Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

OK, here's my thought for the day. :-)

I sticky thread that is basically a list of ported games that aren't (or are?) in the garage.

It seems to me that there are a lot of ports here in this thread that aren't in the garage. that might or might not have deb's. So, someone coming into this thread looking for games that aren't in the garage will come browse. But it might have scrolled off. So they search, but they might or might not use the right terms.

Whatever.

So, if there's a sticky thread that is basically just entries that include the game name, a description, screenshot, and maybe a link to a thread on the game.

Then a newbie or whoever can pop in here, see that thread first, and browse for the games. Instead of posting a new question about DOSBOX, they see it in the list, and click the link for the thread that talks about DOSBOX?

I realize, this would be mostly more work for armins, but :-)...

Just a thought, kick it around or not.

desiv

p.s. OK, I'll admit I'm selfish. I don't want to deal with the hassle of getting my game port in the garage. But my guess is, once it scrolls off the first page in this thread, no one will see it. :-)

Dang it, I spelled suggestion wrong in the title!!!! :(

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Good idea. It'll stop me having to search for each game each time I reflash my device.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

great idea.
small modification:
- game name (in alphabetical order)
- description
- screenshot (optional)
- link to the game (*.deb) (MANDATORY: imagine the amount of complaints "where can I get this; where can I get that)
- link to a discussion thread - so the sticky fulfills it's job, and that there are no comments concerning one specific game.

a separate category (if not a separate thread, but I dunno here) is needed for non-installable games, such as:
- dosbox
- all the emulators (Colem, fmsx, Vgba... sorry if I forgot some)
- flash games (.swf)
for each of those sections (compared to the installable apps list), we would need the following:
- title (alphabetical for each section)
- [brief] description
- screenshot (optional)
- link (optional)
for the .swf files, a title and a link would be more than enough.


for every single description, no user opinions should be included. No comments regarding the playability of the game are needed either, unless it is to warn that the game is slower than playable.

Have I forgotten something?

Ilia

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Theres some threads around that I'm surprised they aren't stickied. Like the screenshots thread...
anyway, sounds like a great idea, but how bout by category, instead of abc order?
now that i think about it, a wiki would be easier to manage by multiple people

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

I don't really like the idea of a wiki for a few reasons
1) wiki is [almost] always unfinished
2) personally (don't mean to generalize here, but it's true!), I would never edit a wiki due to the time it takes since it has to be perfect, but I would rather write a hundred posts in the forums
3) (in support of 2) look at the current wiki. is there any COMPLETE topic? I doubt it. and look at the games section - it has been there for quite some time. nobody took care of this. I think a forum is way better
4) psychologically, people prefer forums to wiki (only personal experience here; but compare the forums' community and offered support to it's wiki. FORUM >>> Wiki)

I would take care of such a project (forum, that is), but I think that for it to pass, we need collective work. what if we (users) create a thread where we would post the info for each game
- name
- platform (if emulator)
- genre (interesting idea, but I doubt we can find more than 5-10 for each genre... seems pointless at the moment)
- description
- screenshot (with a URL to the screenshot so it can be reattached to the sticky thread)
- link for download

Then, a certain person would take these ideas and add them all (one by one) to the sticky thread. this way we would have a community effort, but not on the wiki.

Once it's done, someone could actually copy-paste this to the wiki...

does this seem realistic, or pure Sci-fi?

Ilia

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Sounds wonderful. You're right about the wiki. I never even use it myself, so I don't know why I was stupid enough to suggest it. A wiki would have so much more potential for a collaboration effort but I definitely see why forum would be better instead.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

And what do you do when people come by and post other things in your thread? Then the guy who comes by later to put it in the wiki has to fight through an N810/iPhone war to get the content; I think it's much better to just toss it in the wiki.

I think a lot of people have wierd psychological hang-ups about wikis. It's not supposed to be finished, and it doesn't need to be perfect, because someone else can always fix it later.

Would it be easier if I put up an example or two as a template? My wiki-fu isn't that strong, but I can figure it out if someone will follow through with adding more games.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

I don't like wikis... :) Very often very difficult to navigate.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

I navigate wikis the same way I navigate forums when seeking information:
Google

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Heh, then what will you do, when the wiki is internal? :)

EDIT: Anyway, my point is that wikis shouldn't get in the way of the normal users, who often if do know what a computer is, don't know how to search efficiently and what to search for...

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

the idea is to have 2 threads: one for everyone to just send their "game", which will have a lot of posts, and another one, constantly updatable, which will have all that information in 1 single post. the second one would be made sticky for everyone's convenience.

I dunno about you, but I know many people who never browse any wikis. The idea of a template is nice, but we should post it for the first of the two threads described above.

Idea/suggestion/waste of time (you determine in which category it fits): create a poll asking people how often they read wikis. I'm ready to bet that more than 50% will say "rarer than each month". And the fact that they will participate in that poll will prove that they read forums often.

so I opt for the sticky post.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

I hadn't understood that you were putting everything in a single post in the second thread; that removes the objection about people spamming the dedicated thread, but raises a new one: post-size limit.

I don't generally browse wikis; I search them when I am looking for information.

As you say, many people are clueless about search, so maybe the sticky thread should be on searching, not games...

As for the poll, I'd say it's probably a waste of time; it's a nice self-selected sample, what about all those who read wikis and not forums? :p But seriously, you seem to have pretty well decided, so why bother?

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

ok I know some people wanted this and some did well I don't have awhole lot todo today so I started a games list in the wiki no one has to use it if they don't want to but I have the basic formation of how I think it should look like. If you never knowledge of wikis is not strong send me any info you want in the game section. the like to the section is http://www.internettablettalk.com/wi...itle=Game_List or you can search Game List on wiki or you can click on game is in Game section of front page of wiki. Ps only have one game on there now will work on more in a few mins.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Well, I tableized the emulators section. I think this is a much tidier way of presenting the information; comments? (Before I go hog-wild editing everything, which I've no great inclination to do anyway, least of all if no one else likes it...)

I'm also not sure about categories; shooters is rather broad, perhaps we'll need subcategories, as we've got FPS, side-scrollers, and top-downs...

Some of the others might also merit subcategories in some larger category; not playing them much, I have no precise notion where to draw lines amongst strategy, board, and puzzles.

Finally, I'm not sure about game engines as a category; that's a technical distinction (and not always a useful one), whereas the other categories seem to be genre of gameplay.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

I personall don't like hte table since it kinda crames alot of data on a site that really isn't that wide to start with. As far as what games a strategy, board and puzzles. Well strategy are normally games like Civ, Age of Empires and stuff like that. Board games are well board games like Chess, Checkers, and puzzles are stuff like bejeweled, pac man and such. Game engine needs it own category becuase well you need more then just he engine to play the game you need the data file for the game as well. I would put it with emulators but its not really an emulator. Also using the table like you did it doesn't put each game on the contents which once you get several hundred games on here you would want them all listed in the contents.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

OK,
I'm OK with the WIKI, but I agree that there are people who come here to the forums and don't generally go elsewhere for information.
So, how about a compromise. A well maintained WIKI, AND a sticky thread that says:

"For a good time, click here!"

Well, maybe you could phrase it differently. :-) But that way, people who come here can go to the first post and see "Hey, there's something I can click on with a game list, yeay!!!"

desiv

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

yeah that would be easy to do just have to get the Admins to set it as sticky

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Well, it doesn't cram much data, actually; mainly the space is taken up by ridiculously verbose and redundant descriptions. But I see where the main use of lateral space is (which exacerbates the wastage), and I'm gonna go fix it right now.

EDIT: Now it displays well in portrait on my N800 (at 100% zoom); I think that should be good? (The tallest entry is only 5 lines high.) BTW, all these long url auto-links are the main thing preventing it from working well on narrow screens; is there a reason not to wikify them?

Still, some editorial work is needed on those descriptions; I don't want to get involved in that, a debate over formatting is sufficient without heating things up with content editing. ;)
Pacman is puzzles? I'd have taken it to be arcade. What about strategy games played on boards? To me it seems that, while the lines between these may not be quite clear, they all (except pacman) are distinct from arcade/action games. So I was thinking they might be subcategories...

But I don't know; don't really care either.
But how is this page trying to be organized? By genre, or by technical requirements? Both is not good, it makes it difficult to find the games you want because they could be in either place. And what about game engines like lxdoom, that come with a shareware version of the files? The "need" for a separate category seems to dissolve here, but people may look in the game engine category anyway, knowing that it is a game engine, and not knowing that the wad is included.

I suppose we could put up a poll on this, but I think very few people really think having a several-hundred-line TOC is a good idea. What would be the point of that? (I'm really open to explanations, but I can see no reason it's helpful.)

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

You know it really doens't matter to me, you can format it how you like. You have done nothing but complained about everything I worked on but this thread is several days old and I was the first to do anything with it. You can do it how ever you want and you can even dig up the info and put it on the wiki also. As far as the descriptions go most of them are copyed from the post about the game. I decided if there was one not to edit it. Maybe we need a seporate Page for Game Engines that don't come with data, and put the engines that come with data just under the game list section. Like I said on the TOC yeah you don't need it but if you have 300 games on this page it is going to be long real long so you have to scroll through even if you know what game your looking for. Either way I really don't care.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

OK, let's call it all constructive criticism on all sides.
We are ending up in a better place than we were, and I'd like to thank everyone for that! :)
There are issues to be worked out, but we won't address them all now.
If we come up with a design that works well for now, but we have to change it in 6 months because something became too large, that's OK. It'll still be better than what we have now in the forum.
Categories are always tricky. I reorganize my movie collection every few months. It's the nature of the beast. ;)
I would suggest keeping it as small as possible.
If someone wants something longer or more screenshots, there should be a link to something else (webpage or a forum post). I like the concept of making sure this is accessible by users with tablets.

Thanx again for everything. I think it looks great, and all ideas are appreciated, even the really dumb ones.. I mean... there are no dumb ideas.. Yeah, that's it.. ;)

desiv

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

You need to calm down a bit so you can think straight. You don't like the formatting I added, but claim I have done nothing but complained? Did I format, or did I do nothing? Or is formatting a unique form of complaining?

Also, since we're talking who was "first" now (Why does that even matter?), I offered to implement something, but didn't jump straight in without knowing someone would back me up; I don't care about this enough to do the info-dredging myself, and didn't want to waste my time adding two games, and watching it go precisely nowhere.

Now I did implement something, since I saw there was at least one person around (you) who is (or was, at least) willing to do the information-dredging, so I'm willing to help.
You seem to be perceiving this as an attempt to take control of your efforts, and to be "letting go" and claiming you don't care. Whether that's an appropriate reaction to such an attempt or not, that's not what I'm doing.

I'm trying to help; I'm trying to get input to make sure that my "improvements" are in fact generally perceived as such, or if not, removed. I got some criticism from you; I tried to improve my changes to make them a genuine improvement. (I've gotten absolutely no input from anyone else, which is a little disappointing.) So, I'd think, by continuing to discuss this, we could get a working template together that we both (and anyone else who cares, which seem to be scarce for all the traffic this topic has generated in a couple threads) would consider better than the initial layout. But you respond with... well, not a rant, but whatever the above is, declaiming your lack of concern; and that cuts the process short.

So it sounds like this is winding up exactly where I thought it might; I waste my time setting up a template, then the project gets abandoned. At least there are 7 games and 3 emulators, instead of the 2 games I had feared. :rolleyes:

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Please! Please!
This is supposed to be a happy occasion! Let's not bicker and argue about who killed who. ;)
Honestly, there's hasn't been a flurry of activity on this thread, but we have to remember that, at least initially, the people who will be most served by this initiative are those who are least likely to post and get involved. The majority of people on this board are looking for things, but they don't post. So, like much in IT, as long as they are not complaining, saying nothing is a good thing! :)

And this won't end up abandoned. Worst case scenario (and this can be attested to by people who have read my posts :-), I'll try to keep it up, whatever format is there. And I honestly think, once it gets a bit more populated and we get the sticky, people will update it as they release new ports. Especially since it uses our existing accounts, and all we'll have to do is click edit.
Even I can do that.. well.. probably... We'll see how it works out. :) ;)

Again, thanx to EVERYONE involved. It's looking great.
If there weren't any disagreement, THEN I'd be worried about the project!!

desiv

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

You know maybe I am wrong, it just seems like you were a little hard on the catagorys and stuff I wrote but remember I have only spent about 30 mins on it infact i have spend more time talking about it then doing. It let me take this time to say I'm sorry if I just to conclusions. I will keep working on it becuase I think it will help the community. We will go with the the tables unless we get alot of people with a better idea. Also I will move the Game Engine to its own Page since it like you said isn't a Game. Engines that come with data can go on both pages. I'll work on data if you can do the table formatting.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

gone though 4 pages for the game forum section wiki is starting to look good now.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

No problem; perhaps I was overreacting as well. Good work on the split, and I'll be back to reformat some more... but today's pretty busy.

And, thanks for slapping me, desiv. ;)

As always, suggestions are welcome...

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

yeah I guess we just needed desiv to step in and calm us down :)

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Just a heads up...

I was just going to suggest including the name of the game when I noticed the spacing...
So, I highlighted, and there was the name of the game..

Apparently, if you choose the "Classic" theme, the name of the game is the same color as the background.. :-)

desiv

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Yeah, it's appalling. All the ===Headers=== disappear.

I keep planning to CSS around that, but I don't get around to it.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

hey there,

I looked at the wiki: looks good (up to now).

there still are no sections for the console emulators, but that's not technically an installable game. it's lacking screenshots (no complaints - does the ITT wiki support images?), as well as instructions on install. this might be needed for some games. I will help with the list starting next week (last week of college right now!).

I have never reached the post length limit; what is it? it would still be neat if we could simply have this in two locations: wiki AND forums. both of them would be editable (preferable at the same rhythm). that way, it will be most accessible to everyone.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

When someone gets around to creating the "sticky" message/topic, I was thinking it would be a good idea to include instructions for developers/porters on how to add or get their game added to the wiki. Just a quick little step by step on what to do in what order. The easier it is, the more likely it'll be used.

desiv

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Ummm... Yeah, there is a section for emulators, it's split into it's own page. Start here.

Not sure what the limit is, but I've seen a couple people split posts in two because it nailed them first try.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

As far as the images I'm not sure most wikis allows to upload images but I havn't seen that yet here. As far as instructions to install I give the thread link with them so you can find stuff like that there.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Uploading files is disabled in the wiki. I don't know if you can embed an image from, e.g., a forum attachment.

Adding a single thumbnail for each entry would be nice, if we could.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Well I have gone through about 9 of 17 pages in the game section. So far I have found 21 Games and several Game Engines and Emulators. I hope to dig through the rest with in the next few days but anyone who wants to help with posting games or even just working on the format/data that is already there go for it.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Ok I have finished all 17 Pages in the games section. I have posted every game that has a working download. I didn't both with ones that are in alpha or pre alpha that havn't been updated in months figured they would never be. I will try and add new games as they come out. Anyone can feel free to edit the list and change format if they wish I am also going to start a list of working Flash games and have considered making a site where we can upload the free flash games we find so other people can download them. That way everyone wont have to dig through sites sources to find link to download game. If you think its a good idea let me know.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Someone else has a site like that started, IIRC.

Re: Suggenstion: Sticky Game list thread..
 

Hey just my 0.02 I really appreciate what you guys are doing :)

oh and FYI I edited the Hexen ITT Post link, it previously linked to the Tyrian thread :)