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Author Topic: Revamping ZFGC  (Read 33811 times)

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Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #80 on: March 13, 2011, 08:13:13 pm »
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I know that now to yes. Any who I already started with some design at least for the engine or the back bone of the project. A lot of it will also apply to the eventual project. Any input is appreciated.
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Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #81 on: March 20, 2011, 09:07:08 pm »
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Hate to say it, ZFGC is a one-trick-pony. We've all witnessed the community grow around a singular project twice over. Once with OoT2d (abandonware) and then again with Shadowgazer (abandonware). The in-betweens have never been good. The forum only works when there's a big project for people to gawk at.

As bad as it may sound; fangaming is more of an introductory/hobby thing... Most people who started developing here have moved on to their own IP's. It's a lot more satisfying to make something that's truly your own. It's because of this that I agree with Porkchop on just removing "Zelda" from the equation. Frankly, Zelda has kinda sucked for the past 10 years anyway.

In my completely honest opinion, ZFGC should be done. It's the community that people pine for in these threads, not the subject of the community. We're limiting ourselves by being "Zelda Fan Game Central", and the community just doesn't exist anymore. Make something new. Make something different. Whatever community is still here will obviously be there too, so what's the difference. Right now it's just silly how this forum lingers and lingers when it could just die and have something better come out of it's remains.

I agree with this, a lot.

All of the active users who actually brought something to the community for the most part have got bored with Zelda and moved on. In my opinion, what made the forums great were people actually working on projects, and people actually taking the time to play other people's games and give feedback. Rather than just lurking once in awhile and occasionally posting about how the site is dead now.

Drop the "zelda", go with something else. Something more broad and less restrictive. Make zfgc.com point to the new domain, that way any of the few active members will migrate and anyone coming back from years of absence will know what's up and still be in touch with the community.

This is a serious issue for the community in my opinion, and based on discussion featured here I think it should be brought into a voting phase. No more discussing it for days on end with no end result. Start a poll, see the results, take appropriate actions. Stop being afraid of change, especially when it's for the better. ZFGC's community deserves more.
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Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #82 on: March 20, 2011, 11:30:29 pm »
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Quote
Hate to say it, ZFGC is a one-trick-pony. We've all witnessed the community grow around a singular project twice over. Once with OoT2d (abandonware) and then again with Shadowgazer (abandonware). The in-betweens have never been good. The forum only works when there's a big project for people to gawk at.

As bad as it may sound; fangaming is more of an introductory/hobby thing... Most people who started developing here have moved on to their own IP's. It's a lot more satisfying to make something that's truly your own. It's because of this that I agree with Porkchop on just removing "Zelda" from the equation. Frankly, Zelda has kinda sucked for the past 10 years anyway.

In my completely honest opinion, ZFGC should be done. It's the community that people pine for in these threads, not the subject of the community. We're limiting ourselves by being "Zelda Fan Game Central", and the community just doesn't exist anymore. Make something new. Make something different. Whatever community is still here will obviously be there too, so what's the difference. Right now it's just silly how this forum lingers and lingers when it could just die and have something better come out of it's remains.

I agree with this, a lot.

All of the active users who actually brought something to the community for the most part have got bored with Zelda and moved on. In my opinion, what made the forums great were people actually working on projects, and people actually taking the time to play other people's games and give feedback. Rather than just lurking once in awhile and occasionally posting about how the site is dead now.

Drop the "zelda", go with something else. Something more broad and less restrictive. Make zfgc.com point to the new domain, that way any of the few active members will migrate and anyone coming back from years of absence will know what's up and still be in touch with the community.

This is a serious issue for the community in my opinion, and based on discussion featured here I think it should be brought into a voting phase. No more discussing it for days on end with no end result. Start a poll, see the results, take appropriate actions. Stop being afraid of change, especially when it's for the better. ZFGC's community deserves more.

If people don't want Zelda, why not go join some other game development community like TIGSource? Some people (like me) still enjoy Zelda; maybe not the games so much as the idea. Honestly, if this website goes away from Zelda, my interest in it will also go away (not to say that I don't like the community, I do for the most part). Also, I would no longer have a place to get feedback about my Zelda project from a community with the same interest in Zelda, as nobody else would either. And feedback is very helpful at keeping the project going strong and to help it take form into a solid game. Furthermore, there is a good amount of Zelda resources on here that are not available anywhere else, and there are spriters that make custom Zelda graphics for others that need them.

People that really do want to make a Zelda should have a place to go where they can get support from others that share the same interest. If you take away Zelda from here, then THE place to go for Zelda fan games dies. Sure, the "target audience" is small, but widening the target audience will just weaken what makes ZFGC great. My view is that the few people that do want Zelda fan games should have the option of a Zelda-focused gaming community.

But that's just my humble opinion. The only fair thing to do would be to set up a poll of some kind to get the vote of the community as a whole.
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Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #83 on: March 20, 2011, 11:50:34 pm »
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If people don't want Zelda, why not go join some other game development community like TIGSource? Some people (like me) still enjoy Zelda; maybe not the games so much as the idea. Honestly, if this website goes away from Zelda, my interest in it will also go away (not to say that I don't like the community, I do for the most part). Also, I would no longer have a place to get feedback about my Zelda project from a community with the same interest in Zelda, as nobody else would either. And feedback is very helpful at keeping the project going strong and to help it take form into a solid game. Furthermore, there is a good amount of Zelda resources on here that are not available anywhere else, and there are spriters that make custom Zelda graphics for others that need them.

People that really do want to make a Zelda should have a place to go where they can get support from others that share the same interest. If you take away Zelda from here, then THE place to go for Zelda fan games dies. Sure, the "target audience" is small, but widening the target audience will just weaken what makes ZFGC great. My view is that the few people that do want Zelda fan games should have the option of a Zelda-focused gaming community.

But that's just my humble opinion. The only fair thing to do would be to set up a poll of some kind to get the vote of the community as a whole.

My suggestion then, if people actually legitimately want the Zelda resources such as sprites and sounds, is to keep the zfgc.com domain as a resource page. Similar to Shyguy kingdom but for zelda only.
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Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #84 on: March 21, 2011, 02:53:51 am »
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drop both of those ideas cause we completely dont need anymore. theres already TSR, shyguy, DA, etc. and ITS A ZELDA SITE WILL PPL STOP SUGGESTING TO CHANGE THAT. Its litrally the best zelda forum online. seriously. Zelda universe has nothing on this !@#$% lol
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Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #85 on: March 21, 2011, 04:04:35 am »
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I've lost faith in the whole idea. It's obvious that the people in charge want to part in any sort of change, so it's not even worth arguing.

4Sword, if you ever have a change of heart, let me know.
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sup
Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #86 on: March 21, 2011, 04:45:27 am »
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The problem with generalizing the focus is that we would still have many Zelda projects here, and we would need to do a whole bunch to attract users beyond that. I am not against expanding ZFGC's focus, I just don't want to hobble Zelda development here to do that, have Zelda development here viewed as a pariah, or for everybody to give up after said expansion and then go back into a chasing the nostalgia ghost kind of a mode.

The current board structure I was working towards was seeking to help out Zelda development while giving Other development more space to grow on its own. Otherwise though, in some sort of kooky brainstorm I just had (the ideas aren't fully thought through) I came up with this sort of stuff:
Quote
ZFGC.com
 - Management
 - Moderation
  - Deleted Posts
  - Reported Posts
 - Updates
  - Archive
 - Feedback
 - Community

Development
 - Sponsored
 - Projects
 - Discussion
 - Recruitment
 - Contests
  - Submissions

Resources
 - Programming
  - Engines
 - Graphics
 - Audio

Rename site from Zelda Fan Game Central to ZFGC

Either -
Eliminate all General Discussion boards
 - replace with Community board which would be under the ZFGC.com category
 - basically a lot of the General Discussion stuff isn't needed or doesn't need to be cared about here
Or -
Make it so posts in General Discussion don't increase post counts at all

Merge Zelda Projects and Other Projects to just Projects
 - if both Zelda Projects and Other Projects are low in activity levels, it should be fine
 - future growth might still show that there are a lot of Zelda projects but this would always be a "burden" to future expansion
 - increase requirements to get project into board so that all projects have demos

Bring Sponsored back
 - now for recognized team projects, potm, and community projects

Actually do the PotM again
 - see if anyone comments on the articles for it at all rather than just voting
 - laugh ass off when people complain about needing to explain why they voted, then have that requirement lifted and have it so people can vote for more than 1 project, then stand back in shock and dumbfounded awe when no one comments on the article explaining any sort of congratulation or thank you for the winner or his or her efforts.

Have specific Contests to do things beyond Zelda stuff
 - e.g., Pokemon, Mario, etc.

Merge Zelda Coding and Other Coding and separate Engines out
 - keep track of Engines better if boards are merged

Locally moderate all development boards with those with some interest and expertise in that development area.
 - have global moderation done by administrators

Clean up the Archive so it isn't a spam hole and actually means something

The activity levels of the Project boards might be a little distracting for each project there, but in the long ago past people didn't see to mind that sort of stuff, and increased requirements in the form of making sure that each project in that board at least has a demo or trailer from the get-go would at least make sure all projects there are at some level of development. Local moderation would be done on boards in order to ensure that the boards would get cleaned up and monitored by people who knew what they were doing (there'd probably be 2 local moderators per active development/resource board). Basically the thought is to slim down ZFGC, make sure its development quality is top-notch, that its boards are clean, etc.

A lot of that though is wishful thinking and like putting a cart before a horse. Another issue to figure out would be what would a generalized ZFGC look like in terms of its theme (e.g., its forum icons and whatnot). We could keep a Zelda theme in order to appease the hauntings of the nostalgia ghost, but we'd need a theme that wouldn't scream at people we just Zelda dawgs.
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Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #87 on: March 21, 2011, 02:18:11 pm »
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Well it looks like you're at least trying to broaden the horizons.

If anything, I think it should be similar to how it is now, but instead of a "Zelda Fangame Development" and an "Indie Development" it should be "Fangame Development" and "Indie Development". That way all of the Zelda, Pokemon, Sonic, ect fangames can have it's own section still with resources.

Then replace the name of "ZFGC" to something new all-together, or keep it and change the meaning.
"Zany Fan Game Central"? < - lol
"Zone For Game Creators"?  < - LIKE!
"Zipper Fun Girl Couples" < - Ran out of ideas already... But I like the second one! :D
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Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #88 on: April 02, 2011, 07:57:52 pm »
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ZFGC.com
 - Updates
 - Feedback

Development
 - Projects
 - Discussion
 - Recruitment
 - Contests
  - Submissions

Resources
 - Zelda Coding
 - Other Coding
 - Graphics
 - Audio

(Community Boards)

I have been thinking over this stuff more and the above is how a "transition form" would look like between now and something more general. Basically Zelda Projects and Other Projects could merge because those who come here expecting Zelda would be assuming that Projects contained Zelda Projects and it wouldn't be too cluttered by merging it with Other Projects to contradict that. (The above is how regular members would see the boards, with staff boards hidden - community boards would still be there I just didn't feel like listing them).

Zelda Coding and Other Coding wouldn't be merged right away because Zelda Coding isn't organized. If the two boards were merged and someone who comes here is expecting to find Zelda help, the merged boards might be confusing to them. I get that at one point the two were kind of merged, but they were separated previously with the intent to make the Zelda coding on this site more organized and I don't think that should be regressed upon. Like I said earlier somewhere, we don't want to throw Zelda under the bus as we do have some talent for it here and to expand we need to still incorporate it. We can't just become more general so we don't have to do the work of making Zelda here more organized. If Zelda Coding became organized, then it would possibly be merged back and separated again into Coding and Engines.

I don't think we could really have and Indie Development area on its own just based on the level of activity associated with that. If at some point the activity levels of projects in Projects got to be at a certain point the Sponsored board could be brought back or possibly the board itself could be divided up into Team Projects and Solo Projects. I am more fond of doing that second idea because Sponsored as a board involved some effort in managing what went into it - be it Projects of the Month or whatever. A Team Projects board might encourage those who would want their project to not be swamped in Solo Projects to possibly work with other people.

I like the Zone For Game Creators name too, it seems reasonable and would allow us to keep the domain name. Beyond that though, there still remains the issue of what would the theme of the forum possibly look like.
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Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #89 on: April 02, 2011, 10:43:03 pm »
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A theme? Maybe have a member mockup competition where we could all design mockups of the layout/colors. Then have a vote on which to go with. I think we should moreso keep the same theme, just color swap and replace some zelda imagery.

And I also agree that Other Projects and Zelda Projects should be merged. There's not enough activity in there to even need them separated, plus it'll promote more development as programmers seem to like the competition and always delivering updates to stand out among the competitors who are doing the same.
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Re: Revamping ZFGC
« Reply #90 on: April 03, 2011, 12:20:28 am »
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When I stress that a theme would have to be put together I should reemphasize that before anything could really go into effect that Zelda Coding should have its content organized. That isn't to say that both couldn't happen at once, it is just that sorting out Zelda Coding is the most important and no transition can be successful unless that is done. I guess modifying the current forum default theme to be more general wouldn't be too much of an issue but I am not an artist and I didn't know if something fresher would be better or not.

I don't fully agree with the idea that a crowded board creates a competition aspect that leads to more development, as sometimes people won't be posting updates if they feel those updates aren't getting any attention, but I get how the appearance of an active board might encourage some people to start or continue developing. About merging the Zelda Projects and Other Projects boards, the mechanism that Windy's site system has to post topics on the forum would have to be tweaked so that each new project would just go to the one new place.
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