Avatars and Identity - a chat with Heidi aka Stylite

One of the fascinating parts about running a 3D avatar community where you can create your own virtual style is seeing the interaction between avatar and their owners real life identities.

To be honest, when Frenzoo first launched its beta, we weren't really sure what to expect but now we have built a community of members its interesting to see the actual behaviors at play.

Whilst there are many enjoying pure dress up, avatar roleplaying and fantasy elements, we have seen a LOT of crossover between real life and their 3D style on the site. I guess thinking about it it makes a lot of sense - the driver of self expression and showing a unique identity remains important in a virtual social environment as a real one.

Heidi Ulrich, one of the active members on the community under her avatar name Stylite (picture above) shared her thoughts:

Welcome, tell us a bit about yourself in real-life?
Hi! I'm a 25-year old girl from The Netherlands. In daily life, I'm a student in the field of Concept Design. I'm about to graduate, and then I'll be Bachelor of Arts. But I'm interested in far more than arts only. I'm often busy with computers and graphic design and I try my luck on all kinds of hobbies, like dancing, singing, photography. Lately I have developed a 'passion for fashion'!
How did you find out about Frenzoo?
Recently, my mom started a blog. To support her, I read every little piece she wrote. One day she blogged about having entered a summer dress design contest. Eager to join, I Googled for the contest. Frenzoo.com was the first hit. I forgot about the design contest and signed up :)

What attracts you to stay and get involved in this avatar community?
Well as I said, I like to try my luck on all kinds of art forms. I have tried clothing design in reallife, but me and my sewing machine don't go so well together. So my creativity was kind of blocked at that point, until I found Frenzoo. Another benefit is the 3D engine. I often work with 3D in Cinema4D and I have once done an attempt to create clothes with it. But there's so much technical stuff to overcome before you can start on the actual design - it just kills the spirit. On Frenzoo, the templates, the Unity engine: it's all there. I can focus on the design rightaway.

So is there a connection between your virtual character and reallife?
Yes, I think there is.

I had - and have - no wish to create a dream doll. My avatar is my dressdoll, and in a way, she represents me. The avatars are not dramatically skinny or have weird 'attractive' deformations. Lately, I have been playing with my avatars looks for a bit; I have tried on different hairstyles and clothes that I wouldn't wear in reallife. And now comes the funny part: by mixing and matching clothes on my avatar I have discovered some new styles that I actually fancy to wear in reallife. And, when I go shopping, I often see things that I'd like to customize for Frenzoo.

So you see, it works both ways!

Thanks a lot Heidi !

I'd love your comment on this or suggestions for future topics. Feel free to leave a note.

2009 World Intraverse awards and thinking about usability

Last week I had the interesting pleasure to be invited into an event in Second Life celebrating the winners of the 2009 World Intraverse Awards.

Our 3D Fashion Game for Girls, Frenzoo was one of the winners, awarded a Special Mention of the WIVA jury as the "most global 3D fashion centric achievement", and we were one of two companies from Asia in the winning group and addressing the crowd, the other being China virtual world - HiPiHi

"Frenzoo's achievements led us to believe that soon it will turn into one of the most efficient 3D platform in the world" - Gilbert Reveillon, President of the Jury

The award was certainly an honor but also an interesting experience to be attending the ceremony in world. There were several technical hitches, 2 changes of locations involving confusion around teleporting vs trying to follow the ceremony leaders in walking there. One of the speakers was speaking too soft for anyone to hear, another way to loud and triggering the red on the UI speech icons.. many couldn't get their in-world speech going at all. It was all rather lighthearted and amusing at the time but highlighted a key point of usability.

Second Life is a particularly deep and powerful open experience and deserves its success - but is it mainstream for those who are not at the upper end of technology proficiency? In it's current state, I would argue not. For all the possibilities, many typical people would give up after a short attempt, confused by the whole experience. Which is no doubt why they are putting effort into revamping the interface this year.

It's something we also grapple with in our own community - how can we make it easier to get people into the front door? whether they come in direct, through our avatar blog. And make it easier for them to have their first interactions in a painless and fun way that's easy to pick up for a new or returning member...

Not easy at all to get a newbie friendly interface - and we're learning valuable lessons from our experience and constantly improving. However it's vital - the the most important thing to get right in a virtual worlds product, and rightfully at the top of the priority list...

VIP Membership and Currency Exchange in Fashion Communities

In the era of social networks and communities, it is amazing how many different niche groups you can find. If your interests are Aviation, there are groups surrounding all aspects of flying. If you are in to Modern Dance, there are networks that focus on sharing experiences and tips on how to do the 'next' dance moves. What we focus on this blog are the fashion sites, the communities that allow for us to dream and design our own clothing and put that out to the rest of the world.

What we can do for free is endless, if you are in to fashion design you can check out any number of free design sites. We have listed many of those on this site previously. But what we haven't listed are the a number of sites that allow for you to design, but also that are paid! It does seem counter-intuitive, but many it is increasingly important to note that most of the free sites we have reviewed also have paid functions. What a better way to gauge your favorite than checking out the research we have done?

We have found 7 sites that we think are at the forefront of the design and community for fashion. Many of these sites have their own internal “currency” which in some cases are stronger in a US Dollar exchange rate than many country's own currencies!

Here is a table overview the statistics and figures for upgrading free accounts, or just getting more $$$ to fly in your virtual private jet...

	Currency	Cost	You Get	Users
Stardoll.com	Stardollar	$5.95/Month $39.95/Year	SuperStar VIP	29,280,000
Meez.com	Coinz	$10 Prepaid Cards	Get Coinz	4,600,000
IMVU.com	Credits	$6.25/Month	VIP Club	30,000,000
Frenzoo.com	Gold Coins	Special Selection	VIP Status	Not Disclosed
Secondlife.com	Linden Dollars	$9.95/1 Month $6.00/Month (year subscription)	Premium Member & Land Purchases	15,000,000
WeeWorld.com	Gold Points	$5 / 2500 Points	Lots of coins	26,000,000
GaiaOnline.com	Gaia Cash	$1 / 100 Gaia Cash	Ability to buy special items	17,204,000

In terms of direct currency exchange, Gaia, WeeWorld and Meez offer the paid coins services to offer a way out of spending many hours working to gather enough coins to purchase the expensive items. Offering the option to buy virtual currency needs to have incentive, and there are many cool items that can only be purchased by obtaining the respective virtual currency.

The other course of action for these paid options is offering elite services. In Stardoll, when you subscribe to be a Super Star VIP, you are get the ability to own your own fashion shop- allowing you to design, buy and sell your own fashion line. You get exclusive High-End designer labels from both Stardoll and from real world designers. The most interesting aspect is that you are able to send global broadcast messages to the entire Stardoll community.

In IMVU, the paid subscription allows you to be able to register your name, instead of having 'Guest' in front of your user name. With that you also get Super Powers, and VIP Badges in the game. If that isn't enough, you get many upgrades and features that are unavailable to the 'normies'.

One of the biggest names in virtual reality is Second Life. The coolest feature of any of these sites is the ability to buy your own virtual land for development when you become a Premium Member. You can use this to design the topography, housing, and to top this off you also get a monthly allowance of Linden Dollars.

The newest community in the bunch is Frenzoo. Since they are in Beta still, the VIP program is given as a gift to highly active members in the design community. VIP members get the ability to design clothing for either men or women and sell their designs in their own shop. Your profile picture receives a VIP badge, which makes you stand out in the crowd. There is a gold coin function to buy coins, but it has yet to be introduced to the beta community.

If you are looking into what deals are out there for getting new features and coins, I hope this helps you compare what is out there. We love to add functionality to every game we encounter, and with these seven sites there are many things we would love to get our hands on!

The Top 5 Fashion Design Sites on the Web

Once again we are back finding out the best in Fashion sites, this time we want the best that allow designing of your own fashion.

In this Top 5, each of these sites carries their own unique touch to creating fashion. The best part of each of these sites is how much creativity is allowed by all of us users! It's no wonder these games are so popular, because instead of picking and choosing, we get to draw – shape – sew – and dream.

1.Girlsense
2.Frenzoo
3.Roiworld
4.Fashion Fantasy Game
5.Polyvore

Girlsense
The greatest part about designing fashion is sharing it with the world around you. Girlsense does a great job of allowing you to pick any item on the site and completely restyle it and decorate to match your imagination. After you save your designs, you can open a shop to sell the fashions to other designers in Girlsense and make yourself into a true fashionista online!

You get to choose your avatar at the beginning and build your way to the top, just like real life- and definitely as stylish!

Frenzoo
Taking dress up games into 3D is the future, and in Frenzoo, the ability to design clothes in 3D is a reality. Starting out in Frenzoo you can buy fashion or design your own, and there are more than enough items already in shops that were designed by others to spark your creative juices. Just like Girlsense, you are allowed to open a shop and sell your own designs! The create tool is very powerful for being online, as seen below- you get to design on a 3D mesh!


Roiworld
Delving into the world of fashion, Roiworld offers hundreds of mini-games designed to allow us to dress up avatars into any combination of clothing. Since this list is about “fashion design”, we draw attention to the 'drawing' function in Roiworld. As the picture shows below, you are able to draw ontop of your avatar into any design imaginable. Since this works more like a photoshop or paint, it takes a steady hand (not pictured below). The fashions you create on this can be saved, and then entered into competitions- which give you the ever sought after fame!

Fashion Fantasy Game
In fashionfantasygame.com, you get to design clothing combinations based upon color and pattern styles. Becoming a VIP in-game means you can design clothing color patterns, and place those onto any template in the design shop (below). The community has shops for each person, like the other sites on this list, and the important thing about this site is that each outfit gets rated as you design it! And of course, the first few times you will be a 'disaster'. It helps you get better, promise.

Polyvore
This site is the only of the 5 that uses real fashions (not virtual) but it involves a great sense of creativity, and that is what fashion design is all about. Within Polyvore, you are allowed to mix and match any fashion items and group them together, which is interesting because you can choose anything! The design creation center pictured shows how you can mix sizes colors shapes and accessories in one place and then save those designs. Even though there is no avatar to speak of, the site is definitely worthy of a top 5 spot.


There you are, our top 5 fashion design games- Give them a try, and we know you will find something you like! And maybe meet a few friends along the way.

Best Anime & Cosplay Sites Online

One of the fastest growing trends in the USA is cosplay. Since the first true instances of cosplay originated in Japan, the trend of dressing to mimic the appearance of manga or anime characters has taken to online portals. Where you can enjoy 3D virtual cosplay by designing and dressing up virtual avatars at places like Frenzoo, IMVU and Meez, the following list contains some of the best and most active cosplay sites you can find on the web.

1. Cosplay.com

Cosplay.com is one of the largest and most noteworthy sites dedicated to the world of cosplay. Containing a marketplace, very active forums and even a cosplay calendar (USA). The best social feature of this site is the ability to buy and commission costumes!

2. CureCos

Cure Cosplay Community is a Japanese/English site that does a great job and utilizing user interactivity. The interface is easy to use and gives cosplay a great location to hang out and share photos of their best and favorite costumes.

3. Cosspace

Cosspace takes the MySpace approach to networking, giving a strong community with many different features enabling cosspace to involve users much more. There are costume ratings (by other users) polls, video submissions, quizzes, expansive forums, and the ever popular gallery. Cosspace is simple in design and supports 3 languages (English, French, Spanish).

4. Cosplay Walker

Speak Japanese? Perfect! Cosplay Walker is mainly in Japanese, but offers a fun space for the cosplay fan to share designs, and if you get rated the best out of other fans on the site, you get a front page mention! If only I spoke Japanese fluently so that I could get a front-page mention!

5. Cosplay Forum

We're keeping it international for this site too! This forum is all in French, but there is a very large presence in their discussions- and for good reason! The environment is very festive and has thousands of active users! When any cosplay forum has a group dedicated to this cos theme: Groupe Walker Texas Ranger : Japan Expo 2009 – you can count me in.

6. AnimeOnline

Want to share your favorite character or anime pic or even how you think stories should have ended, etc... Anime online has a large forum community backed by their own RPG game and Arcade online. The coolest feature is the 'Watch & Discuss' where you can.... watch and discuss shows with other people (Sorry its USA only). Which means for us in Asia we don't get this feature. The gallery has a lot of user content, and it is a good time to get ideas for upcoming cosplay events and even to design new gear.

7. AnimeNewsNetwork

The ANN is a great site for upcoming events/shows/anything! The first page when you see when arriving at ANN is the newsfeed, which is constantly updated keeping us in the know! How great is that! There is an Encyclopedia to give you a refresher course on your characters/shows and there is also an editorial wiki page to let you share your opinions. But don't forget the huge forum that is always buzzing with activity.

8. Daz3d

If you are in to ultra-realistic Anime & Manga design, Daz3d is a downloadable tool that assists in 3D design. I still don't know how to work it, but once I do I may actually make something worthwhile. Check out their 'Hall of Fame' for unreal photos!

9. Cosplay Meetup

An honorable mention, cosplay meetup is a site made on meetup.com, which different cosplay groups from around the globe have listed their location for other cosplay fans of anime and manga to join in with a large group!

The world within Cosplay fans of Anime and Manga is large and expansive, and we can't wait to dive into the different sites here and get to know more about our fellow Anime lovers! Enjoy and share often!

An avatar world without groups?

Possible? Of course not!

It's a topic we've spent a lot of time pondering on with our 3D Fashion Games world, Frenzoo.

Groups are the foundation for any vibrant society, be they ones built on common interest, fashion or lifestyle niche, family ties, geography or any other combination: groups give much needed identity to any community.


By community we could mean a real life one, but also applies equally and even more so in an online virtual world. In a great post on "Ways to make your social space more gamey", Raph Koster summarized the 8 important requirements for a successful social space building of gameplay fundamentals, and he rated groups at the top:

"Provide clear group identities that users can join, leave, and signal to one another with highly visual markers."

In my view Lively, Google's illfated adventure into avatar communities, struggled to be succesful for several reasons, and one was the lack of context or identity in the world.

Justin Gibbs of Vivaty pondered aloud recently whether virtual worlds need context to be succesful.

"If a virtual world lacks context does that make it simply 3D chat, a social network, or game platform? Is that enough when I can get that in many other places?"

I think the answer is truly that CONTEXT IS VITAL - to build a succesful new community, context is needed on 2 levels.

1/ The world itself needs context
2/ Within the world, members need context

1/ Unless you are Facebook or SecondLife, the days of expecting any general purpose community to take off are numbered. We see this in some of the newer avatar world, where the main purpose is just chat... but on what topic?

On the other hand, picking a particular topic and shaping your site around that automatically gives context. Whether it's robots, wizards, Asian celebrities or in our case lifestyle and fashion avatars... the main thing is that there is a theme.

Members join for a reason and they enjoy and feel tied into being part of a community that has real meaning to them. Conversations start naturally and can develop from there.

2/ Within the world, people want to identify with other likeminded members, even within the world. I agree with Raph, groups are an important way to establish ties and identity. Just witness the phenomenal success of guilds on Gaia.

We just launched clubs on Frenzoo. Whether it's a Fashion Club or one for One Piece Anime fandom, members can create and further find meaning in the community. It's early days and the club functions are sparse to start with, but even just a place for people to join and establish context and identity, that is a big step forward to build the foundation of the community.

It will make striking up conversations and forming friendships just that much more easier and fun. And don't friendships make any community tick?

I'd love your comment on this or suggestions for future topics. Feel free to leave a note.

Best Dress Up Games Features - Top 10 List

Addicted to dress up...

If you've ever spent hours perfecting a new dress for your avatar, you'll already know why fashion games are so popular and enjoyed by millions around the world.

Every day girls young and old roleplay as the virtual fashionista online. From the simplest flash sites for kids through to sophisticated 3D dress up games for teens and older, there are many addictive offerings in the genre.

But what are the "X factors" that makes them so appealing? Let's take a look at the "best of the best" - the Top 10 features from the hottest dress up games out there today. Let's go!

1. Runways - JoJo's Fashion Show 2
2. Celebrities - Stardoll
3. Fashion Design - Frenzoo
4. Games! - RoiWorld
5. Chat and Groups - IMVU
6. Making Money - Second Life
7. Role-playing - The Sims 3
   
8. Music and Dancing - Nurien
9. Building Your Label - GirlSense
10. Cheeky - MissBimbo

1/ Runways - JoJo's Fashion Show 2

Working in a boutique may be cool, but being a designer with a runway show is the high point of glamour for the virtual fashionista. So, it's no surprise then that JoJo's Fashion Show has become one of the most played dress up games on the planet and gone on to produce a number of spinoffs and sequels. It all revolves around the runway show, which appeals to girls young and old - witness the popularity of America's Next Top Supermodel.


You play as designer Jojo Cruz and you must arrange runways shows and arrange your models in the styles the game asks you to. The gameplay is fun and frantic, asking you to pull together items, and results sometimes random as you don't know how the combination will be "judged". Sometimes a perfect combination scores lowly while a messy mix comes out on top, but then again the seeming randomness makes it unpredictable and fun, and very addictive.

2/ Celebrities - Stardoll

Celebrities are the most popular people on the planet, so it makes sense that celebrity fashion doll games are amongst the most popular destinations for young girls on the web today. And the largest of them is Stardoll.

Stardoll mixes up the usual shopping and styling with a huge range of celebrity paperdolls, which look sharp. Who can deny the attraction of taking control of Avril Lavignes wardrobe, or dressing up Selena Gomez in something really "out there"? And the beauty of celebrities is that there are always new ones coming up and plenty to keep the game fresh and fun.

3/ Designing Fashion - Frenzoo

Why buy virtual clothes the shop when you can design your own? Attractive with teens, Frenzoo is a new 3D fashion games community where the focus is on designing your own fashion, hair and accessories for anime styled 3D avatars.

The design tools are fun and within a few minutes you can make great looking designs to match with beauty and accessories. With practice the type of virtual fashions you can create with time and some practice are amazing. And once you've created your own perfect look, the site encourages you to enter a variety of competitions for fun and fame. Be warned though, for those who like being creative with dress up and design, the site gets addictive.

4/ Games - RoiWorld

If guys can have fun with the many action and fantasy MMOs on the net, what about girls? Fashion games are the answer. Now for every Runescape there is an RoiWorld. RoiWorld is a new fashion games portals, with close to 1000 fashion, beauty and celebrity themed micro-games to play from.

There are a few basic types of games, ranging from drawing through to dress up, memory and time challenges that mix things up and give some variety. Most of the games can be played without needing any account, which makes it a simple and fun place to waste time.

5/ Chat and Groups - IMVU

If you want huge chaotic group chat together with 3D avatars, IMVU is the place for you. With over 30 million members and a massive amount of fashions available in the shop, you are bound to find your niche underground fashion style and chat with other like-minded fashionistas. Unlike other chat worlds that can often be empty and boring, IMVU's chat is popular, in large part due to letting you show off your own unique style and a strong content creation for professional developers. Want to find a group to chat about neo-steampunk style tips? Easy...

The clothes range from simple and clunky to beautiful, but to buy any of the good fashions is going to cost you real money. Here you pay to play - the free credits you get at the start won't last you very long at all. And it's a shame that you can't create your own fashions like in some of the other sites on the list, although what it lacks in that it makes up in the range of choice already available in the shop.

6/ Making Money - Second Life

Open virtual world SecondLife is the adult fashionista's paradise with masses of 20 and 30-something logging on and buying a huge variety of fashions. Part of the reason for that huge variety of clothes is the lure of real money - SecondLife runs a very large economy where residents can sell items to others and earn real cash. Even though the amounts are very small for the vast majority of designers, the motivation and desire is there - the addiction of making a sale and seeing an avatar wear your fashions is a big force.

Being an older, more mature world (the average age is over 30) there is a lot of adult themed content and the interface to use Second Life is very complicated, but if you're willing to work past those barriers, those into realistic avatars and sophisticated dress up can find a lot to enjoy in SecondLife. And who knows, maybe you'll open your own boutique there one day.

7/ Role-playing - The Sims 3

"Everyone on the planet either is a Sims fan or knows one". The scary thing is that with over 100 million games sold that's not far from the truth at all. In The Sims, the emphasis is on roleplay and life simulation. That core gameplay allows you to make a family, become a pop star or choose any path you choose, and dressing your Sims up any way you want along the way... as a result a huge sub-culture has grown around the game for virtual fashion.

Some of the most creative and stunning avatar apparel on the net in any game, community or genre is created by Sims fashionistas - this group of ultra hardcore dedicated fans of the Sims who mod the textures to make unique items. Add on top the increasing number of real brand fashion spin-ins to Sims such as the popular H&M expansion plus the next massive installment of the franchise in 2009 with The Sims 3- expect the legion of addicts around the world to grow for years to come.

8/ Music and Dancing - Nurien

Time to start practicing your moves... Wherever there are fashion runways there is music, but it's surprising more fashion games don't go one step further and include dancing to go with the music element. Nurien, a Korean studio is coming at it the other way around, and starting with an avatar dancing as its core game, and then branching out into fashion catwalks and chat game.

The graphics in Nurien are great and the dancing animations are very smooth and fresh, which makes the feature addictive for those girls who like to dance and make friends. The fashion element is also strong, with beautiful fashions, however it's a shame you can't design your own.

9/ Build Your Label - GirlSense

GirlSense takes the dress up game concept and extends it into fashion design and creating your own boutique. The sites Fashion Design Studio is quite a powerful tool and lets fashionistas create a wide variety of outfits. It's a really fun way to roleplay as an up-and coming designer and build up your own brand and customers. You can even purchase "ad space" on the site to promote your new designs.

Although the graphics are all in 2D and very simple, it matches well with the young audience of tween girls that make up the community, and there are lots of them! In fact, over 14 million girls have joined so far...

10/ Cheeky - MissBimbo

Well, all of the dress up games in the list are fun and addictive, but one stands out for being different. You could even say MissBimbo's key feature is its "cheekyness". Starting with the name, which flips the normal negative Bimbo into something quirky and fun to aspire to, although of course not without a lot of controversy.

"Bimbos" can shop for new clothes, become social butterflies and gain fame and event undergo plastic surgery like in the real world to , although you have to ask if this is a good role model to be showing to young and impressionable tween girls. Love it or hate it, it certainly is unique and stands out from the crowd.

So there you have it. The Top 10 features from the very best dress up games out there. Feel any others deserve a special mention or disagree/agree with any on the list? Give us your feedback!

Got a site topic you'd like VR Fashion to explore? Feel free to leave a note.