State of the Site

State of the Site?

  • Absolutely stellar, never been better.

    Votes: 8 5.9%

  • Pretty much as good as usual.

    Votes: 37 27.4%

  • Not what it once was, but still fine.

    Votes: 54 40.0%

  • Definitely degrading.

    Votes: 11 8.1%

  • Pretty bad.

    Votes: 7 5.2%

  • It's locked in an unavoidable spiralling descent into destruction.

    Votes: 18 13.3%
  • Total voters
    135
Ennui

Ennui

The Freeman
Joined
Dec 31, 2003
Messages
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Well, vote. I want to see what the general consensus is about the state of the site.

also, if you think it's bad - what do you suggest we do to improve it?
 
Hmm, not what is once was imho, quality of the posters over the past couple of months seems to be slipping. Think this thread gives an insight into where hl2.net may end up.

Go to go, so improvement ideas later
 
It's not what it was when Half Life 2 came out, but what did you expect? Things will pick up again as soon as Half Life 3 is announced.
 
Its a lot better than it was a few months ago, but obviously not up there with the pre-hl2 era
 
These things go up and down. Right now it's on its way up I think, with DoD:S here, and Aftermath and Lost Coast coming.
 
create a new website called halflife3.net...........................

halflife2 is out, and has been for a year this website = almost irrelevant in that respect, a major move to target mod community and include indepth information on mods more, interviews with lead directors, that kind of thing

halflife3.net should be made, with a interface purely as halflife2.net once was speculation, talking about the game excitement information, news spnippets and a forum full of dedicated hl3.netters, this place is going down zee crapper cos its jsut randomers joining for the general off topic chat, i go there more than the halflife2 forum now for god sake.
 
as someone whose been here since pretty much the very beginning I must go with option 3
 
it's not as much fun as it once was but it's still coo
 
Well, I LOVED the DOD:S release night, that was a nice sample of pure pumped-ness :p
 
I voted last....

Unless something new and very exciting emerges from valve soon, hl2.net is going down, the mods should be given power to sort out General Half Life 2, so the "How to fix loading screen?" threads are moved to the Community Game Support forum etc.

Also the flames must stop, if someone makes a thread and you don't like it, just say something constructive or STFU from now on, yeah this is highly hypocritical of me after the other days thread, but that was something that could of been answered by a search or in the right forum.

Not sure where we went wrong, but with the right people running the forum, it may turn around.
 
What is it we can do to turn the site around? I mean, none of us are at all excited about Half-Life 2 anymore - it feels to me like the magic is gone. Day of Defeat: Source is still awesome though.

I propose that we try to enhance the feeling of community by doing community projects - a Day of Defeat: Source machinima, or a minor modification, stuff like that. Sourceworld was something that really brought us together back in the day and if we can get something going (not on that scale though) that everyone can be excited about and pitch in on, we might be able to make the site feel a lot cooler.
 
I dunno, mabye Aftermath or Half-life 3 or something, but this is ridiculous I don't mind reading about things people have done or interesting stories in general off topic... but "Daycare" or "Does it smell good in your room?", is shit and it pisses me off.

I totally agree with you though, Ennui, the community worked together best when everyone had something to contribute to, like the tests.

Yes! ask someone at Valve to make another test, to get some cool aftermath info or something, that could really work.
 
yeh thats what i mean atm all this site is is a forum, and a bit of news

Machinima would be good,

contests, aka art work... maybe a contest for who can complete lost coast in shortest time that kinda thing:)

Benchmarking forum for the hardware whores,

so on bring it together by increasing interaction et teams...

a hl2.net get together, a uk lanparty,, and so on
 
Not quite "It's locked in an unavoidable spiralling descent into destruction." yet, but I voted "pretty bad".
 
The site needs Valve to tease us with Half-Life 3. That way we'd get like 2000 members on the site at one time. We'd all get together and solve mysteries!

But, since we all know Half Life 3 is a longshot away. The forums are in a bad state!
 
Well, lets discuss what kind of project we should embark upon.

Our choices are limitless, but i think the main three things would be a contest of some sort, a mod, or a machinima.

I think a contest would be kind of lame and wouldn't get much support, but a machinima (DOD:S ftw!!) or perhaps a mod of some sort would attract people.

I'd say a DOD:S machinima - we might even be able to get tfg to help out.
 
sounds like a good idea, but with these sort of whole forum projects everybody gets really excited and puts loads of ideas in and then it goes nowhere. Look at forumland and sourceworld :(
 
sourceworld was super over ambitious. we can't think "oh it'll just fail" from the start though - even if it did fail, it'd give us something to do for a while. forumland fell apart because TDE disappeared, qckbeam got tangled up in real life and couldn't code it, and vegeta and I looked at each other, shrugged, and dropped it.
 
Definately degrading :(

The mods are nerfed to hell and can't moderate properly anymore, some not even moderating for fear of losing their status from complaints.

Munro is in denial that the site is in serious trouble (take a look from outside the box and this site has gone way down hill in the past months)

Certain members of staff are working against the site not for it.

Members are running free and in the case of a few of them basically deciding who stays and who goes, what stays open and what gets closed.

Quality of posts have hit rock bottom

Rules appear to be something the site had once or only apply to some and not others

Art contests, contests in general, great idea in theory but it took me and Zerimski a long time just to try get anything even remotely close to doing that right. Then it ended up being left to rot when nobody was there to take over and there was no help offered to try turn it into something special for the community.

Community projects, again good idea in theory, but SW showed you simply couldn't have so many people wanting to run it, 90% of the idea's submitted were terrible and I had no choice but to go underground with it or lose it completely. Community projects since then have rarely got past the first few posts, or ended up involving people who said they could do this and code that only for them to back out at the 11th hour when they realised they were actually newbish programmers with no actual talent in the field. Messing everyone around. So if some community project is going to succeed it MUST be done properly with the FULL backing of the site and some organisation. Having to make deals simply to get a new forum section just isn't good enough.

I think if the site wants a chance, there needs to be a very big shakeup, with staff, members and enforcing rules. Strict but fair, it used to work nicely and it can again.

tbh I'd suggest Munro give up the site to Chris_D, I might have rarely agreed with him in the past but look what he's done with his SIN site. Actions speak louder than words. (I can't mention ue3.org cause of my initial involvement with it)

Right now its going downhill. The member numbers are at an all time low and the impression given is its making a steady amount of money via ads for someone and little interest in changing things that could risk that.

Apart from visually, there's been little change to the site since 2003, now it just has a very corrupt feeling to it that tbh makes me wonder if Munro is even in control of it anymore, just some figurehead.

To those who are trying to improve things however they can, coming up with new idea's and trying to find out what people want, writing articles in the hopes they get uploaded or making tutorials or continuing to try enforce the rules of the site regardless of the complaining and planned attacks against you simply because your doing the right thing. I think thats great and wish more would be like that, I just think its like trying to fight a volcano with a chocolate orange right now and while I admire those of you trying. I just think your wasting your time until things are changed for the better.
 
Ennui said:
sourceworld was super over ambitious. we can't think "oh it'll just fail" from the start though - even if it did fail, it'd give us something to do for a while. forumland fell apart because TDE disappeared, qckbeam got tangled up in real life and couldn't code it, and vegeta and I looked at each other, shrugged, and dropped it.
Click to expand...

Sourceworld (the community project) failed. But the thing itself is going strong right now. It's just no longer called Sourceworld or related to Source or UE3 or crytek in any way. It was over ambitious for the Source engine, but as its own entity now its just right. Still huge but not tied to the limitations imposed from before when it was Sourceworld.

forumland's death cannot be contributed to my disapearance, as I made it clear from the start I would not be involved in it, I simply came up with the original idea (as a joke to begin with until it turned out people actually liked the idea) and it was left for qck, vegeta etc. to bring it to life. I made it clear back then I wouldn't have the time to work on it atall, I gave warning I could suddenly become very busy, which happened as I expected when I vanished for months. I'd sorted out what I could for it before I left but I was never part of the actual creation of it.
 
Naturally it won't be as it once was because we are all not speculating as madly (maybe) about what HL2 will be like. Now that it's out and has been played to death, I find this forum to be a nice place to chat because of several reasons:

1: No signature images.
2: Rational (for the most part) members. Few unmoderated mad rants.
3: Better sense of "community". We all like HL2. We've all been through the second ring of hell waiting for it's release, it's installation, update bugs, etc. The world map of all the members is the icing on the cake.
 
oh i know its still going, you gave me no illusions about that TDE :) but it did fail in the sense that it was a community project.
 
What someone considers to have been the best time period for this site is up to himself/herself; it's the first enjoyable impression you have about the site and what you remember about it and how it'll never be the same again.
 
Hmmm... a minor modification would be nice...
Like God Damned Undead : You can contribute ideas, models, concepts, skins,...
Everyone then decides if they find the (idea, model,...) fit in and interesting, it goes in the mod.
 
I couldnt agree more

almost a mission statement for this website would be a good idea, giving it definition of what it is.

there are really too many people for a project of sorts to really work, unless a set group of people made the decisions a forum were dedicated to it with no threads being makeable and a ,

ideas thread( State your idea title and describe)

A jobs Thread, listing everything needed, so like plant prop, 2d fight scenee containt yadaa yadda

Thread documenting progress only postable by set member group

for each of the required genres a subforum dedicated to say 2d art thread in there saying applications of fight scene yadda yadda , Wip examples

This could be easily acheiveable with a dedicated team, who can moderate the forum and keep it tidy,

the main website then could host updates and it would attract fledgling designers who want to try there hand at games design whilst still being managable overall.l

this would mean the website woudln ot only document the HL2 mod community but be part of it itself giving the website a new definition

this equals a sense of place at these forums instead of just simple general off topic forums and help my game is broken info......

One of the fourms downfalls was hetaria, as this excenuated a divide bewteen members bassically ripping the forums apart.
 
Joims said:
One of the fourms downfalls was hetaria, as this excenuated a divide bewteen members bassically ripping the forums apart.
Click to expand...

amen to that, brotha
 
Ennui said:
oh i know its still going, you gave me no illusions about that TDE :) but it did fail in the sense that it was a community project.
Click to expand...
:)

How about...

Droids
Make a mod where you build up your droids from parts kinda like Garry's Mod, then let them fight it out in an arena with other people's creations.

Rising Damp - The mod
Based on the popular 80's TV show and film with a digital versions of Frances de la Tour and the late great Leonard Rossiter.

Space Invaders
Make an absolutely over the top version in Source with every single bell and whistle and feature thrown in just for the hell of it

sideways scrolling shoot-em-up
In the style of the old classics such as R-Type and X-out. With those great powerups you could get, the wave after wave of the same ship/creature/thing and the end of level bosses

Teh Horror
Try and create something SO scary people will be afraid to play it.. Without simply ripping off Silent Hill. Prove Source is any good and tap into people's fear using the technology available

Wind up
Puzzle game, tons of maps, all set in offices. The way to win each map is to use deskfans pointing in the right directions to blow a small pingpong ball into the waste paper basket at the end of the office before the timer hits zero and the MD comes back from his lunch.
 
Do not bring Hetairia into this. I won't get into an argument about it. All I'll say is we were a result of the site undergoing entropy, not vice versa.

I can only wistfully imagine the possibilities inherent in a massive overhaul and reorganization of the site like TDE was talking about, but Munro will never let that happen.
 
I didnt want to bring it into this, i was simply commenting the first kinda thing that i feel caused it to go down hill......

i like the horror idea,

a smaller community project if munro would get of his behind would be a history of halflife2.net page, simply to bring people together rembering the good times of hl2.net and following it on from there.

by doing that a feel will be made for the method we can go about starting a small mod. allowing us to realsie problems with the systema dn fix them before going all out on something of a somewhat larger scale:)
 
Ennui said:
Do not bring Hetairia into this. I won't get into an argument about it. All I'll say is we were a result of the site undergoing entropy, not vice versa.
Click to expand...

/me zips mouth shut

I don't understand, who gets all the money from advertising and so on? Surely it can't all go towards the cost of the website?
 
We need the admins to be close to the community, something they've failed to do so far. The only of the four admin you can see on the boards is Chris, but that's not enough. I wasn't here during the first year, but I've been here well over a year now, and I don't think the quality of the posts has changed that much. It just feels like attention has been taken from the HL2 forums to the Lounge. As far as I'm concerned, this board stopped being about HL2 a long tima ago.
 
Not what it once was ever since the political thread has been online
 
Definitely degrading for me. :/

It's still a fun place to post...but you know what? Recently some idiot noob dragged up an old thread. Who did I see? Brian Damage. Snakebyte. Pendragon. Old members. Suicide42 typing badly. It made me so ****ing depressed I almost cried. ;(

It's been going downhill since the Munro incident.

Unless something new and very exciting emerges from valve soon, hl2.net is going down, the mods should be given power to sort out General Half Life 2, so the "How to fix loading screen?" threads are moved to the Community Game Support forum etc.
Click to expand...

YES. Whoever's moderating the HL2 forums, make it stop. :(
 
I've considered writing a History of Halflife2.net page but I've never had the application beyond the inclination. The main problem with that as a community project is that most people don't totally know about everything and are completetly wrong on some accounts, as the wikipedia article demonstrated (people were so wrong in what they wrote there it was amusing).

What we do needs to be something that can be worked on by a (relatively) small team of core members supported by the site as a whole working as "ideas" people. The community would drive the direction of the project and anyone could contribute if they had the abilities, but most of the work would be done by a core team.

Hetairia is doing this with Zombie Master and it's working out beautifully, so I'm curious to see how it'd work with a much larger community like this.

Also I would completely support deleting the Politics forum, but then all the filth from it would be in Off-Topic instead.
 
Munro gets the money............. What he does with it is probs very little as i have no idea how much google ads are worth+

21 quid for a.net domain for 3 years

hosting probs costs a bit more seeing as the amount of bandwidth this site gets through

Ennui:

giving the community the ability to contribute work to a project and let a core team do the managing would make quite an effective system,
everyone would get metioned inthe creds who even posted an idea, as one persons idea can inspire someone else into an even better one

it woudl bring ppl together, a hl2.netter who lives near another, they coudl work together doing a lil bit and submit it, liek one models one animates kinda thing

Just needs to be set up well. and requires actual moderation
 
Valve Software and Limelight Networks host Halflife2.net for free on the same servers as Steam. This is why we go down at the same time as Steam or Steampowered. Otherwise the hosting would cost a hell of a lot (hundreds and hundreds of bucks a month) and it'd be totally rightful for Munro to advertise for the money to cover that.
 
The Dark Elf said:
Community projects since then have rarely got past the first few posts, or ended up involving people who said they could do this and code that only for them to back out at the 11th hour when they realised they were actually newbish programmers with no actual talent in the field.
Click to expand...

You're such a funny guy.
 
Ta for clearing that up Ennui,

SO where the hell si munro, you woulda thought an owner of such a massive community would actully put more input into it, its like it has been left to the mods....
 
How about we don't fight in this thread, qckbeam and TDE? Take it to PM if you're really so irked about it, but I don't think TDE's comment was at all called for.

Munro is in Florida for a few weeks, he left a couple of days ago.

The thing is, he's a nice guy and all that - but he doesn't do anything more than minor aesthetic or content changes. The site is stagnating worse than a dead body in the desert and he does nothing about it. We're experiencing a horrible case of entropy and yet all he can do is change the forum colors a bit.
 
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