thund3r
Alis
Its about time.
Posts: 361
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Post by thund3r on Nov 22, 2015 19:45:25 GMT
I remember a few years back (2011'ish) this place was used very often and had a very active community, the few faces that posted often are still around from back then but it appears not to be as widely used. What do you guys think?
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Post by Rastanfarian on Nov 22, 2015 21:22:08 GMT
I agree that the activity is down. I spent several years as a lurker before joining/posting. I think the two biggest reasons are:
1. We are getting older. I think most of the community is about my age... born late 70's early 80's. I started my family young, so I am not a good example, but I would assume many are in those "insane family years". One or more little ones running around the house, mom and dad taking any free minute they can to rest. Hobbies get pushed to the side...
2. Recent "controversies" such as the mega drive section and game reproduction have left several long time members quiet and others have left altogether. Not sure if this in fact has anything to do with the very recent lack of activity. Just a guess.
Nevertheless, SMS fans are a loyal and nostalgic group. Even if activity is down, the community is always strong!
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thund3r
Alis
Its about time.
Posts: 361
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Post by thund3r on Nov 22, 2015 22:09:45 GMT
I'll agree Rastanfarian, i'm at a stage where things are getting serious with my misses and we are ready to take the plunge into more serious 'things' and over time my gaming has become more casual as the xbox one has had little play since I got it earlier in the year. But the one thing I keep hold of is the nostalgia of gaming even though i don't have the time at the moment the memories from playing SMS as a kid still make me happy.
I'm unaware of the controversies your on about but i'll assume whatever happened it wasn't positive for the community, I think whatever the situation the SMS has always been small in conjunction with the NES or Atari community, lets just hope for the best and see whats to come...
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Post by Kenneth on Nov 23, 2015 13:08:34 GMT
Also, I think facebook killed the internet discussion boards, as it did with blogs Except for a couple of "big" ones, most of the videogame forums on which I used to spend a lot of time (that's around 50 different forums) are dying. The old guys like me not posting much anymore (mainly because they got all their questions answered in the past) resulting in the young guys not posting much because they feel like the boards are dead.
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Post by ShadowAngel on Nov 23, 2015 15:53:44 GMT
I agree that the activity is down. I spent several years as a lurker before joining/posting. I think the two biggest reasons are: I agree with them and i would add that there just isn't that much to talk about the Master System. Let's face it, homebrew and prototypes aside, the console is dead for 20 years and we talked about all the games and everything there is to it. So outside of homebrew, new prototypes and "how much is this worth?" there's not a lot that hasn't been discussed to death. Actually what i miss most from back in the day (waaaaay back, i just saw i'm here for nearly 12 years, crazy!) is all the insane funny banter that once populated the off topic section. Anybody remember TransButtah and his zany antics? I think there are still ways to make this forum more active. What about the SMS Quiz for example? After the fourth one, it just died even though it was really popular. I said it before: Making a new Top 100 with votes from the people. Oppinions change and the last one is about 3 years old. And in general i wonder why there isn't all that much talk about the games. I get the impression these days everybody is more concerned about the value of their collection, selling stuff or being afraid of having a fake cartridge, rarely even playing the games anymore?! Why not restart the SMS Game Club? I think new people are somewhat afraid of writing something in those topics because at most message boards you get shouted at for "necroing/bumping" a topic that is older than 2 months. And i still think a Mega Drive section wouldn't be bad, it was the follow-up to the Master System, it has sequels to MS Games (like Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle, Super Fantasy Zone or the Shinobis) and related games (like Sonic or the Disney games) and i guess everybody who has a Master System has an MD too.
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Post by Transatlantic Foe on Nov 23, 2015 17:52:13 GMT
Restart the game club and archive off the old threads so previously done games can be revisited by newer members without necro-bumping threads? Maybe throw in score challenge/speed runs/other challenges so that people who've played a game a lot still can contribute?
More game club might inspire more threads about games in particular?
Would love to see more of the quiz!
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thund3r
Alis
Its about time.
Posts: 361
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Post by thund3r on Nov 23, 2015 19:07:51 GMT
Oh god the TransButtah threads! I'd almost forgot about those, where is he now? Maybe things just need to be brought up to modern day standards? Move the boards to something more social (phbBB?) or have something on facebook instead? Maybe slightly drastic after making this thread upon having a few years away, but how would you generate interest in a forum that has been going for over 10 years? I used to visit this place when Shinobiman was running the site and there are some great memories, reading people's stories or reading up about the tectoy carts that i would have missed, if it were not for this site i would never have picked up an SMS again. I still see that Playgenerayion Aypok and rupert still post here which means a lot of the big collectors still post, so there is a small community that has lasted on here, but times are changing i guess?
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Post by Maxim on Nov 23, 2015 19:16:56 GMT
It's wrong to think you can't talk about something that has been discussed before, the same as it's not wrong to necro-bump threads. The important part is to get some engagement with others on the forum, which is a function of how many people are around, how much effort they are putting in (e.g. playing a game for an hour in order to get the context) and how much they have to contribute.
There's rather too many people who produce noise about saying hello and welcome and look at this funny picture but that's perfectly suited to Facebook. Not that it doesn't have its place, but the point is to generate something interesting and new - which is still not that hard IMO - rather than to go through the motions.
For example, why not make your own SMS quiz? It's not that hard - it doesn't have to be beautiful, screenshots are easy to make in an emulator, and you can cut them in Paint or online image editors. You can rip the audio from Youtube playthroughs (e.g. savefrom.net) and trim using free online tools or free software like Audacity.
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Post by playgeneration on Nov 23, 2015 20:44:19 GMT
I still visit but don't have much spare time to contribute these days. I don't have the money to collect games any more, especially since what I don't have is all expensive to get. So no collection updates have come from me in years. I don't really have time to play games either, be that Master System or anything else. I didn't like how out of shape I had got due to getting older and not being a youthful fit by default, so fitness is a big time muching hobby of mine now.
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Post by ShadowAngel on Nov 24, 2015 0:39:02 GMT
I still visit but don't have much spare time to contribute these days. I think that is the problem with "retro gaming" in general. It went from "i played it as a child, i play it now, the memories are awesome, playingi t now combined with flashback to my youth are awesome" to "I collect it, how much is that worth, how much is this, what is a full PAL set, how much is it worth, there's a prototype of something!" Don't get me wrong i find it fascinating that prototypes of games or would be games show up and i took part in the investigation of The Godfather for the Master System, that was never released, was suspected to be like the Amiga game and was even reviewed in a german magazine and all that but i think we lost ourselve in the collector stuff, wondering hoiw much something is worth, what is a collection even while forgetting the reason we are here: to enjoy games, to relieve memories. I find those "how much is my collection worth", "is this a real cartridge or fake?" when i think it should be a mor eabout game discusions, memories, stories and of course high score challenges because the master system was segas try to bring arcade to your home and i don't see that because retro gaming turned into a contest about who go the most expensive game or who sold the game for the biggest price. And when you hear "i don't have the money" that is sad, it just shows how much it is about people jerking off about how they spend a ton of money to get some box cover variant or some cartrige variant or whatever when it really just should be about the games itself and the system itself in a celebration about our youth and the fun times we had back then and the fun times we even today have. Don't take all this stuff serious, it's games, it's fun, it's a flashback to your youth.
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Post by Stan on Nov 24, 2015 2:51:01 GMT
Mainly just a time thing for me now with the little girl. Most of my day is spent finishing work or playing with her. But she's starting to get into games. But yeah, I think Shadow hit on all the main points.
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Post by Stan on Nov 24, 2015 2:53:01 GMT
This is still one of two most active SMS forums, though, there's no doubt about that. When I first started coming here years ago when Shinobiman was running it, there was almost no one around. At that time we were just starting to compile all the things you see on the site today including hardware data. There's only a finite amount of that stuff to discover, and now it's just an occasional thing. I really want to get into retro gaming again, but my career is obviously first since this is just for fun.
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Post by flatapex on Nov 24, 2015 8:24:03 GMT
I think for a lot of us, real life has got in the way. For the last 2 and a half years I was one of the most active members on the forum, makes sense as I was new to the system, didn't have one as a kid, loads of new memories to make.
The last few months have been awful, any free time I have these days are either spent caring for my terminally ill father in law, at my own medical appointments, or trying to catch up on everything else that we all have to do, some of the odd minutes here and there are easier spent here rather than playing the games because its not always the most practical thing to get a master system out.
I agree with what shadowangel has said, the main thing is just enjoying the games, rather than having to own everything and rather than more, better, more valuable. I think the key to maintaining the site is the off topic section, talking about what has been keeping us busy away from the games. If work has been keeping you busy- what do you do? if you have been away on holiday- where did you go? bought another system- what is it? and what is it like owning one?
I admit I dont have the money for some things I am missing but that is because I like kiosk demos, and they are not exactly flooding ebay lol, when it comes to "normal" games, I don't bother with the expensive stuff, if I played the common, cheap, good games to completion (i'm looking at YOU gran turismo) then that would take me plenty long enough
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Post by balkry on Nov 24, 2015 8:36:10 GMT
I agree with you, the forums do not die, but they decrease in quality. For all the reasons you have given: our ages, family, less time, too many collectors who do not really care about games (and myself first, I am in many of these categories). With time, things will be even worse because a lot has already been said. But I agree with Maxim, not everything has been done. I think that if we want to recover in the coming years, the most important would be to refocus on the games. We must want to replay. Most of us do not know a lot of games (maybe 30-50). It may be time to force us to rediscover games. In recent months, I worked on the wiki of smspower, and it made me want to play games I did not know (or little). Too many are underestimated or ignored. It might be time to rebuild "a game of week / month", this could restart topics...
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Post by rupert on Nov 24, 2015 21:26:07 GMT
I agree with you, the forums do not die, but they decrease in quality. For all the reasons you have given: our ages, family, less time, too many collectors who do not really care about games (and myself first, I am in many of these categories). With time, things will be even worse because a lot has already been said. But I agree with Maxim, not everything has been done. I think that if we want to recover in the coming years, the most important would be to refocus on the games. We must want to replay. Most of us do not know a lot of games (maybe 30-50). It may be time to force us to rediscover games. In recent months, I worked on the wiki of smspower, and it made me want to play games I did not know (or little). Too many are underestimated or ignored. It might be time to rebuild "a game of week / month", this could restart topics... I like this, re-discover or discover games. I have every game but there is no way I have played them all properly, including some of the good ones! I visit the forum nearly every day but as i'm not adding to my collection offten I have not posted as much. Also I don't always have the spare time to help with questions like I used to. I still love this place though, and look forward to the annual meet ups!
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