Issues to Discuss: Revenge of the Redux Reloaded. Poll.

[Alcar]

There are a few issues concerning the forums at the moment which I'd like to open up to member input. A few of them are rather obvious, after the recent catfights, but a few are some most of you are either oblivious to, or haven't given much thought to.

Spicing Up the Forums
The forums, while they're doing okay, are lacking in member activity. It's pretty obvious, because Off-Topic Discussion has always been the barometer of our activity - and as of late, it has decreased quite a bit. I've been thinking a tad on the subject, as to how we could bring in more activity, but I've really turned up nothing. So far the best suggestion has been from Hobo, whereby we torch the forums. I'd like all of you to please, Jesus, please, suggest something better than that, or I may be forced to get out the matches.

State of the Monarchy
It seems that the Oddworld Forums attract a lot of debate over member issues such as banning, warning, or general happenings. On other forums I've visited, I have rarely seen such a strong force behind the members. This can both a good and bad thing. Here, we try to maintain a fairly democratic system, whereby member input is encouraged (in most cases), so that a decision can be made that isn't biased. However, that was just all waffle to fill space. What I wanted to ask was what people's qualms with the government here are. Things to change? Things to improve? Yada, yada, etc, etc? Moo? Baa?

Other Issues to File
And of course, I open up the floor to anyone else who can think of an issue to discuss.

Alcar...

[Dino]

For spicing up the forums I have a couple of things going around my head.

The first thing is, since there is a general lack of Oddworld content, we should place an emphasis and add more facilities for fan created Oddworld content (fiction, artwork, games, etc.). Perhaps even invent some kind of persistent world that we all contribute to, like maybe some kind of second series of Oddworld following on from where Lorne and his lackies left off. I'm not going to make the ideas here because I don't want to limit the scope, I'm gonna leave that up to the others - just in general perhaps have the forums work kinda like how GaiaOnline does, with those sorts of things, that line of thinking and fun ideas etc. But I certainly think the recent increase in new members participating almost exclusively in FC is indicative of the growing popularity of such things due to the lack of new Oddworld related stuff.

The other thing is maybe some kind of points system or something, that allows us to funk up our postbit and/or do all sorts of other stuff. I can see this being an upopular idea, the most logical argument against it that I can think of would be that it may cause postwhoring. But the general idea behind it is to make the site more engaging, so that it isn't just about contributing ideas and opinions to debates and such, but it's also an experience and a game/form of entertainment at the same time. It can be oddworld themed or user themed or whatever - again open to ideas on this, I just wanted to kick off that line of thinking.

Those are the two main things that strike me. If we want to boost the popularity and therefore the userbase, we need to make plenty of content and plenty going on to draw in the crowds, and also have perhaps a broader range of interests promoted as well as make the site more engaging, meaning people will by almost drawn to the site because it's so fun.

My apologies for the lack of eloquence, grammer and such, I'm just letting my brain go nuts with ideas here.

[Hobo]

The shopping mod would be teh roxor.

As for spicing up there's not much we can do other than broaden offtopic sections and narrow oddworld related ones as that's as good as dead...

[SeaRex]

If we want to boost the popularity and therefore the userbase, we need to make plenty of content and plenty going on to draw in the crowds, and also have perhaps a broader range of interests promoted as well as make the site more engaging, meaning people will by almost drawn to the site because it's so fun.

I concur.

In fact, I would like to suggest something pretty radical. Perhaps we need to expand the forum's focus beyond Oddworld. I think that we could draw in more members if the forum didn't revolve around a game/media company that, for all intensive purposes, is practically nonexistent as of late.

This is asking a lot, I know, but what about a forum that celebrates ALL forms of innovative gaming, rather than just the games of a single company? Katamari Damacy, Psychonauts, Oddworld, the list goes on. Not only would we attract the (rapidly shrinking) OWI fanbase, but I think that we would soon find ourselves in the company of many, many competent forumers with different interests and tastes.

Couple a broader spectrum of gaming with our strong roots in Off-Topic discussion, and I think we will have an extremely busy, and therefore interesting, forum again.

So, in conclusion, I'm pushing for a total forum makeover. Don't screw OWI; keep it. Just broaden our horizons.

[Shrink]

I really like Dino's idea of increasing the emphasis on user-created content.
Perhaps splitting into sections of art/writing/games etc, with tutorials and the like on how to actually... create.
The 2nd world that we all contribute too... well, I don't know how this would work, so I can't comment on it. However, doing something by heading in that general direction would be lovely.

[T-nex]

And maybe have a forum seperatly for OW RPG?? ^_^

Although i think too that shopping-mod thingy would be fun to have on the forums. Just another reason to stick around and post alot(non-spam posts, cos spam will be punished with eating um... something gross)

Anyways, maybe we could hold some sort of activities with Oddworld as a subject, to maintain(sp?) oddworld-interest. The Oddlympics were fun back in the days, even if it didn't get to be finished

[Dino]

I concur.

In fact, I would like to suggest something pretty radical. Perhaps we need to expand the forum's focus beyond Oddworld. I think that we could draw in more members if the forum didn't revolve around a game/media company that, for all intensive purposes, is practically nonexistent as of late.

This is asking a lot, I know, but what about a forum that celebrates ALL forms of innovative gaming, rather than just the games of a single company? Katamari Damacy, Psychonauts, Oddworld, the list goes on. Not only would we attract the (rapidly shrinking) OWI fanbase, but I think that we would soon find ourselves in the company of many, many competent forumers with different interests and tastes.

Couple a broader spectrum of gaming with our strong roots in Off-Topic discussion, and I think we will have an extremely busy, and therefore interesting, forum again.

So, in conclusion, I'm pushing for a total forum makeover. Don't screw OWI; keep it. Just broaden our horizons.

You know, I was thinking of suggesting that whole idea a while back when I suggested the Non-Oddworld Gaming forum. And to be honest, you're absolutely right. The main reason I didn't suggest it was because I never pictured NOG being anything other than second best to OT.

Though, there is one, perhaps minor hitch. This forum's authority and success stems from the fact that it is the number one, almost official Oddworld forum - therefore, it is a major player in that field. But if we changed the subject of the forums as a whole, to gaming in general, we would lose our position and be up against some MAJOR competitors, and would therefore find it quite hard to have the kind of "draw" we're looking for with crowds from Google without them first visiting bigboys like IGN and Gamespy.

That's not to say I don't agree or don't think we should do something like that, but I say that if we do, we should go about it carefully, and have ourselves a bloody good forum (one that clearly outranks the others), otherwise climbing up the ranks could be very difficult without buying expensive forced first page result places from Google.

I think that idea combined with various shopping type hacks and other such innovations and some brilliant ideas from our members could put us ahead of the competition easily. We've already got a strong core of regular members with some brilliant ideas here, and the OT forum is really top notch, far better than many other forums I've been to. Also expanding our roleplay and user created content sections will create a powerful, self sustaining community of loyal members that never gets boring. We could expand OT by adding a "world events/news" subforum, and move NOG to it's own zulag, giving it more priority with it's own supplementary forums such as "general game help", "mods, mapmaking and editing", "Spoilers" and perhaps even a section for multiplayers, lan parties and general gaming related "get togethers" online or offline, XBL or internet.

That would generally broaden the whole forum's, and I've not even touched on broadening non oddworld fiction and role play.

The only other hitch would be the domain name...possibly might confuse the direction that this is all heading in. Of course, with nothing set in stone it's gonna be confused anyway, but would a more "general gaming" themed domain be in order if the OWF were to broaden it's horizons in such a way?

[Munch's Master]

I agree with Dino's original idea of addding more user content, and I think that a shop mod could work well. Over at a large series of fansites, the WebQuad series, I am a long-time mod and formerly active, now less active member, and there is a shop mod there. Spammers are more common with that system, but they are dealt with by ignoring the spam and then deleting the posts and issuing warnings or bans. Cyber-Slig was also once a member over there, and I think he'll probably agree with me that the shop mod was great fun, so an Oddworld themed shop mod could be great. Having more Fan Corner options would be great. However, I don't think that the site should expand to include other games series, leave them for stickies in Non-Oddworld games discussion. These are the Oddworld Forums, and shoudl remain Oddworld as such.

[Hobo]

I think limiting fan corner would be a better idea. As far as i know it wouldn't be a major loss. Perhaps a merger with RPG? Oddworld Help should merge with GD.

Offtopic should be broadened in many a way.

[T-nex]

Um... I think RPG should have it's own sperate Zulag <_< It wouldn't be a majour loss for you, since your not really active there...

There's no point in merging them, since the Main-rp will be out soon, and i just talked Alcar into making me two sub-forums. Now why change it again? t'll all be too confusing.
Anyways, i've always looked at RPing as a subject of it's own...

[Hobo]

The zulags are not the problem. We need no more no fewer zulags. All they do now is seperate the areas where i patrol and where Xav patrols. Well if RPG isn't to be cut back, and let's face it. it's the least popular forum. then a merge of the fan corners maybe? There's no reason to split the two anymore. Perhaps a prefix to indicated Non oddworld fan corner topics may be needed but all the same... If we're going to cut back anywhere it should be between Fan Corner RPG and oddworld help.

[Kimon]

At risk of writing something too long, I"m gonna sum this up as succinctly as I can:

I absolutely love Searex's idea of broadening out horizons from Oddworld to various other innovative games. This would bring together the most intellegent and interesting people of the video game community, and it'd really add to the character of the community, I think.

However, losing the Oddworld name would be nothing to strive for, seeing as how excellent and innovative the series is, but I'm not sure it can be avoided if such additions as different gaming forums are to be included. So, if we decide to go that way, I think there should be several templates made for the games that we are promoting (Physchonauts, Katamari Damacy, what have you) and add them to the current themes we have now. Those who want to stick with Oddworld may do so, and so each person would be able to view the site with the idea that the game they're there for is the one the site revoloves around.

But that's a minor detail in a huge mess of stuff we're gonna have to deal with if we start advocating other games. If I come up with any ingenious ideas, I'll post them here, and otherwise I'll contribute to this thread as much as I can. I think this could be a major turning point for OWF.

And to raise another question: How would people other than those who are already members of our forum be informed of our change? Would we need an advertisement campaign or something, or would we post on other forums that we become a part of?

[Shrink]

If we move to other games, I'd say only have innovative games, particularly unusual games, or non-mainstream games that should get tons of sales, but instead yet few.
Just to retain the atmosphere of Oddworld.

A lot of new themes would not be necessary: Change the Logo at the top, maybe add a different game character instead of the glukkon, someelse instead of the snoozer; then change a couple of the other graphics, such as the 'new posts' ones.

However, if we move into other games, we should still concentrate on specific games, with specific forums for those games, as so:
Zulag 1:
Oddworld Discussion
[Next Innovative Game] Discussion
[Next... Psychonauts seems popular here?} Discussion

Zulag 2:

There's no need for the spoiler or the help forum. No need to reduce the Fan area - simply make the Fan Corner encompass the new games too and keep the Non-Oddworld art/lit.
Maybe make Non-Oddworld Gaming a main forum in Zulag 2 (or indeed 1).

That's assuming we want to go down that route. Would it add spice? Would it actually work: Do we know enough about these other games, and are we as interested in them to discuss? The good thing about Oddworld is the Mythology. In normal games, you'd need Multiplayer to keep the discussion going on for so many years.

[SeaRex]

Changing our domain name would be a double-edged sword of sorts. Dino is right; we would have to compete with the big gaming sites out there if we lost the title of "Unofficial Oddworld Forums" or whatnot. However, as interest in OWI is generally fading out, we will get fewer and fewer members if we keep our current name. I imagine most potential members being turned off by the fact that our name implies that all we talk about is Oddworld; before they get a chance to experience OT discussion, people might just shrug us off.

"Oddworld? Yeah, I think I remember them... didn't they used to make video games or something?"

Well, maybe we wouldn't be discarded THAT easy, but you get my point.

On the other hand, if we changed our name to something like "Indie-Games-A-Go-Go" (that's off the top of my head, I'm not actually suggesting it), we might see a slow trickle of new members rather than just tapering out, which we seem to be doing now.

On a random note, if we do change our focus, I think it is important that we separate ourselves from the pack by holding games to... well... higher standards. In other words, I would love to see games like "GTA Clone 5" and "Ridiculously Large Breasts 7" be discouraged. But maybe that's just me...

Lastly, this talk of user-created content interests me. Not only would I like to participate, but if we stressed indie gaming, we might even attract some DIY gamers, which is always cool.

[used:)]

It doesn't nessecarily have to be games, there are other big things, like *anime* and other arts like musical theatre and music. Lets have an open mind about this. And think outside of the frigin' box!

[Kimon]

"GTA Clone 5" and "Ridiculously Large Breasts 7" be discouraged. But maybe that's just me...

OGM LARF.

Lastly, this talk of user-created content interests me. Not only would I like to participate, but if we stressed indie gaming, we might even attract some DIY gamers, which is always cool.

I'm rather confused by this concept. What do you fellas mean by "user-created content"?

It doesn't nessecarily have to be games, there are other big things, like *anime* and other arts like musical theatre and music. Lets have an open mind about this. And think outside of the frigin' box!

Anime? Musical Theater? That's the shits. No way, Ronaldo.

Although I wouldn't be averse to expanding to music or movies; maybe we could have an "Indie Others" forum. That might be too broad a scope to handle, though. If we do expand the forums, I suggest we start small, then if that's a success, we can expand to other media.

[used:)]

Screw you, Kimon! I've accepted your interests so why don't you accept mine. And i only prefer dark/fantasy animes (Paranoia Agent, Inuyasha) and dark/fantasy musical Theatre (Happy End, Moulin Rouge, Wicked).

[Kimon]

Screw you, Kimon! I've accepted your interests so why don't you accept mine.

If joking, LARF. If serious, it's not a mutual thing. I'm not asking you to be interested in what I am, and apparently I'm not interested in what you are. As such, I will not support your interests. Goddammit, someone should make a sarcasm smiley so as to connotate jokisms.

And i only prefer dark/fantasy animes (Paranoia Agent, Inuyasha) and dark/fantasy musical Theatre (Happy End, Moulin Rouge, Wicked).

Actually, Moulin Rouge was pretty sweet. Love the old timey version of Smells Like Teen Spirit during the absinthe trip at the beginning. Nothing I'd devote a whole forum to, though.

[AquaticAmbi]

On the other hand, if we changed our name to something like "Indie-Games-A-Go-Go" (that's off the top of my head, I'm not actually suggesting it), we might see a slow trickle of new members rather than just tapering out, which we seem to be doing now.

I think the whole not so mainstreamy games thing is a good idea too, and I can imagine that it would bring in a great handful of new members. Ones with brains even!

But the whole changing the images all over the site sounds like a lot of work for whoever does that--Alcar I assume?

On a random note, if we do change our focus, I think it is important that we separate ourselves from the pack by holding games to... well... higher standards. In other words, I would love to see games like "GTA Clone 5" and "Ridiculously Large Breasts 7" be discouraged. But maybe that's just me...

I agree completely. My respect for this place would go down the drain if this forum became a place with discussions about games of this nature/comparing how hot game characters and whatnot are/whatever all over the place. Honestly, I'd probably leave. Surely, that would never happen though.

[Alcar]

You've all got some great ideas, and I'm looking over a number of them. However I can't help but intrude and say that the Oddworld Forums... are about Oddworld... I couldn't shift the focus onto other games.

Not only because, yes, these are the Oddworld Forums, but because Oddworld Inhabitants still exist, and Abe Babe would kill me

Alcar...

[used:)]

Sorry Kimon, I was blinded by the text .

Whewre has Abe Babe gone off to anyway?

[SeaRex]

Not only because, yes, these are the Oddworld Forums, but because Oddworld Inhabitants still exist, and Abe Babe would kill me

Good point.

Well, I'm all out of ideas.

[Leto]

It doesn't nessecarily have to be games, there are other big things, like *anime* and other arts like musical theatre and music.

Not to be a bother, but I think many Oddworld gamers aren't too heavily into Anime and musical theatre, as they like 'indie'-esque things. Sure, they can be discussed, but just don't really deserve a forum dedicated to them.

Also, the noobs would be attracted to the Anime section if there was one, and many people don't like noobs and noobettes.

Moulin Rouge and Akira ftw though.

I'm thinking, perhaps a way we can retain the Oddworld Forums title and still have these sexy changes is that we create an entire new forum as an OWF affiliate. Like, www.oddworldforums.net and www.indie-gaming-a-go-go.de, or something.

And lastly, I back up Hobo in saying that a Music forum would be the cool/lolzorz. (I believe Hobo said that at one point or another... If not, well, I support whatevah!)

[T-nex]

I'd say we could have a front-site, with all kinds of stuff like piccies, flashies, webcomics, music. You know, like being able to have your own lil' galery, or upload flas-movies, either about Oddworld or some other game. These sites usually turn out to be quite good if succeed. Blah-blah, but i don't see why we should abandon Oddworld completely... Changing the name, would be changing this forums' identity, which we actually are doing <_<. Anyways, I'd just say, let Oddworld live, and maybe add some OT-stuff

[Alcar]

I'd say we could have a front-site, with all kinds of stuff like piccies, flashies, webcomics, music. You know, like being able to have your own lil' galery, or upload flas-movies, either about Oddworld or some other game. These sites usually turn out to be quite good if succeed.

That's actually a killer suggestion, and I can see a lot of potential. One problem I'd see with it though, is that it would be the front-site, such as a portal, which would detract from the actual Forums (as in when people first click oddworldforums.net they want to see the actual Forums). Which is sort of why Oddworld Universe and Oddworld-Web all link back (and vice-versa).

Alcar...

[T-nex]

Well, if it's gonna attract more people, theyr are likely going to get curious, and see what's on the rest of the site, and you could do some login-thingy, so that they can only upload stuff if they're member of the site. Also, page like this usually has alot of forum-members, since well they'd likely want to discuss their piccis, movies and stuff you know...

[Dino]

Changing our domain name would be a double-edged sword of sorts. Dino is right; we would have to compete with the big gaming sites out there if we lost the title of "Unofficial Oddworld Forums" or whatnot. However, as interest in OWI is generally fading out, we will get fewer and fewer members if we keep our current name. I imagine most potential members being turned off by the fact that our name implies that all we talk about is Oddworld; before they get a chance to experience OT discussion, people might just shrug us off.

"Oddworld? Yeah, I think I remember them... didn't they used to make video games or something?"

Well, maybe we wouldn't be discarded THAT easy, but you get my point.

On the other hand, if we changed our name to something like "Indie-Games-A-Go-Go" (that's off the top of my head, I'm not actually suggesting it), we might see a slow trickle of new members rather than just tapering out, which we seem to be doing now.

On a random note, if we do change our focus, I think it is important that we separate ourselves from the pack by holding games to... well... higher standards. In other words, I would love to see games like "GTA Clone 5" and "Ridiculously Large Breasts 7" be discouraged. But maybe that's just me...

Lastly, this talk of user-created content interests me. Not only would I like to participate, but if we stressed indie gaming, we might even attract some DIY gamers, which is always cool.

Yep, the user created content, such as fanfics, roleplaying (KIMON you should've read this at the beginning you pillock) and such will attract DIY gamers if we add a section for non oddworld RPG and stuff (which I think is desperately needed).

And we can debate until the sun goes down whether or not the RPG/fiction area deserves expanding or not, but either way I don't think we should ignore the fact that at present, almost half of our newbies signed up specifically to participate in it.

Also, the shop hack could incorporate elements that are specific to the user created content areas, thus adding to the whole thing.

Kimon's mention of movies is a good idea, perhaps a subforum to expand OT just simply entitled "Movies, short films and music videos" or something along those lines would be a good move for OT, especially if we're looking to expand the discussion.

And I don't think anime should be dismissed so readily. We've already got LOADS of anime fans among us, and while I don't think that really needs to be catered for, we could at least do them a favour by expanding areas like NOAL to include RPGs.

I take on board Alcar's point about not wanting to phase out or minimise the Oddworld element, and that really is fine - my suggestion about ridding ourselves of the Oddworld thing was really only put in play to merely understand what direction this whole thing was headed in.

I think we could easily expand our discussion horizons, revamp the site's image, add shop hacks, expand areas, and stuff like that without ever encroaching upon the Oddworld theme - if we need to keep the theme throughout, a front page might have "Oddworld's Weekly Game Reviews" or such like, and we could have a kind of "Gaming with Abe" feel.

Speaking of a front page, I've been to many forums that have used front pages and their forums are absolutely buzzing with activity, so I don't think we'd cause any confusion so long as we made the link to the forums clear enough so that people don't get lost and frustrated.

[Facsimile]

To be honest, I've hated every single idea suggested here, except the front site one T-nex just came up with.

Expanding it to include other "indie" games: I don't even know what an "indie game" is, and if this forum became a shared game forum I would most certainly leave, and I would think some others would too, because I don't even know what these other games are! It's very well saying we'd get more 'smart' members, but if there'd be no common ground on which to relate to them.

But I'd say the front site thing would work, the only problem is it would require masses of work. Who would decide who submits/rules one part of the site, etc?

[SeaRex]

The common ground would simply be games with interesting premises and/or innovative design. Of course, everyone wouldn't be interested in the exact same thing, which is why we would get a variety of new members. We've started saying "indie" games because it's shorter than saying "games with interesting premises and/or innovative design." We're just lazy about typing stuff. Whoo.

Well, it's not like it matters anyway, since it's not going to happen.

T-Nex, I love your idea of having a front page, although I think it's important that we don't turn this site into a mini-deviantART; the thought of that makes me shudder. Anyway, if we had separated sections for comics, pics, animations, etc... instead of each individual member having a database, I think we would be better off.

Alcar, you listen to me. YOU LISTEN TO ME. If you get a front page up in the hizzouse, I WILL write video game reviews for it. Funny ones. Scathing, funny, video game reviews. Hell, maybe even a movie review here and there, although I don't watch movies as much as I used to, given the sad, sad state of American cinema.

[Dino]

To be honest, I've hated every single idea suggested here, except the front site one T-nex just came up with.

Expanding it to include other "indie" games: I don't even know what an "indie game" is, and if this forum became a shared game forum I would most certainly leave, and I would think some others would too, because I don't even know what these other games are! It's very well saying we'd get more 'smart' members, but if there'd be no common ground on which to relate to them.

But I'd say the front site thing would work, the only problem is it would require masses of work. Who would decide who submits/rules one part of the site, etc?

And to be honest, when I saw that you'd contributed to this thread, I KNEW you'd oppose absolutely everything that's been suggested, because that's what you always seem to do.

I think your fears about not having any common ground on which to relate to new members are baseless. Especially since you seem to spend the majority of your time in the Off Topic forum where we don't even talk about Oddworld. When was the last time you "related" to a new member by talking to him about Oddworld?

And don't think I'm just opposing you for the sake of it, it is my opinion that you've genuinely not thought any of this through before making your frank dismissal of our ideas.

You threatening to leave isn't going to help or slow things down any either. Since the majority seem to be in favour of some kind of radical change to really spice up the forums, I doubt that very many would leave as a result. And since the whole point is to pull in lots of new members, losing the odd couple of old members isn't really going to be much sacrifice to endure in order to really get things going again.

I think we should all approach this with a totally open mind, taking into consideration our goals (making the forums more lively, getting more members in, etc), and what methods we can use to achieve those goals (more content, more to do, more to talk about, more areas to talk in, broader range of subjects to attract more people). Consider the fact that most the zulags and areas within those zulags operate like their own little forum anyway. Now consider the fact that Off Topic is like the community congregation area for people from all those other forum areas. The more of those individual areas we have then the more people will be meeting up together in Off Topic, because it's inevitable that people will come to fill up those individual forum areas.

We have the goal here of reviving the forums, and if we don't reach that goal then the forums themselves are likely to be pronounced dead and taken down. Being all conservative, negative and dismissive will lead us to a flatline faster than you can say "Save The Whale!". And while I appreciate that those may be your opinions, we need some alternative ideas. We can't just stay how we are, because that isn't going to attract many new people. W+B barely sees any new-user action as it is.