Aerothorn on 12/5/2012 at 00:07
Quote Posted by Muzman
I can't tell people to like the place, but how did people become incapable of ignoring the things they don't like? You may not like seeing Koki and dethtoll fight for a couple of pages, but if you can't look past it you're really not trying.
Responding to this late, but I have to respectfully disagree. It wasn't some isolated spats; almost every thread in gen gaming became a vitriolic pissing fest, and the few "new member" threads we got we instantly filled with the sort of bile you only roll out if you're actively trying to drive people away.
I never "gave up" on TTLG. I'm still here, and I will be for some time. But you cannot lay the fate of the website at the feet of any one individual; I cannot resurrect it, I cannot increase the member count, and I'm not going to get anywhere by saying "hey guys be nice" (GBM and RBJ taught me that years ago). TTLG always had an attitude, but it was only in recent years that the sort of "friendly slug" became "fuck you and die."
However, I do agree that it there is no singular blame for its death. It's a conflation of factors. As Stitch (and many others) have noted, Web 2.0 has brought offerings that are more appealing than forums for most people; that's the whole reason they've supplanted them, it's not a random act of fate. And so the casuals started peeling off, and for whatever reason it ended up that the most diehard members of TTLG were (in general) the most vitriolic. Everyone shares responsibility; the people who left, the people who stayed, Mark Zuckerberg. But I'm not sure you can lay the blame on any one party.
I'd also like to say that I think this discussion is the most heartfelt thing we've had in years.
Mr.Duck on 12/5/2012 at 00:21
Hear-fucking-hear!
Goldmoon Dawn on 12/5/2012 at 00:21
Quote Posted by Aerothorn
TTLG always had an attitude, but it was only in recent years that the sort of "friendly slug" became "fuck you and die."
Obviously I blame dethtoll lol or was it metal dawn. I cant remember! :p
jtr7 on 12/5/2012 at 01:35
There's plenty of activity, but more and more aborted attempts to start topics, and fear of starting a topic only to watch it get aborted, bloody or not. I still have a great interest in TTLG, as a legacy site, and have a lot of things I'd like to discuss, and I'm not alone. TTLG has become the wrong place to enjoy LGS gaming conversation, with fan-missions being the closest general topic to LGS's official games. The most knowledgeable peeps are either gone or reluctant posters, and the burn-outs have taken up the hobby of killing threads, to name a couple of the many things within TTLG causing people to not post or stay. Discussing favorite games is an uphill battle, and I only post less and less for being tired, sick, or sick and tired, yet not at all burnt out on the games themselves or the wish to talk about every little thing.
A lot of us have moved past hoping members seen as antagonistic (wrongly or rightly) will just leave a thread alone, instead of posting against a topic--especially those who seem to have no interest or connection with it who won't just pass over it--and have reached a point where we are sadly-relieved those members are just gone altogether. Watching my intent turned on its head over and over, and every attempt to fix it backfiring and compounding has made me miserable with those members. My increased use of smilies a few years back was an attempt to clear up misunderstanding, and to have them labeled as "passive-aggressive"--the opposite of the truth--was pretty damaging, along with all the lectures that would only apply if I wasn't, in fact, coming from the opposite view to begin with.
I've watched the same methods used against many other members, continually baffling those of us specially cursed to be in that category, until we've had no good choices left, making the choices to slam doors and burn bridges, hoping there wouldn't be any sort of...invasion. Thankfully, there was only one incident of a member clicking through my Friends List on my profile page, one friend after the other, with a backhanded comment questioning the veracity of the goodwill between myself and anyone, when those friends simply understood my intent and didn't seize onto the opposite as "fact".
I've been told several times by friends through PMs that the people I'm most in conflict with are funny and make them laugh. I don't know what that has to do with the problems, but the people I'm in conflict with most should know that that's the greatest defense of them that's been offered. I don't know. I like the funny a lot, myself, and miss it when it's not there, even at my expense.
I know I've been a part in driving away members, including my friends, and a great percentage of us die-hards have lashed out at the innocent for sounding too much like the people or social archetypes we are fed up with in a raw moment. Plus, we've been here long enough to see a new generation of gaming culture, and all the foreignness of a generation gap.
The silence of mods and admins regarding FAQs, the hub, and other important connections with members and new-comers, has made another uphill battle of some common interactions.
We are long past the point of wondering why we should bother, and have graduated to knowing it's pointless, and cruising at another altitude about it all. I don't see us infusing the forums with renewed vigorous activity, certainly not in a sustained cyclical manner, but what's happening on Facebook is mostly just saying hello to missed friends and characters. Reconnecting and playing catch-up with people is the heart of it, and buzzing around that is the recollection of shared interests, testing memories, but of course, organically and fully human, not clinically as my words suggest. As long as discussion is a battle where the intent is to kill the topic or kill the messenger, not open it up to all the strange and uncomfortable and wonderful, etc., TTLG will continue to atrophy.
june gloom on 12/5/2012 at 01:50
Quote Posted by Goldmoon Dawn
Obviously I blame dethtoll lol or was it metal dawn. I cant remember! :p
I tend to reserve "fuck you and die" for very specific individuals though. :( Everyone else just gets "fuck you."
Avalon on 12/5/2012 at 02:04
I think what I enjoy most about this thread is that the people crying the loudest about how TTLG's downfall has been its failure to evolve and change, were the very same people in a thread a few months back loudly proclaiming that TTLG doesn't need to evolve OR change and summarily dismissing all ideas being thrown about as entirely unnecessary. The thing rotting away TTLG's core is, well, its core, crying about how something needs to be done but doing a 180 whenever the opportunity arrives to actually do something about it. You guys are the most Republican bunch of liberals I have ever seen!
I haven't read through all of this, but TTLG is super neat, GBM is/was super neat, and regardless of the downward slide, I would be very upset if you guys go through the whole process of bitching about things sucking and then being too afraid to do anything about it YET AGAIN. It's like TTLG is stuck in a Matrix loop and we're at the 6th iteration of Neo.
Goldmoon Dawn on 12/5/2012 at 02:25
Quote Posted by Scots Taffer
For this place to survive, it needs a leader and it doesn't have one.
I think when that new Thief game comes out we should find Stitch, PigLick, and Rug Burn Junky and make them the mods for every forum. :p
Avalon on 12/5/2012 at 02:28
And as a followup now that I am seated and more comfortable and my brain is working, with some thoughts that are probably only halfway relevant to a quarter of the conversation going on here:
I disappeared for a bunch of years, and I'm still just as busy as I was before, I just remember to log on here in my few moments of free time. But when I came back however long ago, the first thing I noticed was the 'final evolution' of behavior that had started before I left.
It's no wonder that Facebook has killed off this crowd, as some of you have said. This site was originally a video game website, centered around a couple of very specific games and then branching out. In fact, it still is a video game website. Yet the core that's stuck to TTLG like a disgusting tumor, the core that influences what goes on here by being the loudest voice in the room, not only hates gaming - most of you have grown to hate the very games that got you here.
Which is a problem that spread to the administration. The guys who actually call the shots here are either legally obligated to stay hands off as game developers, or they are part of the crowd that retired from the gaming scene. So we have an entire community being lead by people who don't really have any passion or desire to build on what we're here for. If they were given the task to develop a general interest community with a bunch of websites on bar crawling, drinking and social get togethers, HOLY SHIT GUYS this site would go nuclear with activity because someone would actually care.
It's not just a matter of handing the reigns off to one such passionate individual. When that individual is still being surrounded by a very vocal, very vast majority who make it their job to at best ignore, but at worst tear down the foundation of this website, it would be a purely uphill battle to get anywhere. Hell if I know how that gets fixed.
BrokenArts on 12/5/2012 at 02:41
OK, now that everyone has had a chance to regurgitate and puke all over the place. I just realized that for those that are shy about posting, you lurkers out there, you know who you are. The forum is now ours! BOWHAHAH!!!! Take control of it! If anyone says boo, who cares, say boo back at them. Hey time to start over, kick ass, I'm for it.
Goldmoon Dawn on 12/5/2012 at 03:04
My point exactly. :sneak:
In fact, I am almost certain that this little place has many followers who have been waiting for just that chance! :p I mean, if Thief 4 doesnt bring a lot of cool new people here, well um... youre left with whoever already knows about the place. Oh boy, maybe one more chance to get it right with *gasp* new people! Hey, if Thief 4 is gobbled up there may even be a ThieV! That would certainly be the cats meow. The lifespan is obviously there yet, so do more funny things. Less posts about 10 pages of bickering and proving, and more funny! At the very least, you could do it the way they used to. Tear each other apart, sure, but be funny. ;) Or, suffer the consequences and die! Mwwaaahahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
