How does a good cup of coffee in a quaint shop in Los Gatos sound? Great! Let's take a look at The Great Bear Coffee Shop, which is an Atmosphere recreation of a real place in Los Gatos, California, USA. It's not a huge world, but there's a lot of punch packed into this fast loading environment.

Upon entry you're greeted by some jazzy ambient music and the world unfolds in front of you. You'll immediately notice the wonderful texturing done in this world from real images of the coffee shop. There's so many ways to add realism to an Atmosphere world, and using and applying great photographic textures is one of them. From the bulletin board on the wall, to the greeter standing behind the counter, to the semi-transparent shop windows, you see all the details of the coffee shop coming to life.

You can browse the Los Gatos related pictures on the walls and click on the website pictures which will bring up a new browser window (note: You may find youself in a second Atmosphere world when clicking). There's a lot to see in this small coffee shop, so take your time and browse around.

As you go outside to the front of the shop, you'll note a porthole to another Atmosphere environment. This will take you to a very interesting navigational interface world that shows the arial overview of Los Gatos. As you float down you'll see portholes to the different places there. The Los Gatos eXperience is working on building the whole town! You can see other worlds they've been working on and read about their project on their website at www.losgatosx.com

My only suggestions for this world would be to work on the outside ground texture so it's as fab as the sky texture is, place a few objects about on the counters to bring the detailing that is in the textures out into the rest of the shop, and adding some chairs would also be nice. :)

The Great Bear Coffee Shop is a wonderful place to see the use of trompe l'oeil with photographs within Atmosphere, and the fast load time makes it an ideal world for hanging out and chatting with friends. (See below for screenshots)

-Review by: Francesca Crolley

	Outside of the coffee shop, Excellent sky texture; ground texture could use some tweaking.
	Great use of a semi transparent image on the windows. You can even see the reflection of the people in the coffee shop.
	The bulletin board is an outstanding use of trompe l'oeil, giving the 2D image a 3D look
	Don't be startled when you look up and see the greeter behind the counter. A nice touch which adds warmth and realism
	More wonderul use of photographic textures, giving the back counter all the detailing of the real shop.
	There's lots of photographs on the wall to look over, as well as some clickable webpages.
	A distance shot of the Coffee Shop, showing that a world doesn't have to be big to be interesting and enjoyable to visit.