''Twinity'' is a 3D online

virtual world A virtual world (also called a virtual space) is a computer-simulated environment which may be populated by many users who can create a personal avatar, and simultaneously and independently explore the virtual world, participate in its activities ...

. Initially developed by

Metaversum GmbH Metaversum GmbH was a Berlin-based startup company behind the 3D virtual world Twinity. The company was founded in July 2006 and was led by CEO Jochen Hummel, CMO Mirko Caspar and CTO Christian von Hardenberg. In 2010, the company had offices ...

, it is currently held by ExitReality. The game offers its population, called Twinizens, to navigate around virtual (historical) versions of real-world cities, also called a

mirror world A mirror world is a Representation_(arts), representation of the real world in digital form. It attempts to map real-world structures in a geographically accurate way. Mirror worlds offer a Utilitarianism, utilitarian software model of real human e ...

or a

Metaverse In science fiction, the "metaverse" is a hypothetical iteration of the Internet as a single, universal, and immersive virtual world that is facilitated by the use of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) headsets. In colloquial usa ...

. A public beta began in September 2008 with the release of the first virtual city,

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitu ...

, which later was followed by

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a coastal metropolis and the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida, United States. With a population of 442,241 at ...

and

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

. ''Twinity'' is built on

BigWorld Technology BigWorld Technology was an Australian software company. It was the developer of BigWorld, a middleware development tool suite for creating massively multiplayer online games (MMO) and virtual worlds. It was formed in 2002 by John De Margheriti ...

and its economy is based on a

free-to-play Free-to-play (F2P or FtP) video games are games that give players access to a significant portion of their content without paying or do not require paying to continue playing. Free-to-play is distinct from traditional commercial software, which ...

model. ''Twinity'' is the first 3D online virtual world to incorporate true-to-scale replicas of large cities from all over the world. However, the company has recently begun to shift the focus away from a mirror world towards a more

fantasy Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy literature and d ...

-oriented environment with locations like the Isle of Palmadora. In this respect, ''Twinity'' seems to be moving towards a

Second Life ''Second Life'' is an online multimedia platform that allows people to create an avatar for themselves and then interact with other users and user created content within a multi player online virtual world. Developed and owned by the San Fr ...

-like world with more innovative features that they set up within the game, since much of user-created content is

fictional Fiction is any creative work, chiefly any narrative work, portraying individuals, events, or places that are imaginary, or in ways that are imaginary. Fictional portrayals are thus inconsistent with history, fact, or plausibility. In a tradit ...

and is not related to real addresses of shops and

apartments An apartment (American English), or flat (British English, Indian English, South African English), is a self-contained housing unit (a type of residential real estate) that occupies part of a building, generally on a single story. There are man ...

. All of the game's cities were removed in January 2012. On June 8, 2012, the acquisition of ''Twinity'' by ExitReality was announced.

World

Avatar customization

''Twinity'' members represent themselves in the world where they can use their real names and create an

avatar Avatar (, ; ), is a concept within Hinduism that in Sanskrit literally means "descent". It signifies the material appearance or incarnation of a powerful deity, goddess or spirit on Earth. The relative verb to "alight, to make one's appear ...

that can be customized in different ways, including the usage of a special

Photofit A facial composite is a graphical representation of one or more eyewitnesses' memories of a face, as recorded by a composite artist. Facial composites are used mainly by police in their investigation of (usually serious) crimes. These images a ...

application. Photofit allows a user to upload a real photo, which it then adapts to the measurements of an avatar face, making it resemble a picture. However, the creation of new

alter ego An alter ego (Latin for "other I", "doppelgänger") means an alternate self, which is believed to be distinct from a person's normal or true original personality. Finding one's alter ego will require finding one's other self, one with a different ...

s and

role play ''Role Play'' is an upcoming American thriller film directed by Thomas Vincent, written by Seth Owen, and produced by and starring Kaley Cuoco. Premise A married couple's lives are turned upside down when secrets are revealed about their past ...

are popular among ''Twinity'' players as well.

Globals

The

virtual currency Virtual currency, or virtual money, is a digital currency that is largely unregulated and issued and usually controlled by its developers and used and accepted electronically among the members of a specific virtual community. In 2014, the Europ ...

used in ''Twinity'' is called "Globals". With the Globals, the Twinizens can buy clothes, furniture items, animations and pay for their own virtual apartment. Globals can be bought with credit card on the homepage, with

PayPal PayPal Holdings, Inc. is an American multinational financial technology company operating an online payments system in the majority of countries that support online money transfers, and serves as an electronic alternative to traditional paper ...

or through

Mopay Mopay is a mobile payment platform represented in the U.S. by Mopay, Inc. Mopay and Mopay, Inc. are registered trademarks of MindMatics Group, a Germany-based mobile marketing company. History The brand mopay was first registered in Germany in ...

. The users can also gain Globals by attending virtual contests and events, use SponsorPay or finish the welcome tour that they are offered upon registration.

Content

''Twinity'' is based both on professional and

user-generated content User-generated content (UGC), alternatively known as user-created content (UCC), is any form of content, such as images, videos, text, testimonials, and audio, that has been posted by users on online platforms such as social media, discussion f ...

. Many Twinizens are content creators, developing and selling their own products in the world as well as creating their own

machinima Machinima, originally machinema () is the use of real-time computer graphics engines to create a cinematic production. Most often, video games are used to generate the computer animation. The word "machinima" is a portmanteau of the words ''m ...

. Users also set up their own apartments, clubs, shops and lounges in which to host various events or to share with others. Starting fall 2010, all users are given starter apartments that they can furnish and decorate themselves. Users can create their own furniture or purchase pre-made items from the shops in ''Twinity''. Additionally, a real estate agency can be found on the ''Twinity'' homepage where the Twinizens can localize an apartment of their choice. Within ''Twinity'', an achievement system is offered, which allows users to earn profile badges related to the categories: travel, lifestyle and living.

Technology

''Twinity'' uses next-generation texturing technologies to deliver a graphically up-to-date visual experience that can be compared to the latest game releases in the industry. This includes such engine features as normal, specular and cube maps.

Screen space ambient occlusion Screen space ambient occlusion (SSAO) is a computer graphics technique for efficiently approximating the ambient occlusion effect in real time. It was developed by Vladimir Kajalin while working at Crytek and was used for the first time in 2007 by ...

and glow shader effects finish the final look in the post-rendering. ''Twinity'' uses 3D mapping data by

Tele Atlas Tele Atlas is a Netherlands-based company founded in 1984 which delivers digital maps and other dynamic content for navigation and location-based services, including personal and in-car navigation systems, and provides data used in a wide range ...

, which makes the virtual buildings resemble their look in the real world. A major part of the content in ''Twinity'' is user-generated. Premium members can create 3D-objects, clothes, floor plans and animations which they upload through the ''Twinity'' client or export

COLLADA COLLADA (for ''COLLA''borative ''D''esign ''A''ctivity) is an interchange file format for interactive 3D applications. It is managed by the nonprofit technology consortium, the Khronos Group, and has been adopted by ISO as a publicly available ...

files through 3D modelling tools such as Google Sketchup,

Blender A blender (sometimes called a mixer or liquidiser in British English) is a kitchen and laboratory appliance used to mix, crush, purée or emulsify food and other substances. A stationary blender consists of a blender container with a rotating me ...

Autodesk 3ds Max Autodesk 3ds Max, formerly 3D Studio and 3D Studio Max, is a professional 3D computer graphics program for making 3D animations, models, games and images. It is developed and produced by Autodesk Media and Entertainment. It has modeling capab ...

Autodesk Maya Autodesk Maya, commonly shortened to just Maya ( ), is a 3D computer graphics application that runs on Windows, macOS and Linux, originally developed by Alias and currently owned and developed by Autodesk. It is used to create assets for interact ...

. ''Twinity'' uses the 3D Game Engine from

BigWorld BigWorld Technology was an Australian software company. It was the developer of BigWorld, a middleware development tool suite for creating massively multiplayer online games (MMO) and virtual worlds. It was formed in 2002 by John De Margheriti ...

, an Australian games company for 3D virtual worlds, which was specially created for Metaversum.

Closing

At first week of November 2021 Twinity website and game were shut down, its official blog https://blog.twinity.com/ is on still with last update of December 10 2021.

References

External links

* {{Official website, http://www.twinity.com/
ExitReality

"Twinity - what is it good for?"
2008 video games Virtual world communities Gaming websites Windows games Windows-only games Video games developed in Germany Virtual economies Massively multiplayer online role-playing games