My grandmother used to play 2nd life. I remember sitting with her as she made all sorts of things from outfits, avatars, to houses. She was very talented and made some money off of commission making things for people. I miss her and would give anything to have that time with her again.

You know that the game was never big when you can set your name as just any random name without numbers or underscores.

I used to play IMVU back in it's prime. Those "fake" players are actually people who bought vip/their username. If you buy VIP, you get the "Guest_" part taken out of your name along with a bunch of other features. It was a common thing back then (and seemingly still today) for people to be afk a lot. People, including myself, would be on IMVU all day and night, so there were periods where we weren't at our PCs but were still logged into the room. Watching that segment brought back so many memories. If anyone is curious, I can try to answer a few questions about the game.

"I hate homework and bein grounded" immediately followed by "im 30" was unexpected comedy

the game you went into where the players kept asking who you were is like going into a bar that only like 3 local old men are in and they all look at you like you've just walked into their house despite the sign on the door saying OPEN. i hope both these bars and these video games never have to shut down

Virtual Paradise legit seems like a game that a group of friends made for their own fun only and nobody else's

I love how in second life everything is huge, because all of the people make their avatars 7 1/2 feet tall

The man in the picture, AKA "2000's relevant musician," is indeed a 2000's relevant nusician, Sting, his solo act, after leaving The Police.

It’s so refreshing to see someone cover WORLDS without shitting their pants and blowing their load about how SCARY and LIMINAL and EERIE the game is.

'Psychochild' in Meridian 59 was one of the developers, who passed away in 2021. What you found at 49:15 was a memorial dedicated to him.

What I really find interesting is the fact, that someone built those places. He sat there with the 3D program and placed the trees, formed the caves, and arranged the chairs and tables. But it was so long ago, hard to find who built it; not many people "witnessed" these structures, with deep sadness, you can say people did this and put a lot of work into it, but only a few were able to appreciate this work.

You including IMVU into this made me start dying of laughter. I remember all the drama that revolved around that game. One of my exes I would constantly catch him on there chatting up underage girls, about 1k REAL money spent in the game so he could spoil people with virtual clothes and gifts. It was a hot mess, those were real people, but the likelihood of them being actually in Discord or a private DM chatting it up and ignoring you is a lot higher than you think LMAO

Playing dead games, is like unearthing lost civilizations, obscured and untouched for a long time. like visiting a ghost town that's been abandoned for god knows how long, it's so fascinating.

9:19 Wow, I can't believe it, 3DEE is in here! 3DEE/3DWorlds used to be an offshoot of Active Worlds that ran on its own server with a couple of worlds. I think the creator paid for a license for an old version of the AW software to run it. It's partially a recreation of the Dam Square in Amsterdam, and you're correct that it's Dutch. It ran from about 2000 to... I have no idea when. What you're visiting here is a backup of the main world, and the main area has barely changed since my first visit. Those little shops have always been there, and have always been broken and unused, lol. I was active on there from 2001 to about 2008, as a young teenager. It had this small but great community of about 50 people from all ages between 10 and 60, and we used to have IRL meetups once or twice a year. It was awesome. A young, hormone-laden teenage Bert dated with a bunch of the girls on there. As a socially awkward teen who didn't really fit in at school, it was the perfect place to escape to when I came home. The world itself was really only secondary to the community experience, since a lot of us logged on and chatted on there on a daily basis. Nonetheless there are a lot of things in there that you missed: a pyramid-shaped night club behind the Palace On The dam, where we could listen to music (one of the members ran a streaming radio show every week, Radio 3DEE) and dance, and we even had a couple of New Year's parties in there. There was a swimming pool that way as well. In another direction there's a cinema that played some movie trailers. Remember, this was before KZfaq, so it was very impressive in those days. Every easter we had an easter egg hunt where they were hidden all around the Dam square. There were also a bunch of other worlds, mostly from members who wanted to experiment with building in their own world. The main world didn't have any building; I don't think flying was even enabled for non-moderator members. We also had a bunch of themed worlds throughout the years, mostly for Christmas. I'm still in a Facebook group with most of the regulars from 3DEE from back in those days, but we barely talk anymore. Everyone grew up, moved on, started living lives of their own. Still, it's nice to be reminded of this place.

I was a crazy Hanson fan back with Worlds 3D chat. The band actually hosted a CHAT in Worlds and it was weird. It was like an AOL. I was like 13 and mastered the custom avatars somehow. I remember I loved being a pool so everyone could stand in me 😂

All these companies sponsoring these extremely small worlds that were practically dead at their peak is almost a 1:1 mirror of the Metaverse today.

If you continue this, I'd love to see more interaction with the few people you do find on these games. You really get to wonder who they are and what they're doing on a literally dead game

this is such a hidden gem of a channel!

Seeing the old music news was so interesting. Its literally a time capsule or like time just suddenly stopped one day and everyone vanished in a spooky way.. its so cool

Sub Rosa was so good game. Ill never forget how I met with other businessman and he said to us. "It appears you want this disc. You can have it if you..." In that moment he and his friends were hit by high speed car and start flying away. One of us run pick up disc we looked at him and he said "What? Hes dead. He won't need it in heaven. Were rich, now get to car an lets get out of it before someone hit us" When he started to run towards us thru road he was hit by car and send flying. This game is pure comedy it's like "naked weapon"

Sub Rosa is such a shame, looks like it could have been a really fun little time.

Random fact about Second Life, I remember it being sponsored by Rio Salado College, a college my dad has worked at for around 20 to 30 years now. I don't remember much, but I remember my dad working on cpr training and my mom was a dj in the game, making actual money from it.

Absolutely loving the ode to Ferris Bueller you slipped in at 48:30. Nicely done. MIDI of The Smiths is total cherry on the top.

That track at 50:07 - amazing piece of music and love that you noticed it !! The music was composed by Gene Rosenberg who did the score to Furcadia as well!

You’re a pleasant blend of funny and not over-the-top, which is super important in longform content like this. I’m a new fan

Oh man, IMVU. What a throwback. I used to play that a whole lot when I was like 12. I made some good friends there that I still speak with to this day.

As someone who has played Second Life for about 15 years and also have made quite a bit of money out of the game too (By selling land on sims like you spoke about.) it's honestly kind of a spectacle for US who play second life as well. My group of friends and myself will randomly go to sims like that just to find some wild things, from completely intact and working water parks and a whole ass recreation of central park. A lot of this stuff can even come and go so I'm not even sure what is still around, There ARE some places you can go to Redlyne though like London and the Welcome Islands, there are some other places as well but I forget them.

around an hour ago i commented on the first video in this series mentioning There, completely unaware that you actually found and explored it in the next video. the entire There section of this video was so nostalgic to me, i remember when i was a kid the first day i started playing the game, i teleported to tyr tower gate (the exact same one you went to in this video) and fell into the abyss while walking across the bridge. i spent hours trying to get out, completely forgetting that i could teleport out via the map seeing the game so empty and devoid of all the structures players had placed in the main beach area and the rest of the world like Vista Point and Twin Lakes makes me really sad. i'm glad the game is still around, but the things that made it special and fun to explore and mess around in are completely gone

Being a player of Second Life since 2006, it's always fun to see a new person's perspective of my weird ass game. You didn't do anything wrong, in fact you brought to light again how hard it is to get into it for anyone who's curious and doesn't have any friends to teach them the ropes. There's a ton of beautifully made places with the ability to use mesh, shaders, and normals, but because the game still has all the old stuff as well available to players, if they don't know what they're doing, they'll just end up mismatching literal decades of content, or paying Lindens (LBux) for stuff that doesn't look good, yet costs the same as something 10000x higher quality. It's a money hungry game to make it work right, but you end up getting amazing places like the Final Fantasy 7 Roleplay sim, which looks to the T from all three versions of the game. And it's not weird to enter a sim filled to the absolute brim with people, hundred strong though, constantly and consistently. It's just way too easy to just stumble across nothing but empty stores and strip clubs and see nothing worthwhile.

This is a really niche part of collective internet culture I'd love to see more people explore but it's hard to imagine anyone else's take on it being quite as nailed on enjoyable as these. Both of your videos are a great balance of genuinely very funny and strangely touching, big appreciation

Really appreciate the Trigun title card music. Very nice touch that both goes well with the vid and makes me feel all tingly inside from the fact that I've realized it.

"3 questions in and i think i found the first bump in the road" is my new meme. thanks for that one

The fact that the Googie Room made a return made my heart grow three sizes

Meridian 59 was the bomb back in the days, it felt so unreal walking around in a "big" world where other players from around the world where walking around at the same time.

It's so hard for me to watch you navigating SecondLife and going to some of the forgotten sims. But-- I'm also glad that it was visited. There's a bunch of places that are much much better, but there's a lot of those W E I R D places like the ones you bumped into. I kinda wish I might have bumped into you while you were checking Second Life out to show you around to the higher quality sims. x3 Either way! Great content, and lovely to see all the old games.

"3 questions in and i think i found the first bump in the road." such comedic timing on that. kudos!

"I hate being grounded..." "I am 30". The dry wit on this man.

Sub Rosa is a hidden gem. It’s surprisingly good or atleast was like a year ago. Underrated game

Dr. Kleiner being questioned by disembodied voices while standing next to the Delorean Time Machine is something that seems out of a fever dream.

the excitement u have when revisiting gogie is amazing

Never been happier to stumble upon a channel than via your disturbing game iceberg. Keep up the fantastic work!

The Millionaire creation in Virtual Paradise was actually really well crafted; especially with the in-game episodes

32:27 “Hits Expert Island started off strong with me falling from the sky to some Christmas music.”

3:49 this is actually a very faithful recreation of Flynn's basement from the movie TRON Legacy, and the name "Grid" is a reference to the in-universe virtual reality of the same name

I love how these virtual worlds tend to look like someone's fever dream mixed with advertisement and teen angst.

20:00 I am a huge wrestling fan, so I can help. That poster was The Rock vs Stone Cold Steve Austin from Wrestlemania X7(17). This was their second match in their 3 matches at Wrestlemania. (The first being at Wrestlemania 15 and the last on wrestlemania 19. It took place on April 1, 2001 and it regarded as not only the best Wrestlemania of all time, but possibly the best Wrestling Pay-Per-View of all time. The match is infamous for Stone Cold turning Heel (or bad guy to non-wrestling fans) and siding with is long time rival Vince (Mr.) McMahon. There were also other posters, the one I saw was King of the Ring 2001. That PPV had Shane McMahon getting thrown through real glass by Kurt Angle. So this map was either made or last updated in 2001.

Second Life seems to be the same as it was when I played it about 10 years ago - full of places to spend real money after the game went popular and a handful of people made a lot of money fast. That and watching everything load in so slowly you could probably make a game of guessing which textures would load next.

Seeing that Who Wants to be a Millionaire bit put a smile on my face. I used to be obsessed with that show when I was younger, and I would have TOTALLY been on board with all that stuff had I been aware of it at the time.

It would be cool to do interviews with the active players to ask what keeps them on and about their community!

i absolutely love this channel. i discovered it from the first "Exploring Dead Games" video and I've just got done watching the Dark Games Iceberg series. i love the humor and chill vibes, so i subscribed and cannot wait for more videos :)

I love the colorful/flashy 90's text font. Its so nostalgic. I wonder what it was like to play on one of these games back then.

He returns, and getting a sequel has temporarily cured my depression. Thank you.

The map "Grid" was a recreation of the set from Tron: Legacy when he first gets teleported into the Grid and is sitting at the Grid version of his dads computer desk. Great movie that is welllll worth a watch

I have become addicted to this series. Cant wait for future videos into these nichè dead games. Great commentary my man.

Love your commentary on these videos, so entertaining and funny. Please do a part 3!

your voice, humour, and editing style really sells this interesting concept of a series. please make this be a big thing you do

Worlds is like clicking on a sketchy gif ridden website and actually stepping inside of it

I listen to this when I need to focus at work. It’s relaxing, I think it’s your voice. Thanks for all the work you do!

I actually played imvu for a long while, and just letting you know most of those players arent fake, theyre just deciding not to talk to you and are whispering. Groups in that game are super exclusive for some reason and people can be hard to befriend.

The guy saying the answer to which bar was an ingot was a "bump in the road" is either some damn good acting, or the clip actually comes from all the way back when crafting in games wasn't a thing yet 😂

Something i remember from imvu is that if someone doesnt have guest next to their name it means they have the subscription, which gives them a "whisper" option. It basically just means they can dm each other in the room. I just noticed that all the players you thought were fake didnt have "guest" in their name so they were probably just talking to each other that way

The death of Sub Rosa is very saddening. It was a neat little Devolver title, and it was really damn fun.

47:24 "I went for a zero magic build cuz it's all a bunch of shit. Wizards aren't even real" fucking hilarious

I am so glad i found your channel. Everything about it is fantastic, your accent, your content, your editing! Thank you for being here!

14:58 This is Sting. He was in a band called "The Police" that formed in the late 70s and disbanded in the early 80s. Most people would put them into the "New Wave" genre but they had a lot of inspirations from punk music and reggae. They are really popular so you've probably heard some of their hits (Every Breath You Take, Message In A Bottle, Roxanne, Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic, and a lot of other songs.) Think my favorite song of theirs is "Be My Girl - Sally" which is kind of a deep cut from their first album "Outlandos d'Amour". It's about an inflatable sex doll, cool song! Also cool video I love this kind of stuff.

i remember 2nd life taking out a rage in popularity. everytime i visit a website i would always see ads of it, at a time where virtual world games were taking a complete blast.... i've never considered taking a look at it, so seeing this genre get grave yarded makes me wonder about how incredibly fast time goes by.

Okay, now this is the obscure part of history I enjoy experiencing. Ya got my sub good sir.

very sad this is probably the last time we'll meet Googie...well, Googie will always be googieing inside my heart

I'm obsessed with this series. I just know that for some of these games, these videos will be the most clear footage that'll ever get saved of them. And I'm impressed with how well you manage to cover these empty worlds while keeping the videos entertaining.

This is like the more modern version of seeing old ancient civilizations and wondering what it was like back then xD so interesting!

The transition into the dancing at 40:19 had me in tears. It was nice to see Waltuh enjoy himself on his journey through IMVU

I love these , it’s like exploring abandoned forgotten cities.. even more sad these are human creation that will eventually be lost. Forever.

I absolutely loved Sub Rosa back when mission mode was still playable and seeing it randomly pop up after a bunch of 90s/early 2000s virtual chat rooms was painful

Definitely digging the 90’s DnB Jungle tunes during the Worlds segment of the video!

Don't know if anyone else has mentioned this but the BT Openworld map looks like it was actually a promotion with a massive broadband company in the UK, BT (British Telecom) is one of the biggest telecom companys in the UK, I Noticed their old logo above one lf the doors

I know realistically there are only so many “dead” games but man I love this and the first video, I’d love to see this be a semi-regular series.

39:56 I particularly love how they have an endless loop playing on the tv of Bakugo, a character who has absolutely fuck all to do with being a Gamer™ instead of like... Kirito or something

Funny note about second life is that there’s dozens of abandoned university sims that to this day are getting paid for by the schools that somehow forgot about the $100+ per month for the past 20 years. Also it’s still pretty active in small little communities off of the main lands

second life is absolutely the kind of game you need to explore with someone who knows what they’re doing, especially since the user interface is so unintuitive. my delve into the second life world was pretty much exclusively with my friend who knew the ropes, and it’s a good time just exploring all the weird stuff out there. the officially sponsored Duran Duran world holds a special place in my heart. another fun quirk about SL is how chock full of horny people there are, like i swear every interactable chair or couch or hot tub had a bunch of sex modes along with the regular sitting modes. i had to like actively try to not accidentally click on a sexy action when i was sharing a bench with someone.

At 20:43 appears what seems to be the BT logo. So BT doesn’t stand for Big Time, it stands for British Telecom, one of the telecommunications companies in the UK. Edit: research reveals that BT Openworld was a former brand name for BT’s ISP division. It’s unclear when they stopped using the name but it seems to place that map around the early 00s. Why such a random game was presumably endorsed by BT I have no idea.

Worlds actually wasn’t “dead long before the server went offline”! I played it sometime last year, and it was online back then; it had a pretty substantial user base, they were all friendly and chatty. It seemed their community was actually pretty active and did events together and everything. I have no idea what happened between now and then, because it really wasn’t that long ago that I checked it out. I’m almost tempted to think there may have been another download out there somewhere that is the actual active one. Anyway, it was pretty cool, there was an avatar customizing place where I gave myself the body of a woman in a black dress and the head of a Canadian goose. It was quite the look

Sub rosa was so much fun. You would join a company and steal briefcases and do some stuff on terminals, and best of all was shooting the competition. I got some wild memories with it

13:56 the metal room i’m CRYING with laughter

Because of how sad it is (to me at least), I find it weirdly difficult to think about how many friendships were formed in some of these old worlds. So many people have seen their friendships slowly fade away, or said their last goodbyes to their 90s online friends. How many people are thinking about these old online friends today? Wondering how they're doing? It makes me feel sentimental and is almost enough to make me cry... No time for crying now though, because despite how sad it is, these people are probably doing okay these days! So that's nice to think about at least. Hope that made sense... also OldPete65 is a Superchad Supreme. 😗

BT Openworld was the first name for British Telecom nationwide broadband service (now called BT Openreach). Many Internet Cafes in the early-2000s in England offered Openworld connections for 15p per minute on a pay-as-you use basis, or 90 minutes for £5.99. That's BT's logo in the game too.

30:47 "Oh man... oh man," ~Something I subconsciously quote now whenever I see something disturbing.

Totally unrelated but I love the little Trigun transition sounds in between each game :)

Ghost towns are always fascinating not just for their frozen in time aesthetic, but for the often interesting story everyone up and left. Video game ghost towns like these are no exception.

Even though i have 0 nostalgia for any virtual world since i didn't play any, the idea of exploring these abandoned places is such a cool niche i didn't know i needed.

Your videos give me a cozy feeling. Something about your voice the music the comedic timing is so familiar

Loving these videos, the BT open world room was British telecom open world it was the name of BTs internet in the early 2000s before changing it to Reach, BT is big internet and phone company in the uk.

Ah someone’s probably already said it but “The Grid” is what the world inside the “Tron” machine is called. The only half completed room there looks VERY similar to the room from Tron:Legacy that teleports people in and out of the Grid.

@15:02 the 90s musician is Sting, he sang "roxanne" and "every breath you take" Both decent tunes

@ 3:55 its literally the scene from Tron Legacy when the main protagonists gets sucked in, the only thing that gave it away was the keyboard covered in dust and my mind instantly shot to that scene, weird how the brain works sometimes

‘Grid’ in Virtual Paradise is supposed to be where Sam Flynn loaded into the Encom Mainframe in the movie Tron: Legacy. I’m guessing the desk activates something and sends you somewhere like a different part of the map that looks like the virtual reality setting of the film. 3:52

I clicked on this video immediately. Such an interesting and somewhat eerie thing to do. Thank you for the work you put into this!

Absolutely revisit Secondlife again, there's a lot of people and a lot more weird stuff to find.

Watching you repeatedly break into houses on a single sim in Second Life is hilarious and made me laugh til I couldn't breathe (legit logged into SL as I type) keep up your virtual journeys buckaroo!

14:58 That’s Sting, the singer and bassist for the 70s-80s band The Police.

The unfinished GRID map in Virtual World appears to be the beginnings of a Tron map. That unfinished room you showed in the clip appeared to be a recreation of the room where Flynn is accidentally digitized into the Grid in the basement of the arcade.