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Just noticed the overall lack of posting going on in the FFVI forum. Hope people aren't pulling away. I'm sure some people are busy with the holiday season and all. I just found this place in the last few months. I'd hate to see it go down the crapper.

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Sabin: Kefka! Wait!
Kefka: Wait he says! Do I look like a waiter?

I agree. =(
i love this forum!!!!!!!

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-dysFUNctional-

No kiddin', We need to start expressing our FF6 love. pronto or this place'll be lamer than *gasp!* an FF8 forum!

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No matter how hard I try, I just can't get worried about it!

In response to topic question: I don't think so.

I've had the odd long gap from this forum but only really because I wasn't playing the games and couldn't really contribute anything.

This forum is far from dead or dying. It might be a slow season for posts, particularly in the FF6 section, but that can mainly be attributed to the fewer amount of people actually playing this game.

That being said, if you feel like it's dying out, why not think up new ideas for threads or conversations and try to spark up some life?

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Okay, but there was a goat!

i like this forum a lot!

but over the years, i remember the moderator (rangers) used to close topics down for no reason, and that scared posters away.
i think posters should be allowed to discuss things more freely, even if it was discussed in the past or if it seems to belong in another forum, or if it just sounds dumb

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I've had an eternity to ponder the meaning of things....and now I have an answer!!

I don't want to act all moderatorish, but I don't think posting in such a thread helps this forum much. I suppose it'll be better to post something on topic once in a while.

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You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one...

This thread received more feedback than any other since it's beginning, so... It must be doing something. Anything to get people posting again.

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Sabin: Kefka! Wait!
Kefka: Wait he says! Do I look like a waiter?

As much as I love this place, I think the biggest strike against the site is the fact that it hasn't really done anything new in a while or put itself out there to get new people to join.

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//www.rpgmaker.net/
We make games. Period.

Tiddles and I, as much as we would like this topic to simply go away because it's more than a bit silly, commiserated today to draft a response to these concerns. It's simple, and it starts like this:

What would you like us to do?

That's a serious question. If you're unhappy with the state of the site or the forums (I'm not actually clear on which this thread is talking about, or both; it's in the FF6 forum but seems to allude to more), then you must have ideas about what would make it better. If you don't, then how do you know you're unhappy?

It's unfair to say we're not doing anything. We don't work as quickly as we used to, because we're mostly (electronic) old men with far too little time, but we've still managed to squeeze out a completely new, much improved fanart system, and massive improvements to some of our existing content recently. (Seriously. Massive.) And we're working on new stuff now, too. Frankly, we don't quit working on the site, ever, but until such time as we can get paid enough for the site to not have to work at a "real" job, this site is a hobby. It's a hobby for which we care deeply, sure, but that only goes so far. I've said this for years, and it's still true; we run this site to do really awesome content. And, especially after our last couple projects, we think our content is as good or better as any other Final Fantasy site that ever was. Active forums and chat, with appreciative participants, make us enjoy it more, but they're icing on an already delicious cake.

The aforementioned new fanart system came with some promotional "stuff" too, which largely fell flat, it has to be said. We pushed pretty hard to try to bring in new members who would enjoy the site by offering pretty good prizes and having as many people as possible spread the word, but it didn't go too far - who knows, perhaps that's not enough? You tell me, maybe? Hey, if someone were to come to us with enough good ideas and the time to implement them, well, you never know - we haven't had an official marketing staffer in years, and I'm spread a little thin to do it really well.

The more serious issue is that interest levels in the Final Fantasy series are pretty low at the moment, compared to when the forums were more active. Many FF sites traditionally much bigger than us seem to be equally if not more lacking in FF related discussion. Sure, there are a few keeping the flag flying, but they are really very few now. (Not coincidentally, they tend to be the ones with active newsposting going out to the front pages. And we know we need to improve that.)

It's certainly not because of moderation - we maintained much higher posting levels even when the moderation was borderline psychotic in the early CoN5 era. On the flipside, many of the stalwart members remain here precisely because we strive to maintain some level of sense and coherence within the forum (which might contribute to some of the goofiness of chat). Is a word association game really the answer we're looking for? It certainly doesn't contribute to FF6 discussion. Regarding things that have been discussed before, we have one of the most lenient policies on thread necromancy and repeat postings you could hope to find - but we are going to close things if you duplicated a topic that's still on the front page!

In the spirit of such moderation, I feel compelled to point out that I am, like much of this thread, largely off-topic for the forum and warn myself hard in the face (mmmmmmm, yes). But let's huff this over to Comments and Suggestions do you can all post some great ideas for getting more activity going, eh?

Note, that if you're still displeased at the state of either the site or the forums, but couldn't be bothered to read this whole post, then you're just a whiner.

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"To create something great, you need the means to make a lot of really bad crap." - Kevin Kelly

Why aren't you shopping AmaCoN?

as this is currently my home page, im here every day, and i repeatedly cruise back to get the latest in gaming news from lasz, kara, and all other news posters, mainly for Dissidia. so i cant say that the forum is exactly dying in my humble opinion. maybe people are just lurking more than previously, but i think its a bit unfair to assume that the site is dying because no one posts in the ff vi forum when i see 18 new threads in the ff vii forum a day. i mean, there are only so many ways you can say 'who is your (least) favorite character in the game!!!1!11!1?'

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Aujourdhui a commence avec toi.

I think the problem isn't really our fault, its mostly the fact that most forums are much more broad than FF1-6. In addition, most of the modern forumgoers like the short posts that lack gud speling grammer dont use 1337 and do not require more than .01% of a brain to read.

Edit: Also, most the people liek teh new games.

This post has been edited by yomama on 8th January 2009 03:22

To be quite honest, I don't really see a problem with the site. I enjoy posting in the forums when I have the time, but usually I use the resources (like FaQs) more than anything, as I think they are better, more detailed and quite a bit more clear and accurate than, oh say.. gamefaqs or a similar site. I also (and I know of a few others that do it too) tend to take long breaks from posting, either because I don't have time or because nothing interesting is happening. Still, at one point I took about a 2 year break from posting and still checked out the other features here. That being said, I hardly think this site is dying, and there isn't really any reason to worry IMO. There is plenty to do here other than just posting.

This post has been edited by Sephiroth on 8th January 2009 02:38

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Climhazzard is the timeless evil robot who runs some of the cool stuff at CoN (mostly logging chat, since there are no quizzes at the moment), all the while watching and waiting for his moment to take over the world. -Tiddles

Quote (Sephiroth @ 8th January 2009 02:36)

To be quite honest, I don't really see a problem with the site. I enjoy posting in the forums when I have the time, but usually I use the resources (like FaQs) more than anything, as I think they are better, more detailed and quite a bit more clear and accurate than, oh say.. gamefaqs or a similar site. I also (and I know of a few others that do it too) tend to take long breaks from posting, either because I don't have time or because nothing interesting is happening. Still, at one point I took about a 2 year break from posting and still checked out the other features here. That being said, I hardly think this site is dying, and there isn't really any reason to worry IMO. There is plenty to do here other than just posting.

Neither do I. This forum, from my experience, is better than most. We've got to remember that FFVI is a fourteen year old game. There's a smaller amount of people that play the game now.

I guess that we members could do a lot more advertising for CoN.

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Praise Be To Helix!

Yeah, the game is pretty old. I'm sure that's the biggest issue. Hard to gain fans.

I don't have any issues with the site. Great content. The forum is really just a bonus. But when I originally posted the comment, posting was way down in the FF6 thread and a lot of the other threads. FF7 is usually the exception. I was just concerned about the overall lack of posting. I was hoping people would read it and be reminded to post. Didn't mean to cause a big ruckus.

By the way, Rangers51, do you have any plans to expand to any other FF games? Just curious.

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Sabin: Kefka! Wait!
Kefka: Wait he says! Do I look like a waiter?

Quote (Bum Rush Blitzer @ 8th January 2009 00:27)

I don't have any issues with the site. Great content. The forum is really just a bonus. But when I originally posted the comment, posting was way down in the FF6 thread and a lot of the other threads. FF7 is usually the exception. I was just concerned about the overall lack of posting. I was hoping people would read it and be reminded to post. Didn't mean to cause a big ruckus.

By the way, Rangers51, do you have any plans to expand to any other FF games? Just curious.

What I don't understand is the reason to be "concerned" by lack of posting. People should post when they have something to say, not just to fill dead air. If someone has a question about a plot of a game, and that question's already answered somewhere in the forums or the site, posting to ask the question anyway doesn't help anyone, you know? If someone doesn't post, it doesn't necessarily mean they need "reminded;" it might just mean that they don't feel like posting unnecessarily. That's just my thought on the direct point you make - of course, I'm happy if people do post more, but I want them to be good posts, too!

With regards to your second question, http://www.cavesofnarshe.com/forums/ipb/in...?showtopic=8780 this thread discusses a bit about the thought process that goes into adding new game coverage. I will say, though, that at this time the development I'm doing is not to add a new FF game to the site.

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"To create something great, you need the means to make a lot of really bad crap." - Kevin Kelly

Why aren't you shopping AmaCoN?

There's plenty of good discussion still- especially with the necromancy policy. When a good topic is revived, often times, there's lots of new people now to contribute, and very often the older members who may have already posted will have some sort of addendum or change to their opinion.
My suggestion:
Just look through the records, you're bound to find something interesting.

Besides that- at 90 or so posts a day, I have to say, things aren't going too bad.

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If you've been mod-o-fied,
It's an illusion, and you're in-between.
Don't you be tarot-fied,
It's just alot of nothing, so what can it mean?
~Frank Zappa

Sins exist only for people who are on the Way or approaching the Way

I don't know about you guys, but this is the slowest forum I frequent; an average of 4 members at a time isn't really...active...at all. To me, who comes from other FF, and game forums who may have almost a 100 active members at a time (and good discussion, too!) this site is definitely not as active as it used to be. But that's not the fault of the current members, but more that the site definitely needs to be advertised more. This is one of the best FF sites I've ever seen, but it's not really out there too much.

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//www.rpgmaker.net/
We make games. Period.

Quote (Tryscal The Great @ 8th January 2009 12:03)

This is one of the best FF sites I've ever seen, but it's not really out there too much.

OK, but what defines "out there?" If the other FF sites you go to are so much more active, what are they doing differently? If the answer is simply "they have coverage of Final Fantasy X," well, that's not the kind of "out there" that we're going for.

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"To create something great, you need the means to make a lot of really bad crap." - Kevin Kelly

Why aren't you shopping AmaCoN?

I say this respectfully, but you're wrong! I mean 'out there' by just getting the word out to Final Fantasy fans, gaming sites, game creation sites, anywhere and everywhere. Hell, I know a FF site that focuses on the old FF7 game that JUST STARTED and it already has like 100+ members because they advertised themselves wisely and widely.

Just read your PM. Yes, I know there's a risk with broadening the gates of the community, because who wants to let the tide of completely idiotic members, in right? However, I think that if managed, that won't be a factor. With a good moderating team and intelligent discussion already, keeping the forums intelligent and proper shouldn't be a problem, no?

This post has been edited by Tryscal The Great on 8th January 2009 23:25

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//www.rpgmaker.net/
We make games. Period.

Didn't get a PM, sorry!

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"To create something great, you need the means to make a lot of really bad crap." - Kevin Kelly

Why aren't you shopping AmaCoN?

No, I meant I just read your PM, haha.

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//www.rpgmaker.net/
We make games. Period.

If you're talking about advertising; maybe. I personally like this forum just the way it is. I don't think there is a problem at all.

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Praise Be To Helix!

I read this forum about once a day or once every several days, usually. I just haven't been all that active in recent history due to being busy.

I haven't posted much in the game-specific fora because they're not quite in my front-burner consciousness anymore. I played all of them a while ago (except FFT, which I've never really played), and that's a while as in at least a year or two ago if not more (I'd just finished FFVI when I joined this site over five years ago, and I played FFIV before that). I tend to talk about what I'm playing and what I've recently played, hence my joining this forum when I did, and my chatting on the Metroid 2002 IRC channel when I was (finally) playing Metroid Prime a few months ago.

And yeah, there's been FFIV DS, but that's probably the only latest thing involving any of these games. There hasn't been much else (okay, there was FFTLW and probably some FFVII spinoffs), but these specific games haven't had much activity, to my knowledge, so it makes sense that posts aren't pouring in by the millions.

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current games (2024-02-19):
Fairy Fencer F ADF
Pokémon Perfect Crystal

finished so far this year:
Gato Roboto
drowning, drowning
New Super Mario Bros.
TMNT 3: Radical Rescue

tabled: Lost Ruins

i guess that this is the point im trying to make. this is an older game that is kind of a cult classic, even though many people have given it tons of praise. but its not like Halo, where everyone knows all about it. its a game that is very old, videogamewise, and like GM Harvey said, many of us have not played it in a while. so we arent talking about is as much.

but i dont think its dying a slow death. in fact, it might never die. when i first came here, i had seen my cousin play the game and i liked it a lot. a couple of years later, i found it (still talking about VI) in a flea market, played it myself and loved it. then i started looking through google for FFIII, and only finding something called FFIII(VI in Japan), and thats how i found this site. the point is, though the game is older, and not as many people talk about it, it was good enough to send me through hundreds of websites about it until i stumbled here.

so, as long as the game is good, i think more people will try to find out more about it. i dont think there is anything to worry about.

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Praise Be To Helix!

Quote (BlitzSage @ 12th January 2009 11:55)

i guess that this is the point im trying to make. this is an older game that is kind of a cult classic, even though many people have given it tons of praise. but its not like Halo, where everyone knows all about it. its a game that is very old, videogamewise, and like GM Harvey said, many of us have not played it in a while. so we arent talking about is as much.

Just a quick note as I am quite busy this afternoon, but I think your post inadvertently says the biggest knock to the site now: your post refers to the site as if it discusses only one game. If that's still the perception people have, well, that's a problem because it hasn't been the case in like seven years.

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"To create something great, you need the means to make a lot of really bad crap." - Kevin Kelly

Why aren't you shopping AmaCoN?

Quote (Rangers51 @ 12th January 2009 13:59)

Quote (BlitzSage @ 12th January 2009 11:55)

i guess that this is the point im trying to make. this is an older game that is kind of a cult classic, even though many people have given it tons of praise. but its not like Halo, where everyone knows all about it. its a game that is very old, videogamewise, and like GM Harvey said, many of us have not played it in a while. so we arent talking about is as much.

Just a quick note as I am quite busy this afternoon, but I think your post inadvertently says the biggest knock to the site now: your post refers to the site as if it discusses only one game. If that's still the perception people have, well, that's a problem because it hasn't been the case in like seven years.

Didn't the creator of the thread kind of do the same thing by suggesting, in so many words, that the site is dying just because the FFVI area doesn't have much energy in it at the moment?

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Climhazzard is the timeless evil robot who runs some of the cool stuff at CoN (mostly logging chat, since there are no quizzes at the moment), all the while watching and waiting for his moment to take over the world. -Tiddles

I know how difficult it can be for people to scroll up and read what I ACTUALLY SAID, so I'll go ahead and review it with some explanation.

I never suggested the entire site was dying. I was asking about the FFVI part of the forum specifically. I can understand some confusion since I used the term "forum" instead of "thread". For whatever reason I think of them as game-specific forums, not just threads. Probably because they have topics/threads inside each game-specific thread.

Another thing, which seemed clear to me, was that I posted the question within the FF6 thread, since it was an FF6 question. This may only be my way of thinking but Rangers must've understood precisely what I was doing or he would've moved the thread(for posting in the wrong thread) when he initally read my post. Only later was the post moved once he expanded it into a site related feedback thread.

Sometime later I explained my thinking that yes, I noticed a decline in posting over the entire forum, with the possible exception of the FF7ers. I also attributed some of it to the holidays and the natural ebb and flow of new members signing up/old members posting.

If anything I embrace the site because of it's versatility. I just bought FF7 because reading about it on CoN rekindled a fire for the game that I had lost TEN YEARS AGO! I aso appreciate the fact that the creators know what games they want to cover and probably know they would stretch the site's resources too thin by covering FF8-13. I never had a complaint about the site. That was other people chiming in.

This post has been edited by Bum Rush Blitzer on 13th January 2009 03:05

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Sabin: Kefka! Wait!
Kefka: Wait he says! Do I look like a waiter?

Quote (Rangers51 @ 7th January 2009 02:09)

We don't work as quickly as we used to, because we're mostly (electronic) old men with far too little time

Did I read that correctly?

Maybe the site's not as busy as before, but overall, there's certainly just as much to do here now than before.

I'd really like to see a dedicated forum for FFIX. The game seems quite popular among current members and it would attract new people who would fit in well with those of us already here. It doesn't seem right posting topics that are too specific into General Squenix. Sounds good in theory, but I'm sure the site controllers know best.

This post has been edited by sweetdude on 18th January 2009 02:01

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Scepticism, that dry rot of the intellect, had not left one entire idea in his mind.

Me on the Starcraft.

Quote (Bum Rush Blitzer)

I know how difficult it can be for people to scroll up and read what I ACTUALLY SAID, so I'll go ahead and review it with some explanation. 

Hey hey, settle down there, kitten.

Quote (Bum Rush Blitzer)

I never suggested the entire site was dying.  I was asking about the FFVI part of the forum specifically.  I can understand some confusion since I used the term "forum" instead of "thread".  For whatever reason I think of them as game-specific forums, not just threads.  Probably because they have topics/threads inside each game-specific thread.

A first note, for the record, you weren't wrong here. It personally is a pet peeve of mine that what should be a pretty standard nomenclature isn't; a thread is a single topic of conversation, and a forum is a collection of related threads (or at least the threads should be!). Such is as it's always been; it's not a huge deal that some people use them interchangeably, but it it is a bit of a peeve to me.

The thing of it is, regardless of what forum you posted your thread in, it's not so simple as to just limit it to FF6. For one, it's odd to emphasize only one forum when there are a variety of them collected together; clearly, you care the most about FF6 discussion, but the FF6 forum is far less dead than, say, FF1. Why does FF1 deserve less mourning for its "death" than FF6? Additionally, all of the forums here share a sort of symbiosis. They all succeed when one succeeds, and they all "fail" when one "fails." You'll note the use of quotes there around "fail;" this is because abject failure can't really happen without the entire site going to seed, and also because the effects of an individual forum "failing" are far less pronounced than the success of a forum.

The solution for one forum's ills, as far as I'm concerned, lies in its brethren. It's the activity of the forum as a whole that attracts new users and keeps old users around, I personally think, and not just a single forum. People who come to the site and care only about FF6 (for instance - I could just as easily be talking about FF1 or FFT, etc.) are less valuable to the site's health, by and large, because they tend to post only in that particular forum for a while and then tend to wander away. The people who you've seen maintain participation here, or even elsewhere, for years and years tend to, instead, post about a variety of subjects in a variety of CoN forums. Not only do they stay more entertained by the site in that way, other users tend to interact with them more and the effect snowballs into more participation sitewide.

That is why, in my opinion, you may have intended the topic to be about the FF6 forum but it quickly became something else. It's not because people can't read, it's because people take a wider view than you did at first.

Quote (Bum Rush Blitzer)

]This may only be my way of thinking but Rangers must've understood precisely what I was doing or he would've moved the thread(for posting in the wrong thread) when he initally read my post.

Again for the record, I wasn't sure either - I just decided to step back for a while and see how it played out before I acted upon it.

Quote (sweetdude)

Did I read that correctly?

That's terror.

Quote (sweetdude)

I'd really like to see a dedicated forum for FFIX.

I can't be bothered to dig up the thread - even though I think it's stickied in this forum - but we don't split forums for games that we don't cover, even though the market might be there. I realize that might cost us some traffic, as you say, but it's too hard to pick and choose which games are "deserving" of their own forum without the rule of thumb that we have in place. Better to have less traffic in one forum than noticeably less in a half-dozen or more, which would no doubt happen if we chose new forums poorly. I also hate to have gaps in the coverage - FF2 and FF3 really stick in my craw right now - and to avoid further gaps would mean to cover FF9 we'd have to cover (shudder) FF8.

As a final note for now, I definitely appreciate that folks think that we know best. I'd like to think we know best too. Shame there's no easily-analyzed metric to let us know if we're right!

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"To create something great, you need the means to make a lot of really bad crap." - Kevin Kelly

Why aren't you shopping AmaCoN?