What would you like to see more of or change on SP/BoM?

Remove all ads!

Well, I'm not a big fan of how the news headlines are presented. Might just be me, but my eyes kind of slide through them without absorbing much. Better chunking (bullet points?) might improve them.
My screen resolution is 1200x800, btw. It takes about two mouse wheel scrolls. I realise that might not sound like a lot but it's not exactly inviting either.

I totally understand why you wouldn't want to do a fluid layout because they're a colossal pain in the arse to make, but right now things do feel (to me, anyway) too cramped on the front page.

(I've just finished an IT/Multimedia double degree and have been having good website design practices drilled into me, so I might be more sensitive and nitpicky to this sort of thing than most people)

 

OK, now I know I need more learnin ma!
Went to answer one of Tals questions and posted the quote. What an idiot!

Tal , you asked what games I was refering to when I tossed out the Sacred games. Those were the two that formed my solid dislike of what are supposed to be good sites. It was kind of a "see what you can find" thing and see how bad your competion is. Any good game found by real members should be considered. Members who come back more than once or twice.

I went into some of our game forums and looked for information about the game. I don't know if you remember me trying to find information about the game when SoZ came out, would it be possible to say somewhere if a game was ment to be played off line as well as on line, how many players and so on? Not everyone has played what we offer, information about games is hard to find anywhere unless all a person wants is a sales pitch. If we have such an area could it be easyer to find for a first or second time visitor and the search blind like ones we all know!

I found some areas where a post went unanswered for weeks where someone had a question no one answered at all. Our fault someone isn't returning after awhile when that happens. One of the best things about us is the help we give each other and how friendly we can be. Don't want to hurt feelings but don't Mods look at posts anymore? Nasty comment I know but they used to when I posted or went looking at someones question I wanted an answer to also.

On the subject of RBP. When I was the most interest being there was when conversions between members were goiing on post by post not just one liners except for saying I'm Here. One line banter is different than one line comments and gone I am! It used to be full of conversations and I quit going there when they went away. I'm one of the guilty ones doing just what I am complaining about. We members don't talk to each other in a public open conversation area anymore and I don't mean FAI. We are split into a lot of areas. These observations are very small problems but I think could boost traffic on the site. Just the observations about what I thought and why I slowed down comming.

 

Aha!

I think you have a point there.

The really sticky sites have self sustaining user content. Note that the most popular part of this site is the message board, which is, surprise surprise, user content...........

 

On a less radical note: Is an in-built dice roller for the forum possible? A bit of googling shows this add-on: http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/showthread.php?t=245192

Just feeling a bit of the roleplaying bug - not sure if anything will come of it, but a dice roller might be convenient.

 

I dunno, I kinda like the idea of scantily clad women...

 

I have no idea where Silvery got this from, but I support it.

 

Ironically it was page 3 I think. Didn't notice there was another page between comments

 

Which is why we need more people like Baronious.

 

On that note (and this is meant for consideration, not as criticism), might it possibly be a better idea to let the exchanges like in the Reputation thread above live on, publically? Just from the standpoint of a casual observer, I found it vaguely compelling before it was constrained to PM.

BoM members tend to post more coherantly than the "f#@^ u b!t@&$" types from other boards, so I don't think there's normally much danger that things will get to that level here. (Could be wrong though of course.)

 

I didn't know JT wrote books. Any of them good?

 

Firstly, I apologise for posting in this thread and then vanishing for a month. Secondly, I also apologise if what I'm posting echoes previous posts, but I just don't have the time to read them all.

What tends to bring people to sites is content. I found SP whilst browsing for BG1/2 content of some description (either patches or portraits... or maybe GateKeeper?) and stayed because of the forums populated by intelligent human beings, rather than Caps Lock abusing trolls. Content is the worm on the hook, and for SP to keep from terminal stagnation, some workable content angle has to be found. I understand that the need for stupendous bandwidth required to host mods for more modern games rules that out. SP, therefore, needs to look in other directions. Reviews, written articles, maybe even Podcasts (better compression than video, and arguably more in keeping with SP's ethos) are ways to energise content that require relatively little bandwidth compared to video or mods.

Things like forums for more titles etc. should encourage discussion among those already here, but in an environment as transitory as the Internet, that worm on the hook needs to be as juicy as possible.

 

Agree with above. I guess many visitors just take for granted that SP is as much a game resource site as it is a forums. An "if you wanna improve your game experience, see SP's list of mods/patches/guides/game news or check the SP store" feature could work, I mean I've just started posting last week but I've already read a lot of posts where people keep asking for links to mods which SP already had. And the number of resources this site offers is enormous, not to mention some of the useful info I've read here is unique to this site.
Also I think the forums need to be more closely tied to the main site in some way, since most people who do searches on RPG stuff end up here instead of the main site.

 

So, Tal... 2+ months on from the original post, how closer are we to getting the mobile BoM or different skins?

 

There is already a great deal here. One can spend all day here and I think some do.

The only thing I can think of is the Bethesda TES V Skyrim game that is due out 11/11/11. I know SP primarily supports Bioware games but I think Skyri8m is goin to be a very popular game. A friend has started a Blog Site for Skyrim just recently and it is already getting many visitors. It is quite well done and you mi8ght call it a one-stop shopping center for information on Skyrim.

Prehaps if SP did some hype for Skyrim it might attract more people.