Inuyashaisbest's Site

#20 Mar 2 2009, 4:52 pm In response to Spunky_Girl (#19)
Tiberath	Spunky_Girl wrote: Link is broken. URL Not Found. I had already fixed this by the time you posted...

#21 Mar 2 2009, 4:52 pm

In response to Lummox JR (#14)

Foomer

Lummox JR wrote:

Tom's thinking on that was--and I fully agree with this--that the description changes infrequently enough that except on a first visit, it's not going to be seen much. For that reason we have an excerpt of the description on the Overview tab, but not the full description.

Perhaps you need more opinions from people who don't frequent the site then. It seems like all the weird options would just confuse new people - even if it all seems easy for us who've been around for a while. The last thing you want to do is scare off potential players, right?

#22 Mar 2 2009, 4:55 pm In response to Tiberath (#17)
Lummox JR	Tiberath wrote: Though it does need to display the game banner somewhere on the original tab. It does. You're not seeing a banner on that page because Icon Ultima has none. Lummox JR

#23 Mar 2 2009, 4:58 pm

In response to Foomer (#21)

Tom

Foomer wrote:

Perhaps you need more opinions from people who don't frequent the site then. It seems like all the weird options would just confuse new people - even if it all seems easy for us who've been around for a while. The last thing you want to do is scare off potential players, right?

Well, I expect to refine this a few times this week, and in the process we'll get some outside opinions. My gut feeling is that the new layout is pretty accessible, though-- it's not like the tabs at the top are difficult to find or use. Upon browsing a few sites, I do agree with you that some of the lesser-used stuff (mainly the list of links-- eg "Watch in Pager"-- at the top of the Overview blurb) should be moved or reorganized. We'll do some public tests & changes tomorrow and see if we can't come up with something a little easier on the eyes.

#24 Mar 2 2009, 4:58 pm

In response to Spunky_Girl (#18)

Tiberath

Spunky_Girl wrote:

Okay yeah. That's a little TOO long. Maybe you guys should enforce a limited number of characters in a game's description? :\

Now that's just pointless and annoying. The hub page is the users #1 place to advertise their game on BYOND. What sense is there in limiting the users ability to do so? If they have an ungodly amount of information they want to put forward, that's their prerogative. Limiting this does nothing but annoy developers.

The idea is to expand, not to limit.

#25 Mar 2 2009, 5:04 pm In response to Tom (#23)
Airjoe	I'd definitely like to be able to link to a specific tab (e.g., link to the description tab).

#26 Mar 2 2009, 5:04 pm

In response to Lummox JR (#22)

Tiberath

Lummox JR wrote:

Tiberath wrote:

Though it does need to display the game banner somewhere on the original tab.

It does. You're not seeing a banner on that page because Icon Ultima has none.

Lummox JR

Ha, I could have sworn it did. Unless it was removed recently or something, but I do distinctly remember it having one. Eh, no biggie.

The only other issue I have with the page is the red and green backgrounds on the Live/Not Live portions of the index. Both the green and the red hurt my eyes a fair bit and make it genuinely more difficult for me to read the page itself.

#27 Mar 2 2009, 5:07 pm In response to Airjoe (#25)
Tom	Airjoe wrote: I'd definitely like to be able to link to a specific tab (e.g., link to the description tab). Yeah, that and the ability to refresh the individual tab are two things that should be in place soon (pending Lummox JR's website wizardry:)

#28 Mar 2 2009, 5:11 pm In response to Tiberath (#20)
Spunky_Girl	I hit the Post button about 10 seconds after I clicked on the link...

#29 Mar 2 2009, 5:20 pm In response to Spunky_Girl (#28)
Tiberath	Spunky_Girl wrote: I hit the Post button about 10 seconds after I clicked on the link... And it doesn't take more than a couple of seconds to mouse over the link (which is a reflex every time I make a post), notice that I'm missing an apostrophe that closes the link, hit the edit button, add that one single character, and click the post button.

#30 Mar 2 2009, 5:26 pm

In response to Tom (#4)

Nightmare3

Tom wrote:

Nightmare3 wrote:

I think it's sort of.. Un-appealing in the idea that it doesn't display enough information immediately.

What else would you like to see? We needed to compress the layout to make room for the upcoming medal system. I also think for repeat visitors this new layout makes more sense, since you don't need to see the description etc every time.

(I didn't read ALL of the posts that I missed, so forgive me)
Generally grouping of information and things of the sort. I feel like the overview sort of thing should be left on the games live section. Upon opening it, I feel like the description should load up to immediately inform the browser of what to expect.

I do very much like the steps it is taking, however. It's general appearance is very pleasant to the eye (I guess you could say).

Make sense? ;P

Edit: I agree that it may be a little confusing to those who are new to BYOND.

#31 Mar 2 2009, 6:46 pm In response to Stephen001 (#16)
Foomer	I see your point, but they could still limit the main page description to 1-2k then tack on a [read more] after that, while hiding images and such. Then people wanting to see the entire description could click either link.

#32 Mar 2 2009, 7:28 pm

In response to Tiberath (#26)

Lummox JR

Tiberath wrote:

The only other issue I have with the page is the red and green backgrounds on the Live/Not Live portions of the index. Both the green and the red hurt my eyes a fair bit and make it genuinely more difficult for me to read the page itself.

I could try a darker red and green. I'd actually like to try a darker blue for the regular boxes as well without going too much darker. Our standard light blue just doesn't seem to be doing it for me aesthetically.

Lummox JR

#33 Mar 2 2009, 8:20 pm

In response to Foomer (#31)

Stephen001

I presume the short description was kind of meant to serve this purpose, although it comes of a lot more like a tag-line than a description. A proper short description field (call it a sales pitch field or something) for hubs would be nice, perhaps taking the first X characters from the main description if the hub owner hasn't filled in this field, trailing off with a ...

Your suggestion is quite similar, however I'm not sure too many game owners would twig that they should write the first X characters of their main description in a manner that allows it to be pulled out and used as a short description. Ultimately either works though. You're really looking for a happy middle ground between self-expression and a minimum presentable standard, if the latter is too low then it reflects badly on BYOND as a whole for new users (the myspace effect).

#34 Mar 2 2009, 10:00 pm

In response to Lummox JR (#32)

Falacy

- First and foremost, you need make it so the page updates itself automatically to the new style. When I first went there and saw the blobbed together, half functional links with just plain text information down the page; I was about to come here and smack you in the head... I doubt there's a 100% chance that all players will refresh a game's hubs, and visiting multiple ones doesn't seem to cause the update.
- As was already pointed out, the green BG on the live games box is kinda strange, and feels very out of place. Why not go with something that matches the Play Live button's style. The little yellow men could be lit up if games are live, or grayed out if none are available.
- We also seem to lose all HTML formatting in the description box on the overview tab, which kinda sucks.
- And on the Related tab, the 'Listed in Guilds' and 'Players Also Like...' sections could be boxed in for easier visual separation of the two.

#35 Mar 3 2009, 2:12 am (Edited on Mar 3 2009, 2:24 am)

In response to Nightmare3 (#3)

Sweep

Nightmare3 wrote:

What do you guys think of it?

Honestly, I didn't see a need for the layout to be changed. It was all nicely columned before and now it's all weirdo centered it looks off. (Nice explanation I know but let's just leave it at, it looks weird to me.)

I'm agreeing with the fact that not enough of anything is displayed when you visit the hub, even I was confused when I was trying to read my own hub!

I know a lot of people use the hub for important info + update info, not enough people read that info as it is. The people that are the ones who SHOULD be reading it, ain't gonna go searching around and clicking buttons to find it I'll tell you that right now.

To sum it all up, my personal opinion on this is, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

EDIT: Also I noticed if you're using HTML in your description, the preview of the description does weird things.

#36 Mar 3 2009, 2:40 am
HTML	http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/4716/j0001.jpg that is what I see in every game I have : Fire Fox - internet explore - Windows XP

#37 Mar 3 2009, 7:30 am

In response to Foomer (#31)

Mobius Evalon

Foomer wrote:

I see your point, but they could still limit the main page description to 1-2k then tack on a [read more] after that, while hiding images and such. Then people wanting to see the entire description could click either link.

I think that plus some smart use of any provided newlines in the description would be ideal; the last newline before the cutoff point is used for overview truncation if it's reasonably close enough. This may already be the case, but I haven't investigated many hub pages.

I have noticed the image hiding went a little wacky though, as the first few words of the last visible sentence of the overview truncation is hyperlinked to one of the images that preceded it.

As far as the layout itself, I don't think it's so bad. The only problem I have with it is that distinct bubble feeling of the items on the overview page, but I haven't any suggestions on that.

#38 Mar 3 2009, 8:55 am In response to HTML (#36)
Mobius Evalon	That's the new hub page layout (or at least likely similar to the finished product). Also, I had a laugh at that colon cleansing ad on the right.

#39 Mar 3 2009, 9:06 am
Android Data	One thing that seems to be missing with the new hub layout is the ability to jump to areas immediately. Some links still contain a reference to #online. Example: http://www.byond.com/games/Xooxer/Chatters#online Yet those links do not show the currently online games. Proposal: when #online is used, it should automatically switch to the "now live" tab, etc.