Dunno if you’ve been checking, but there’s a fair amount of the ‘verse on MySpace.

CAST
Among the zillions of wannabes, imposters, and sincere but unofficial fan and tribute sites, there are some actual Big Damn Heroes out there.
Nathan Fillion - Captain, our captain, and semi-regular blogger. His posts don’t appear often, but when they do they’re long and rambling and hilarious. I joined MySpace specifically to read his entries and I’m very glad I did. And so should you.
Jewel Staite - Not as bubbly as Kaylee in real life, but every bit as cute and now we get to hear about her career, her husband, her love of “Lost” and shoes, and how she unwinds after a hard day (hint: it involves “Lost.” And shoes.)
Mark Sheppard - Our loveable, utterly untrustworthy businessman Badger is there as well. Not many posts, but he does keep you updated on his career. Currently he’s popping up in BattleStar Galactica and will be in the pilot for “The Bionic Woman.”
Gregg Lee Henry - The sheriff from “The Train Job,” and the mayor from “Slither,” among many other roles. He blogs off and on, and he has a music page with some of his own pieces on it.
Rafael Feldman - Fanty from “Serenity” (the prettier one). Occasional posts about his doings and indy projects.
Michael Hitchcock - Dr. Matthais from “Serenity.” No blog entries I noticed, but he does check in.

But it doesn’t stop there. Look what else you can find!

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> Chris says “Want to jump into the ‘Verse and start roleplaying your own Serenity games, but you don’t have people handy to play with?”
> Chris says “No problem! Just get into the SerenityMUSH and get started!”
> Chris points to www.serenitymush.com for more information.
> You are welcomed into an online, text-based, multi-user world of Browncoats, purplebellies, Companions, Shephered, Reavers, Readers, and more, all laid out and ready for you to play.
> You log in to telnet://serenitymush.com:2020 with your free MUSH software client, available from several sources such as PennMUSH, and you create your character by choosing your archetype (think “character class,” but not as limiting) and generating your stats, feats, skills, background, appearance, etc. Your brand new character will get dropped at the Persephone spaceport and then it’s time to get going, you’ve got a life to live and it ain’t easy, out in the black.
> Chris says “SerenityMUSH” puts a heavy emphasis on roleplaying, to the point where you have to get permission to be Alliance or a Companion (since they both require higher-than-average RPing skills) and you can’t be a Reader without Admin invitation, and then only after you’ve proven yourself for awhile. There’s a wide variety of settings, planets, situations, and other people to interact with, and the system uses HSpace for 3D ship navigation, combat, repairs, etc.”
> Chris smiles wryly. “That said, I’ve never played a MUSH, including this one, so I can’t speak from experience, although I’m sure that like any RP game a lot depends on getting the right group of people together. However, there’s a nice review of the game here, and according to this reviewer the SerenityMUSH, like most Browncoat endeavors, seems to attract good people.”
> Chris spread his hands and asks “Anyone out there tried it? What did you think?”

Here at the mud farms of Canton they pay their workers almost nothing, so they can pass the savings on to you, the customer. Of course, there’s this pesky mythic hero thing they’ve got going…

A group from the Miranda Survivors of Second Life have been working on making their own Jaynestown, and they’re having way too much fun doing it. Pictured are Red Rogers, Abby Dawson (she of the virtual Firefly build), aenea Erlanger, Sirk Sumbula, and Elsbeth McConachie. Not pictured is Merasu Acropolis. With an only slightly drunken attention to detail — or possibly an attention to drunken detail — they have filled in the area with everything mud farmers could possibly need. Above is the mud itself, complete with frogs and mud wrestling options.

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The Big Red Button store in Second Life has moved to Washtown! All your favorite shiny virtual places are now within easy walking distance!

Second Life is an immersive 3D experience wherein you create an avatar and explore, make friends, sell stuff, buy stuff, and party a lot. Or, if you’re a Browncoat, you find other Browncoats and congregate. Me being me, I set up a store to promote Firefly and Serenity related virtual merchandise. Go figure.

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Some of you may remember the fantastic Lightwave model of Serenity made by Sean Kennedy some time back. If you’re interested in making your own insanely detailed 3D model, he’s been posting a step-by-step tutorial here.

Aside from the cool versy aspects of it, this is also an incredible tutorial on using Lightwave, the VertiBevil plugin, texturing, and more. You’ll need to know the basics or you’ll get lost very quickly, but this tears the old girl apart and examines every minute detail in, you know, detail.

Lots of pictures throughout. You can also find the tutorials in PDF form here, but I advise going through the forum posts because he answers questions as he goes.

The Serenity at Washtown in Second Life isn’t the only one. I actually saw this one first.

It’s by Abby Dawson and it’s a work in progress. Currently at over 600 prims (shapes) it’s not as accurate a Serenity as the one by Fenix Eldritch that Washtown now boasts, but it’s more furnished, it’s hovering instead of being parked, and it has firing engines courtesy of Hinkley Baldwin and operational shuttles by Ilyara Tardis. Take a peek?

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I see absolutely no reason why your Second Life should be any less obsessive than your first, and apparently neither do these people.

Second Life is an immersive 3D environment where you create an avatar to represent yourself, and you travel through the worlds interacting with other avatars and reshaping the world to suit yourself. People design their own luxury mansions, their own skyscrapers, their own amusement parks and nightclubs and sex grottos. So, naturally, some virtual Browncoats got together to make the crappy little town where Wash is a hero. And now they have their own Firefly.

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The ‘Verse is everywhere, and everywhere is in the ‘Verse. Or, more accurately, Browncoats are everywhere and they bring the ‘verse with ‘em. Such as in, say, The Sims.

The Sims is a 3D immersive game that allows you to create avatars and let them live their lives with casual or heavy-handed influence from you. You can personalize your avatars and design their surroundings, and it seems as if some people have been doing their best to Jossify things.

billygruffs has been making Whedonverse avatars and along with the Buffy and Angel ones, he’s got the Big Damn Heroes. He’s missing Wash and Simon, but has two Jaynes so that helps.

Fortunately other Sims players picked up the slack. There are more here and there, just do a search for ‘em (registration required).

Back in the days of the show, modeler SkinwalkeR was asked to create a map of the ship that could be used in Unreal Tournament and to help create a virtual walkthru of the ship for the FOX website (you can read about it and see some preliminary shots archived here. This effort kinda died when the show did, but SkinwalkeR did make some character skins that are still around.

Mal, Zoe, and Jayne, for Unreal Tournament or Quake 3. Download ‘em here.

I wonder if Microsoft has any blue-handed employees?

Dunno for sure, but I do know you can fly a Firefly through their online game Freelancer with the help of this MOD by Godzero.

This MOD can be played in Multiplayer, Singleplayer and open Singleplayer games. It adds the FireFly class Freighter, available on Planet Pittsburgh for $5000.
FireFly class freighters are one of the sturdiest classes of ships you will ever find in the universe. With a good crew these ships will practically live forever. Mostly used by smugglers because of its numerous hiding places, this ship has an excellent cargo carrying capacity and a strong reinforced hull, making it a popular choice with many traders. After its delivery to Sirius in 312 AS it went through a complete overhaul to help it better cope with the dangers of the Sirius system, including 3 chin mounted gun mounts and 5 hull mounted turret mounts. With that much firepower Firefly’s can go anywhere in Sirius with near immunity.