These forums are dead...

#1 Uhh... Mark... you've been a member now for 24 hours. There are many people who live on these forums... not just visit. I'm sure your in for a surprise at how active the GarageGames' forums are. Welcome to the community.

#2 I'm here everyday, as are several others. I'm just not as helpful as they are.

#3 I know I haven't joined until recently, but I have been reading and watching these forums for ages...
And from what I can see the Torque forums are much smaller and less active then other ones like GameSpot. Just my opinion, so don't crucify me for it.

#4 Well, you might find more information is being shared here than at Gamespot nevertheless, ;)

#5 I guess your right, there are SO MANY unhelpful people at gamespot that either spam or flame, at least nobody here is like that =D

-Mark Grooby

#6 I guess your right, there are SO MANY unhelpful people at gamespot that either spam or flame, at least nobody here is like that =D

-Mark Grooby

#7 Roflmao.... Sorry for the accidental refresh.

#8 Most posts, arent in the public area.

#9 I basically live here. Here and the Uru live forums. Theres alot more talk in the pirvate threads than the public ones.
But If you removed the Flaming and the "Who would you rather date - Alyx or Cortana?" threads from Gamespot it would basically be empty, It's what keeps their community alive ;)

#10 Hey mark -

it's hard not to sound glassy-eyed and zealotous here, but i'm gonna give it a shot anyway and say that the GG community, aka The Forums, has one of the highest signal-to-noise ratios i've ever encountered. if your impression is that the forums are dead, then it's possible you're not browsing them in the best way.

my favorite way of consuming the forums is thru the what's new page. i catch at least twenty posts there every day which are either directly relevant to my projects or just interesting to me in general.

anywho.
if yr still feeling like the forums are dead, drop me a line and i'll point you in the less-dead direction.

orion

#11 Heh I saw this thread's title and I thought he was talking about somewhere else...I was curious, now I'm just laughing. =) ( and, BTW, Definitely Cortana, she's smarter and will never age.)

#12 Please help me on the thread, "two questions..."
Thanks

-Mark Grooby

#13 Also, my last question on the thread, "two questions..." has not been answered for at least 5 hours. Compared to some other places, that is pretty much dead. Gamespot forum are almost like chatrooms, thats how fast you get replies.
Not trying to be insulting/offensive.

EDIT: My question answered. Yay!

-Mark Grooby

#14

Quote:Also, my last question on the thread, "two questions..." has not been answered for at least 2 hours.

Give it some time. People are working on games and do not sit on the forums all the time. You have to wait a day or two for responses. Several reasons why you have to wait: different time zones, people working on their games, people only check forums once a day or every other day, or may not know the answer to your question, or your title of your thread "two questions" should be more specific (you also had more than two questions:)). I responded to your thread "two questions" before I read this one.

I personally read/scan the forums once a day as well as the blogs. Since I own licenses to all three engines, it takes an hour every day to go through. I try to reply to a couple of thread each time as I am doing here and on your other thread.

edit: spelling

#15 @Mark G.

To expand a bit on what Mark B. said, the Garage Games forums definitely have a different audience than GameSpot. Many of us are doing almost all of the labor on our respective projects, so we are pulled in several different directions. Programming, scripting, modeling, texturing, marketing, documentation, webpage design and tech support for our projects takes a lot of time. And many of the people around here have regular full-time jobs, wives, kids, mortgages, etc. to keep them occupied.

Having said all that, I'm constantly impressed by the number of helpful people on these forums offering their time, knowledge and encouragement to other members of the community.
That's very cool.

#16 Hi Mark G,

The day these forums turn into GameSpot forums, I'm gone.
Number of posts doesn't equal quality, and if I want chat I'll go to a chatroom.

Edit: Doh, there are two Marks in here.

#17 You are comparing disparate communities. For a better example using a similar community (in some ways the same one), you should look at the GameFAQs Game Programming and Design forum, which houses a small splinter community on the GameFAQs forums, which I'm sure you know is merged with the GameSpot forums, combining two once fiercely site-dedicated communities into a single one (with minor points of deviation between the two forums). I've been a moderator at GameFAQs since June 2000 and at GameSpot since the merge, and comparing the signal-to-noise ratio on a packed forum(s) of game players versus one comprised of game developers doesn't make much sense. Comparing GameDev.Net would be a bit closer.

Now, if you frequented some of the lower traffic forums (say for import titles, though not the popular ones guaranteed to come here such as the FF ttitles), you will notice a much slower traffic flow than most any social board. If you frequent social boards, then almost any game board (except the FF, GTA, Oblivion, etc boards) will seem slow in comparison. You can often get help for individual games more quickly (sometimes with as much detail) than on the individual game boards or within the game unions.

Making games takes much, much more time than playing them. What I would recommend is that if you are feeling that your posts aren't being answered, get into IRC and ask them there. But I'd also recommend hanging out for a bit and figuring out the flow of the community--which I recommend when entering any community.

#18 I spend most of my time in the TGE, RTS-SDK, TGB private forums and in TDN, but even there, I usually read what people have written rather than write my own. There is so much meaty content there you'd have to buy an engine and try use it to understand. Even when people do respond, they often take at least a day or two to test out the question, write some code, or find the answer. Heck, in the RTS-SDK forum the guys spent over a month trying the find the script code that was lost...but they found it. What you'll get here is dedication, respect, and powerful, meaty answers. So, as they mentioned above, garbage is quick and easy to produce. Quality and meat are hard. So, if you want garbage, pick anther forum community, here at GG, we like nice juicy steak. ;)

Edited to remove the psychic reference. Also, noting that is why I like to read rather than write comments. ;)

#19

Quote:I usually read what people have read

Are you psychic ?

#20 It's very true that most posts are in the private forums that product owners have access to. Most of the public forums are basic questions about the products. If you have any questions that have not been asked or you can't find just ask. The community is very helpful as long as you are willing to put in the effort to figure out stuff for yourself as well.