except then anyone who might be interested in what you had to say would have to go trawling through the past 15 pages looking for your replies
Isn't it the opposite, tho? In another day or two, this exchange we're having, @DomeWing333, will be buried and only those who go spelunking back through the deepest, dankest pages will ever find it again. Whereas if this conversation were threaded, each time somebody jumped in to comment on this particular side-branch, those freshest fruits would be surfaced as "new comments" -- always cleanly connected back to the trunk.
Sorry for mixing both cave and tree metaphors there!
But my poorly articulated point being -- a threaded type of system is really the ideal way to keep shorter, specific conversations going (and ongoing) in a much more time-displaced, asynchronous manner.
And having joined in late, what would have made things even better was if I could jump right in and reply to specific posts in a threaded mann… moreer
Alright, I'll bite. That would be great except then anyone who might be interested in what you had to say would have to go trawling through the past 15 pages looking for your replies. I thought you guys were trying to move away from scavenger hunt puzzles...
That's for one thread. You said you wanted to reply to multiple posts. Imagine you did so. Every thread you replied to now has a new comment. Now how would any outside observer be able to tell that you replied to multiple threads or just the one that the "new comment" button directs them to? Now imagine multiple users, each replying to multiple posts at the same time (as it likely to happen if this forum ever becomes active again). You see the problem here?
except then anyone who might be interested in what you had to say would have to go trawling through the past 15 pages looking for your replies… more
Isn't it the opposite, tho? In another day or two, this exchange we're having, @DomeWing333, will be buried and only those who go spelunking back through the deepest, dankest pages will ever find it again. Whereas if this conversation were threaded, each time somebody jumped in to comment on this particular side-branch, those freshest fruits would be surfaced as "new comments" -- always cleanly connected back to the trunk.
Sorry for mixing both cave and tree metaphors there!
But my poorly articulated point being -- a threaded type of system is really the ideal way to keep shorter, specific conversations going (and ongoing) in a much more time-displaced, asynchronous manner.
@werefox Consider: A thread is 100 pages long. It contains multiple threaded discussions, of which I'm involved in several, and of which there are many that I'm not involved in. The issue is that using the 'next new comment' will take you through all new comments, regardless of whether they're in a sub-discussion that you were involved in. And it will do so in a non-chronological order (as far as I can see). In many cases this is simply not usable. Direct replies to comments are flagged in the feed, which helps. But indirect replies on the same thread are flagged in the same way as unrelated replies, so are hard to distinguish.
Most of us are used to using flat forums where context is maintained through quote functionality that both specifies the name of the quoted poster and a link to the quoted post. With 40 or 50 replies per page it's possible to skim-read large threads, filtering out irrelevant discussions.
Threaded discussions could be a good thing, but with the current implementation they're hard to use. It would be better if there were a way to easily track sub-discussions that you're involved in. The 'classic' implementation with its limited posts per page and only basic quote facilities doesn't work well either. I think that's what most people are miffed about -- you've broken something that worked well, and the alternative needs work.
except then anyone who might be interested in what you had to say would have to go trawling through the past 15 pages looking for your replies… more
Isn't it the opposite, tho? In another day or two, this exchange we're having, @DomeWing333, will be buried and only those who go spelunking back through the deepest, dankest pages will ever find it again. Whereas if this conversation were threaded, each time somebody jumped in to comment on this particular side-branch, those freshest fruits would be surfaced as "new comments" -- always cleanly connected back to the trunk.
Sorry for mixing both cave and tree metaphors there!
But my poorly articulated point being -- a threaded type of system is really the ideal way to keep shorter, specific conversations going (and ongoing) in a much more time-displaced, asynchronous manner.
The threaded comment thing might work if the new comments refreshed at a reasonable rate (like, they were no longer marked as new after being read) or if clicking on a new comment in the user CP or whatever actually, you know, brought you to the new comment.
However, neither of these things is the case.
The new comments are not marked as read until two hours after they are made, which in a fast paced discussion means that you would have to sift through loads of already read comments to hunt for the actual new ones. And even so, clicking on the new comment button (either in the User CP or on the thread list) brings you to some random page in the thread, not the one with actual new comments on it. Combined with a incredibly slow loading time for changing pages in a thread and the inability to use touchpad gestures to swap between thread pages, it just ends up being a chore to use.
The touchpad gestures is really a big issue for me personally and probably everyone who uses a phone or Mac laptop. It's incredibly irritating when I just want to go back to the previous page but doing a two fingered back swipe brings me all the way back to my User CP. With a touchpad it's easier to use gestures than try to muck about with the mouse, so this makes using this website far more difficult and time consuming than literally every other forum I participate on.
I don't think it's right that Kevin is being antagonized. It was nice of him to join the discussion, and while it's good to point out the specific problems we have with the new forum, and it's good to point out that the majority of us would strongly prefer something more like the old forum, repeatedly calling somebody incompetent when that somebody is trying to explain their decisions is just rude.
There's a lot about this forum setup that I find really obnoxious, but I think 90% of my issues would be solved with "let thread starter decide to post in classic mode," plus bugfixes. But sure, let's all complain about how the staff won't communicate with us and then vilify the staff member that tries to communicate with us.
Communication would have been great. Instead, the people he responded to had their posts picked apart for the most minute issues (such as his job description or whether newcomers on the forum are nice or not) while the larger issues presented in the posts were ignored. Meanwhile, the meaningful posts that were primarily constructive and moderate were ignored even more, especially those regarding the impact on the community by myself and Giant Tope.
To be fair, what could Kevin have really said there? "Sorry you lost pretty much your entire community?" What then? What would that have done? As meaningful as they were, both your and Giant Tope's posts were just lamentations and can't really be addressed constructively. You said it yourself, "Even if the forum were changed back to the vBulletin style today, most of them wouldn't come back." The only thing to do is try to salvage what's left into something resembling what was there before. The staff speaking with us is a good start. Hopefully, they will listen as well.
Communication would have been great. Instead, the people he responded to had their posts picked apart for the most minute issues (such as his … morejob description or whether newcomers on the forum are nice or not) while the larger issues presented in the posts were ignored. Meanwhile, the meaningful posts that were primarily constructive and moderate were ignored even more, especially those regarding the impact on the community by myself and Giant Tope.
Well, recognition that we're not just a bunch of whiny infants would be a start. We're not upset because it's new and different, we're upset because it made it hard to talk to people we like to talk to, so hard, in fact, that a lot was just obliterated. The switch to the new format makes it difficult for online friends to communicate via this medium and I think the reason this is the case is because the fact that a lot of people on here are really good friends wasn't factored into the web design process.
This new website isn't a place that's friendly for buddies to hang out and talk about games. It's structured towards a call and response type of communication where getting to know people is made needlessly difficult. Since I think this is one of the major failings, I was trying to call attention to the fact that deep friendships do, in fact, exist on these boards and that the website should have been (and perhaps still can be) constructed with that in mind. Hell, two of my friends, one from college, one who I met on these boards got engaged as a result of meeting on the Telltale forum. Getting to know someone that well on these forums seems impossible now due to the layout.
Since there aren't any Telltale employees on at the moment, I'm going to play the role of devil's advocate.
Just why is it impossible to get to know someone well on these forums? Why should a call-and-response type of communication interfere with buddies hanging out and taking about games with each other? Is it just the threaded nature of it? Does the problem go away in these Classic Style threads? Is it the aesthetics of the comments themselves? It would really help if you could identify specific features that are missing or have been added that make getting to know someone so difficult on the new forums. It would help even more if you could brainstorm things that can be done to rectify the situation short of a complete tear down and rebuilding of the site.
The threaded comments break up conversations, and make it difficult to keep up with what a person is saying. The slow loading times make it difficult to browse through threads, the PM system mixes private messages in with thread notifications making it easy to lose these conversations. The problem doesn't even go away in these classic style threads because there isn't a good quoting system to carry conversations in an easy-to-follow manner. The old quoting system provided a way to quote multiple posts in a single post and also provide a link back to the original post, so even if the reply happened a significant time after the original post, an interested party could follow the conversation back to the start.
This forum is geared around an OP receiving responses. For a news site, this is great. A reporter writes an article, people reply to the article. But for a discussion forum, having the OP at the top of each page is not useful because discussions flow and change during their course. A good discussion does not involve a bunch of people replying to a single post, it involves a group of people talking about a broad topic. In addition, the addition of the OP at the top of each subsequent page means that fewer posts can appear per page. Again, given the slow loading times, it means that going through a thread takes ages.
In a nutshell, it's harder to meet people on this forum because it's harder to read the posts due to the format and it's also harder to post. It takes longer to browse the forum, see unread threads, and find unread posts.
It used to be that I could sift through all the threads in General Chat in under five minutes, browsing for interesting posts. I could reply twenty or more times per day to a variety of threads. Now, trying to find a thread that has new posts that I haven't read is so difficult I've only been able to browse through maybe three threads per day and my posting rate has greatly decreased. Meeting someone new under such slow posting conditions is nearly impossible.
EDIT: Another feature that is conspicuously lacking is the presence of a friends list. With a terrible search function and no list of forum friends, it's almost impossible to find a specific user in order to PM them. It's almost like this forum was designed to split up people who enjoy talking to other members. I'm not even sure the PM function allows for PMing multiple people for a group chat. Of course, given the backlash already received, I can see why all efforts to stamp down potential organization would be necessary.
Unfortunately, the staff don't use online forums to maintain friendships with other gamers like we do. So all they can possibly forsee using it for is to answer individual Support questions.
Have you noticed that when both Kevin and Werefox said they wished this was a threaded discussion, it was merely to provide support?
Sure, they're the devs and that's their job. But it also shows they know nothing AT ALL about making friends with gamers online and having long, meaningful conversations with them. Kevin actually said that he prefers trite, casual conversations over intersting ones.
I would provide a quote and link to his actual post, but I can't do that anymore.
Since we know that the staff are actually reading this, I want address them directly: Why don't you actually talk to us in actual lengthy conversations about things we like to talk about rather than just support? It won't take long to realize threaded responses are unwieldy. It's a novel idea, I know, but you should try using a forum for what WE use it for before you decide that our discussions have less value than Youtube comments.
What that means is that the SUPPORT forums should be threaded. Not ones pertaining to general conversation. But they don't understand that.
Actually, Kevin cited Facebook as one of the places where they looked to find popular discussion, but it occurs to me that threads and replies in Facebook groups aren't threaded either.
I think I'm going to keep bothering them about actually using the forums at length for serious, meaningful conversation rather than just support. It does occur to me that if they did take me up on that, it likely would not be here. Nor would we know at all that they did. But I feel like bothering them anyway.
Okay, so MtnPeak made a reply in the Government Shutdown thread shortly after I did, but it took me a while to find it because the forum still said "15 new comments". A whole bunch of posts were still marked as "new", making finding what I'm looking for quite difficult.
Rather than making the the timeout period on read posts shorter, it would simply be better if his new post was at the bottom of the thread with a quote from the post he was directly replying to.
Obviously that's better than the way it was before.
And obviously NO ONE wanted to be able to reply to multiple posts in the same post. It's so much more convenient to make 10 individual replies to each person spread out over 30 pages of posts than to just make one comprehensive post that contains all relevant segments of all the relevant posts and links to the original.
They wouldn't have removed the features if we actually wanted or liked them, because they know what's best for us. Just like we didn't REALLY want puzzles in our games, we just wanted to be able to watch movies that gave us busywork to do between cutscenes. They always know what's best.
Okay, so MtnPeak made a reply in the Government Shutdown thread shortly after I did, but it took me a while to find it because the forum still… more said "15 new comments". A whole bunch of posts were still marked as "new", making finding what I'm looking for quite difficult.
Rather than making the the timeout period on read posts shorter, it would simply be better if his new post was at the bottom of the thread with a quote from the post he was directly replying to.
Of course it's better. If things were done YOUR way, @Kevin would have to READ, and if he wrote a response to somebody he might have to QUOTE them and hold a conversation or something! These are Herculean trials, things that no grown man can be expected to do without great difficulty.
Thumbs Up/Down buttons are so much easier.
It's nice, because rather than needing to understand what the other person said and WHY you think what you do about it, all you need to do is push the "ME NO LIKEY" button.
I want to quote Dashing's "thinking is hard" statement, but to do so I have to copy/paste it manually or else write it out, myself.
In any case, maybe @Kevin and company like games that don't make people think because they don't like to have think themselves. [insert humerous and extremely offensive jab at their collective intelligence and questionable parentage that may or may not get me banned.]
Oh, look. I'm angry again. You know it occurs to me that the more I insult them, the less likely they are to listen to me and take seriously what I have to say.
... That might concern me if I thought they'd listen to me in the first place. But no, so far they're just holding to the party line.
Frankly, every time I come on this site, it makes me angry. And I'm sick of being angry, sick of being ignored, and sick of being [CENSORED], so I think I'm going to just stop coming. I was planning on arguing a lot longer (and hell, maybe this will be the shortest leave ever and I'll be back later this week) but at this point, it's all about the fucks I do not give.
I think I may take a small break from this site as well. I was lead to believe this is a loving community. As the release date is pushed back. From Late last month to early this month with no information and it is early Oct right now. I cannot wrap my head around, what is taking so long. Is it not done. If so why so poorly project the release date so far off.
It's a shame. I've been one of the most active, and respectful members since coming on this community from the walking dead.(Not the most respectful, one of the most respectful) If you compare me to the other people who spoil the game for other people. I too am becoming frustrated with tell tale but for a very different reason then you are.
I think I may check back in this site, in a week. When they actually know what their going to do. It's a shame. I approached this site, thinking they would be able to accurately project a simple release date. I know now, they are way off on their projections.
Frankly, every time I come on this site, it makes me angry. And I'm sick of being angry, sick of being ignored, and sick of being [CENSORED], … moreso I think I'm going to just stop coming. I was planning on arguing a lot longer (and hell, maybe this will be the shortest leave ever and I'll be back later this week) but at this point, it's all about the fucks I do not give.
Well, my frustration has still not yet given way to apathy so I'll still be around if any of the staff still wishes to discuss the points that were raised and either how you plan to address them or why you don't consider them to be worth addressing. @Kevin@werefox
Threaded discussions are good for casual visitors who are looking for a specific topic (skipping most of the others) and want to weed out anything irrelevant to what they're looking for.
Flat discussions are good for more casual conversations where the topic may drift over time. They're better for frequent visitors who read and write a lot, and they're better for cultivating friendships. (Imagine a first date fixated on topics versus one where the conversation is allowed to flow. You probably wouldn't get a second date.)
Traffic has dropped because with threaded discussions, you need a lot of new topics coming in to encourage people to comment on them, and right now, Telltale is in a quiet period between games. Most of the people who were just casually commenting along in the meantime have left or have drastically reduced their messages, as the threaded forums are harder for them to use.
At the moment, I'm seeing more angry posts than anything else (and that political thread isn't helping), and that's not what I came here for. I guess I'll see if things get better when TWAU is released, so I'll be hanging around 'til then.
The ability for a poster to select threaded or flat (with more automatic quoting for flat threads), or for the reader to do so, would be a good thing.
Threaded discussions are good for casual visitors who are looking for a specific topic (skipping most of the others) and want to weed out anyt… morehing irrelevant to what they're looking for.
Flat discussions are good for more casual conversations where the topic may drift over time. They're better for frequent visitors who read and write a lot, and they're better for cultivating friendships. (Imagine a first date fixated on topics versus one where the conversation is allowed to flow. You probably wouldn't get a second date.)
Traffic has dropped because with threaded discussions, you need a lot of new topics coming in to encourage people to comment on them, and right now, Telltale is in a quiet period between games. Most of the people who were just casually commenting along in the meantime have left or have drastically reduced their messages, as the threaded forums are harder for them to use.
At the moment, I'm seeing more angry posts tha… [view original content]
Alright, seriously, what could have POSSIBLY compelled those two thumbs down?!!!
God, I hate this anonymous rating system.
EDIT: BTW, this was in reference to the puzzlebox's post (which got 2 immediate thumbs down as soon as it was posted), not any of my own. I can see how that ambiguity may have caused me to come off as a self-absorbed tool...
The voting system is one of the things that I think is most valuable. It provides an outlet for people to express themselves with a much lower barrier to entry than writing a full on post. It has been argued that this will encourage people to childishly down vote a user in a punitive fashion. I have more faith in our community than that. I am passionate about enabling participation in as many ways a possible. Posting, voting, polling (which is currently absent), and anything else that makes it easier for someone to participate is great in my book. I don't fear lighter, more casual participation and in fact want to encourage it! This doesn't preclude or diminish lengthy intelligent discussions at all. 100 page threads just don't work for everybody in every context.
Alright, seriously, what could have POSSIBLY compelled those two thumbs down?!!!
God, I hate this anonymous rating system.
EDIT: BTW, th… moreis was in reference to the puzzlebox's post (which got 2 immediate thumbs down as soon as it was posted), not any of my own. I can see how that ambiguity may have caused me to come off as a self-absorbed tool...
Dashing. I appreciate your passion and tenacity when it comes to identifying issues with the new forum. However, what you are doing is not the least bit helpful. Nor is it humorous, entertaining, or clever.
We all remember what Kevin said. Many of us have already identified various flaws in his argument. He knows this. And we know he knows this. So please refrain from parroting his quotes back to us "ironically" and then presumably patting yourself on the back for a job well done for being such a sassy fellow.
I know that you are indeed capable of forming insightful thoughts and providing rational arguments. Please utilize those skills instead of your admittedly impressive skills of mocking repetition. Thanks.
The voting system is one of the things that I think is most valuable. It provides an outlet for people to express themselves with a much lower… more barrier to entry than writing a full on post. It has been argued that this will encourage people to childishly down vote a user in a punitive fashion. I have more faith in our community than that. I am passionate about enabling participation in as many ways a possible. Posting, voting, polling (which is currently absent), and anything else that makes it easier for someone to participate is great in my book. I don't fear lighter, more casual participation and in fact want to encourage it! This doesn't preclude or diminish lengthy intelligent discussions at all. 100 page threads just don't work for everybody in every context.
"I know that you are indeed capable of forming insightful thoughts and providing rational arguments. Please utilize those skills instead of your admittedly impressive skills of mocking repetition. Thanks."
Dashing. I appreciate your passion and tenacity when it comes to identifying issues with the new forum. However, what you are doing is not the… more least bit helpful. Nor is it humorous, entertaining, or clever.
We all remember what Kevin said. Many of us have already identified various flaws in his argument. He knows this. And we know he knows this. So please refrain from parroting his quotes back to us "ironically" and then presumably patting yourself on the back for a job well done for being such a sassy fellow.
I know that you are indeed capable of forming insightful thoughts and providing rational arguments. Please utilize those skills instead of your admittedly impressive skills of mocking repetition. Thanks.
You reap what you sow. In the end, a small community being upset about their home being demolished won't hinder whether or not the company will be successful, however, a history of false promises and well intentioned blunders will bite you in the butt.
You reap what you sow. In the end, a small community being upset about their home being demolished won't hinder whether or not the company wil… morel be successful, however, a history of false promises and well intentioned blunders will bite you in the butt.
Puzzlebox, I miss you.
This is some EXTREMELY interesting Reddit-style "shadow ban" shit right here:
Left window signed into "Rather Dashing", right signed into a different Telltale profile. Dislikes are gone for everybody who didn't directly challenge Kevin Bruner's voting system.
Comments
Isn't it the opposite, tho? In another day or two, this exchange we're having, @DomeWing333, will be buried and only those who go spelunking back through the deepest, dankest pages will ever find it again. Whereas if this conversation were threaded, each time somebody jumped in to comment on this particular side-branch, those freshest fruits would be surfaced as "new comments" -- always cleanly connected back to the trunk.
Sorry for mixing both cave and tree metaphors there!
But my poorly articulated point being -- a threaded type of system is really the ideal way to keep shorter, specific conversations going (and ongoing) in a much more time-displaced, asynchronous manner.
That's for one thread. You said you wanted to reply to multiple posts. Imagine you did so. Every thread you replied to now has a new comment. Now how would any outside observer be able to tell that you replied to multiple threads or just the one that the "new comment" button directs them to? Now imagine multiple users, each replying to multiple posts at the same time (as it likely to happen if this forum ever becomes active again). You see the problem here?
@werefox Consider: A thread is 100 pages long. It contains multiple threaded discussions, of which I'm involved in several, and of which there are many that I'm not involved in. The issue is that using the 'next new comment' will take you through all new comments, regardless of whether they're in a sub-discussion that you were involved in. And it will do so in a non-chronological order (as far as I can see). In many cases this is simply not usable. Direct replies to comments are flagged in the feed, which helps. But indirect replies on the same thread are flagged in the same way as unrelated replies, so are hard to distinguish.
Most of us are used to using flat forums where context is maintained through quote functionality that both specifies the name of the quoted poster and a link to the quoted post. With 40 or 50 replies per page it's possible to skim-read large threads, filtering out irrelevant discussions.
Threaded discussions could be a good thing, but with the current implementation they're hard to use. It would be better if there were a way to easily track sub-discussions that you're involved in. The 'classic' implementation with its limited posts per page and only basic quote facilities doesn't work well either. I think that's what most people are miffed about -- you've broken something that worked well, and the alternative needs work.
The threaded comment thing might work if the new comments refreshed at a reasonable rate (like, they were no longer marked as new after being read) or if clicking on a new comment in the user CP or whatever actually, you know, brought you to the new comment.
However, neither of these things is the case.
The new comments are not marked as read until two hours after they are made, which in a fast paced discussion means that you would have to sift through loads of already read comments to hunt for the actual new ones. And even so, clicking on the new comment button (either in the User CP or on the thread list) brings you to some random page in the thread, not the one with actual new comments on it. Combined with a incredibly slow loading time for changing pages in a thread and the inability to use touchpad gestures to swap between thread pages, it just ends up being a chore to use.
The web team are very much aware of these issues, and they're currently reviewing them.
I can't really say much more than that though, sorry. I'll have a word with puzzlebox, see if she can get the web team to say more.
The touchpad gestures is really a big issue for me personally and probably everyone who uses a phone or Mac laptop. It's incredibly irritating when I just want to go back to the previous page but doing a two fingered back swipe brings me all the way back to my User CP. With a touchpad it's easier to use gestures than try to muck about with the mouse, so this makes using this website far more difficult and time consuming than literally every other forum I participate on.
I don't think it's right that Kevin is being antagonized. It was nice of him to join the discussion, and while it's good to point out the specific problems we have with the new forum, and it's good to point out that the majority of us would strongly prefer something more like the old forum, repeatedly calling somebody incompetent when that somebody is trying to explain their decisions is just rude.
There's a lot about this forum setup that I find really obnoxious, but I think 90% of my issues would be solved with "let thread starter decide to post in classic mode," plus bugfixes. But sure, let's all complain about how the staff won't communicate with us and then vilify the staff member that tries to communicate with us.
Communication would have been great. Instead, the people he responded to had their posts picked apart for the most minute issues (such as his job description or whether newcomers on the forum are nice or not) while the larger issues presented in the posts were ignored. Meanwhile, the meaningful posts that were primarily constructive and moderate were ignored even more, especially those regarding the impact on the community by myself and Giant Tope.
To be fair, what could Kevin have really said there? "Sorry you lost pretty much your entire community?" What then? What would that have done? As meaningful as they were, both your and Giant Tope's posts were just lamentations and can't really be addressed constructively. You said it yourself, "Even if the forum were changed back to the vBulletin style today, most of them wouldn't come back." The only thing to do is try to salvage what's left into something resembling what was there before. The staff speaking with us is a good start. Hopefully, they will listen as well.
Well, recognition that we're not just a bunch of whiny infants would be a start. We're not upset because it's new and different, we're upset because it made it hard to talk to people we like to talk to, so hard, in fact, that a lot was just obliterated. The switch to the new format makes it difficult for online friends to communicate via this medium and I think the reason this is the case is because the fact that a lot of people on here are really good friends wasn't factored into the web design process.
This new website isn't a place that's friendly for buddies to hang out and talk about games. It's structured towards a call and response type of communication where getting to know people is made needlessly difficult. Since I think this is one of the major failings, I was trying to call attention to the fact that deep friendships do, in fact, exist on these boards and that the website should have been (and perhaps still can be) constructed with that in mind. Hell, two of my friends, one from college, one who I met on these boards got engaged as a result of meeting on the Telltale forum. Getting to know someone that well on these forums seems impossible now due to the layout.
Since there aren't any Telltale employees on at the moment, I'm going to play the role of devil's advocate.
Just why is it impossible to get to know someone well on these forums? Why should a call-and-response type of communication interfere with buddies hanging out and taking about games with each other? Is it just the threaded nature of it? Does the problem go away in these Classic Style threads? Is it the aesthetics of the comments themselves? It would really help if you could identify specific features that are missing or have been added that make getting to know someone so difficult on the new forums. It would help even more if you could brainstorm things that can be done to rectify the situation short of a complete tear down and rebuilding of the site.
The threaded comments break up conversations, and make it difficult to keep up with what a person is saying. The slow loading times make it difficult to browse through threads, the PM system mixes private messages in with thread notifications making it easy to lose these conversations. The problem doesn't even go away in these classic style threads because there isn't a good quoting system to carry conversations in an easy-to-follow manner. The old quoting system provided a way to quote multiple posts in a single post and also provide a link back to the original post, so even if the reply happened a significant time after the original post, an interested party could follow the conversation back to the start.
This forum is geared around an OP receiving responses. For a news site, this is great. A reporter writes an article, people reply to the article. But for a discussion forum, having the OP at the top of each page is not useful because discussions flow and change during their course. A good discussion does not involve a bunch of people replying to a single post, it involves a group of people talking about a broad topic. In addition, the addition of the OP at the top of each subsequent page means that fewer posts can appear per page. Again, given the slow loading times, it means that going through a thread takes ages.
In a nutshell, it's harder to meet people on this forum because it's harder to read the posts due to the format and it's also harder to post. It takes longer to browse the forum, see unread threads, and find unread posts.
It used to be that I could sift through all the threads in General Chat in under five minutes, browsing for interesting posts. I could reply twenty or more times per day to a variety of threads. Now, trying to find a thread that has new posts that I haven't read is so difficult I've only been able to browse through maybe three threads per day and my posting rate has greatly decreased. Meeting someone new under such slow posting conditions is nearly impossible.
EDIT: Another feature that is conspicuously lacking is the presence of a friends list. With a terrible search function and no list of forum friends, it's almost impossible to find a specific user in order to PM them. It's almost like this forum was designed to split up people who enjoy talking to other members. I'm not even sure the PM function allows for PMing multiple people for a group chat. Of course, given the backlash already received, I can see why all efforts to stamp down potential organization would be necessary.
Unfortunately, the staff don't use online forums to maintain friendships with other gamers like we do. So all they can possibly forsee using it for is to answer individual Support questions.
Have you noticed that when both Kevin and Werefox said they wished this was a threaded discussion, it was merely to provide support?
Sure, they're the devs and that's their job. But it also shows they know nothing AT ALL about making friends with gamers online and having long, meaningful conversations with them. Kevin actually said that he prefers trite, casual conversations over intersting ones.
I would provide a quote and link to his actual post, but I can't do that anymore.
Since we know that the staff are actually reading this, I want address them directly: Why don't you actually talk to us in actual lengthy conversations about things we like to talk about rather than just support? It won't take long to realize threaded responses are unwieldy. It's a novel idea, I know, but you should try using a forum for what WE use it for before you decide that our discussions have less value than Youtube comments.
I never really thought of it that way, but that makes a lot of sense. And really explains a lot of design decisions that seem ludicrous to us.
What that means is that the SUPPORT forums should be threaded. Not ones pertaining to general conversation. But they don't understand that.
Actually, Kevin cited Facebook as one of the places where they looked to find popular discussion, but it occurs to me that threads and replies in Facebook groups aren't threaded either.
Replies can be now, but no one I know uses it.
I think I'm going to keep bothering them about actually using the forums at length for serious, meaningful conversation rather than just support. It does occur to me that if they did take me up on that, it likely would not be here. Nor would we know at all that they did. But I feel like bothering them anyway.
Okay, so MtnPeak made a reply in the Government Shutdown thread shortly after I did, but it took me a while to find it because the forum still said "15 new comments". A whole bunch of posts were still marked as "new", making finding what I'm looking for quite difficult.
Rather than making the the timeout period on read posts shorter, it would simply be better if his new post was at the bottom of the thread with a quote from the post he was directly replying to.
Obviously that's better than the way it was before.
And obviously NO ONE wanted to be able to reply to multiple posts in the same post. It's so much more convenient to make 10 individual replies to each person spread out over 30 pages of posts than to just make one comprehensive post that contains all relevant segments of all the relevant posts and links to the original.
They wouldn't have removed the features if we actually wanted or liked them, because they know what's best for us. Just like we didn't REALLY want puzzles in our games, we just wanted to be able to watch movies that gave us busywork to do between cutscenes. They always know what's best.
Of course it's better. If things were done YOUR way, @Kevin would have to READ, and if he wrote a response to somebody he might have to QUOTE them and hold a conversation or something! These are Herculean trials, things that no grown man can be expected to do without great difficulty.
Thumbs Up/Down buttons are so much easier.
It's nice, because rather than needing to understand what the other person said and WHY you think what you do about it, all you need to do is push the "ME NO LIKEY" button.
Thinking is hard.
I want to quote Dashing's "thinking is hard" statement, but to do so I have to copy/paste it manually or else write it out, myself.
In any case, maybe @Kevin and company like games that don't make people think because they don't like to have think themselves. [insert humerous and extremely offensive jab at their collective intelligence and questionable parentage that may or may not get me banned.]
Oh, look. I'm angry again. You know it occurs to me that the more I insult them, the less likely they are to listen to me and take seriously what I have to say.
... That might concern me if I thought they'd listen to me in the first place. But no, so far they're just holding to the party line.
Frankly, every time I come on this site, it makes me angry. And I'm sick of being angry, sick of being ignored, and sick of being [CENSORED], so I think I'm going to just stop coming. I was planning on arguing a lot longer (and hell, maybe this will be the shortest leave ever and I'll be back later this week) but at this point, it's all about the fucks I do not give.
I think I may take a small break from this site as well. I was lead to believe this is a loving community. As the release date is pushed back. From Late last month to early this month with no information and it is early Oct right now. I cannot wrap my head around, what is taking so long. Is it not done. If so why so poorly project the release date so far off.
It's a shame. I've been one of the most active, and respectful members since coming on this community from the walking dead.(Not the most respectful, one of the most respectful) If you compare me to the other people who spoil the game for other people. I too am becoming frustrated with tell tale but for a very different reason then you are.
I think I may check back in this site, in a week. When they actually know what their going to do. It's a shame. I approached this site, thinking they would be able to accurately project a simple release date. I know now, they are way off on their projections.
I just don't care anymore. I still will post here if I can be bothered but other than that, meh.
Well, my frustration has still not yet given way to apathy so I'll still be around if any of the staff still wishes to discuss the points that were raised and either how you plan to address them or why you don't consider them to be worth addressing. @Kevin @werefox
They care even less.
Threaded discussions are good for casual visitors who are looking for a specific topic (skipping most of the others) and want to weed out anything irrelevant to what they're looking for.
Flat discussions are good for more casual conversations where the topic may drift over time. They're better for frequent visitors who read and write a lot, and they're better for cultivating friendships. (Imagine a first date fixated on topics versus one where the conversation is allowed to flow. You probably wouldn't get a second date.)
Traffic has dropped because with threaded discussions, you need a lot of new topics coming in to encourage people to comment on them, and right now, Telltale is in a quiet period between games. Most of the people who were just casually commenting along in the meantime have left or have drastically reduced their messages, as the threaded forums are harder for them to use.
At the moment, I'm seeing more angry posts than anything else (and that political thread isn't helping), and that's not what I came here for. I guess I'll see if things get better when TWAU is released, so I'll be hanging around 'til then.
The ability for a poster to select threaded or flat (with more automatic quoting for flat threads), or for the reader to do so, would be a good thing.
Thanks for the well-reasoned post, @WarpSpeed.
Alright, seriously, what could have POSSIBLY compelled those two thumbs down?!!!
God, I hate this anonymous rating system.
EDIT: BTW, this was in reference to the puzzlebox's post (which got 2 immediate thumbs down as soon as it was posted), not any of my own. I can see how that ambiguity may have caused me to come off as a self-absorbed tool...
The voting system is one of the things that I think is most valuable. It provides an outlet for people to express themselves with a much lower barrier to entry than writing a full on post. It has been argued that this will encourage people to childishly down vote a user in a punitive fashion. I have more faith in our community than that. I am passionate about enabling participation in as many ways a possible. Posting, voting, polling (which is currently absent), and anything else that makes it easier for someone to participate is great in my book. I don't fear lighter, more casual participation and in fact want to encourage it! This doesn't preclude or diminish lengthy intelligent discussions at all. 100 page threads just don't work for everybody in every context.
Dashing. I appreciate your passion and tenacity when it comes to identifying issues with the new forum. However, what you are doing is not the least bit helpful. Nor is it humorous, entertaining, or clever.
We all remember what Kevin said. Many of us have already identified various flaws in his argument. He knows this. And we know he knows this. So please refrain from parroting his quotes back to us "ironically" and then presumably patting yourself on the back for a job well done for being such a sassy fellow.
I know that you are indeed capable of forming insightful thoughts and providing rational arguments. Please utilize those skills instead of your admittedly impressive skills of mocking repetition. Thanks.
It would improve the forum if we DAnCED the DAnCE of (lide) LIFE!!!
"I know that you are indeed capable of forming insightful thoughts and providing rational arguments. Please utilize those skills instead of your admittedly impressive skills of mocking repetition. Thanks."
Remember with great power comes snowmobiles!
You reap what you sow. In the end, a small community being upset about their home being demolished won't hinder whether or not the company will be successful, however, a history of false promises and well intentioned blunders will bite you in the butt.
Puzzlebox, I miss you.
This. ^
Also, one's home being demolished is inconsequential if the planet on which the home was demolished is also demolished.
[Praise withheld upon further revelations. Somewhat confused instead.]
Any chance the use of Markdown can be examined? @JesseW I think Kevin mentioned that you would know a bit about this.
This is some EXTREMELY interesting Reddit-style "shadow ban" shit right here:
Left window signed into "Rather Dashing", right signed into a different Telltale profile. Dislikes are gone for everybody who didn't directly challenge Kevin Bruner's voting system.
INTERESTING.
I can still see dislikes...
Dislikes don't really add anything, but negativity. So I agree that they should be removed.