I think this is a great idea. I do have some reservations about the rules, but I don't think it should stop this from happening.
First, regarding rule #3, I think it would be appropriate to relinquish the OP to the game creator or promoter, not the forum mod. If they need to update the OP or whatnot, it would seem ideal to do that immediately and directly, rather than putting that through a mod. A work around might be to keep the thread locked so that they can at least maintain the second post.
Second, regarding rule #5, I don't know how practical it is for an indie shop to give out free codes. For a $10 game, you are asking them to forfeit $100, which could be a week's worth of food.
Would people other than developers be allowed to create threads? If I just love indie game x, but it doesn't have a demo, can I not make a thread? Is it intended to be primarily for self promotion? Seems odd to have the extra restrictions otherwise.
Wouldn't that just be a normal G&T thread? Although I guess having discussion in one subforum and promotion in another is less than ideal...
This is a thing that would be neat. I've browsed TIGSource forums a few times when looking for interesting games, but there's often nothing playable in announcement threads. Curation would help. (It's also a different community over there with it's own feel and own in-jokes. Not that that's bad, but it's different, and it's a time investment to waste time be involved on more than one forum.)
Would people other than developers be allowed to create threads? If I just love indie game x, but it doesn't have a demo, can I not make a thread? Is it intended to be primarily for self promotion? Seems odd to have the extra restrictions otherwise.
Wouldn't that just be a normal G&T thread? Although I guess having discussion in one subforum and promotion in another is less than ideal...
Well, that's the question I have, is how much of this forum is 'for' self-promotion, and how much it's for having a space for lesser known games to not get blown off the first page by all the big AAA titles that everyone knows will have threads. I'm a little less interested if it's just for self-promotion.
Here's an idea: is it possible to create an internal rank of "Indie developer" ala Mod and Admin such that you can set the forum to only allow new posts from that rank, then when you approve people you give them that rank? Or is that just not possible with the forum software?
Second, regarding rule #5, I don't know how practical it is for an indie shop to give out free codes. For a $10 game, you are asking them to forfeit $100, which could be a week's worth of food.
Sorry, but that's their tough shit. Advertising on a space like this costs much, much more than $100. I'm not running a charity for destitute games developers, if they don't have something to offer our users they can feel free not to take the deal.
I think it's a great idea, especially if you're being solicited so often about it. Requiring them to provide something playable to the community will weed out people peddling nothing but bullshit, and allow for more than just speculation in the thread.
Also, as others have said, if it fails, burn it to the ground. Conversely, if it succeeds, it could be a very cool addition to the forums!
Anyone who posts first and asks later gets all mention of their game banned from the forum, even by fans.
It sounds like what you're saying is that if any game breaks that rule, then it gets completely shunned and nobody is allowed to talk about it ever again even in a general sense.
The Wolfman on
"The sausage of Green Earth explodes with flavor like the cannon of culinary delight."
If you make a thread about your game "I, The Wolfman" without permission, your game "I, The Wolfman" is blacklisted and there will be no threads about it on the forums, whether made by you or anyone else.
If you make a thread about your game "I, The Wolfman" without permission, your game "I, The Wolfman" is blacklisted and there will be no threads about it on the forums, whether made by you or anyone else.
Ah, see that sounds a tad extreme to me to have a blacklist like that. That if some idiot dev breaks the rules like that, then nobody can come on later and talk about it in a general sense.
On the other hand, I completely understand the point you're making with it. And I don't think anybody is going to give a shit or lose sleep over not being able to talk about some shitty indie game developed by somebody who thought he was above the rules.
Follow the rules, or we all turn our backs on the game, like that episode of Star Trek where all the Klingons did it to Worf. Works for me.
"The sausage of Green Earth explodes with flavor like the cannon of culinary delight."
a dedicated forum would mean a laser focused audience (gamers interested in seeking out new indie titles), which is more valuable to me as a real critique of my work as opposed to a marketing vehicle.
3. All developers have to ask permission first. One of the things I'm thinking is that devs apply to me, then I make the thread for them as the only person with thread creation rights in that forum. Anyone who posts first and asks later gets all mention of their game banned from the forum, even by fans.
for quality control this sounds like the only way to go, but i imagine this is already a huge tedious task. if it were an established rule that you can post your game info as long as it into the dedicated forum, then i the developer would have the instant gratification of getting my info out there without fear of potentially crapping up the other forums. that said, open floodgates without human eyes would probably push my game back into the dark faster (assuming its a game quality filter as opposed to a strict rule filter), especially if i have to compete with the 10 angry birds clones released that day.
4. All games must either be free to play or have a demo available.
5. Failing that, all devs have to have a certain amount (let's say 10 for now) of free codes to give away exclusive to our forumers.
Second, regarding rule #5, I don't know how practical it is for an indie shop to give out free codes. For a $10 game, you are asking them to forfeit $100, which could be a week's worth of food.
i'm an indie dev, i gave up on food ages ago. it's your house, i'll do whatever you want me to do - freebies, demos, whatever. i want eyes to see how awesome my game is, and eyes are the hardest thing to come by in a market flooded with content.
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Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
Second, regarding rule #5, I don't know how practical it is for an indie shop to give out free codes. For a $10 game, you are asking them to forfeit $100, which could be a week's worth of food.
that's absurd. Yes, it costs them $100 to give out 10 free codes, or whatever, but the amount of sales they would gain or lose depending on whether they were featured here would be, well, i hesitate to put a number on it, but let's say a fuckload
Another indie dev reporting in and I think this is a great idea. I actually already have a thread on G&T since the existence of my company came out of a "let's make a mod" thread on there, but think it would be way better to have an area for this sort of thing.
Also, there are legit reasons to neither be free to play nor have a demo, but requiring giving out codes exclusively to forumers (which I already do on here actually) is a great substitute and this:
Second, regarding rule #5, I don't know how practical it is for an indie shop to give out free codes. For a $10 game, you are asking them to forfeit $100, which could be a week's worth of food.
doesn't bother me at all. Giving out codes promotes your game, it is silly to see it as forfeiting money.
I love the idea. It's essentially free advertising for the devs (we obviously don't know how much $ real advertising on here costs, but it has to be a lot more than what a few codes or limited beta/demo access would cost), and we get introduced to more games.
Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
should there be some rule that the devs ought to spend some time participating in the larger forum community, or do we want to leave that up to their own discretion?
I feel like it will promote more of a
"we're all friends here and some of the friends make really cool games too, want to be one of our friends?"
rather than
"here is a really great internet community for you to market your product to"
There's one important logistical issue that hasn't been considered yet: what happens if a game in the indie forum gets really popular? Consider stuff like Terraria, Bastion, or Zeboyd's games, which started out with tiny development studios but found a huge audience that generated many dozens of pages of discussion. For new cases similar to these, the threads belong in the main G&T forum (both because they deserve it and because it defeats the purpose of the indie subforum if the top 20 games stifle everything else), but how do you manage it? What are the prerequisites for being worthy of the main forum? And how do you physically get the threads there? You can't just move them wholesale because Tube would still control the OP, but starting new threads would cause you to lose a lot of potentially valuable discussion. And obviously nobody wants duplicate threads in both forums.
I like the concept of giving small indie devs a place to promote their games, but I can't support the idea if it gets implemented in a way that ends up detracting from the regular Games & Technology forum.
As a person that purchases probably about 90% of his games via word of mouth, I heartily approve of this idea. I'm pretty sure besides D3, every single one of my last 15 purchases has been prompted by reading threads about them on these forums.
I'm pretty sure I would never go into this new forum and would still rely on the good indy games getting a thread made in G&T by some forumer that really liked them.
I'm pretty sure I would never go into this new forum and would still rely on the good indy games getting a thread made in G&T by some forumer that really liked them.
I'm pretty sure they still can do that. It's just the devs that wouldn't be able to make threads there. And the subforum would be a way for someone to hear of the game and then go make a thread over in G&T so
If you make a thread about your game "I, The Wolfman" without permission, your game "I, The Wolfman" is blacklisted and there will be no threads about it on the forums, whether made by you or anyone else.
I'm curious as to how much extra work that would place on the Mods. I mean, maintaining and enforcing a do not post list like that would be pretty easy on a small forum, here though... That's a pain in the ass waiting to happen.
It seems like enforcement of that rule might wind up hurting some discussion too. I mean, if a guy does a drive by and flits on his merry way spamming forums across the internet and never comes back, but then it turns out that his game actually gets completed and kicks ass, it seems like it would be unfortunate to ban all threads about a fun game because one of it's devs dropped a link a year ago.
There's one important logistical issue that hasn't been considered yet: what happens if a game in the indie forum gets really popular? Consider stuff like Terraria, Bastion, or Zeboyd's games, which started out with tiny development studios but found a huge audience that generated many dozens of pages of discussion. For new cases similar to these, the threads belong in the main G&T forum (both because they deserve it and because it defeats the purpose of the indie subforum if the top 20 games stifle everything else), but how do you manage it? What are the prerequisites for being worthy of the main forum? And how do you physically get the threads there? You can't just move them wholesale because Tube would still control the OP, but starting new threads would cause you to lose a lot of potentially valuable discussion. And obviously nobody wants duplicate threads in both forums.
I like the concept of giving small indie devs a place to promote their games, but I can't support the idea if it gets implemented in a way that ends up detracting from the regular Games & Technology forum.
I don't think the Bastion thread ever hit 100 pages. Regardless if it does, I imagine it would be up to Tube's discretion. In fact "Tube's discretion" is probably the answer to a lot of people's questions.
This sounds great! One of my favorite parts of G&T is when developers respond to member comments, and this would make it easier for all parties to get that "back and forth" going.
A good idea would be to ask the developers to have their own web page. Maybe pointing us to their forums, facebook group or twitter account(s) so the forums don't suffer the overload of data.
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There's one important logistical issue that hasn't been considered yet: what happens if a game in the indie forum gets really popular? Consider stuff like Terraria, Bastion, or Zeboyd's games, which started out with tiny development studios but found a huge audience that generated many dozens of pages of discussion. For new cases similar to these, the threads belong in the main G&T forum (both because they deserve it and because it defeats the purpose of the indie subforum if the top 20 games stifle everything else), but how do you manage it? What are the prerequisites for being worthy of the main forum? And how do you physically get the threads there? You can't just move them wholesale because Tube would still control the OP, but starting new threads would cause you to lose a lot of potentially valuable discussion. And obviously nobody wants duplicate threads in both forums.
I like the concept of giving small indie devs a place to promote their games, but I can't support the idea if it gets implemented in a way that ends up detracting from the regular Games & Technology forum.
I don't think the Bastion thread ever hit 100 pages. Regardless if it does, I imagine it would be up to Tube's discretion. In fact "Tube's discretion" is probably the answer to a lot of people's questions.
I tried to dig up some of those threads to get some real numbers, but holy crap the search function on this forum is terrible. The point is that there are some great indie games that are capable of spawning thriving discussions in the main forum, and those kinds of games getting shunted off into a subforum that the vast majority of people will never see would be a very bad thing. It would be terrible if indie games and non-indie games ended up getting separated categorically, and I want to make sure that isn't going to happen if this plan goes through.
It'd be great for the kind of games that wouldn't get any discussion at all otherwise, but achieving that goal without disrupting lots of other things will be tricky.
Is there a forum plugin / system that allows a new thread to be published only after approval from a mod? (like Akismet for a blog). Given that it would allow the dev to update the OP with new features / developments, allow for smoother transition to G&T and (possibly) lighten the mods workload, it might be a decent compromise.
Fully support the idea and the rules on the whole seem strong.
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Dusdais ashamed of this postSLC, UTRegistered Userregular
Well as someone who's been lobbying Tube (well, as much as one can 'lobby' him) for a game development forum of some sort for years (twice), I'm all for this. Having a dedicated place to promote indie games eases the pressure on G&T mods, I'm sure. What the hell, give it a shot.
I'm guessing with number 4 or 5 you are trying to come up with a reason (besides love for indie games) to drive traffic to the forum? That makes sense, and ten seems like a reasonable number. If the game isn't shit, the developer would easily get more than that out of people here on the forums.
I also agree with the Kickstarter rule. Much of what you've got seems to be focused on real indie games that are actually happening and not braincrack-addled pipe dreams that might become something a year from now. The super laser focus of heavily curating what's posted also helps drive out the fucking noise.
I'm thinking any games that got big enough would still qualify for spawning a thread in G&T just like how it's done today: when a game achieves a critical mindshare and players want to actively get other people to play the game. The Indie Forum would be for devs who want to get their game out there and possibly cause the spark that turns into that critial mindshare fire.
And a rule about "don't make a thread about this game" would most likely be added to the rules forum and then be obeyed just like how the "no anime threads" is obeyed: most everyone following the rules with a couple of random people complaining about it and/or posting threads without thinking.
I'm also on the "this sounds great to me" side. It'd be great to have somewhere dedicated to indie games, and the format for running it sounds like the best way to keep it under control.
It's a nice idea, but, would it actually be worth-while investment of time, on the part of the developer to use such a forum? I dunno. I did post about my previous game in G&T (asked permission to do so), and despite the fact that it did extremely well on the Apple AppStore; I didn't get a single response from anyone on the forum. That's been my experience with quite a few forums, perhaps, it's partly due to my game being on iOS?
I guess if you can set something up, and it's a good place for developers and players to interact, that'd be great.
I like this idea - the only one I'm hesitant on is #3 actually. Seems a bit hard to enforce. Let's say a game comes out and an overzealous programmer starts a thread and gets the game banned. That doesn't stop my Steamsig from showing I'm playing it, if it goes on sale I'm sure we'll want to tell people and discuss it in the Steam thread, someone might want to gift it out and someone would want to thank them. How is that fair to the community?
Additionally, what happens if a common word is the game name? Like Braid or Flight or Sequence? Are you really going to be able to prevent mentions of the game without being hit with a ton of false hits or making those words no longer allowed?
I think there should be a punishment for preemptive posting of a game - but a ban on the entire game seems way overboard.
Edit: Maybe I misread - do you mean a ban from this new theorectical Indie games subsection or from the entire PA forums?
Perhaps there should be an amendment to the rule about needing to provide 10 free copies. I see the reasoning for it, but what about games that are free to begin with? Unless I miss your intent, the 10 free copies provision is meant to provide some sort of compensation to the forum for free advertising. If you design your game around an alternative business model - like a f2p game or something - then those sorts of games do not incur such a penalty.
I think, to keep it fair, that provision should be removed.
EDIT: to clarify - your previous rule about the game being free to play makes it seem as though it's a consious effort to make the forums something more than just free advertising, so that users can't take advantage of PA to make money. Forcing a non-f2p game to provide 10 copies doesn't seem like it offsets that to me.
Perhaps a better rule would be that games are required to at least provide a free demo of the game.
Rule 4 covers your concerns. If there's a playable demo or if it's F2P, then the developer is fine. If it's pay-only, they need to provide a some keys.
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First, regarding rule #3, I think it would be appropriate to relinquish the OP to the game creator or promoter, not the forum mod. If they need to update the OP or whatnot, it would seem ideal to do that immediately and directly, rather than putting that through a mod. A work around might be to keep the thread locked so that they can at least maintain the second post.
Second, regarding rule #5, I don't know how practical it is for an indie shop to give out free codes. For a $10 game, you are asking them to forfeit $100, which could be a week's worth of food.
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Wouldn't that just be a normal G&T thread? Although I guess having discussion in one subforum and promotion in another is less than ideal...
Well, that's the question I have, is how much of this forum is 'for' self-promotion, and how much it's for having a space for lesser known games to not get blown off the first page by all the big AAA titles that everyone knows will have threads. I'm a little less interested if it's just for self-promotion.
Sorry, but that's their tough shit. Advertising on a space like this costs much, much more than $100. I'm not running a charity for destitute games developers, if they don't have something to offer our users they can feel free not to take the deal.
Also, as others have said, if it fails, burn it to the ground. Conversely, if it succeeds, it could be a very cool addition to the forums!
It sounds like what you're saying is that if any game breaks that rule, then it gets completely shunned and nobody is allowed to talk about it ever again even in a general sense.
Ah, see that sounds a tad extreme to me to have a blacklist like that. That if some idiot dev breaks the rules like that, then nobody can come on later and talk about it in a general sense.
On the other hand, I completely understand the point you're making with it. And I don't think anybody is going to give a shit or lose sleep over not being able to talk about some shitty indie game developed by somebody who thought he was above the rules.
Follow the rules, or we all turn our backs on the game, like that episode of Star Trek where all the Klingons did it to Worf. Works for me.
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a dedicated forum would mean a laser focused audience (gamers interested in seeking out new indie titles), which is more valuable to me as a real critique of my work as opposed to a marketing vehicle.
for quality control this sounds like the only way to go, but i imagine this is already a huge tedious task. if it were an established rule that you can post your game info as long as it into the dedicated forum, then i the developer would have the instant gratification of getting my info out there without fear of potentially crapping up the other forums. that said, open floodgates without human eyes would probably push my game back into the dark faster (assuming its a game quality filter as opposed to a strict rule filter), especially if i have to compete with the 10 angry birds clones released that day.
i'm an indie dev, i gave up on food ages ago. it's your house, i'll do whatever you want me to do - freebies, demos, whatever. i want eyes to see how awesome my game is, and eyes are the hardest thing to come by in a market flooded with content.
that's absurd. Yes, it costs them $100 to give out 10 free codes, or whatever, but the amount of sales they would gain or lose depending on whether they were featured here would be, well, i hesitate to put a number on it, but let's say a fuckload
Also, there are legit reasons to neither be free to play nor have a demo, but requiring giving out codes exclusively to forumers (which I already do on here actually) is a great substitute and this: doesn't bother me at all. Giving out codes promotes your game, it is silly to see it as forfeiting money.
Seems like a win/win to me.
I feel like it will promote more of a
"we're all friends here and some of the friends make really cool games too, want to be one of our friends?"
rather than
"here is a really great internet community for you to market your product to"
I like the concept of giving small indie devs a place to promote their games, but I can't support the idea if it gets implemented in a way that ends up detracting from the regular Games & Technology forum.
I'm pretty sure they still can do that. It's just the devs that wouldn't be able to make threads there. And the subforum would be a way for someone to hear of the game and then go make a thread over in G&T so
It seems like enforcement of that rule might wind up hurting some discussion too. I mean, if a guy does a drive by and flits on his merry way spamming forums across the internet and never comes back, but then it turns out that his game actually gets completed and kicks ass, it seems like it would be unfortunate to ban all threads about a fun game because one of it's devs dropped a link a year ago.
I don't think the Bastion thread ever hit 100 pages. Regardless if it does, I imagine it would be up to Tube's discretion. In fact "Tube's discretion" is probably the answer to a lot of people's questions.
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It'd be great for the kind of games that wouldn't get any discussion at all otherwise, but achieving that goal without disrupting lots of other things will be tricky.
Fully support the idea and the rules on the whole seem strong.
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I'm guessing with number 4 or 5 you are trying to come up with a reason (besides love for indie games) to drive traffic to the forum? That makes sense, and ten seems like a reasonable number. If the game isn't shit, the developer would easily get more than that out of people here on the forums.
I also agree with the Kickstarter rule. Much of what you've got seems to be focused on real indie games that are actually happening and not braincrack-addled pipe dreams that might become something a year from now. The super laser focus of heavily curating what's posted also helps drive out the fucking noise.
And a rule about "don't make a thread about this game" would most likely be added to the rules forum and then be obeyed just like how the "no anime threads" is obeyed: most everyone following the rules with a couple of random people complaining about it and/or posting threads without thinking.
I guess if you can set something up, and it's a good place for developers and players to interact, that'd be great.
Would these topics be open for everyone to discuss the game? If so, there probably should be a "no begging" rule.
I would have thought so. Having more interaction, between developers and players, has to be a good thing!
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Additionally, what happens if a common word is the game name? Like Braid or Flight or Sequence? Are you really going to be able to prevent mentions of the game without being hit with a ton of false hits or making those words no longer allowed?
I think there should be a punishment for preemptive posting of a game - but a ban on the entire game seems way overboard.
Edit: Maybe I misread - do you mean a ban from this new theorectical Indie games subsection or from the entire PA forums?
I think, to keep it fair, that provision should be removed.
EDIT: to clarify - your previous rule about the game being free to play makes it seem as though it's a consious effort to make the forums something more than just free advertising, so that users can't take advantage of PA to make money. Forcing a non-f2p game to provide 10 copies doesn't seem like it offsets that to me.
Perhaps a better rule would be that games are required to at least provide a free demo of the game.