THE CUTE AND CREEPY TABULA RASA OF MAX CASE

Another featured nominee from the Extraordinary Avatar Expo, my search for the strangest, weirdest, and most fantastic non-human avatars in Second Life. Previous entries include The Arabian Phoenix of Psyra Extraordinaire.

Max Case on creating his avatar

[I] pretty much started messing with appearance right away. I always liked the character customization portion of games, knowing you are making your digital avatar. I knew I wanted an element of fluidity--
always one of the appeals of the Net in general to me (and lots of others I'm sure)-- that people are only seeing your mind.

So, as you can see, I had Beta, and Zeta, and Andro... But I still wasn't that happy with it-- except for the hair. The hair has been with me since the beginning.

It just came to me at some point that I wanted something small and more tabula rasa. Cute yet creepy. I also wasn't fond of the walking animations, so I set out early on trying to keep myself in [floating] yoga pose. Eventually made that and the custom typing animation [Max rubbing his temples, in a telepathic manner].

As far as attachments, most were motivated by need. Like the Mobius strip on my wrist, [which] has some various utility scripts and objects-- altimeter, compass, floor, etc. The chain was a gift from Shelaura Tomba.

The moving eye came later, when it just occurred to me that I wanted something more asymmetric.

On whether he ever uses a "normal" human avatar

Yes, though generally just for testing, or goofing around. No evil incarnation yet (so I guess that makes me the evil one.)

On whether he roleplays in his avatar

A little. My main roleplay is to not put any outside money in, beyond the inital $10 for a Basic [account]. I decided early on that my first goal was going to be to bootstrap my way up to a Premium account for the year-- that took about 6 months. I wish I could get a free account today. There would be something purer about it.