RMNV4 FEEDBACK

Posts

Be nice if there were script categories (battle, menu, on-map, graphical etc.). If this ever lifts off to be a popular script resource, it would be hard for people to find the scripts they're looking for.

The reason why we don't/shouldn't have graphical resources is because there are already established places and/or archives that are easy to find. Scripts are a little different as they're usually found in annoying forums you have to register to.
Starscream
Conquest is made from the ashes of one's enemies.
6110
We actually have already implemented script categories (you can even designate them when submitting/viewing the scripts). What we lack is a way to filter them currently when viewing the lists. We'll probably change that at some point.
hi
http://rpgmaker.net/scripts/rmvx/

http://rpgmaker.net/scripts/rmxp/


Ye of little faith...

(script categories are filtered by engine. so you have to choose an engine first.)
Starscream
Conquest is made from the ashes of one's enemies.
6110
See? kentona is quick.

*resigns in shame*
Kudos, Rhyme! And while we're on the subject of mock-ups... Hey, a man can dream, can't he? xP

Warning, huge image!
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/6507/locker/Mockup.jpg
author=Adon237
Alright, I was trying to submit audio medias for my game, and when I did, it would not play in the player. My guess is because it is MIDI. Is there any way to enable us to play MIDI's ?


No. It is called an mp3 tag for a reason. It only does mp3s!
author=alterego
Kudos, Rhyme! And while we're on subject of the mock-ups... Hey, a man can dream can't he? xP

Warning, huge image!
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/6507/locker/Mockup.jpg


I really like this layout. Looks much more organized and easier to read.

Add some sort of break or coloration to divide each section (something subtle) and I'd say it's be pretty near perfect!
I dunno, it seems more cluttered to me. All the "busy" stuff is crammed together. Maybe if there were small divides it would look better. This mock-up lays everything out in 2 big blocks.

With the current design the "Gamespot" section acts like a divide and makes it feel more balanced overall, imo. The current design has everything in 4 distinct layers.
I... disagree. The "gamespot" section doesn't serve so much as a divide as it looks just clunky and out of place. Alterego's take on the site makes much more efficient use with the space provided. And RMN already needs breaks between each section...

I took the liberty of adding minor modifications to alterego's mockup. Just to show how dramatically dividers for each section can 'clean up' the front page.
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/1962/locker/Mockup.jpg
Solitayre
Circumstance penalty for being the bard.
18257
author=narcodis
I took the liberty of adding minor modifications to alterego's mockup. Just to show how dramatically dividers for each section can 'clean up' the front page.
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/1962/locker/Mockup.jpg


I really like this.
author=Solitayre
author=narcodis
I took the liberty of adding minor modifications to alterego's mockup. Just to show how dramatically dividers for each section can 'clean up' the front page.
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/1962/locker/Mockup.jpg
I really like this.

yes

author=Rhyme
This one is just mildly odd, not much of an actual problem but I think it's worth a look:

(They have something in common, guess what)

What about something like this?


It's just strange for me to see 6/8 of the headers say the same word.
But yeah minor issue, doesn't matter that much.

Also this, it's minor but really, 'latest' everywhere is sort of obnoxious.
author=narcodis
I... disagree. The "gamespot" section doesn't serve so much as a divide as it looks just clunky and out of place. Alterego's take on the site makes much more efficient use with the space provided. And RMN already needs breaks between each section...

I took the liberty of adding minor modifications to alterego's mockup. Just to show how dramatically dividers for each section can 'clean up' the front page.
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/1962/locker/Mockup.jpg


Mmm...that is sexy. yeah baby.
Rhyme
Tear Harvester Rhyme
7582
kentona introduced me to Opera's element editing abilities yesterday and we messed with the front page a bit. :D

Headers 1.8em > 1.6em
Base font 1em > 0.8em
background-colors: #eeeeee, and #303030
colors: #ffffff
I don't actually know what happened to the gem on the top of the page :< it disappeared somehow

edit:
padding and margin of many elements were significantly reduced. (30 px and 24 px is pretty big!)
Despite
When the going gets tough, go fuck yourself.
1340
yeah baby, yeah!!!
Good replies! I'll respond to some visual and flow-related commentary, as I am planning to work on some design changes that focus on these aspects.

@Anaryu: The point size for front page fonts likely didn't change; the new font probably is inherently larger. This is something that I will be looking at.

@Mog: Did a hard refresh (shift-F5) ever fix that problem you were seeing? As Kenton indicated, it should not appear that way on any browser. If it is, I will look into browser cross-compatibility in more depth.

@Xeilmach: The flow of the site naturally does this; to draw more eye to trending topics and leaving the site-generated auto content down below. As you indicated, this might not be preferred by all of the site's users. I was considering adding a link up top somewhere that would page down to all of the Latest Submissions. Hopefully you'll find that to be a simple and elegant solution to your issue.

@Rhyme: Re: white space, it might seem a little OCD to have the headers not be centered in the available white space vertically, but it serves the purpose of the header better. They might seem to "float" a little more because the headers are stuck in that white space, which could be solved by offering different styling for the headers, which I was also considering.

Re: the ribbons screwing up when the screen is sized down, this will be corrected one way or another.

Re: the hard-to-read text in certain areas, if not already corrected, this will be addressed too

Re: all caps, it depends on the font. Since the font in use is pretty thin, I agree that all caps might be a little too clumsy. With the right font, one with more weight and width, it will look better, but ultimately we'll go with what looks best.

Re: main column being too bright in contrast with the background color, I tend to agree, and will definitely be considering something more elegant

@Mog et others: latest comments were pretty popular, the code is working, and I'd like to work that in to the front page as well. As a content item, that's more up to Holb, kenton, and anky, but I can make it work either way.

@Dyhalto: While we'll never design the site to be navigable without a horizontal scrollbar, I'm curious to know what breaks the design now as opposed to before? The previous version was width 980, so that would have had horizontal bars, too. This really shouldn't be all that different. Any issues I can address, I will.

@narcodis: good ideas about putting links in headers. A simple fix.

@nesfreak: Game pages will be looked at. I'd like to have a layout that allows the default layout to not only look nice, but play nicely with custom layouts. We'll see what happens.

@zephyr: Probably right about being able to compact things. The headers are probably larger than needed when we can use more subtle design elements to separate the content and make it more presentable. I will be looking at this.

@felipe: Did you ever get those things set back up? Those are pretty simple elements that shouldn't have completely stopped working, but I'll look at them if they did.

@link: The clickable links should all be the same color, as you indicate. Will be looked at. Also, regarding breadcrumb links at the top of forum threads, I don't see why I wouldn't be able to copy the code down below and put it up above. Maybe make it smaller and a little more eloquent so that it's not forcing everything down.

@Locke: Making an adaptable layout with as much predefined and auto-generated content as we have would be a pretty massive undertaking. Again, I'm wondering how the site used to look on a 800x600 display because WIP said it certainly wasn't adaptable before. On the other hand, I might look into making a mobile site layout as well.

@Rhyme again, re: all the "latest" sections, ding ding ding =) That has been fresh in my mind and will likely show up in some form in any design I come up with.

@alterego, narcodis, Solitayre, Darken: Thank you, alterego, for the effort in producing the mockup =) It, along with narcodis's revisions, implements some solid ideas, many of which I've had in my own mockups in the past. Let me break things down some more, then we can discuss (which may not be as effective as producing more mockups, but I don't have time for that now).

First of all, the header. It's come to my attention that donors do not see ads up top, so instead they get a massive white space next to the logo. Due to this, I would likely have the RMN logo share the same vertical space as the navigation bar, so that it looks good without an ad, and if ads ARE displayed, they merely push everything down a bit. For that reason, the larger logo should probably shrink down in size as seen in the mockup. I would probably do it similar to as shown.

Now, I have to disagree with shoving all the eye candy together. The "gamespot" section was indeed designed to serve as a separation between staff-generated content and site-generated content below it. The above-the-fold mentality of having all of that imagery there when the site loads is not needed, and can be quite overwhelming.

I can appreciate the desire for efficiency, but unlike designing a ui for a game, as an example, we have web browsers with perfectly functioning scrollbars; vertical real estate is not an issue, and to that effect we should use more of it to make things more readable. I like how cleanly organized narcodis's table of content below looks, but it is very cramped and has a "wall-of-content" appearance where the headings actually just kinda of get lost within those dark dividing elements. In short, you were right about providing the separation of sections, narcodis, but the dark gray lines and lack of vertical spacing between them removes that subtlety that previously was provided by white space.

All in all, I agree with many of the ideas put forward; what I'm going to be attempting to do is to execute them eloquently with an emphasis on readability.


EDIT: Look at Rhyme's latest post; this is an example of making subtle changes that improve readability. Slight changing of colors of the headings, and he left the slight vertical spacing after each element. A great example.
Solved!


and for easter, it will be all pastel colours!

TehGuy
Resident Nonexistence
1827
I just got back from my break from the site.

Then I was like 0-0 when I saw the new page
author=TehGuy
I just got back from my break from the site.

Then I was like 0-0 when I saw the new page
Like....
??
Oh, hey, it's nice to see some discussion going on in here. I thought my post was just going to get ignored or something. =)

Now, my mock-up had some annotations but I removed them because they looked ugly. But, I'll explain my reasoning here...

One of my main grievances with the current layout of the site is it's middle section, because I think it kinda looks just thrown together and it breaks the harmony of the rest of the site's design.

The "What's buzzing" section not only is too big/wide to just be consisting of four links and a little commentary; but it's also a two columns section when the rest of the site can be divided into three columns. As far as I know this is a no-no in editorial design because everything has to fit the same grid. Web design can't be that different, can it?
The "Gamespots" section on its part isn't really that bad but it is rather poorly aligned with everything else, and it puts most of its weight to the right when the rest of the site does it to the left.

So what did I do? I flipped the "gamespots" section horizontally, and fitted the "what's buzzing" section into two columns aligned to the left as well. This way the first two columns can be seen as one main column that displays most of its information from left to right. While the third or side column is basically a listing of things. (top to bottom)

The alleged benefit of putting all the "eye-candy" at the top was that people new to the site could have a glimpse of the very best this community has to offer without having to scroll down one bit. While the bottom half is more text-heavy and community-oriented for us regulars who already are familiar with the site. And if you think about it, the distinction between staff-generated and site-generated content is still (kinda) there... In any case, I guess one alternative could be to keep the current order and put something else besides the the "what's buzzing" section or expand it so it now includes six entries instead of four.

Let me also add that I think some of the site's 'busyness' could be alleviated by optimizing the number of fonts used on it. If I'm not mistaken there's at least 6 different types of fonts. (and they come in all sizes too!) But just like there's a "Three tile rule" to mapping, you could also say there's a "Three fonts rule" when it comes to design. =P

So anyway, those are my arguments... And, here's an updated version of my mock-up including some of people's suggestions:

http://rpgmaker.net/users/alterego/locker/Mockup.jpg
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
Here are some screens of the site in 800x600 resolution, before and after the introduction of RMN4. Seems it didn't actually fit before either, but the parts that were cut off were less important (mostly just descriptions of things, while the names of those things didn't get cut off). Also apparently it cut off at a column break, which made it look a little prettier in 800x600 I guess, at the cost of making it so some people probably didn't even notice that it could scroll to the right.

The old one was I guess slightly less wide also, but they both fit in 1024 and neither one fits in 800, so that only really mattered to people who don't maximize their browser window. And no one cares about those people.

http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/6579/locker/RMN3_800x600.png

http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/6579/locker/RMN4_800x600.png