On your next visit you may hear something different as you walk around Kokoro!

"My feet? They make sound?"

Why yes they do!

That's because we've have developed a new sound system for our sim called Footsteps!

What's Footsteps?

Footsteps is a new system that plays different sounds as you walk and run, depending on the type of footwear you are wearing, and the type of surface you are walking over.

How do I use it?

Footsteps is generally designed to 'just work' however there are a few things you can do to make sure it works perfectly for you!

The Footsteps HUD

• Adjust your timings
  We have done our best to make the default timings great, but every AO is different. You can use the HUD accessible from the sim menu to adjust your timings to better match your AO.
• Make sure your shoes are recognised
  Shoes need to be worn on Left Foot and Right Foot. If your shoes are attached to Hands, they will not be detected! Put our key phrases in your shoes descriptions to help Footsteps recognise them.

Find the full details on configuring footsteps over here!

We hope you'll enjoy the sims new feature!

Looking back on 2022

2022 was a busy year for Kokoro!

One of the first things we did in 2022 was to introduce homerooms as a weekly gathering for students and friends to gather and chat!

Deco Club and Curry Club worked together to run the Valentines Park event

Development began on building interiors that will eventually be used in our town as student accommodation

We introduced movie nights, and Deco Club ran the Summer Games event!

Kokoro's Castle Gallery: https://imgur.com/a/P0PdTiO

Jetski Race Gallery: https://imgur.com/a/HCBmn5G

Pillow Royale Gallery: https://imgur.com/a/F0XeVtE

Our event winners~

Students gathered to plan Seiiki's future, and some initial layout plans were put together for the the phase 1 section of the town:

Plans were made for a new collaboration based clothing store in our town, which involves an experience based system that allows you to try on clothes in store!

A special new version of the uniform was made so we could enroll a very special student! We also made a flippy skirt~

We all gathered to do our second yearbook photo~

We started work on a new creators course aimed at helping students get into creating - The course involves learning a program popular with Japanese game studios - Metasequoia, and also texturing in Blender! We ran trial lessons on some of these courses to begin to work out the kinks and make sure it runs smoothly when the course starts for real. We also developed screen share laptops students can use to show teachers their work~

Towards the end of the year, things quietened down on the event side. Some small immersion improvements were made in the sim, including a new splash screen, smoother skybox teleports that don't play sounds, we also started working on a footstep sound system to increase immersion walking around the sim!

Some quality of life improvements were also made, for example we made it so if you teleport out of the sim briefly and teleport back within two hours, your location is restored - You don't have to walk from the spawn! We also added a couple of help points to the sim as a trial way of helping new comers!

We also started work on a new Tennis game, and although not strictly Kokoro related I released a Cheerleader and Tennis Outfit that will be perfect for just this~

Going into 2023

Help Wanted

Building and development is requiring a lot of time, and as such in recent months events and services that I usually run have suffered as a result, indeed in recent months I've been so focused on getting things finished that I haven't run homeroom or movie nights at all! I'm conscious that this isn't great, so I'm choosing to scale back these activities and make them better instead.

Homeroom I will now be running on a fortnightly basis on a Sunday, and Movies will be once a month for the time being. But I will actually run them! Promise! I could really use some help doing events and whatnot, so if students want to help on this front it would be appreciated!

Development Focused

Kokoro going into the start of 2023 is going to be focused on development efforts, this includes building the facades of all of the buildings in Seiiki, finishing the footstep sound system and tennis game. Although this means there will be less events at the start of this year, I hope you will find that the wait will be worth it!

I look forward to going into 2023 together with everybody!

Happy new year!!

The change comes as we work to make the website support other types of activities such as Classes.

~Captain

RLVa Requirement will be turned on next Sunday. If you log in with a viewer without RLVa you will not be able to participate on the sim.

Why - Privacy

For a long time we have been unable to obtain privacy within our sim, with users being able to peer-in, sit-teleport into private conversations or see the whiteboard in private meetings among other things. It has always been a problem.

The issue became further apparent recently as we begun to develop student accommodation within the sim. Students should be able to shut the door and switch off rather than feel like there are still people making what they are up to their business. It is impossible to employ standard SecondLife parcels for privacy features due to our sim layout. We made several feature requests [1] [2] [3] to Linden Lab to try to get better parcel privacy features without success.

Ultimately we tried to avoid requiring RLVa for a long time, as we know it prevents people on the default viewer or people who simply don't want to use RLVa from participating on the sim. But it is felt that it is holding us back too much, preventing enjoyment of the sim. By requiring RLVa we are able to set a camera distance limit and prevent sit teleports, allowing guests to enjoy privacy within the sim.

Enabling RLVa

Much like emails, so long as you understand RLVa it is safe. We've compiled an article which explains RLVa with links to further reading if desired. We recommend reading it if you are not familiar with RLVa, before deciding to enable it.

Enabling RLVa in Firestorm

Activity Reviews

Twice yearly, clubs will now be reviewed for activity with the intent of making sure that our Club Directory, even if smaller, contains mostly active clubs that our students can participate in.

The activity review will occur on the first Saturday of April and October. We will check the club calendar and ask the organiser to report on member activity also.

If a club does not meet minimum activity standards, it will no longer be listed as an official club in the directory.

Minimum Frequency

We will be updating our guidelines to state that, at a minimum, club organisers should arrange a meeting on campus at least once a month to be considered an active club.

Student Club Membership Limit

In general, club activities tend to be more involved. It is felt that it is better for a student to be in a few clubs and spend lots of time in each than to be in many and have little time for all of them. Therefore, we are limiting students to a maximum of 3 clubs each going forward.

Note: This does not apply retrospectively. Any student currently in more than 3 clubs is not affected but will not be able to join any more before they are below 3.

Decoration Club and Curry Club presents: Valentines Park!

The school is open to the public today! We're running an amusement park on our baseball field!

Come play on the Bumper Cars!

Come join us, soak up the atmosphere and enjoy the carnival games and rides with everyone~

Decoration Club has put together a special tunnel water ride~ Take someone special with you~

I'm informed Curry Club will be running activities at 11AM SLT!

See you soon!

~Captain

2021 is drawing to a close and we're about to enter the year 2022! Some of you speedy time travelers are already there!

We haven't been doing year reviews lately, but a lot has happened at Kokoro over the course of the past year, and I thought this year it would be worth covering some of those things!

So many new students have joined us

This year we have seen way more new faces than usual, many of which have went on to become enrolled students at our school!

I would like to start celebrating our students more, so I would like to show all of the people who joined captains books this year!

Our students are all an important part of Kokoro, without them Kokoro would not be a very interesting place to be!

We had our first ever Official Yearbook Photo!

Many of our students old and new gathered for a Yearbook Photo this year!

Entertainment before the Photo~

We've been a busy school with Clubs and Activities

For the first time in Kokoro's history, we have had active clubs for students to participate in, several of which have been opened by our students!

We have Dance Club headed by Pururin, Photography Club by Maki and Duckie launched Curry Club!

Photography Club putting on an Awesome Halloween Dance Event at Kokoro
So many people came to spend Halloween at Kokoro and see the Dance Event~

Decoration Club put together wonderful Christmas Decorations, where we spent much of Christmas together~

Nezu and Duckie putting on a Christmas Play~

We formed a new Student Council which has been hard at work

A functioning Student Council has been formed at Kokoro that has been having meetings several times a month this year.

With the aid of the council, many new things have been developed and more planned for Kokoro. We've put together an official Enrolment policy which has helped to make it easier for new guests to integrate and become a part of Kokoro. As a result, many more students than usual have joined us!

We've been working on things to support teaching at Kokoro too! We have also been planning the development of Seiiki, the town island!

We finally got our Male Uniforms!

This year, Kokoro finally got its male uniforms! We have already seen students start to adopt them and we hope you enjoy them!

...And a new Cable Car Station

This year saw the development and installation of Kokoro's new Cable Car Station in Seiiki!

The station is a custom mesh with materials where new building techniques were tested~ Ni provided us with ticket machines too!

With the station we also deloped a Ticket System that helps us to maintain customs and traditions at our school, as we work to turn our school into a students first environment~

2022

We're working on building a town for our students to live in!

This year, we intend to place much of our focus on Seiiki, our town island. Specifically, we will be developing the side of the island from the Heliport up to the station, turning it from an empty path to a vibrant town!

We want to build many different types of shops, mostly roleplay but some otherwise. We also hope to develop student accommodation above the shops, that we hope our students will feel happy to call home~ We also have plans to build a new visitor center and function hall of sorts!

Although not much building wise is planned for our campus island this year, we hope to work on the community side of things and begin to enable more activities such as teaching at our school!

A personal message

To each and every one of our students, I am sure that there will be many challenges ahead that the year will bring each of you as individuals, but I want you all to know that you are not alone. Kokoro and your Captain are here for each and every one of you, and we will face the challenges that the year brings together. I hope to help make sure that each and every one of you does not just survive, but thrives in 2022!

Get your sleep and do your exercises! No seriously, it will help make sure that you are better prepared to deal with whatever the world might throw at you, and make sure you are in a good state of mind not just to help yourself but those around you.

With that bit of realism out of the way, I do hope that all of you do have a great year, and I hope we will have as much fun in 2022 as we did in 2021! I really enjoyed this year. It was something special.

See you on the other side~

-

A new ambient sound system has been built into the School HUD!

Depending on where you are, and the time of the day you will hear different ambient sounds as you wander throughout our sim. Try having a wander!

It is hoped that with these ambient sounds, it will help provide a sense of atmosphere, and also enhance a sense of space as they drown out distant sounds that would otherwise be heard in a vacuum.

Comfortable Listening

We hope that most people will enjoy the new sounds throughout the sim, but recognize that with listening devices such as closed back headphones ambient sounds can create a pressure within the cup that can result in discomfort depending on the individual.

We have provided a set of commands that can be used to adjust the volume of ambience to a comfortable level for your listening, or mute if desired. Just type one of the following commands into the chat:

By default, Ambient sound volume is set to Medium. The HUD will remember your preference.

After much work, Kokoro Academy for the first time now has male uniforms available to its students!

Our male Uniform has some subtle details of their own that we are sure students will enjoy~

Buttons

Our Gakurans have golden buttons with a custom design by Ni.

Did you know it is a custom during your graduation ceremony to give the second button of your Gakuran to your sweetheart? It is considered a confession of love!

Like our girl Uniform, the male uniform too contains two golden ropes to give a sense of duty. They are placed on the right hand arm - The sword arm - because we want our boys to know that one of the gifts of being a male is strength!

Men have naturally stronger bodies and we want them to consider it their duty to use it for good! Make sure to train those muscles so that you can serve and protect the people you care the most about!

Of course our Uniform would not be a Kokoro Uniform if it did not have our twin hearts somewhere. On the boys, we thought that it looked pretty stylish on the tails of the jacket!

(The girls wear theirs on the back of their collar)

Currently, we have the Uniform rigged to Kuroo and will be distributing it to all our existing students. We will be working on bringing it over to the Kemono w/ Male Chest over the coming weeks.

That's all for now!

The sim has re-opened its doors to new guests.

We are trialing a new ticket system aimed at ensuring we grow at a sustainable rate in the future. Remember to grab a ticket from the ticket machine!

See you!

Notifications from the forum are now sent as Instant Messages as they arrive

Note this does not include Private Messages - This is a separate system on the forum. We'll add something similar for private messages in the future.

From your profile page, click Edit Profile

Select Enable Status Updates and Save

You can now submit status updates to your profile!

You can also follow other members to see their status updates. Just click Follow member

Tip: If they have enabled status updates, you can also post on their feed, and reply to their status updates!

We want this day to include everybody old and new and indeed I have reached out personally to many of you yesterday who were around in Kokoro's early days to be a part of things too and will continue to do so.

Kokoro has Changed

To our oldies, Kokoro was largely an informal affair for the most part. My leadership (or lack of) style at the time was to simply try to please everyone, even those who may have made other guests feel down. Over the years that has changed and I am less receptive of those things than I used to be and much more willing to take action where I feel necessary.

Some behaviors that used to be tolerated (and perhaps even participated in by me) will not be any more. This includes things like:-

• Passing comments about a students appearance or other forms of ridicule.
• Coming to 'be around' us, without making the effort to engage with the people you are around or get to know them or let them know you.
• Prying about 'who a person really is' asking them if they are an alt etc.

In the past we would not have acted on those things and perhaps even seen some of them as 'banter' but we've come to realize how they affect members of the community and make them uncomfortable. Be aware that we take these things seriously now and if me or one of our admins feels you have been participating in these types of act you will simply be removed from the sim - Don't do it.

Getting together

When the day comes, there may be lots of people who have never met you before, have a think about what you would like everyone to know about you. What are your hobbies? What kind of job do you do? Are you studying? Is there something interesting about where you live? What would you like to achieve as a student at Kokoro?

We will make sure everybody gets an opportunity to learn a little bit about everyone, so we are all at least a little bit familiar with each other and can connect over things and have fun. It'll be a good opportunity to see what Kokoro's students are interested in and perhaps a good starting point to think about what kind of clubs and classes students would enjoy in the future.

Till then

~ Captain

Kokoro Academy is a privately owned sim in Secondlife. Although we generally endeavor to let new guests visit us, this is not to be taken for granted. We are not a public service.

We do not owe anybody access to our sim, or even an explanation as to why we are operating the sim the way we do.  Any such act should be considered an act of good will.

Last Saturday I took the executive decision to restrict access to the sim to students only. I will not divulge the reasons why, they are personal between me and some of the people at Kokoro.

Conduct at Kokoro

It came to my attention that some of those who were unable to access the sim as a result may have taken it upon themselves to give my friends a hard time. This is not acceptable behavior. I will not name and shame publicly and ask everyone to do the same, but know that those people will be dealt with accordingly.

Many of our students are very welcoming and love to make everybody feel welcome. But know that we are still a well-kept tight knit community. When it is felt that their kindness is being used I can and often will step in. Visitors should expect that they are less likely to retain access to Kokoro if they are taking advantage of the kindness of those in our community.

Kokoro is remaining students only until further notice. This may change in the future but no commitment is given. Some of our students are not currently in the student group. If you are one of those people chances are I will reach out to you soon.

Whether you're working together on a super-secret group project, or doing things that would land you in the Headmasters office, this update benefits you.

The new updates aim to turn Kokoro from one small room that everyone can see everywhere in, to a big place with many private rooms that can only be seen and entered on foot!

No more!

How does it work?

Users with RLV get the best experience, the camera is simply constrained to the maximum distance using RLV.

For non-RLV users, we simply block the view with the HUD when camming too far. You will be prompted to reset your camera by pressing ESC.

Keeping up with Growth

Kokoro's Community is growing and as we grow there are more people on the sim. We hope that this change will allow those who enjoy some privacy once in a while to still enjoy Kokoro and find a peaceful hiding spot on the sim when things get busy. The change will also likely become more relevant should we build student accommodation in the future.

The feature is not quite finished yet. Currently our Experience is not required to enter the sim, but we intend to change that soon.

You will now see the last 3 created topics when entering the sim.

Underneath are the latest News and Announcements. If you have a forum account you will still get notifications to replies tags and followed topics as before 🙂

~Ai

Now in the post editor 👍

~Ai