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chrissiediego

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does anyone know whats going on?..

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Joined 2005-08-12

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(Note: this was all typed before I saw Jack’s post, and is not intended as a response to it, even though I realize it may look like one.)

As someone who’s been around for far too long, and who’s been contributing to the lack of activity, I agree with the general assessment that the community has become a toxic husk of its former self, reduced to a few old-timers biting each other’s faces off over decade-old grudges. (How long did it take for THAT to happen in this thread?...) I think, however, that the problem runs deeper than a few unpleasant people (who still do need to get kicked out, don’t get me wrong).

After all, it’s not like things were ever perfect here. I remember the community always being somewhat toxic, even 15 years ago when that little shit Future Award-Winning Game Designer Jake Rodkin and his little posse used to terrorize anyone who’d dare deny the perfect brilliance of LucasArts. And then a few years later there was What’s-his-face-with-his-cutesie-nicknames, who also had a posse of his own. And then Fienepien’s seemingly-endless reign of terror, etc.

As another example, I don’t think these forums were ever a good place to discuss specific games in-depth. I remember that, when I restarted the Adventure Game Scene of the Day back in 2012, my main motivation was to encourage in-depth conversation about specific games, because I felt that it so rarely happened. It was not a success. It’s just something that never really worked around here.

However, for all the occasional unpleasantness and lack of game-specific conversation, there was plenty of interesting conversation about other stuff, especially debates about the history, evolution and future of the genre. That’s mostly gone now, at first leaving just the forum games and quizzes, and then nothing but the bickering.

Part of the reason is that the community no longer needs a central hub to discuss adventure games. Between the Steam forums, reddit and whatnot, it’s easy to find some place to discuss the specific topic you’re interested in with like-minded people—that’s more attractive than come to some general AG forum and hope that other people there also happen to be interested in the same topic. What I’m saying, basically, is that it’s not just here: old forum communities have been fossilizing all over the Internet for years.

That being said, I do think that there’s something specific to Adventure Gamers. Old-timers move on or run out of new things to say all the time. You can’t imagine how many posts I’ve started typing over the last few years, only to realize that I’d already said the same stuff years before and didn’t see the point in repeating myself. And that’s OK, as long as new blood keeping pouring in. However, attracting those active new posters is something only the main site can do, and AGs has been doing a very bad job of it for years.

Fifteen years ago, back when Marek and Evan were in charge, the site had a very clear point of view: at a time when the genre was in bad shape, AG.com was optimistic and forward-looking, when many other outlets (especially JA) specialized in endless bitterness. It was also a younger voice, run by people who had fallen in love with the genre thanks to the point-and-click games of Sierra and LucasArts rather than Zork (or even the original King’s Quest). That outlook was expressed through numerous opinion pieces, as well as a clear point of view in news items and reviews.

Move forward to 2005-2006, when Evan retired, Marek stepped back and Jack became in charge. Things changed a lot. The quality of the reviews increased significantly, to the point where it rivalled (and often outclassed) that of professional sites. However, the site also seemed to lose all interest in having a point of view. Gone were the opinion pieces; gone was any sort of site-wide slant when covering games. Individual reviewers had personal opinions, but the site as a whole no longer had any.

And eventually the conversations in the forums died down. It took years for it to happen: years for regulars to move on (or stay on but run out of stuff to say) and not be replaced because there was nothing in the main site that drew new people to the conversation. And now here we are.

Take the recent interview with the German developers. There’s some really interesting stuff in there! If that were published in a newspaper, you’d have the interview and also an editorial giving the paper’s point of view on the stuff that was discussed. But here you just have the interview, with the site seemingly having no opinion on it. I do believe that that makes it much harder for a conversation to start on the forums, or for readers to decide to decide to jump in and join the community.

I don’t know how to solve this. I’ve been visiting daily for almost 20 years now; I’m not the right person to ask about new blood. And I know the site is strapped for cash. The staff is mostly comprised of volunteers, plus a couple of criminally-underpaid people; it’s not realistic to ask more of them. But I do believe that, as long as the site (as an entity) persists in not having a point of view about anything, it won’t foster interesting conversation in the forums, and it won’t attract new, passionate members, and the community will keep withering—until all that’s left are Karlok and rtrooney bickering until the heat death of the universe.

     
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Joined 2012-03-24

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nomadsoul - 01 April 2018 03:14 AM
Oscar - 31 March 2018 09:11 PM

because there are several members who should have been suspended and/or banned already

Still taking sniper shots and not mentioning names

It makes it personal if the names are mentioned & therefore they shouldn’t be unless you want to focus the forum on public lynchings rather than what it’s about i.e. GAMES!!!!.

nomadsoul - 01 April 2018 03:14 AM

Several members (makes more than one member), and thats very counter productive for a forum which is already dead as Advie once said to me, if nomadsoul you wont post it here, this will become graveyard and i totally agree with him,because if you remove Advie,nomad, wilco and sdude wats left?


Certainly the forums are quieter than they were but I think they will continue with or without the contributions to threads from members listed in a ‘private’? ‘buddy list’ - just flick through the threads listed over the last few pages to see that there are many other contributors.

Oscar - 28 March 2018 11:10 PM
Advie - 27 March 2018 02:52 PM

It just feels like we don’t care as much about adventure games anymore.”

i might disagree with the last Part my friend, we do care, see?

A week ago I posted my opinion on the latest Orwell game which had just come out. In that time no one has been interested enough to post a single reply.

And yet the day I posted, I went over to the Steam forum and found at least half a dozen active, multi-page threads discussing the ending, the plot as a whole, comparisons with the first game, etc.

I can see this place going the way of JustAdventure or Gameboomers, if it isn’t there already. A place where a small bunch of “veterans” who like to think they are diehard fans, get more excited about the re-release of a 20 year old Monkey Island game than actually playing and discussing the great new adventure games that are out there. That’s a sign of a dying community if I ever saw one.


I really hope it doesn’t go like that but I think with such a diversity of games now being released (isn’t that luxury compared to 2000’s +!) it’s harder to have common ground on a particular game so you may need to go to e.g. Steam to have more of a conversation but what I do like is to see opinions here from a member who’s played the game because I’m not going to visit the Steam forums for every single new game but I will visit here & like to read member’s impressions!

     
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Total Posts: 1341

Joined 2012-02-17

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Kurufinwe, you make some interesting points (which, not surprisingly, I’ve seen you make before Tongue ), which I partly do and partly don’t agree with.

Certainly the site did NOT stop having opinions when I took over. I’m the one who started the blog and I’ve written my own op-eds. Under my watch we started the Aggies, did the Top 100 (which may not be the same thing, but is certainly the opposite of not having an opinion). We started entirely new article series about casual games, non-adventures with a puzzle-solving focus, story games with no puzzles, etc. All of those clearly reflected our editorial slants, even if we didn’t devote entire articles just to spelling them out. We tried, unsuccessfully—twice—to start a rotating guest developer column, but have had ongoing “adventure architect” series, and most recently a graphics-based column.

It’s true that I’ve personally contributed less to such content in the last few years, simply because I’m just too busy, but if current staff wanted to do more “think pieces”, I’d gladly welcome it—if they’re original and not simply rehashes of old topics, which is another challenge. But most don’t, and there are so many games now that we can’t even keep up with the reviews, so those remain our priority.

So, as you say, any perceived lack of such articles now is really just a reflection of time and staffing and availability, not direction.

(On a positive note, we actually do have a few ideas which I hope to realize in the next year that will go a long way in addressing this issue—though again, it will all come down to whether it’s logistically feasible, not whether it’s wanted enough.)

All that said, I’m not really convinced that there’s a strong connection between the main site and the forums anyway. That’s more correlation, not causation. I’m always bemused (and somewhat disappointed) when people post news in the forums that we’ve already shared ages earlier. I don’t think many of the hardcore forumites even READ the main site. Shifty Eyed

Sure, it’s possible that the more “interesting” pieces we have on the main site might drive more people to the forums, but by and large, it’s a different crowd. There are people who like to read and learn about games (most people), and there are people who like to talk about games in their spare time (far fewer people). The quality of the forums will be the predominant determining factor in its success, not the main site.

Don’t get me wrong: as a staff we’ll keep trying to create new and interesting content, including more pure editorial stuff. But that’s not going to make a huge difference here.

     
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Joined 2005-09-29

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chrissie - 01 April 2018 12:22 PM

It makes it personal if the names are mentioned & therefore they shouldn’t be unless you want to focus the forum on public lynchings rather than what it’s about i.e. GAMES!!!!

I have been called idiot to stupid, sometimes same/similar adjectives/verbs etc by same guy kurfinwe(which basically is polar opposite to his long level headed post), and i even asked jackal about it, how to confront that personal attack, before i tackled him

He made the comment in Syberia3 thread iirc, because as usual he doubted my opinion and instead insulted me directly which later proved to be poorly rated game eventually , even on this site. because as i mentioned he already had prejudice and perceived himself bigger fan of Sokal than me and more

So (A) I dont agree with personal comment , because in these forums personal character assassinations are first, and more important than products(games) as people get insulted all the time if their holy grail(any game/genre) gets criticized and they start shitting on people
So yes i can list all the personal lynchings i faced and i ignored them

(B) Oscar/or some other guy once made a blunt racist comment stereotyping me saying if i have a beard because i pray , stuff of pure regressive mindset basically

(C) Biting wit and others stereotyped you(chrissie) directly and i came into defense NOT because we had same game interest in common because it was stereo typing of female fellow member , direct attack not on your taste of games, but on you

(D) Origami constantly was calling names and insults until i started replying him back harshly, which i dont like, but he always forced me , always baiting , i even PMed Dale before replying him back, and yes i will reply in personal insult in same tone if he will keep insulting me(but i will never start it first, if i will , gladly apologize)

So public direct mudslinging is mainstay here, on the contrary if any kuru, or other guy will sort it out like a man through PM , like soccerdude and others did with me, that could be far more productive if not through PM than here, now that we have started the thread about it, it can only result in less toxic place, if they can name the people bothering them, this hidden invisible war of grudges will continue

There are some liked folks and disliked ones, and i would still say, there are some who like similar thinking folks , some are open minded to have open conversation(and sort it out instead of gated community)
Only in later case community can be far more diverse and less bigot

chrissie - 01 April 2018 12:22 PM

just flick through the threads listed over the last few pages to see that there are many other contributors

Recent fresh thing in mind from last few pages also have contributions from new headycakes guy making offensive remarks directly to you, proving my point above
In my case mods dont come to support me so i take it on myself to settle score or settle people who stereotyped you in Game Dev thread (based on Advies Bros Book) , so much for contributions
And no its not private buddy list, its list of people i had arguments with and will have more heated ones in future but we made up and 2 of them are connected to me through other social media channels, in reality this is the best service of this site
To find real friends who can continue for decades for life , and you find them through bit of struggle since online chat is not meeting in person , but well worth it i hope

     
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Joined 2012-01-02

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Jackal last reply was a high note, i respect your frustration nomad, i know, i see what are you talking about, but let us end this discussion as the senior members of this site and forums would, and let us talk adventuring or play adventures. let us start from now to make these forums as good as it was before again.

i know you will hate me for this reply, but let us suck or grudges at this moment and give a high priority to the subject we care of, what you care of all those long years before i joined in, to make and create productive discussions again.

@Jackal we need to expand our vision for what falls under the genre Jack, we need more non-adventures to be melted into the site, even if it is against our definition, even if i was once against it and aggressively.

     
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Total Posts: 5813

Joined 2012-03-24

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I don’t forget offensive posts from other posters nomadsoul but I’m not going to dwell on them so forgive me if I have to let go issues between you & other posters also.

If we want the forums here to survive we have to be a little friendlier to newcomers & more respectful to each other with a stronger focus/tolerance on/of the games we’re choosing to play & those of others!
Smile

     
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Total Posts: 655

Joined 2017-04-14

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Nomad, you have a very combative posting style, which I assumed you were aware of (maybe not?).

I don’t think it appears to new posters that you are merely firing back at perceived slights, though I guess that’s ultimately what we’re all doing.  I’ve certainly been guilty of it myself.

Like Advie, I’d like to see us all just get along, man. Tongue

     
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Joined 2011-04-01

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nomadsoul - 01 April 2018 01:59 PM

(B) Oscar/or some other guy once made a blunt racist comment stereotyping me saying if i have a beard because i pray , stuff of pure regressive mindset basically

Whoever that was who said that, it wasn’t me. That’s one problem with mentioning names, we can be wrong with which names we mention.

I agree with chrissie, instead of assassinating let’s look at ourselves first. If we’re not friendly towards others we can’t expect the same behavior from them.

     
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Joined 2008-01-09

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Considering the diversity of our members when it comes to our varying experiences, cultures, languages and ages, there are bound to be misunderstandings and outright disagreements from time to time.  However, we all have a choice as to how we react to one another in the forums.  Common courtesy goes a long way to keep things on an even keel, and the way we respond, even when we’re angry, determines whether a situation escalates out of control or becomes a productive discussion.

     

Carpe chocolate.

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Joined 2005-09-29

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Oscar - 01 April 2018 05:15 PM

Whoever that was who said that, it wasn’t me. That’s one problem with mentioning names, we can be wrong with which names we mention

No Mr always Right it was indeed you, thanks for pushing me to look into 3 mins of google search, now own it like a man and accept that only person lying is you

https://adventuregamers.com/forums/article/id,892/p,2/viewthread/8944/#126323

Oscar - 09 December 2016 08:02 AM
nomadsoul - 09 December 2016 04:36 AM

Halfmuslim so understand alot needed in prayers
Apart from that Nope

Half muslim? Is that when you do the prayers but don’t eat halal or wear a beard?  Confused

Oscar - 01 April 2018 05:15 PM

let’s look at ourselves first. If we’re not friendly towards others we can’t expect the same behavior from them.

Yes look at it, and let others new members see who starts attacking people directly and pretend to be a saint

And look at this thread , how you derailed it, your whole contribution was NOT GAMES ITS CONS OR PROS NOPE TOPIC was Nomad’s dissection , his religion etc

https://adventuregamers.com/forums/article/id,892/p,2/viewthread/8944/#126323

dumbeur - 01 April 2018 05:14 PM

Nomad, you have a very combative posting style, which I assumed you were aware of (maybe not?



Read above , there is always a valid reason
And combative style is bad if i have to defend some game or bash it ?
or is it far more human to bash other humans directly ?
Far too superficial in my books and painfully materialistic if priority is ego of fav games over basic respect of fellow member , dont want such fellowship hence the fav posters who can man up and make up

     
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Joined 2011-04-01

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nomadsoul - 01 April 2018 05:40 PM
Oscar - 01 April 2018 05:15 PM

Whoever that was who said that, it wasn’t me. That’s one problem with mentioning names, we can be wrong with which names we mention

No Mr always Right it was indeed you, thanks for pushing me to look into 3 mins of google search, now own it like a man and accept that only person lying is you

Sorry, but there is nothing even slightly racist about that comment. Maybe you misunderstood.

     
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Oscar - 01 April 2018 06:19 PM

Sorry, but there is nothing even slightly racist about that comment. Maybe you misunderstood.

Do you have anything except denials?
First you denied that you dont want anyone banned where karlok quoted you , you clearly said it
Then you denied you didnt said any comment like that , just took me to type beard,oscar, adventuregamers on google to come up with that topic
Now you are spinning and denying it with its not racist now that i have quoted your complete lie?

What was in your mind to attack me,what was your thought process or intention when to associate beard with religion ? Very pure intention right? On topic right? No cynical ploy? Nothing to rattle cages but to make deep honest religious debate right by mixing stereotyping racial profiling(even though i am not Arab and Islam is not a race but i know where that profiling was coming from) ?

yeah you still have gall to treat me like an idiot

     
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Joined 2017-04-14

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@nomad

Yes, as a somewhat reformed extremely combative poster/human, I think it’s unconstructive.

We always think we’re fighting for some cause, but for example, your manner of posting in the LGBT thread led to me backing out and not offering my personal experiences.

You didn’t offend me, you were keen to point out it wasn’t an issue with the LGBT community, but you were just angry and seemingly agenda-driven and it wasn’t worth getting into.

That’s an example of someone new choosing not to get involved due to a combative style, not because of being attacked, but because the average person doesn’t want to fight about everything (and it’s hard not to fight once one gets into a situation like that).

This is not an attack on you, it is merely me hoping to show you an example of how a combative style can scare new members away.  It’s just one opinion anyway.

     
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i ask ‘what is wrong?’ and i see what is wrong, we don’t forget nither forgive any misunderstandings or call what you want ‘BACKSTABBING’,  and we wait for the day to take revenge or for our Papa to take it instead of us.

there was a wave of hostility here, and then a phase Mods stepping in taking some drastic measures, then a period of time blaming the Mods for their actions, and those were like 5-6 months and were obvious to all Lurkers, Newcomers and the Silent-(mostly)-members that-enjoy-being-here-but-a-bit-shy-to-come-forward, whom are by all measures more important than us because they are the majority plus they are reading and watching and what we do affects them even if we cant see it.


what i am saying is this forum was not great because we had great topics and nice debates but we were many much members acting like adults.

do we need to remember members who were no less active than me but took aside because they have/had seen what are we talking about know; remember Sefir, Tad, Zobraks, Ariel Type..etc i can make a long list REALLY and I think of it seriously as a kinda tribute to our old mates.

i looked years ago at most of the adventuring sites and i have seen no equal intelligence nor adultness to what was here and still, here! but needs refreshing. we need a long persistence time to take away all these negativities, like an oath or something (don’t laugh at me right now, right here if anyone has a problem with another say it now or forever forget about it (and forgive).

     

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Joined 2007-12-29

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I too have noticed that some people are very antagonistic. It makes me scrunch up my toes. And as a very inarticulate person, I am always afraid that something I say will make someone attack me.  Like LadyK said, “Common courtesy goes a long way to keep things on an even keel, and the way we respond, even when we’re angry, determines whether a situation escalates out of control or becomes a productive discussion.” 

so, I pretty much don’t respond to things as it does seem that some people here are on an attack mode.  I just want to have fun and talk about games.

     

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