ID:132443
 
I'm not the only one who thinks so. Byond is losing traffic, I looked at a 2007-2010 traffic graph.

Log out, go to byond.com, and look at the front-page, and tell me it doesn't look like a scam.

That needs changed. In my opinion, the future of byond depends on it. The website is what gets people on byond and I think most people leave when they see the front-page.

It's yalls website and I have no right to tell you what to do but I think byond will die if something isn't done about this.

It's too hard to find a list of games on Byond.com for a new person, you have to click through like 5 pages of stuff before you get to the games. It's all too convoluted and also redundant. People need to get to the content fast to see what they're trying to register for.

When the front-page looks like a scam nobody wants to "Install now" because they're scared it'll give them viruses.

There should be an unfiltered list of games, listed by player count, on the front-page so they can see what they are in for without clicking a million billion things to see the content. Anime games are the biggest draw to byond and that fact shouldn't be hidden away, the players choose to load themselves up by the hundreds on anime games and giving the majority what they want will bring more people to byond.

That's all. I don't want this getting any longer. This isn't criticism (or whatever word I'm trying to say), just opinions. Thanks for reading.
There's a website upgrade in progress right now that might remedy the situation. We're definitely not losing users though, we have more people now than ever.
In response to Nadrew
Nadrew wrote:
There's a website upgrade in progress right now that might remedy the situation. We're definitely not losing users though, we have more people now than ever.

Good and I hope that's true that there is more players than ever, but the traffic graph I found says otherwise: http://www.quantcast.com/wd:com.byond

Also on the website each day it maxes at about 6000 online players at once. 2 years ago it was 13000 to 18000 a day. So that indicates less than before.
In response to Dragonn
Uh, what? The only time the numbers looked like that was when there was a bug with player reporting. 6,000 online users is actually quite high for us, in 2007 we were lucky to break 1,500. You're quite mistaken.
In response to Dragonn
Also, in that graph, you have to keep in mind that it dipped from Public Education
In response to Dragonn
Dragonn wrote:
Good and I hope that's true that there is more players than ever, but the traffic graph I found says otherwise: http://www.quantcast.com/wd:com.byond

Yes, our analytics also confirm that traffic is down on the website. I have no doubt that the design is a factor-- and as Nadrew said, we're working on a major overhaul to help that-- but I also believe the main reason is competing sites. Nowadays there are far more social networks and gaming sites to monopolize people's time.

Also on the website each day it maxes at about 6000 online players at once. 2 years ago it was 13000 to 18000 a day. So that indicates less than before.

You aren't remembering correctly, because we've never had that many users. We're actually peaking in terms of pager traffic right now.
In response to Tom
Tom wrote:
Yes, our analytics also confirm that traffic is down on the website. I have no doubt that the design is a factor-- and as Nadrew said, we're working on a major overhaul to help that-- but I also believe the main reason is competing sites. Nowadays there are far more social networks and gaming sites to monopolize people's time.

Not to mention that those other sites tend to have a far superior overall look to them than BYOND has. While some oldbies remember the so-called "good old days" of how the site looked, there's still a similarity between the old and new: it's designed like the stone-age internet. Even if you guys like it, it's probably a turn-off for 80% of the user-base. A major overhaul is nice, but a complete site redesign into the 21st century might end up being an even better investment in the long-run.
In response to Fugsnarf
Fugsnarf wrote:
Not to mention that those other sites tend to have a far superior overall look to them than BYOND has. While some oldbies remember the so-called "good old days" of how the site looked, there's still a similarity between the old and new: it's designed like the stone-age internet. Even if you guys like it, it's probably a turn-off for 80% of the user-base. A major overhaul is nice, but a complete site redesign into the 21st century might end up being an even better investment in the long-run.

"Superior" is subjective but I will concede that consistency with modern sites is probably in our best interest. The new site, which we hope to launch within the next week, should meet that criteria and won't hurt your eyes (undoubtedly people will complain anyway). I don't think it's the answer to all of our problems-- ultimately people will judge BYOND by the games here-- but every little bit helps.
In response to Tom
Tom wrote:
"Superior" is subjective but I will concede that consistency with modern sites is probably in our best interest. The new site, which we hope to launch within the next week, should meet that criteria and won't hurt your eyes (undoubtedly people will complain anyway). I don't think it's the answer to all of our problems-- ultimately people will judge BYOND by the games here-- but every little bit helps.

That's really the key, and I think what will give BYOND's games the audience they deserve is a better showcase of them. Take yoyogames.com for instance, and how their front page showcases different games from different areas in order to turn on the potential players that come across the site. Although the other thing that gives them the upper hand is the lack of the process of signing up for a key and downloading BYOND, that's for another day; it is, however, significant.
In response to Tom
Tom wrote:
The new site, which we hope to launch within the next week, should meet that criteria and won't hurt your eyes (undoubtedly people will complain anyway).

I don't think rolling out a new site like that is a good idea.
Perhaps we could access it now by going into byond.com/new or something? We need to be able to test out the site in advance and make suggestions before just throwing it out there.
In response to Flame Sage
Maybe showing a few screen shots now would get you some opinions.
In response to Tom
Please say that the new website design isn't an amateur effort--aka say an artist designed it.
In response to Vermolius
More of a sub-community effort. There has been quite a lot of testing and feedback happening between the developers and the testers. More so than the previous site changes.

I don't think hiring an artist to design and develop a site upgrade would be financially viable for BYOND at for now. I personally think it looks great, and a lot of other people who are pretty versed in web-design do as well. Of course there's gonna be people who don't like it, but that's true for anything.
In response to Nadrew
I never said you had to -hire- an artist. Although it would be nice to see BYOND with a professional website. The community is not without artists, were efforts made to contact the better artists around to see if they were willing to help out? For all these years we've had a really really lackluster website. I'd just like to see the website get a decent face-lift.

I'm not really trying to knock something I haven't seen. Perhaps this new design is a wonderful step in the right direction. Let's just hope that someone opened photoshop, thought about layout, color composition, looked at some other successful websites with similar purposes for ideas, and maybe even read up on website design. I say this because the last few iterations have seemingly been cobbled together rather than designed.

I'm excited to see what has been come up with, but you can't seriously expect people to be joyous about another less than mediocre design; if that's what it is. A large part of the problem with BYOND development is that you guys tend to be a knuckleheaded and stubborn. A poor design is pushed and then the outcries are shrugged off with a haters-gonna-hate mentality. The reason you get so many people saying they dislike the design of the website is because it is a bad design.
In response to Vermolius
Vermolius wrote:
The reason you get so many people saying they dislike the design of the website is because it is a bad design.

I don't mean to sound defensive, but that is rubbish. Opinions on design are subjective. Some people like fixed-width pages, some prefer full-width. Some like dark colors, some like light colors. I for one am happy that every site oh the internet doesn't look like Facebook (which surely has a team of expert designers).

I am more concerned about functionality than appearance, and I think the next iteration will show this (while also making the appearance more mainstream to hopefully satiate the many people who hate the current site). If it's feasible, we'll do a public preview prior to rolling it out, to get a bit more testing and feedback. If some of the artists on BYOND would like to contribute prior to that, perhaps they can follow up here and I can contact them privately. We are not keeping things a big secret or anything but our setup doesn't really allow us to have lots of traffic to both the live and test sites, and currently due to the way we optimize stuff, the test site is very slow.
In response to Tom
EH, don't really see much of a problem with the colors. Personally, I think the front page should show off the games for each section, though.
In response to Gtgoku55
Gtgoku55 wrote:
EH, don't really see much of a problem with the colors. Personally, I think the front page should show off the games for each section, though.

Yes, a lot of people feel that way so we're doing that in the new site.
In response to Tom
Tom wrote:

I don't mean to sound defensive, but that is rubbish. Opinions on design are subjective.

Of course they're subjective.

But when you're trying to please a userbase, and the userbase absolutely hates what you're doing, then you're doing something wrong- even if it's something like trying to appeal to the wrong audience.
The peoples republic of china wrote:
Of course they're subjective.

But when you're trying to please a userbase, and the userbase absolutely hates what you're doing, then you're doing something wrong- even if it's something like trying to appeal to the wrong audience.

Yes, except a few vocal users hating on the site isn't necessarily representative. If I felt that way I would have given up on this project years ago because more than a few have hated on the software. The fact is, no one speaks up when something is satisfactory, only when something is unsatisfactory.

But I don't want to debate this, as I've already acknowledged that the site could benefit from a more modern makeover since a certain look is in these days.
In response to Tom
Tom wrote:
I don't mean to sound defensive, but that is rubbish.
Opinions on design are subjective. Some people like fixed-width pages, some prefer full-width. Some like dark colors, some like light colors. I for one am happy that every site oh the internet doesn't look like Facebook (which surely has a team of expert designers).

I bolded important sections. I understand you have your own opinions, which is fine, but don't let that get in the way of good design. Once again you can say "good design" is subjective, but compare a stick figure to a full on artistic rendition of a man and tell me that people should prefer the stick figure. The point is that the front end of the website hasn't had enough attention. You guys have worked hard, just try to present that hard work better.

I am more concerned about functionality than appearance, and I think the next iteration will show this (while also making the appearance more mainstream to hopefully satiate the many people who hate the current site).

That's good, since the current version has a lot of hangups in the functionality. Finding games is problematic, to say the least. I'd say the goal should be ease of use and presentability.

If it's feasible, we'll do a public preview prior to rolling it out, to get a bit more testing and feedback. If some of the artists on BYOND would like to contribute prior to that, perhaps they can follow up here and I can contact them privately.

I wouldn't mind seeing it, but I'll just wait. I could point Tayoko to this thread but I think I know what he would say already--not saying he outcrops anyone else, but he's definitely good.
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