[Advice] Game Suggestions Website (Gamers Wanted)

Maginomicon

This is not a thread for you to post game suggestions or game ideas in. Read The Freaking Thread, people!

I acquired this kick domain name (I'm not going to plug a link, don't worry) and I was looking for suggestions about what additionally I should be doing with it. What the site's for might seem a little ridiculous, but hear me out, OK?

A while back, I thought to myself "I know what I want in games, but what do they want? What do the other gamers want?" Granted there's a billion-and-one places I could look to see what gamers want, but my sample would be biased by what I'm interested in. Plus, I don't have the time to look around in those billion-and-one sites. So I decided to make a site all about game suggestions.

Oh. By "game suggestions", I am not referring to "game ideas". (e.g. "Make a Barbie game where she goes on a rampage killing everyone because she broke a fingernail!") Every gamer and their dog has a game idea. It takes a bit more thinking to make a game suggestion. (e.g. "AI that outsmart us once in a while.")

Currently the site is just an email form, but I've already got a lot of work done towards making it a place where you can personally rate suggestions in a database as well as rate eachother as suggestors. There are various categories a suggestion can be tagged with. There are various statistics that can go along with this, such as "Top 10 Suggestions by Rating", and "Top 10 Suggestors by Submissions", etc. but just having stats isn't enough in my opinion. My problem is... I'm at a loss about what other kinds of features to include.

What more would gamers want in a website that focuses specifically on allowing "game suggestions" to be catalogued for public display and to be rated by peers? I already have the site display links to known "givens" (game suggestions so blatantly obvious that it should be a crime that they aren't universally accepted and used now) such as "A Gamers' Manifesto" and "The Top 231 Things I'd Do If I Ever Became An Evil Overlord", but what else gamers would really want out of such a place eludes me.

Can anyone help me out here?

Oh, I almost forgot. Right now it's not really an issue, but if there are any mature (a bit silly that that has to be mentioned) gamers that would be willing to help run such a site (knowledge of PHP/MySQL recommended) please let me know via PM.

I got this approved first.

Lord Yod

Aren't there issues with using an idea from a source like that? I know that the Babylon 5 writer never read fan mail so he wouldn't have to worry about someone guessing what was going to happen next and suing him saying it was their idea.

Assuming that hurdle was passed somehow, it sounds like a neat idea, and I'd love to help.

mausmalone

Well, step 1 would be to somehow figure out how to import GameFAQs full game list, that way you don't have to. Then somehow get people to log in, post their own reviews of the games, and then track which games they say are good.

How to build recommendations: write an algorithm that selects all reviewers that gave a game a rating of 8.0 or higher. Then build a list of all the other games that all those people reviewed. Tabulate the 5 games that got the highest average review scores from those people. Cache the list. You now have a "if you liked this game you might also like:" list.

Maginomicon

Lord Yod wrote: »

Aren't there issues with using an idea from a source like that? I know that the Babylon 5 writer never read fan mail so he wouldn't have to worry about someone guessing what was going to happen next and suing him saying it was their idea.

Assuming that hurdle was passed somehow, it sounds like a neat idea, and I'd love to help.

The issue you described inherently resolves itself. Now, if the site were about game ideas, there might be copyright issues sometime down the line, but game suggestions are a different matter.

The site is intended to be a database of game design aspects, what gamers really want in their games. Suggestions so universally obvious that games in general should be using them now and should of thought of them sooner.

mausmalone wrote: »

Well, step 1 would be to somehow figure out how to import GameFAQs full game list, that way you don't have to. Then somehow get people to log in, post their own reviews of the games, and then track which games they say are good.

Um... I don't think you're quite getting it. It wouldn't be a site about game reviews. It'd be a site that shows the public what gamers think needs improving in games and the game industry as a whole.

Lord Yod

So for instance, a viable suggestion would be 'Let's start making games where the controls aren't mapped to specific actions, but rather control your character's limbs and how they are used depending on context'.

And then Ubisoft makes Assassin's Creed. Wouldn't this pose some sort of legal problem? Obviously I'm not a lawyer but that is something I would want to work out ahead of time.

Maginomicon

Lord Yod wrote: »

So for instance, a viable suggestion would be 'Let's start making games where the controls aren't mapped to specific actions, but rather control your character's limbs and how they are used depending on context'.

And then Ubisoft makes Assassin's Creed. Wouldn't this pose some sort of legal problem? Obviously I'm not a lawyer but that is something I would want to work out ahead of time.

Why would it pose a legal problem? Since most "game suggestions" are far too broad to claim legal ownership over, and gamers (like myself) just want their suggested game design aspects in games ASAP, then there shouldn't be a problem.

Besides, ultimately, a disclaimer could simply be put up. Something like "By submitting a game suggestion to name of site here , you surrender all legal ownership of the suggested material to the public domain, where anyone (particularly game designers) can think your suggestion is awesome and use it. Likewise, no one would be obligated to give you or name of site here any credit of any kind."

mausmalone

I hate to say this ... but this is an awful idea for a site, and a better idea for a forum thread. A website that's not just a forum wouldn't allow for the discussion that would make these sorts of suggestions interesting.

Maginomicon

mausmalone wrote: »

I hate to say this ... but this is an awful idea for a site, and a better idea for a forum thread. A website that's not just a forum wouldn't allow for the discussion that would make these sorts of suggestions interesting.

I thought about that. I am planning on implementing a "improvements" system whereby people can suggest modifications to an existing suggestion (essentially like commenting on a blog) but the public (particularly busy people like game designers) will want instant access to this information, and don't want to have to go sifting through a forum to find it.

Deviant Hands

So you want like a Wikipedia thing for games?

Maginomicon

Deviant Hands wrote: »

So you want like a Wikipedia thing for games?

Not really. More like a thinkbank.

Aroduc

I think you mean thinktank.

Unless you're going to loan out brains and charge interest on them.

Maginomicon

Aroduc wrote: »

I think you mean thinktank.

Except that thinktanks aren't usually open to the general public. The emphasis is on having a database (bank) of game suggestions.

Lord Yod

It really sounds like what you want to do is set up a Wiki for this. That's the only thing I can think of aside from an actual forum that would allow clear, concise display of the actual suggestion while still giving the opportunity to discuss it.

DiscoZombie

sounds like a good idea to me. and considering there are so many businesses out there designed to con people out of patents (like those TV ads with people saying they'll 'help' you patent your idea), I'm pretty sure all you need is a kind of disclaimer to avoid getting sued. good luck getting it started. I'd certainly visit such a site. would be fun to vote and post suggestions.

Maginomicon

Although I could setup a wiki, it probably wouldn't be a good idea. I administer a wiki already and know that making one for this would be a bad idea.

First off, a wiki allows anyone to start editting right off the bat. What I want to do is establish user ranks based on how many suggestions they've made that have been approved. (Less than 3 approved suggestions = "newbie", 3 or more = "member", 20 or more = "trusted member", etc.) It's all about how much trust the member has earned.

Permissions currently in development include:

• Suggesting
• Rating
• Improving
• Approving
• Categorizing
• Moderating
• Administrating

A wiki cannot easily create and manage all of these permissions separately.