SW City Newsletter/February - March 2004

This is an archived copy of an SW City newsletter. Mentioned events are not running and links may be broken.

↢ June - October 2003	SW City Newsletter February - March 2004	N/A ↣
February EDITOR'S NOTE If you read the newsletter before you read this, you may have noticed that Syntax has a large, um, presence in this edition. :) Well our old pal Synny is expired from AW. But fear not! He shall return. In fact, he... never really left. Yeah. You can find him still slacking around the forums or in AW as a tourist on occasion. Well, when he's not imprisoned behind a drafting table up in Nova Scotia. Yes, friends. It's a little known fact that architecture students have no lives whatsoever during their first year at college. It's even worse than being an engineer. But somehow Syntax has kept his life uh, for lack of a better term, alive, and well. And quite frankly, we don't know how he does it. It's quite a miracle. And so, Syntax, we in the press room christen you a real man of genius. Yes, you certainly deserve this award if you can avoid going insane after being cooped up inside a drafty (pardon the pun) room up in remote Nova Scotia and still have the mental capacity necessary to deal with the likes of us at the end of the day. This bud's for you. *clink* Cheers, SW Chris, Editor-in-Chief AW 3.5 Beta Released If you've logged onto Active Worlds within the past few weeks you will have noticed that 3.5 has been released to public beta. Many of the inhabitants of SW City have had a chance to try it out. Here are some of their comments: "Theres an INVITE feature. So far, it doesnt work, but the only reason this is good is because im hoping it will stop those stupid spam tgrams for useless events no one cares about" --AlaskanShadow "I think it's too lame to be even considered an update. It's just tons of useless stuff. No new building commands either :P All this update did to AW was add a pretty frame to the picture." --Ferruccio "My main beef with 3.5 is that now you cannot resize your AW window width-wise since there is no menu there. I guess you could run a minimized window like Mauz does.. (check out her 2003 screens for example at http://host.activeworlds.com/mauz/public/)" --Syntax The reception came off kind of lukewarm. But this is beta, and things are still changable. :) I myself think that it's a nice GUI upgrade and that it's nice that there are some more things for world owners to add to their worlds. But it would be nice for us slackers who don't own worlds to get a few new interface features as well. Skinnable avatars, anyone? But they threw us a bone with tourists, move and rotate, and 3d axis rotation. So I can't complain too much! Add your opinion here!WM SW CITY WEBSITE SHOWS OFF CITY'S BEST Hey all, it's your resident web-head Syntax here writing to tell you all that there are some new links to check out on the SW City website! There hasn't been much activity on the website in terms of updating but now that my account has expired, I want to do something to keep me connected to the city. Anyway the new webpages are for the Central, Estate, Palm and River Districts. Each district page has a new link on it which takes you to a screenshot page with roughly 8 amazing screenshots from places around that district. I have done this because the website has barely any pictures that actually showcase what SW City has to offer. Each screenshot also has it's own caption as well, to give the viewer a preview of what the build is like or some history behind it. There is also a rating system to help the person make the right decision on what builds to teleport to first. All are amazing buildings but they can't all be five stars. Of course, the rating system is just my opinion on the builds. So browse on over to www.swcity.net and check out some of the screenies. It may inspire you to visit or re-visit some of SW City's best. (Editor's Note: It's nice to know that James River is only full of broken (but good-looking) stuff. :P) SW City District PagesWM SYNTAX EXPIRES, BUT NOT GONE Our resident arcky student Syntax has let his account expire due to his studies taking up all of his free time. Unfortunately the cost of AW doesn't justify how little time he is able to spend with it. He said he will rejoin the citizendry towards the end of the semester. But for now you can find him running things behind the scenes, on the forums, and occasionally as a tourist in-world. Syntax is currently studing architecture at Acadia University in Nova Scotia. Wishing the best for you. SYNTAX'S SW PICK OF JANUARY/FEBRUARY Way back in 2001 when I started construction on Syntax Mansion, I really didn't know who Ferruccio was. I remember him visiting the few odd times coming to see what I was doing when he was bored. I knew he had awesome building skills at this time so I asked him if he was interested in building a mansion beside mine. At this time, I had not constructed the mountains that are now to the east of my mansion. He said he would try to make a mansion but it didn't happen. I constructed the mountains and the land that Ferruccio's mansion was suppose to be on was now gone. 2002 rolled by and Ferruccio and I became better friends. I asked him again but he was busy. Finally in August of 2003, Ferruccio approaced me and asked me if I could spare some land for a mansion he was interested to build. I was excited to hear that he was building a mansion so I quickly gave him a gigantic plot of land that was south of Syntax Mansion. Within a few days, Ferruccio had a gigantic shell of a building constructed. Within a few months, he had a full-fledged mansion complete with a reactor, tennis courts, pools, bowling lanes, restaurants and other exotic rooms. What was once a two year old thought was now an amazing building that many people have seen since it has became "completed" (mansions are never complete, hence the quotations :P). I suggest anyone who likes fine architecture visit the Palais de Ferruccio because it is certainly one of SW City's finest buildings. March EDITOR'S NOTE February showed a resurge of activity among the denizens of SW City. Syntax actually renewed a few days after I sent out the last newsletter and has been building and improving things ever since. SW Comit started work on revamping Velothi Island and most of us pitched in here and there refreshing the area around Town Square Park. And of course, we all got together to plan SW City's fifth birthday party. Everyone should come to at least one of the events of the four-day long bash, because it's going to be awesome. You can read more about the party further below. Cheers, SW Chris, Editor-in-Chief SW CITY TURNS FIVE Five years! Wow. It's hard to believe that we've been at it that long. And so we want to put on the best party that Active Worlds has ever seen. Three days if pure fun, starting March 24 and lasting through the 26 and 27. That's Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday. Our building contest this year is a rock sculpturing contest, and you will be able to begin building on March 24. On Friday, we commemorate the openning of our new city hall with Comit's new corona fireworks. We're even trying to get the nice folks at Active Worlds to change the sky to night for a brief period of time to set them off. One of the newest events will be our Subway Challenge. This is a totally awesome event where teams of players race through the subways of SW City. If you ever wanted to see all of the places in the city, this event will help you check a lot of places off of the list! There are more events as well, and we wish you wouldn't miss a single one as each is sure to be packed full of citrusy fun. See the full list of events and their times here.WM STAFF UPDATE - SW COMIT I created a more official entrance into the Sharman Caves on Velothi. It's an ore extracting plant, and ore cache. This is located in the utility/industrial sector of Velothi which is on the west end on both sides of the highway. Been doing some much neglected work to the sewer system; more specifically the sewage plant, which is where it all goes. Not the most glamorous work but someone's gotta do it, =D but to liven up the icky plant there's a bunch of nougats. Later this month in March we'll be constructing the Velothi Outerlands bridge of Highway 10. A semi-large bridge of 70 coords. It'll be a half-suspension bridge. STAFF UPDATE - SYNTAX That past year has been a pretty hectic one for me, both in and out of Active Worlds. About one year ago from this month, I was finishing up my Grade 12 in good ol' Manitoba, enjoying my last months as a high school student. Obviously I was pretty active in the SW community as I had so much free time. Graduation came and gone, and it was a good one. Getting the top scholarship offered to our school was a big helper for good ol' university, which I would leave to after finishing up my summer job at the local gold mine (which paid reaaallyyy well, btw). :P University rolls around, and this is where things sort of get mixed up. Active Worlds isn't as much of a priority as I have so much homework all the time that has to be done. I just don't manage to get on AW as much as I would like. This means that I barely get on AW at all. From August to December I get absolutely no building time, or SW City time for that matter, in at all. This is pretty obvious to all who take part in SW City on a regular basis. Oh well, Christmas break rolls around and I get back into it after catching up with all my old friends after being away from them for about 3 months (...catching up for 3 minutes and then partying the rest :P). I do some building but then the ol' cit expires and I can't build anymore so I just do behind-the-scenes work on the website and stuff. As you all know, I've since renewed and done some cool stuff on File Island. That's about it for me! STAFF UPDATE - SW CHRIS For the last year, I've been busy. Busy busy busy. :P The end of school had me focussing on finals, and afterwords I worked for my uncle's booming business at www.wiebetech.com, where they sell high quality portable firewire and usb devices. In August school started and I really began to work on a small sci-fi film I'm working on. We actually started shooting it, but the camera broke on our third day, so filming is on hold until this coming summer when we can get a better script put together and sets built. Also going on during all this was school. So you can imagine that I haven't been in Active Worlds much. Just in the last month I started fixing up a few areas and even developed a beta version of a Stargate teleporter ring system on Velothi Island. Everyone I've showed it to was really impressed by it. I plan on sticking around AW for awhile, so telegram sometime and we'll chat. STAFF PROFILE - ONILINK A few months back I stopped getting on AW to play the MMORPG Ragnarok Online only to find that I had forgoten to cancle my citizenship, so I had to pay over $80 in overcharge fees because AW took money out of my account when it wasn't in there. After having paying that I felt I had "spent" enough on AW and take a break. After I finished up with Ragnarok I joined up with SW Comit and Captain MAD Mike in Horizons. Been playing Horizons for about 2 months or so, and I finaly renewed my citizenship at the end of this February, and I plan on staying around for a while, and fix up things around Saddle Creek. :) SYNTAX'S SW PICK OF MARCH This months pick, like the SW City Biodome, is also a result of SW'ians gathering together and working on a specific area. Carschall Tip is located at the most northern part of Sybit Island and was a hub of commercial and industrial activity...until August 18th, 2002. Before scientists at the Mount Griffin Observatory in Central SW City could alert the proper authorities, a meteor named Pelma entered Alphaworlds atmosphere. Much of it was burned up but since it was so gigantic, a fair chunk still remained. What remained of the Pelma meteor travelled approximately 75404 coordinates over major AW cities such as R-Town and Yeti City in the atmosphere before smashing into the shoreline of Sybit Island. The resulting impact blew away the ground and created a crater which has since filled up with ocean water. The shockwave created blasted all the buildings, destroying most of them immediately. Cars were tipped and trees were de-rooted, which gives you an idea of the power of the meteor. The SW Army moved in, evacuated the area and built a research facility that studies the meteor. If your going to visit Carschall Tip, do so at your own risk. The SW Army has determined that there is a fair bit of radiation still present in the area which is also visible to the human eye. The adventure around the ruined office buildings and factories is worth the risk, though.
SW City Staff Members Network Captain MAD Mike • Espilae • Ferruccio • Hyper Anthony • Joshua •OniLink • SW Chris SW Comit • Syntax • Vornox Alphaworld Enhanced • Birthday Bash • Builder's Academy • SBN • Scarabian Republic SW City Interactive • SWiki Notable Locations in SW City AWIA Adventure Game • Grimmwood Forest • Ilexus Caves • Irenic Ocean • Hyrule • Mazenda Caves • Nimbus Land • Palais d' Ferruccio • Pamozo Island • Rising Glen Retreat • Town Square Park • Sharman Caves