A SECOND LIFE man has confirmed he will continue dancing like an extremely confident woman at a hen night because finding his own dance animations sounds like a lot of fucking about.
Ryder Darkstone, 47, has spent the last three years attached to his girlfriend's dance HUD despite accepting that none of the animations were designed with him in mind.
At any given club night, Ryder can therefore be seen delicately rotating his hips, running both hands through his hair and occasionally bending forward while looking seductively over one shoulder. “I know,” he said. “I should probably sort some dances out.”
DANCING
Ryder first began using girlfriend Luna Moonlight's HUD after the couple attended a club shortly after meeting. “She said ‘jump on my HUD’, so I did,” he explained. “That was 2023.” Ryder has remained on it ever since.
Luna's collection contains 74 dances, including SASSY GIRL 08, SEXY GROOVE 4, FEMME CLUB 12 and one particularly elaborate animation in which Ryder slowly strokes his thighs before flicking his hair backwards. Ryder is bald. “I don't love that one,” he admitted.“but it's only about 40 seconds.”
EFFORT
Friends have repeatedly suggested that Ryder visit an animation store and choose dances of his own. He has investigated this possibility and discovered it would require teleporting somewhere, trying animations and then making purchasing decisions. “Nah,” he said. “I've already got these.”
Researchers estimate that assembling a basic male dance HUD would take Ryder approximately twenty minutes. Instead, he has spent roughly 1,400 hours performing a sequence in which he puts one hand behind his head and slowly rolls his pelvis towards a DJ called Brian.
CLUB
Other residents insist they have become accustomed to Ryder's distinctive dancing style. “You don't really notice after a while,” said friend Blade Darkheart. “You'll be talking to him normally and suddenly he'll put both hands on his knees, arch his back and wiggle his arse at you, that's just Ryder.”
During particularly energetic songs, Ryder occasionally transitions into an animation involving a small hop followed by a dramatic hair toss. His avatar is a six-foot-four heavily tattooed man wearing combat boots and a T-shirt reading NO GODS NO MASTERS.
HUD
Luna says she has offered numerous times to help her boyfriend find something more suitable. “I sent him a landmark to an animation shop,” she explained. “He said he'd have a look later.” That was eighteen months ago. She has since added another 23 female dances to the HUD. Ryder now performs all of those too.
His current favourite appears to involve pretending to hold an invisible handbag while pointing enthusiastically at somebody across the room. “I quite like that one actually, it's got a nice rhythm to it.”
ACCEPTANCE
Ryder has now accepted that finding his own dances is unlikely ever to become sufficiently important to warrant doing anything about it.“I suppose I could sort it tonight,” he said, gently tracing an imaginary line down the side of his body. “But we're going out at eight.”
At press time, Ryder was standing beside Luna at an 2000s club while "Can't get you out of my head" played. Luna was dancing elegantly. Ryder had both hands above his head and was slowly lowering himself into a squat.