Why Your Game Is Broken Part X: RTFM!

[kaputtnik]

Maybe we should knock up a short AGS game in which facts and the framework of the community are explained.

"New to AGS? Play this game before you start to find out about the engine and the community" certainly doesn't sound aggressive. Any unemployed social education workers with extensive AGS scripting knowledge around?

No, but seriously: Why not add a short and friendly text to the forums front page, to introduce the community to people who are considering to register? Like, mention all the cool things there are and then explain the conditions.

I know that some people might now argue that the AGS forums don't have to suck up to nobody and if you don't like what you see, tough luck - but this is a really friendly community, why not tell it on the front page?

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

Haha Progz, you do realise that abstauber made Alles Euro, one of the first ever AGS games, back in 2000 (or was it 2001)?

I realize that, but I don't really equate age of a member's account with being a long-standing member; I save that for people who regularly contribute to the forum, and it seems that he's just now becoming really active. 

Hell, I had an account back that far on ezboard when I was making some shitty Monkey Island remake, and back then I think I had exactly two posts.  I'd hardly consider myself an 'active member' before, say, mid-2003 when I actually started participating in the forums and not being a random/lurker.  That was my point, really.

[Pumaman]

No, but seriously: Why not add a short and friendly text to the forums front page, to introduce the community to people who are considering to register? Like, mention all the cool things there are and then explain the conditions.

I suppose the main question is, do we have a problem with too many rowdy newbies at the moment?
I'd say no we don't; if anything, the forums are a lot quieter than they used to be.

So then, do we have a problem with appearing unfriendly and putting off people from joining?
I don't know.

The thing is that most of us commenting in this thread are fairly long-standing members, and so rather than discussing it between us, it would probably be far more useful to listen to people who have signed up recently to judge whether there is any problem that we should be addressing. If any more of you "newbies" are reading, it'd be great to hear from you.

[abstauber]

@ProgZmax:
can they still be friends, even if he has not been active?

However, it's quite interesting that a RTFM discussion brings up so much emotions.

As for the knowledge base:
How about a query on all <solved> threads in the beginner and technical forum. Or maybe a nice mod adds the keyword "KB" to the title of a helpful thread and these are getting summarized.
But how do I know? I'm just the new kid...  (sorry, could not resist)

slightly offtopic: website bugs
User World map doesn't work
one the front page resources->downloads  is not shown, but it appears on other pages.
fonts download is broken (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/scifonts.zip)
Mac runtime beta is gone (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/mac/AGS271beta3b.dmg)

[Ryan Timothy B]

I think the best thing on the forum and website is the top montage banner displaying the AGS games by the community.  It really helps show what AGS is capable of and helps inspire newcomers.  It's something I enjoyed looking at (getting old now with no new updates).  Having the one in the forum randomize should spark up an interesting challenge thread, where members make montages of their own games, or combining games as they are now.

Perhaps a challenge thread for making the new website layout.  The winner getting a recognizable trophy for their forum signature.  Everyone loves trophies .
I know that quite a few people in this community make some sick website designs.  I remember seeing a few CL threads on some recently by Nacho and TerranRich.

Also when I first came here in December and jumped the hurdles (aka: the fort knox initiation quiz)--I felt it was a little unexpected, but I understood why it was there and how it was needed.

Perhaps a little "CONGRATULATIONS! You are now a certified, trained and welcomed AGS forums member" message should be the end result once passing the quiz. lol  Kinda like a little pat on the back and some bubbly to celebrate your victory over passing the quiz.  Showing that we're not hard-asses, but we do have simple rules.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

can they still be friends, even if he has not been active?

If by this you mean can you and I be friends, I bear no animosity towards you.  I just (understandably, I hope) get somewhat annoyed when people join up and start posting stuff like 'this needs changing, do this instead'.  It's like going into a new neighbor's house and telling them their furniture taste is horrible.  You can get away with that when you've known the family for awhile, but initially it just rubs people the wrong way .

[Pumaman]

As for the knowledge base:
How about a query on all <solved> threads in the beginner and technical forum. Or maybe a nice mod adds the keyword "KB" to the title of a helpful thread and these are getting summarized.

Interesting idea, something like this could work. I think the main aim of the knowledgebase was to document any long-standing bugs or "features" that weren't going to be fixed any time soon, and as a reference for "How-to" type articles (though that has been superseded by tutorials, really).

User World map doesn't work

AGA/scotch, what's the current state of this?

fonts download is broken (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/scifonts.zip)

Thanks, now fixed.

Mac runtime beta is gone (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/mac/AGS271beta3b.dmg)

Hehe yes, I forgot that this was hosted on the AGS server when we moved servers, and then I realised I didn't actually have a copy of it to re-upload. If anyone can post a copy, that'd be great!

Having the one in the forum randomize should spark up an interesting challenge thread, where members make montages of their own games, or combining games as they are now.

Well, it already does randomize. Not on every page load, because your browser will cache it for a while, but you should see it change now and then.

And yes, we did have a thread for people to contribute their own montages (that's where the current ones come from) -- though it's probably a good idea to have another round of that now that time has passed and more games have been released.

Perhaps a challenge thread for making the new website layout.  The winner getting a recognizable trophy for their forum signature.

Funnily enough, we did try that last year but I don't think anybody actually came up with a design in the end.
Again, there's no reason not to try again if people are interested.

[RickJ]

I just had an interesting little idea that may be generally useful for all but especially so in the beginners thread.   It would be terribly convenient to have a link to the online help file forum's "compose post" page, right under the "How do I post images, smileys and formatting?" link?    This way it would be easy to lookup stuff when replying to someone's question and to insert a link to the relevant info in your reply.   I think there also should  be a prominent link to the help file perhaps in the forum banner or menu area.  It would also be nice it the online help file were search able as well.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

If I remember right, only Darth Mandarb put any real effort towards a full redesign before, although a lot of people offered suggestions on how he should do it.

LimpingFish also made some banners that looked nice, but the outcome seemed to suggest that not enough people were actually interested in helping to make it happen (or we just don't have a lot of web art developers here).

Either way, as I said last year, I think the current layout is fine but would have no problem with a different one as long as it didn't sacrifice usability.

[Trent R]

Personally, I think a simple color change would help 'update' the forums a bit. Throw in a little bit of the dark blue that's now in the 3.0 editor. Even replacing the banner at the top to reflect the new cup graphic (or even a collection of all the cups, including the sprite0)

~Trent

[LimpingFish]

If I remember right, only Darth Mandarb put any real effort towards a full redesign before, although a lot of people offered suggestions on how he should do it.

LimpingFish also made some banners that looked nice, but the outcome seemed to suggest that not enough people were actually interested in helping to make it happen (or we just don't have a lot of web art developers here).

Yeah, that was the last time anybody really discussed the idea. Darth's design looked pretty sharp, and I mocked up those banners based on his layout. Then it all went quiet. Quite abruptly, really, after Zooty's post about Progz's sprite.

Everybody just...stopped taking about it. The AGS hive mind at work!

[Khris]

I've just read the registration quiz again and I gotta say, if I didn't know any better, I'd really believe it's enough to weed out most of the stupid first-timer posts I've had the pleasure to read in recent years.
The only conclusion is that people either get through it by trial and error or, much more likely, simply ignore everything as soon as they passed it.

Just sad.