My Birth in Gaia

Otakon 2008: This is my fourth year attending Otakon. I’ve really gotten used to the activities available and layout of the convention center. During the first day of the week end me, and my friend Mark who was there with me, did an extensive search of the Dealers room. It was my intention to continue my tradition of purchasing a new hat each year at Otakon. As we searched I purchased a Holicxxx wall scroll and Mark bought a Yotsuba figurine. I wanted to get a mask but of the two we found neither was of decent quality. Finally I came a crossed a white hat with long wings on it that ended in gloves, I immediately decided this to be the years hat. In the lobby outside the Dealers room I opened my new hat and found on the tag that it was from a game called Gaia Online.

Mark was already a member and knew of an invitation bonus so I asked him to invite me to the game. Later that evening I dove headfirst into the world of Gaia. I began creating my character, with the obvious choice of male gender. Going for the darkest colored long-sleeved shirt, long pants, and boots available I tried my best to mimic my favorite items in my wardrobe. I had many years before made an Anime persona of myself with long straight blue hair pulled back in a ponytail so I took the longest hair available for my male avatar and colored it blue. I have grown attached to half closed eyes I was given in Animal Crossing and again in Animal Crossing Wild World which I often see staring back at me in the mirror, so I picked the only eyes of similar style available to beginners in Gaia.

I found myself now with no direction as to what to do next. With my character complete and account created, the only thing I could think to do was to seek out a way to meet Mark in the game. In Gaia it seemed everything centers on avatars and their various equips. Navigation seemed fairly intuitive as it was done through the websites navi-bar. I went to the My House tab and found that when I asked to place my own house I was placed into a Flash game where other player characters were wandering about witch I could do as well by clicking the place I wanted to move to. I soon discovered that like in Animal crossing I was able to shake trees, stones, and apparently bushes to make small amounts of money fall out that was placed in my inventory on its own. I could also collect bugs, dig up flowers, and pick up small odd colored rocks. I messaged mark on instant messenger and we fiddled with the zip codes that allow players to relocate themselves in “Towns” and after much frustration and about tree minuets we finally meet outside his in-game home.

After a short time of talking to each other here I went off in search of some form of entertainment. I looked through all the shops and found that my previous method of catching 1 of each bug was not going to cut it and the colored rocks where in fact crumpled paper and other bits of recyclable trash. I found that with fifty papers at one shop I could make hats and likewise 50 bugs at another shop could be turned in for ink usable at a tattoo parlor. All this was interesting but what consumed most of my time was one of the items in the Games section. Each “Game” has channels and rooms where players can chat with others there though hardly any of the games involved any more interaction than that. I found my self on a quest to complete each of over thirty "Jigsaw" puzzles on hard difficulty.

I spent some time collecting inks and money in “Towns” and discovered a fish tank which I have cared for carefully. It pained me to discover that evolving items as well as additional Aquarium items where only purchasable with real money converted into Gaia Cash. My aquarium has rewarded me for caring for it with a few rare items not findable in the shops, most of which I have equipped making my character quite a melting pot of strange items. My character, which I named Vulse after my usual internet persona, is now thirteen Days old with a collection of nearly a hundred fifty items most of witch obtained through “Towns” or “Jigsaw”.