Avakin Life

This week I resumed playing an online game, Avakin Life, after a several year hiatus. The game seems very much improved. While taking into account that the game's hype is calculated to get everyone to play, get hooked, and spend money; this game is somewhat as advertised. It is active, bright, colorful, and interesting. I am enjoying the game. I have been playing about three times each day. I enjoy seeing how far I can get without spending any real money, I spend zero cents, not a penny. So look, look and see the apartment that I furnished solely with Avakin coins or things that I earned in game activities. I furnished it myself and I really like it.

Sometimes the game spontaneously gives me good gifts, usually goofy gifts, but sometimes something very nice like the mahogany highboy pictured in my Avakin starter apartment pictured below. I do have a somewhat skimpy personal wardrobe but both my female and male avakins have clothing suitable for most occasions-pretty much like me in real life! :-)

People from all over the world play Avakin Life. I have "friends" from everywhere. It is my impression that in the morning (my time) people from the United States and South America tend to play, in the evening it is people from Europe, India, and the Middle East, and late at night it is people from Asia and the South Pacific. All of the players whom I have meet so far are young but hey, I am young at heart, and interested to see what the next generations are doing. :-)

Avakin Life extravagantly advertises that it is:

"An endless social world waiting for you. One where you can be anything and anyone – no judgments, no barriers, no limits.

"Connect with 200 million imaginations. Go on adventures with new friends. Create looks from 26,000 choices. Explore every dimension of you.

"This is Avakin Life. Who will you be today?"

"Create perfect spaces and the homes of dreams. Party on sunlit beaches and explore the stars. Dance to real artists and hang out at fashion shows. This world is what you make it.Play Now!"

Although...I am beginning to feel that I should look toward ending my Avakin gaming, and I have already reduced the hours that I spend there after only a week of play. My starter apartment is the only residence that I realistically can obtain since I will not spend money. And I feel left out when I visit my friends mansions, seaside villas, country estate, and space terminals. And I very much do not like the rap music that the game pipes into my apartment and the game objects if I try to turn the ambient sound off to get rid of the rap. Remember the historical meaning of the word "rap"? It is to "strike (a hard surface) with a series of rapid audible blows, especially in order to attract attention..." which is how rap seems to me. Also, I do not like having to step over copulating couples simulating sex to get to the till for my work orders; or to have to walk around those in sexual congress at the mall. This is a game for pre-teens, teens, and the young at heart? No, no, no. I have complained on two occasions, but it is the game that should clean up the public spaces not me, not my job. Maybe everyone likes it that way, semi-nude and sex in public? I no longer know. Much of the skimpy clothing available in the game are unlike anything that I have ever seen a human being wear, the garments look ugly and uncomfortable. Although I have to add that the many types of large headdresses and towering wings that the game offers, at exorbitant prices in real money, are extraordinarily lovely, fit for the gods or demons as you choose.

Some of the gestures and poses the game sells are standard human moves but most are either silly or aggressive with obvious dual purposes for sex and fighting. I did not like the plethora of blood and gore game images during the week before Halloween. Nor do I like the little tricks the game plays like repeatedly upping the price to just beyond what I have so that it took me to days to work for and buy a tea pot and cups. My apartment is now fully furnished, I am not going through that again. I did like being gifted with a free cat, free dog, and free horse Petkins whose cartoon graphics are actually delightful.

The Apartment I Furnished In Avakin Life I & 2

screen capture by Annmarie Throckmorton, copyright 2023

(The game gives you the basics like this starter apartment,

then you play to earn your clothes, furnishings, event fees,

pleasingly the game frequently gives surprise gifts, some dumb-o, some delightful.)

Avakin as advertised-screen capture 2023 1 & 2