marxman1313 Resident Most of the mainland was abandoned in terms of continued development in favour of Bellisaria & inititives like it. Thats just the direction the lab took at the time. Would be great if they changed tack a little more to more generally manage every continent & their infrastructure needs.

Irishk9 Aeon Zindra was many years before the first sims of Bellesaria were laid down from what I understand, so that doesn't really add up to me unless they had been laying things down in bulk on dev servers for just as long.

If you can provide an accurate timeframe for when this happened and to what it'd be appreciated though. Most of my mainland history knowledge comes from users who have been around SL much longer than I have and my memory is faulty at times.

marxman1313 Resident, Zindra opened in June, 2009. I don't know when Bellesaria opened.

Jennifer Boyle That adds up with what I remember yeah. I wanted to say it was over a decade ago but couldn't remember for sure. Bellesaria has been around for around 3 to 4 years now if I remember right. It's very new as far as the mainland continents go.

Northern Zindra was planned as an adult shopping district. But most shops are in private sims nowadays. So there is a lot of abandoned land in Zindra, which is why there is no incentive to add more.

marxman1313 Resident Zindra was downsized to its known size at release in 2009 probably because there was no demand for so many regions at the time, which makes sense given the economic circumstances at the time. The same happened to the Gaeta continents in 2008, out of 5 planned continents only Gaeta V was built fully and Gaeta I about halfway. However in 2010 they built the original Linden Homes continent, Nascera, and 3 copies of it. After Zindra, the only other time they added adult rated "mainland" regions was in 2016, Horizons. It is not regular mainland though, and it follows a community-based theme and model like Bay City.

The change in the Lab's strategy and the paradigm shift Irishk9 talks about happened in 2009, and has nothing to do with Bellisseria, which they started to release in 2019 (and they were building it since 2018 so the planning might have started as early as they were finished with Horizons). Bellisseria is just the result of the changes the Lab has made a long time ago to try and keep the "land product" sustainable.

Some people might have missed the events of a decade or I don't know, I joined in 2019 and there are just so many reliable sources to learn about SL's history from, how anyone who actually has been here the whole time could miss any of it is beyond me.

The point is, while the growth and sustainability of SL relied on and was driven by Mainland from the beginning to 2009, from that point it turned into private regions and "community themed" LL projects like Linden Homes and Horizons.

Actually one of my suggestions when this comes up is to finish the unfinished mainland continents with that infrastructure, could be even LH, but at least like Horizons or Bay City, with predefined parcels, a consistent theme, streets, parks, etc. Roadside and waterfront land is ALWAYS more valuable than those in the middle of nowhere and this is what implicitly brought the initial success of Bellisseria, whenever they add new road connections at some parts of mainland the new roadside lands become highly sought after. This means the Lab's business model could be kept intact and the geography of the unfinished continents could be fixed at the same time.

AlettaMondragon Resident Ok that adds up and reminds me more of what I was told way back. As for people not being able to keep up with it, there's a lot to SL, and it's history plus it is it's own little world in full. I've met plenty of people who don't even know the mainland existed if not always or for a long time at least stuck to their spaces, shopping, and a small friends group so with all that it's no surprise to me at all.

As for finishing those parts of the mainland? it seems like something that needs a very complex but delicate touch. A lot has changed between now and then, more so than you have mentioned and finishing the mainland as it was originally intended may no longer be possible as nice as it would be....but also finishing them as premium homes may sit the wrong way with a lotta people.

That said Bellesaria was definitely a shot in the right direction for the most part as it made a healthy middle ground between mainland, more/better premium homes, stuff for the community and rules that benefit most everyone well enough. It even managed to find common ground on the age old dispute between mainland home owners and vehicle travelers. So maybe they could still take aspects of that into finishing old continents and making new ones while combining good community ideas with both.

marxman1313 Resident Indeed, I realize the "let's complete mainland continents with Belliseria-like LH regions" idea is somewhat the same that I normally oppose, but there is a great example of this at Northern Jeogeot. It is not the continent itself that had to be finished, but originally there was only one row of water regions at the coastline and the Pyri Peaks regions were the world edge, the west side of the island was incomplete. When Bellisseria reached this area, they didn't stop at Oukranos, they added houseboat clusters south of it, added 3 regions to complete the Pyri Peaks island beautifully, and now it is a central landmark in this area instead of a world edge, surrounded by the original northern isles of Jeogeot and the Bellisserian islands. This also makes sailing and aviation in this area much easier and more fun overall. This is an absolute positive example of how to improve an old mainland area with no downside and using the Lab's current, Bellisseria-based land business model.

If they did the same at Southwest Satori (it's really close to it) and if they could reopen the Zindra regions they eventually didn't make, and populate them with Linden Homes or a Horizons-like infrastructure, it would definitely look great and it would be very useful, not only for the homeowners.

AlettaMondragon Resident True, I forgot about that. Maybe they could dot the mainland with the occasional cluster of Bellesaria pattern islands for premium homes for people who want them elsewhere on the mainland and then use that to justify completion of mainland continents and extension of empty public water sims around coastlines. I may go ahead and suggest that actually.

marxman1313 Resident, It seems to me that there certainly would be a demand for Bellasaria-like homes in adult regions. Is there any reason that it would not be feasible to add the missing parts to Zindra and operate the new land area similar to the way Bellisaria is operated, with LL renting out prefab houses?

Jennifer Boyle Mostly community relations. One of the good things about Bellesaria is it's "Disconnected" from the rest of the mainland in a sense despite linking a few continents. Filling in parts of the mainland with premium homes would break that and probably raise concern among non-premium users as well as likely upset older users or Zindra residents who hoped to one day see it finished and close to originally as possible. It could be seen as invasive, tacky, disrespectful, etc.

However adding Bellesaria or Horizon pattern islands with premium homes that are adjacent to the mainland continents that were never finished might go over with people better and leave the proper completion as a possibility while also complimenting the parts of the mainland it's connected to and offer the same amenities to the community as Bellesaria does.

marxman1313 Resident Not sure on dates, my memories are more general. What Ive gleaned is Sl started with a small number of sims that were added to to make up what is today the Sansara continent. The other mainland continents were then added. This all happened during Sls most popular period. A global economic downturn happened, which had an effect on Sl, Ceos changed during all of this too & after some less successful attempts at continents like Bellesaria. Bellesaria itself began to emerge. The main differences being a higher build quality of houses & infrastructure on those sims. There was more interest in them that time round. They grew in the following years, the lab primarily focusing on them. While all this was happening, private sims came and went in the surrounding ocean to the west, growing in number.