A Second Life Outside of Second Life

Scanning over last week’s news on GameDev.net I noticed an interesting entry: the Wall Street Journal reports (bottom of page) on the development behind Tringo, a game developed for play inside a virtual world but which has been licensed for both internet and mobile phone play.nullI like this one because it’s related to this: I’ve been wondering and asking around why designers aren’t using the interface design tools now included with videogame SDK’s (Software Development Kits) to prototype real world interfaces inside a 3D game (e.g. Doom3 – see image above) – complete with in-game simulation of real world events like moving robotic arms or opening airlocks. It seems so obvious to be using these free tools. But no one’s responding to my inquiries.