Shanda Plans Its Own Second Life

Written by Tangos on May 10, 2007
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Shanda, the most successful online gaming company in China, is planning to launch its own version of Second Life, according to an article in FT.com.

“We are moving to diversify our games,” [Chen Tianqiao, chairman of Shanda,] told the Financial Times. “The only thing we care about is what users like, so we are also having a try  . . .  at this Second Life kind of direction.”

Mr Chen said the success of a game like Second Life depended on the rapid creation of a large “virtual community” of players, giving Shanda – which already boasts millions of players on its other MMORPGs and “casual” online games – a key advantage.

As the article said, this may not be good news for Hipihi. However, I don’t agree with Mr. Chen that Shanda’s huge user base will be their key advantage, as my understanding, virtual world is quite different from online MMORPGs. In fact, it is not game, it is community, its targeted users may not be the same as those of Shanda’s games. When will Shanda release this product is also important, but we don’t know any detail information about it.

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