I hate to see the community on this site stagnate so much. We need to somehow make it more popular, at least around the ROC.
Part of the reason why most players don't stay is because the game is too complex; we can alleviate this by luring people first into the forums, then into the game itself.
We should be targeting popular Redwall sites like Redwall Wiki, Redwall Wars Wiki, etc...simply any Redwall forum. Just simple advertisement.
Let's try it out a bit.
It's a good idea if you already have ties to those sites. Unfortunately, I wouldn't know where to start ^_^.
I have a few accounts some places I can try a little advertising. I need to log back into some of them and make some friends but I can do that. It's easier to convince friends to play than it is strangers.
Remember to emphasize the forum, the game is very complex but the forum is a nice community.
We also could make this place a bit more Redwall-centric. Right now, there's very little to do with Redwall on this site (it's essentially a bunch of old friends talking about random stuff). If we are to recruit some more Redwall fans we need to increase the "Redwall activity".
Quote from: Drakus on May 29, 2014, 03:33:19 PM
Remember to emphasize the forum, the game is very complex but the forum is a nice community.
We also could make this place a bit more Redwall-centric. Right now, there's very little to do with Redwall on this site (it's essentially a bunch of old friends talking about random stuff). If we are to recruit some more Redwall fans we need to increase the "Redwall activity".
Well then what would you suggest we do to increase the "Redwall Activity"
Quote from: Krowdon on May 29, 2014, 08:44:54 PM
Quote from: Drakus on May 29, 2014, 03:33:19 PM
Remember to emphasize the forum, the game is very complex but the forum is a nice community.
We also could make this place a bit more Redwall-centric. Right now, there's very little to do with Redwall on this site (it's essentially a bunch of old friends talking about random stuff). If we are to recruit some more Redwall fans we need to increase the "Redwall activity".
Well then what would you suggest we do to increase the "Redwall Activity"
To be honest, I'm not really sure. The end goal would ideally be to make this forum as Redwall-centric as other ROC sites. I'm not sure how to actually proceed, or whether it is even possible, because people here talk about the things they like and not necessarily all about Redwall. That's the beauty of the forums, but it results in there being little to no activity and almost no new members.
Well, then why don't we make it more about the people than Redwall. Make new members feel welcome and make ourselves less like cliques. When I join a new site, I always find it hard to get involved because everyone always has friends, so I just meet up with the other new people on the site.
A place like this where we already have our little groups and not a lot of new members, I can see it being difficult for new people to find people they wanna hang with. You feel me?
Just an idea to put out there: Make it into an app for mobile devices and pcs. Idk could spike people for convience. just my idea on it to spike popularity. It would take a lot of work though.
That would take a lot of work though. I dont know if anyone has time for that.
Actually part of the RWL3 design was supposed to be a mobile interface -- part of the reason the menu was up top. But Ollie wandered off and neither Shadow nor I appear to have the ambition to do it.
We've kinda run out of programmers to pass the torch to as well, there's a bunch that the game needs and unless Shads has some free time it's somewhat unlikely to get done.
The most RWL-ish part of the site is the RP section, we used to get newbies every month or two try to start something there but nothing ever really came of it.
The vast majority of ROC sites are abandoned now afaik, Terrouge was one of the biggest and it poofed years ago. The base is about gone, Jacques passing didn't help that any.
FAF tried rebranding before disbanding, didn't really help.
And I'm not real sure, but it seems like the popularity of internet forums in general is dying out. People are finding something else to do online. Maybe Reddit is absorbing some of the smaller forums as subreddits or something?
That said, if yall can think of ways to drum up activity have at it.
I could be convinced to do some code work if I knew what the game needed. Other than a few bug fixes that have cropped up, what else is there?
I joined because of the game, before you had to be on the forums.
The game will be the biggest draw.
Quote from: Vulpes Jarr on June 03, 2014, 08:59:42 AM
I joined because of the game, before you had to be on the forums.
The game will be the biggest draw.
I was the same way, but joined the forum once I wanted to get more involved (and I had my dads permission because it was middle school)
Quote from: windhound on June 02, 2014, 11:29:16 PM
Actually part of the RWL3 design was supposed to be a mobile interface -- part of the reason the menu was up top. But Ollie wandered off and neither Shadow nor I appear to have the ambition to do it.
We've kinda run out of programmers to pass the torch to as well, there's a bunch that the game needs and unless Shads has some free time it's somewhat unlikely to get done.
The most RWL-ish part of the site is the RP section, we used to get newbies every month or two try to start something there but nothing ever really came of it.
The vast majority of ROC sites are abandoned now afaik, Terrouge was one of the biggest and it poofed years ago. The base is about gone, Jacques passing didn't help that any.
FAF tried rebranding before disbanding, didn't really help.
And I'm not real sure, but it seems like the popularity of internet forums in general is dying out. People are finding something else to do online. Maybe Reddit is absorbing some of the smaller forums as subreddits or something?
That said, if yall can think of ways to drum up activity have at it.
Redwall is pretty old, and it appeals to a very select number of people only.
Vulpes is right in that the game is the biggest draw (since internet forums are indeed losing popularity). The game needs serious reworking—it's complex, no graphics, text based, and no playerbase to speak of.
If possible, a good, long project would be to create an entirely new game and feature it here (along with the classic reg and turbo).
Sorry Drakus, I'm a fairly competent procedural coder (ie, I can code maths) but making a game from scratch would be beyond me even if I had the time to invest.
You can't get help from windy or any other programmers you know?
It could even use the premise of the original game (and hence all the formulas) except with some rudimentary graphics, more in-depth player mechanics, etc.
What kind of graphics do you even want?
Sorry Drakus, I'm not really a programmer.
Kinda like Shadow, I can do maintenance and some minor features and cleanup, but the stuff you're talking about is rather major.
I'm not really sure how you drag a promi game into modern times, given I don't think any other promi succeeded in doing so I'm sorta doubtful it's possible. So you have on your hands a full rewrite of an entirely different game.
Ish.
imho Ollie's themes made the game look the best a promi has ever looked. The point of RWL3 was to make the game more approachable... and it is, kinda. But being a promi there's still a fair amount of intricacy and fiddling you need to do to play competitively. And I don't really know what you would do about that. Strip out some of the things that would challenge a newbie and you end up with a more boring game, neh?
I like the enthusiasm, Drakus, but it's a tough ask.
RWL is nearly 12 years old. Promisance, the code it's based on, is even older. Way back when, an entirely text based game made a lot of sense. It was instant, fast loading, and you could play it on any old connection, on any old web browser.
The ROC was still relatively popular. There were a lot of websites, and they were big. Combining those two things worked, because we attracted gamers and RWL fans. But over time, Promisance got stale. Technology moved on. The Redwall series wasn't as popular.
Today, people use tablets and smart phones for all their casual web stuff. They don't really use PCs in the same way they once did.
The only way I see a game like this surviving into the future is as an app. A super casual one. And you'd have to make it, and that would be hard. Even if you could do it, the competition out there is enormous.
So, I don't really see a way to drastically turn things around. I no longer play the game, and the forums are mostly a way for me to stay in touch with the friends I've made over the last decade.
If you bring in a few of your friends, that's great. But I don't forsee a time where RWL will ever have the hundred plus actives it had in its first couple of years. It only had about 40 actives in reg in 2007. It's now 2014. We've done well to hold on.
I couldn't do anything graphics related to save my life. Which isn't to say that I wouldn't like to learn, but there just isn't the time right now.
If you have specific ideas for what you would like to see with "more in depth player mechanics" then I'd be happy to hear your ideas and code them if they are realistic, however.
The current layout is confusing as all hell (particularly the front/signup page) just sayin' - I think this is a major issue. I look at the front page and I don't know where I would begin to sign up?
whoops
Hey Ashyra!
I donno, is it really that bad? Right up top it says Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.
(http://i.imgur.com/hnUuYbJ.png)
Granted the Game Login block is empty until you sign in, suppose that could be slightly confusing.
Once you have an account the home page provides options for the game logins there -- if you're used to the old system, we nuked that a while ago.
From a "wtf is this shit" standpoint we could def. do a better job though.
Might add in a short blurb under the Game Login section that goes away when you log in.
Cheers.
I will play this game again in July, and I will try to bring sharpienoob back with me.
Maybe I will message Pip, too. :)
Quote from: Firetooth on June 07, 2014, 06:39:36 PM
I will play this game again in July, and I will try to bring sharpienoob back with me.
Maybe I will message Pip, too. :)
Please message Pip
yea (whose pip)
Pippin. A player who has been around longer than I
It is sad to see the game/forums in this state, especially as it's been such an important part in most of our lives.
I think there are a lot of reasons for this really, some are inevitable (text based games just aren't cool anymore), some are/were semi-avoidable.
I think one of the biggest problems is the fact that even though we're a Redwall based game, the game/forums actually have very little to do with Redwall at all, the RP forums have been dead for an age and nobody stays in character in game anymore (or has done for a long time).
Most Redwallers are also likely hardline Christians (I don't have any data to back this up, but I think most people here wouldn't bother arguing this point) some of whom are also possibly put off by the kind of subjects we've had in the past (especially in UMD).
I think to say Redwall as a community is dead is a bit pessimistic though.
Here are the stats for this forum:
Yearly Summary | New Topics | New Posts | New Members | Most Online |
2014 | 121 | 1,872 | 67 | 49 |
2013 | 451 | 8,947 | 297 | 55 |
2012 | 1,461 | 44,737 | 1,030 | 252 |
2011 | 2,011 | 70,905 | 692 | 83 |
2010 | 749 | 16,177 | 555 | 59 |
2009 | 1,552 | 67,956 | 142 | 25 |
2008 | 1,236 | 20,024 | 497 | 49 |
2007 | 811 | 15,006 | 616 | 32 |
2006 | 633 | 7,881 | 171 | 19 |
2005 | 266 | 4,100 | 25 | 9 |
Depressingly, if the second half of this year is similar to the first, this will be the worse year that RWL has had on record (although to be fair 05 won't be that far ahead).
Compare this to the last few months of activity on the official Redwall Forums (http://www.redwallabbey.com/) (they've probably already got more posts in this month than we'll have this year):
Monthly Summary | New Topics | New Posts | New Members | Most Online |
June 2014 | 79 | 5201 | 10 | 69 |
May 2014 | 174 | 11707 | 22 | 79 |
April 2014 | 133 | 13567 | 19 | 57 |
March 2014 | 158 | 9972 | 22 | 49 |
February 2014 | 139 | 8582 | 28 | 48 |
January 2014 | 151 | 9661 | 25 | 60 |
If the game can be changed in such a way to appeal to these people, and the forums can be made more redwall-y then I'm sure the site could at least be doing better than it is now, I don't think there's much time for this to happen though, in my experience as RWLers mature they generally leave the site or reduce their activity to the point where they'll post a few times a month. This site relies on a steady stream of a players hanging around to replace the leaving players, this stream has been lacking over the last year or so and it's really starting to show now.
As has been stated too, the games code is also a big mess, it's using so many deprecated/bad practices that barely keeping it running over the next few years will be a challenge in and of itself, PHP is now starting to actually remove functions that RWL relies on to function.
The code base really needs a rewrite to use some kind of MVC framework that's more modular and accessible to new devs, putting the codebase on Github would probably be great too. I think part of the problem has been the insular nature of the game development. For a long time this game was basically Shaels pet project, and while I'm not denying she's done a lot of good for the game and community, I fear RWL struggled to escape from it's status as her project.
All this talk of an app is nonesense too, making the site responsive (http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2011/01/12/guidelines-for-responsive-web-design/) would solve the whole mobile issue whilst meaning there's still only one codebase to work on. As far as I can see PA has set it up in such a way to achieve this, but left before he had time, it's not something that's too difficult to do, I might try and hack some CSS together for it when I have some free time.
The problem with all of this though is that it would take time, a rewrite of RWL would take weeks full time (to do it well) let alone part time unpaid. The code has been cobbled together by quite a few people over it's 10+ years in existence, and nobody has really documented anything whilst developing it, meaning there's still things in there that we even today don't know if it's safe to remove (at least that's been my understanding, I have read through the code, but not in months).
None of this is feasible though really, I've undertaken one small pet project (http://periodic-table.co/) recently and even that killed hours of time after work for many weeks. The only people here with the skills for a rewrite (or even a tidy up) don't have the time, besides which, if you're working 9-5:30 staring at a computer screen do you really want to come home and do more of the same day in day our for weeks, unpaid?
I guess the easiest (and maybe best) thing to do would be to port the code over to the QMT (http://www.qmtpro.com/) promi code, it's relatively up to date and quite nice to work with. I think Shael started working on this before she left, it'd be interesting to find out how far she got.
I agree with Ashyra regarding the homepage too, it doesn't tell you anything helpful as someone new coming to the site (in fact I'd even go so far as to say it looks a little daunting).
Small correction Sharpy -- The game was Retto's pet project (and Boze's before him). Retto was rather protective of the code -- it was one of the friction points with Beatles, Retto even went and got permission to not release the code (contrary to the game's license).
Shael, Ollie, Shadow, and I all worked on the code at the same time -- Shael somewhat reluctantly towards the end (she tried to pass to torch to me earlier but I really didn't want it... she then just dropped it). As said above, there's been noone to really pass the torch to.
If you're volunteering I'm more than happy to work with you.
The whole 'responsive' website thing is kinda cute.
Blogs, general information sites, sure. Because the main thing there is a text block, and if you only have 4 words per line fine, whatever, it looks artsy.
Promi is a text-based game, yes, but there's a reason some pages (like the scores page) are structured like they are. Reworkable? Sure. But it's a fair bit harder than you're implying.
As far as switching code bases... believe it or not we looked at this a few times. Every time it's been daunting. There's a reasonably long list (longer than you'd expect) of features custom to RWL that would need basically a full rewrite to implement. None of the themes would transfer (and, sorry, but vanilla promi is fugly). It would be my vote to transition to FAF's code base, it was gone through with a fine toothed comb and one-ups standard QMT in most areas. It has clan forums (mini-bb iirc), cronless turns, the pages don't use frikken frames (what year is it?), it's clean and usable.
But again, a fairly major undertaking. Shael didn't get too far with the newer QMT base.
You did accurately pinpoint the problem however, time and motivation.
After my 9 - 5 do I want to open up a text editor and sort through some archaic code or go blast some crap in Borderlands with my few hours of spare time?
The thing you didn't address is promi, as a game, is horrendously repetitive. It gets old fast, and there's soo many games (website, mobile, pc, console) competing for your bits of spare time -- it's just tough.
Reading back over this post (and those I made previous) it does read rather pessimistic... but it is what it is.
Are a good portion of RWL's site problems solvable? Sure. But only by pouring time into it, and eh.
The ROC is mostly gone. I am glad the official Redwall website is doing well, but they're about it.
Just... /shrug.
If you're interested in helping out let me know Sharpy.
(Also, I somewhat doubt the UMD has scared too many off. A couple, sure, but they're the ones that tried to argue their beliefs without having a firm understanding of just what their beliefs were. A good number of forums just ban religious and political discussion, at those that don't they'd mostly receive the same (if not more harsh) response.)
Personally, I'm having fun with the limited community we have. But who knows if they'll stay...?
I'm gonna get back on the official Redwall forum and see if I can't recruit a few people. I'm going on a trip thursday and wont really have internet but I mean I can still start.
Quote from: windhound on June 17, 2014, 11:00:40 AM
Small correction Sharpy -- The game was Retto's pet project (and Boze's before him). Retto was rather protective of the code -- it was one of the friction points with Beatles, Retto even went and got permission to not release the code (contrary to the game's license).
Shael, Ollie, Shadow, and I all worked on the code at the same time -- Shael somewhat reluctantly towards the end (she tried to pass to torch to me earlier but I really didn't want it... she then just dropped it). As said above, there's been noone to really pass the torch to.
Maybe I was a little too harsh on Shael, I'm very appreciate of the countless man hours she has spent working on RWL, all the same I think it might have helped if she'd opened up the source code more whilst she was still around.
I don't know that much about the early history of RWL, but it does sound like early development efforts have hobbled the game a fair bit (even now)
Regarding the rest of your post, I am interested in helping, I definitely want to give something back to this site (it's given me enough over the years), but I don't think I'm in a position to do so now, I might be come September I'll let you know if/when I want to try and help.
Regarding making the site responsive, I realise it is a much bigger undertaking than a simple content site (as you've said, some screens would be difficult to adapt), I still think it would be much easier than creating an RWL app (which a lot of people seem to view as the only solution to this problem).
I also agree with you RE the UMD scaring people off (I was probably over exaggerating that problem), but I do think it illustrates well how different RWL's demographics are compared to a typical ROC.
Help coding would certainly be nice if you are interested in it.
my grndpa is a programer and he could teach me and then i could become a admin :P