Somehow during its seventeen years of existence, "virtual concert in Second Life" has generally come to mean just that, and not much more: One or more avatars performing on a stage pretty much like they would at a real world show, with the possible bonus of synchronized gestures and out-of-sync mouth movement. Late last week, however, hiphop star and Fortnite showed how much more amazing, immersive, and only-in-a-virtual world a virtual concert can truly be. And to a truly massive audience:
More than 12 million players logged in for Fortnite's concert featuring Travis Scott, with reviewers calling it "stunning" and "spectacular". It included a skyscraper-sized version of Scott teleporting across the landscape as he performed his songs… A digital version of Scott performed a fully-animated, scripted 10-minute set – shorter than a concert performance. As Scott moved from song to song, his virtual avatar changed – first into a cyborg, then a fluorescent spaceman. The landscape shifted and crumbled around players on an enormous scale. After it was over, Scott tweeted: "Honestly today was one of the most inspiring days. Love every single one of you guys."
Watch above, and expect to see many more such virtual world concerts by major performers soon, especially with real world shows cancelled during the pandemic. Now that Scott showed what's doable in a virtual world, that's the gold standard going forward. Indeed, beyond a live DJ set in the zero gravity nightclub of Inspire or the live performances of the Skydancers, I'm hard-pressed to think of many "not possible in real life" (TM Bettina Tizzy) music events in SL. It's been 14 years since Suzanne Vega performed live in Second Life, so the novelty value of "popular music star performs in virtual world" in and of itself has long since faded.
And yes, yes, the Scott performance is (far as I can tell) completely pre-recorded while Scott himself is not directly involved, but I'm not sure that completely matters.
Doing a show as complex as Scott's would be extremely difficult to pull off if it also required that he perform live, and I ultimately don't know how exciting that is anymore. Back in the Suzanne Vega days, an implicit hook to an event like that was, "Real celebrity uses some weird game thing only geeks play". But now that thousands of real life entertainers play in virtual worlds like Fortnite on their own time for their own personal fun, that condescending angle is no longer newsworthy, or accurate. As long as the real artist is directly involved on some level (even if that's just posting about it on social media) that's probably enough for most gamers.
Besides, there's probably a happy medium between pre-recorded and live: Make the performance pre-recorded, and afterward, have the performer log into the virtual world, put on a headset and chat/hangout with selected fans.
Wagner James Au / New World Notes 
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