Free, Safe Space for 100 Avatars to Hang?

I'm a teacher; I've been charged with brainstorming ideas for recognizing our 5th graders to be recognized. They'd normally have a promotion ceremony at the end of the year....

Any suggestions that are free and easy to operate that would allow about 100 avatars to hang out? Pretty low-end requirements so that as many as possible can participate would be needed.

I appreciate any resources to look into. I'm at a loss, and also overwhelmed! THANK YOU!

I would semi-seriously suggest World of Warcraft (free until level 20), except it won't work on Chromebooks - that may be an issue for your students. But you could introduce them to Barrens chat if you did.

This seems like a tough one to answer.

I appreciate you attempting at all, Merphle!

WoW would be awesome, to me, at least. I don't see that working with our system administration, since we can't close it off in any way....

I'm looking into streaming options, now. Like, myself and the rest of our admin team would video ourselves doing the ceremony steps, and reading all the speeches, names, etc....

It's probably a bit on the nose, but would Fortnite work? I haven't tried but it appears you can create private matches, it's free, and the private matches support 100 players. I'll try and brainstorm some others!

Is an irc channel too much of a fossil for the youths? Or not secure enough? Don't know much about it other than you can find free web versions and it can do hundreds if the server is robust enough?

I suspect Minecraft can handle it, particularly if you run your own server. I haven't tried it though. And people would need a client, I think.

I've helped run big Zoom streaming sessions, they work for what it sounds like you want. Twitch or YouTube also work, particularly because it sounds like you're looking for a more broadcast thing.

Minecraft would be a good choice, but it's not free.

What about Roblox? I know nothing about it, other than it's reasonably child-safe, it's available on like every platform there is, and it's free.

Roblox might work. My kids play it, it can run on a potato system, and there are supposed to be easy tools to create and admin a space. The issue would be your "about 100". The max number of players per server is exactly 100, so if you're about is under that then it would likely work.

Create and moderate a channel on Discord. It's free, easy to moderate, and simple to add various entertaining bots.

vypre wrote:

Create and moderate a channel on Discord. It's free, easy to moderate, and simple to add various entertaining bots.

This is what I was gonna suggest.

Veloxi wrote:
vypre wrote:

Create and moderate a channel on Discord. It's free, easy to moderate, and simple to add various entertaining bots.

This is what I was gonna suggest.

Yeah, but it sounded like Zoso was looking for something more visual - a graduation/promotion ceremony in cyberspace, since they can't get together in meatspace.

merphle wrote:
Veloxi wrote:
vypre wrote:

Create and moderate a channel on Discord. It's free, easy to moderate, and simple to add various entertaining bots.

This is what I was gonna suggest.

Yeah, but it sounded like Zoso was looking for something more visual - a graduation/promotion ceremony in cyberspace, since they can't get together in meatspace.

Maybe, something like PS Home would have been perfect, but it no longer exists. And the larger problem is the solution will very likely have to be compatible with multiple device types. A video-teleconferencing app would work, but harder to moderate unless you set specific online times that some students may not be able to accommodate and has less ways to make it fun and interesting unless you want to spend a lot of time on it.

Overall, Discord or something similar is probably the best option that offers the most fun and convenience for the students and oversight for the school district.

Best option for a virtual space that I've seen come out of this pandemic so far is a spreadsheet party. It sounds like it shouldn't work but it absolutely does.

That... sounds interestingly fun haha

Private PUGB server.