About us
The people behind the colonies
SL Colonies is a medieval survival, farming, crafting and trading RPG built inside Second Life. It has been running since 2019, it is made by two people, and the world itself belongs to the players who build on it.
What SL Colonies is
Plenty of systems in Second Life let you farm, or craft, or trade. SL Colonies is built so that you cannot comfortably do any of them alone.
Progress in a profession means visiting other people's land, using stations they built, and buying materials somebody else gathered. The economy is not a backdrop to the roleplay — it is the thing that pushes players into contact with each other. That is the whole design, and it is why the game is a community rather than a set of machines.
Playing is free. You wear a HUD and meter, register through it in-world rather than on this website, pick a trade and go. There is nothing to buy to be a colonist — no entry fee, no subscription, and nothing gated behind a purchase.
What money buys is building. The stations, fields, trees, veins and tools in the shop are what land owners fit their regions out with.
- 2019
- Running since
- 13
- Trades to master
- Free
- To play, always
Pick a trade and go
Take on quests, forge alliances, and immerse yourself in a player-driven economy. Master crafting and combat while exploring dozens of regions — and find a community that will happily spend an hour explaining how the loom works.
Run your own region
SL Colonies is a platform for world builders. Craft structures, design quests and shape landscapes with a full toolkit of stations, gatherables, vendors and region servers. Set your own theme and rules, and plug your land into the wider economy.
How it actually works
Your character is one Second Life avatar with a race, a trade and a level in it. Race is not cosmetic — it shifts your starting stats and keeps modifying them in play. There are thirteen trades to choose between: brewer, butcher, carpenter, colonist, cook, farmer, herbalist, merchant, ranger, seamstress, smelter, smith and woodsman.
Work at your trade and you earn Crafting Experience, which buys the levels that open better recipes. Stats, coin, professions and gathered goods all belong to the character, so an alt is genuinely a second character rather than a second wallet.
Land is the other half. Every region in the directory belongs to a player who chose its theme, built what stands on it and set its rules. Regions run the same crafting, gathering and trade system underneath, which is what lets a smith on one estate sell to a farmer on another.
Thirteen trades
From smith and farmer to brewer, herbalist and merchant. Level yours by doing the work — gathering, refining and making things other players need.
Land with owners
Player-owned regions, each with its own theme and rules, listed in the realms directory.
Optional membership
Three tiers, bought in-world with L$ — no card, nothing that leaves Second Life. Details on the membership page.
Who builds it
SL Colonies is made by two people.
Samuel Lison leads it — the design, the direction, and the aim of bringing the best parts of the systems scattered across Second Life together into one coherent game. Drakkhis Skaeren is lead developer, and the reason the concept became a world that runs.
Between them they build the game, the regions, the website and the tools.
Our Second Life profiles:
The mentors
We are not the only people who will help you. A handful of players give their own time to answer questions, show newcomers the ropes and keep an eye on the place — and they are worth knowing by name, because they are usually the first person a new colonist actually meets.
Where to find us
Most of the life of the game happens outside the website. The forum carries announcements, release notes, recipes and argument. Discord is where people actually talk, and where in-world group chat is mirrored so the conversation carries on whether or not you are logged in.
Everything published on the forum lands on the Herald as it happens.
Announcements and guides
Release notes, recipes, guides and the arguments that come with them.
Talk to the colony
The day-to-day conversation, mirrored to and from in-world group chat.
Start your adventure
Join SL Colonies and find a world worth spending time in — a player-run economy, land built by the people who live on it, and a community that will teach you the ropes.
The realm of SL Colonies awaits your arrival.
Start your journey