The End of OWF

[Alf Shall Rise]

shit, thank god I googled Oddworld Forums at midnight out of sheer boredom to see if anything interesting popped up, or else I never would have found this. Genuinely thought the forum was completely gone. I'm honestly touched that I was included in the list. A memorial like that would be nice.

Just curious, would there be a way to archive the whole forum?


EDIT:

Unfortunately Havoc has an archive of everything on here (I think)


The DNS for the old domain is in the bin, Alcar is the one that owns that domain and despite paying for the domain and server, he never manages it so inevitably it'll rot and break.

whoops, missed this

[Tired Glutton]

Unfortunately Havoc has an archive of everything on here (I think)

he or anyone gona drop a link for that before it all goes down ��

[Hobo]

They definitely come under the banner of "people who left so long ago that none of y'all except for Wil ever met them".

Hell, I think Sydney was gone before I ever joined. Certainly before I started regularly posting.

Very sadly I can confirm I did meet Alcar. And I’m not dead btw

[Auriel]

Very sadly I can confirm I did meet Alcar. And I’m not dead btw

tell us more about your rendezvous with the Magical Happy Dream Queen please

[Silver angel]

I didn't quite understand: are they going to close the forum? If so, does this apply to concept art archives on oddworldlibrary too?

[Varrok]

I hope STM recognizes the Caretaker reference I made here before the forums die completely

[Nate]

I didn't quite understand: are they going to close the forum? If so, does this apply to concept art archives on oddworldlibrary too?

The forum is basically here until it stops working entirely, which may happen at any time. It all depends on when the hosting company installs software that breaks our outdated version of vBulletin.

Oddworldlibrary is hosted separately so as far as I know there are no risks there. You'd have to ask Xav for any plans on that.

[dripik]

Welp, I just came back here to look up the old Minecraft server thread because I remembered a video where we celebrated Manco's birthday in the Nether once, and I saw this thread.

When did OWF officially start? I joined in 2002 after my first few tentative steps in online communication on OddChat, but OWF was already well running at the time.

Might I suggest to add The Red Muse to the list? She was around for a brief period sometime around 2002-2003, but she was everywhere, and as much as I remember, was well liked by members. Hope she's doing OK, wherever she disappeared to.

[SgabbitGabbiar]

random question : when OWF is gonna disappear , there will be a way to read all the discussions archived?

like on internet archive or on a similar backup ? would be a shame to lose everything

[Nate]

When did OWF officially start? I joined in 2002 after my first few tentative steps in online communication on OddChat, but OWF was already well running at the time.

This version of the forums dates from April 2001, but an earlier version dates to May 2000. More info can be read here.

random question : when OWF is gonna disappear , there will be a way to read all the discussions archived?

like on internet archive or on a similar backup ? would be a shame to lose everything

Peter has a backup of the database, but I don't think there's a way to view that easily. And the way that the forum handles links via GET requests (i.e. the question mark and all the following terms in the URI) means that the Internet Archive hasn't been able to crawl the threads.

[Wil]

As long as there's a backup of the database, then there's always a way of viewing the content, even if someone has to jury rig something to do it.

Somehow I've been living in a box and hadn't realised Yahoo had deleted all their Groups, so we have actually recently lost 2 historic Oddworld communities from the 90s/very early 00s: Exoddus Club and the Oddworld Group/In Oddworld We Trust.

Sometimes, browsing the Wayback Machine a lot makes me feel like I can just pop back in time and grab some backups real quick, but it turns out I can't.

[Manco]

List of Dearly Departed Members

[…]

• Manco

what are you talking about, i was only gone for–

oh… oh no

[STM]

MANCO!

[Crashpunk]

I'm not dead. I just became a weeb.

[Manco]

MANCO!

oh not that fucker

I'm not dead. I just became a weeb.

Some would say death is better how goes the weebing?

[Crashpunk]

Some would say death is better how goes the weebing?

Pretty great. Watching Vivy: Fluorite Eye's Song.

[Stitchlips25]

I kinda forgot this was here, there's even still life too :Britpog:

[Oddey]

I have names.

Stranger's Maid
Skillyaslig
Moosh da Outlaw
Carnix
AlienMagi
OddYouko

It's tempting to flippantly reject any and all nostalgia and love for this forum and its members. But it would be a lie.

There is an undeniable weight that builds in my heart when I come to Oddworld Forums, even now. Like having come through a hurricane of souls, recalling the names of a few people whose fingers I have grazed with my own, then seeing them vanish and disappear in a whirl of events where their disappearance falls unmarked, just another impossible event to see in the roaring tempest until long after it abates.

I don't know if I'll come back here again. Seeing this old forum theme again makes me feel more sentimental than I want to admit, recalling years worth of memory. I'm not sure I want to bring the baggage of so many years onto me all at once like that again. I'm happy today and live a good life. It's not that I have no wish to be here anymore, but that I have no need for it and the torture of recollection is stronger than what good I think I can draw from here.

I'm reachable on the Oddworld Forums Discord.

[Rex Tirano]

They definitely come under the banner of "people who left so long ago that none of y'all except for Wil ever met them".

Hell, I think Sydney was gone before I ever joined. Certainly before I started regularly posting.

I vaguely remember Sydney. I was 10 at the time, so my memory is super fuzzy.

I'd suggest adding Kaimana to your list. He was prolific in the 2002-2003 period, did a lot of mod work (I believe, @Nate can confirm?), and was part of the 'teenagers who live on Oddchat' group.

This is both incredibly nostalgic and sweet. OWF and the people here meant so much to me as a child/teenager/young person. Thank you to everyone who keeps this alive in whatever form.

Also can confirm, not dead.

[Nate]

(I believe, @Nate can confirm?)

I dunno. I wasn't prolific in 2002-2003 myself

Also can confirm, not dead.

You should post on Facebook more often. How else will I know you're still on this earthly plane?

[enchilado]

hi guys

[MA]

ENCH!

[enchilado]

MA! It's been a hot fucking minute, hasn't it? What's been going on?

[MA]

WELL. the forums are long overdue for an update and will disappear if that doesn't happen, BUT we can't update the forums because Alcar and/or Cloverfield has the keys and no one can get them for whatever reason. or something like that. to be honest i'm not sure. at this stage though i don't think it would matter if we could 'save the forums' because we would just be saving a virtual ghost town. no fucker posts anymore and apparantly the sign-up function has been disabled for fucking ages. so.....yeah.

in other words, this site will go offline at some point. MY HEART BREAKS

[enchilado]

Yeah, that's upsetting. I'm pretty nostalgic for the days when this place used to be busy, although I can't really complain since I stopped posting here ages ago.

I'm glad the discord exists though, even if it's not quite the same and is missing a bunch of core members (such as yourself - you should definitely come complain about Oddworld with us).

It'll be an end of an era all the same when this place finally disappears.

[Auriel]

im just glad i managed to save this thread before the forums go down permanently

[Jango]

(Please delete this post, accidentally posted twice)

[Jango]

Hey guys,

Is OWF really going to end? It makes me really sad to think that it would stop sometime soon. As a teenager I used to logon to here every day to see all the new updates, Paul's editor, level variations, debates about sprout gas, etc.

Why is OWF disappearing? Why doesn't it just stay as the website it currently is? Why would anyone want to take it down?

I apologise for the outburst there.. it's making me a little emotional. I'm glad OANST made it on to the list - he was like the schoolyard bully

P.S. Isn't Paul going to bring out his new editor soon? Isn't that a reason to keep the forum alive?

[Varrok]

Hey guys,

Is OWF really going to end? It makes me really sad to think that it would stop sometime soon. As a teenager I used to logon to here every day to see all the new updates, Paul's editor, level variations, debates about sprout gas, etc.

Why is OWF disappearing? Why doesn't it just stay as the website it currently is? Why would anyone want to take it down?

I apologise for the outburst there.. it's making me a little emotional. I'm glad OANST made it on to the list - he was like the schoolyard bully

P.S. Isn't Paul going to bring out his new editor soon? Isn't that a reason to keep the forum alive?

If you want more OWF in your life, you may want to join our Discord server, which is alive and kicking

[Nate]

Why is OWF disappearing? Why doesn't it just stay as the website it currently is? Why would anyone want to take it down?

No one wants to take it down, but no-one is motivated enough to keep it running. The forums are running on an ancient version of vBulletin, which utilises a very old version of PHP, and at a certain point our servers are going to stop supporting it. And the task to update vBulletin will take a long time and a lot of effort and no-one can be all that much bothered for a place that gets no traffic.