TechCrunch: Ridemakerz Builds a Virtual World For Boys Filled With Its Toy Cars
TechCrunch covers the announcement of the RIDEMAKERZ virtual world, built upon ESC’s WebFlock platform.
The virtual world is a combination of a social network, video games, and a complex inventory system. Boys can design their own virtual cars online just like they can in the store. Electric Sheep took CAD files of all the body designs and measured all the parts with micrometers to render how each car looks. Then they converted that into Flash using 3D Studio Max and Papervision3D. There are 649 million different combinations, and each one can be made into a real car and bought, so Electric Sheep had to figure out a way to make sure that only parts that really fit together could be created virtually. Depending on what parts a boy picks, it will affect the performance of his ride.