release. (I may be gone before this happens I hope not we have some neat stuff ready to show off :))

Starting now and over the spring after I have landed in Toronto I will setting up shop again, with a focus on content and city services. I know several of you have purchased outposts.. if you need help please do let me know. Our corporate rate is 65us/hr this is for both Romsey and I for large projects.

In light of my move, I would like to offer a GRC special member rate of 25us/hr for content services, with a 4hr minimum.

I can personally help you in these areas:

-City Level design
-Game ready 3d Models and assets
-Flash 2d/3d integration
-Lua Scripting

As a special thank you to all members I would like to present a gift, I have hacked together a working boat script. It has some bugs in current the BM client that Tim is aware of, but its a blast bouncing around in the City Editor. I would like to release it for members on the site, it needs a bit of commenting and whitespace cleanup so expect to see a link in a few days. If you want it now pls send email whyroc@in2orbit.net

I would like to release it open-source so we can all benefit from improvements, there are tons that can be made right off the bat..

-Corey Evans

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Here's how it works:

-This is a free service we are providing to our members at grcguilds.com. Register and you can load our 'Gateway' block into your local block editor and build in sandbox/mod like environment to your heart's content!

-When you have made something you would like to share let us know, you will need to send us the .b2c file and we can upload it to the city for you..

That's it! simple .. effective... thats the way we like things at GRC.

For more information and to download our gateway block for free, please register and then follow this link:

http://grcguilds.com/tiki-index.php?page=Gateway%20blocks%20free%20download%20for%20members

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www.gridrock.com is now live with the new Flash site. Check the Virtual land page says this:

Virtual Land in Gridrock City (*****NOTE!!! DECEMBER 24 — prospector blocks have all been spoken for sorry folks..****)

Prospector blocks ~22500sqm for $35usd(in BLU$)/mo
-Big homestead in our science fiction themed city
-A Single family residence (can sublease)
-Prospectors can choose from a pre-cut block or explore and claim a new area
-Access to our content in GRC(vegetation, buildings, scripts, prefabs), drag and drop to rez it in your block editor
-Shop space: Upload and sell anything you like!
-Exterior builds: You can have as much disk space as you need to import your 3d models and media, but we need to approve your builds for theme and basic performance issues.
-Full terra forming rights in your block
-Support and encouragement through our community of guilds.

More land offerings coming soon! contact us for information.

This is a hu-uuuuge parcel of land for you to build on in GRC, its geared towards a mostly residential use, and can be very private or closer to our central areas depending on your desires. Any Prospector Block renters get a GRC guilds membership so you can sell you wares in our shops, or manage a shop of your own if you choose. The neat thing about Prospecting is that you can explore our city and find a place you love in terms of view, waterside, underground.. claim it, then we will create a block for you. It will be delivered through the Blue Mars interface. Once you get the block then you can open it up in the block editor, where you will have access terraforming tools, all the common city content (most of what you see in the city), everything you need start building your dream home!

It may take a little while to get used to how open and flexible the land system is in Blue Mars. We have priced out this Prospector block introductory package to get the ball rolling, and we have about 50 available in the city.

We can really accommodate just about anything you need, our next products will be the guilds memberships (apartment and shop space) and individual shop rentals for merchants.

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By CaseySlate  on Wed 16 of Dec., 2009 08:14 GMT

Been working with KoolMoves flash software over the last few days and have hopefully created something you think is simple, stylish, and elegant. I'm gonna redirect the main URL at www.gridrock.com to it today, with a links back to this guilds site in the community section.

-Stay warm folks, it gonna be a great xmass on Blue mars!

-C

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By CaseySlate  on Wed 02 of Dec., 2009 20:45 GMT

This is your story… and it begins now.

How will it end? Will it ever end?

Its all up to you… You, and your rag tag crew of colonists and settlers, all freshly thawed from a millennium of cold storage and plugged back into your minds.

Our goal:

To leave the traditional concept of collaborating in the metaverse behind, devising new ways of working and playing in virtual worlds.

Our concept:

Gridrock city is made up of guilds. Each guild focuses on a certain aspect of 3d content creation providing an outlet for education, discussion, socializing, and earning BLU$. Working together, the guilds collaborate to make wondrous things, and share them in a creative science fiction based environment.

Guilds Membership :

First things first.. You’ve just been reanimated, you’re disoriented… Relax, take some time to explore the City. When you want to get settled in, you can choose any of the available apartments in the guild halls or other locations to live in, or you can build and upload your own home with a choice of locations on a ‘prospector’ plot.

Next, get an idea of the Gridrock Guilds, and how joining a guild gives you shelves in the guild shop to sell your wares and the support of fellow guild members.

If you are interested in joining a guild , you will need to contact the Guild Steward responsible for activities in your interest area, please contact us for more information.

There are many areas of crossover between the guilds, but each guild individually is focussed around the Guild Shop. For launch we are offering membership in a refined choice of guilds:

Elementals guild – landscape and natural objects
Tailors guild – avatar clothing and style
Masons guild – architecture and design
Directors guild – animation and production
Authors guild – writing and character design
Merchants guild – economy and general trade
Mechanics guild – Vehicle and scripting related
Guild membership includes:

-Residence
-shop space
-upload your creations
-blog space
-technical support
Fees: (will be finalized when Blue Mars Economy is ready, all will be payable in BLU$ Please talk to us about reservations)

Guild membership:
BLU$ equivalent of Popular MMO fees
Guild Prospector:
Basic Guild Membership +
Upload / Conversion charges depending on model
Join us on this expedition into creation, please talk to us about how you can get started with a residence and shop space in our city.

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