This is to replace the Snarkpit Suggestions/Bugs Thread, in light of the proposed changes we will undertake. It seems clear to me now that the site as a reference for tutorials/scripting guides etc is slightly redundant in the face of Wiki style content management and other superior resources. In respect of this, I would prefer to move Snarkpit toward the area in which it really shines, as a portfolio site for all mappers. I hope to conserve the current user stock, although I can't guarantee anything until i've discussed it with coder people.

In terms of progress, nothing has happened yet, and taking into account the fact that it's the holiday season approaching and also for us students, "hand in lots of papers" season, action won't really set into true motion until January time. That does give us, however, a good month and a bit to discuss our concerns and what we would like to see from the new site. All suggestions are welcome and actively encouraged, keeping in mind that the direction we are going is to a portfolio style layout.

I have access to the web hosting so I will make a few minor changes to the current site as general housekeeping desires, but no major framework changes.

Please, if you are going to share an idea - even if it is vague, try and explain it clearly and put it into context with what has been agreed up to that point. Hopefully this will bounce the Snarkpit back into a good frame of life and put some purpose and identity back to it in what is seemingly a competitive and flooded world of mapping websites.

Thanks in advance for all your ideas and contributions and remember, the site now and in the future is in the hands of the community!

Awesome!

It has been mentioned multiple times (by you, actually :rolleyes: ): A "map of the week/moment" would be a kind of standard feature. Not that we would win any originality award with it.

I'm also for keeping somekind of editing board, simply because wikis and tutorial archives will never replace the advice of a more experienced mapper. It's the kind of service that draws in a lot of newcomers and I think we should keep it. And we can't say we're a mapper board but deny any kind of editing help.

In fact, I do think that putting a "random editing tip", like carefully hidden on the current Snarkpit, at a prominent spot on the new site (comparable to a "map of the week") would be an interesting feature. These tips could contain bits of info you won't find any full-blown tutorial (like "add the ".wav" extrension to sound filenames to make them play on Linux servers"). Probably best limited by a maximum number of signs per tip.

Thirdly - and this is quite important to me - there should also be a brighter/graphically simplified skin for the site. I know that yellow on black is the Snarkpit's theme, but please at least keep one compatible skin with a more neutral appearance (text-title, no forum avatars, black on white/grey interface) something... well... less "Computer-gamey" looking - so I can load it at work and make it look like research. :biggrin:

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Why snark works.

I'm gonna have to hurt somebody if the Snarkpit goes back to that blue and white eyesore layout. Please keep the white text on black at least. :smile:

I would really like to see the reviewing aspect of the site brought back in some fashion. I realize the current site supports user reviews of maps, but the amount of grief I received when I did a handful of them was completely not worth it. I had like 50% of the reviews I did questioned by the authors and was bitched at through PMs about stupid s**t like 'My map is not a 1, can you at least bump it up to 2' and 'My killbox is slightly more complex than you are insinuating in the review, I demand you write a thousand words about my worthless map'. I guess some sort of reviewer overview that shows tendencies, rubrics, general guidelines, etc would be good (a cool example would be reviewing the original HLDM maps, which most people know, to give a solid baseline), so that when a person gets a review they can at least see why and how this reviewer reviews as opposed to just having some jackass following Lep's (and radium's) old HL1 reviews that nobody remembers and pissing people off. Reviewing is teaching, and it helps mappers avoid obvious design and construction mistakes. I learned through radium's reviews, as did many older mappers. It was a dark day when it was closed and then deleted.

A related pipe dream I've always had was to have a multiple reviewer website where maps are reviewed by different people with different styles to give a balanced and wider view of a map. You can click on a map and see an overview, pictures, and like four different scores from four reviewers with different tastes and opinions. This probably would never happen because reviews don't even happen now but oh well.

All of this ties into my other issue with the current Snarkpit, and that's the copious amount of worthless s**t garbage maps clogging it up. If it's not 'nice' or 'fair' to delete every killbox and other half-assed non-attempts at mapping then at least we should be able to ridicule them into stopping, or something :/

Just putting down a quick thought for the moment.

Putting down words as you're looking at map screenshots is sometimes too much to ask when many maps come out. Maybe its a good idea to attach a scoring scale for different aspects to each map, where all the members can click on the scale they deem right. That way, when someone does write a few words, the mapper in question won't feel attacked by a seemingly random comment. But he'll see thats the general opinion. So he wont jump in the defence but will actually try to do it better next time. Aspects can be: architecture, lighting, atmosphere, etc.

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These words are my diaries screaming out loud

? quote:I'm gonna have to hurt somebody if the Snarkpit goes back to that blue and white eyesore layout. Please keep the white text on black at least. :smile:

lol, no way! It would just be an option hidden somewhere in the preferences. Keep the Snarkpit style for everything official.

I also thought that, if using a default BB script, it shouldn't be too hard to preserve a kind of "unedited" color scheme and minimal layout from the phpBB board or whatever is used as a base. No extra-work.

As for the reviews... I think the obvious thing to do is to mention them centrally on the frontpage. Right now they're hidden under "features". Who clicks on "features", looking for map-reviews?

In other words: A "review of the week" or "Latest review" block to the front page pls. Right now the only one noticing a review popping up is the mapper - at best.

Maybe then people will catch on doing reviews again.

PS: blister's idea sounds good as well, if a little complex. I never believed in "overall" scores anyway.

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Why snark works.

[color=gray]

there should also be a brighter/graphically simplified skin for the site.

There is, go to Control Panel > Edit Preferences > look under Site Options for "Theme"

All the themes other than the standard one seem to have slightly borked stylesheets (in FF 2 at least.)[/color]

I agree with the idea of a categorized system for scoring levels.

Suggestions:

• Level/game design discussion board; for amateur and professional game developers to talk about their craft with other amateur and professional game developers, thus furthering the knowledge of all involved parties.
• A board with a (single) thread for each person who wants one where they can show off screenshots and artwork. Creating new threads could be locked for this forum to keep it more organized and easily navigable.

I'll offer my help in any layout/sitemap design and/or website graphics.

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o

There is, go to Control Panel > Edit Preferences > look under Site Options for "Theme"

Yup, but as you said, it's treated stepmotherly. I'll stop mentioning it now.

btw. I'm officially offering any help as well.

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Why snark works.

Baron von Snickers said:
Suggestions:

• Level/game design discussion board; for amateur and professional game developers to talk about their craft with other amateur and professional game developers, thus furthering the knowledge of all involved parties.
• A board with a (single) thread for each person who wants one where they can show off screenshots and artwork. Creating new threads could be locked for this forum to keep it more organized and easily navigable.

I like both of these ideas, the second one in particular. There's plenty of cool things I've made that will never be in a map, and it would be a waste of time to put them up as actual named maps on the site cause they will never be finished. I'd still like to show them off and get comments on them. Plus if somebody were to look for 'future Yak_Fighter creations' since they loved my past work (haha), it would look like I stopped mapping completely in Jan 2005 which just ain't true!

As for a categorized score for map reviews, I can't see how that would work. The most important part of a map is playability, not atmosphere and prettiness and all that. Visuals can and do separate the great from the good maps, but they certainly do not make a bad map good. How the map plays is weighted so much more than anything else in my mind, but generally most other map review sites and even general game review sites do not make that distinction and are easily (totally) swayed by graphics. A map with a 10/10 in architecture, atmosphere, lighting and with custom textures and models but with low marks in layout, balance, weapon placement, flow, etc should be a low rated map, making those 10/10s rather meaningless as an explanation to the map's quality. This is why I was suggesting a reviewer profile, as the method to my madness is probably very different from other people, but that shouldn't make my reviews any less legit. With one I could explain the philosophy behind my opinion, comparisons to past reviews, examples, rubrik/scoring guide, and so on.

I like that multiple review idea. And that single-author-eternal-thread-of-work idea.

So how should the forums be organized: General Banter, WIP (Levels & Art), and Design Talk?

Port the existing user database, or start everyone clean? Clean, I assume.

Also, give me moderator power! :smile:

EDIT: And geez, Yak. I never knew you were so passionate about reviewing... I hope you thought I gave dm_torque a fair shake. :razz:

reaper47 you can always try loading Snarkpit through a CLI web browser such as elinks. Im sure there are Windows versions available as well.

Yak_Fighter, your first paragraph makes me think you're suggesting prefabs. If that is the case, I know a long long time ago in a galaxy far far away, Snarkpit once had prefabs. Perhaps it could be something that can be brought back and set in profiles and linked to the Maps forum.

BlisTer, I like your idea. But perhaps instead of doing the scoring system for the entire map (lighting, architecture, atmosphere, etc) perhaps it can be done for both the entire map, and for select areas (possibly from a screenshot). This way, if a map is poor but has one excellent area, a mapper can save it and re-use it in a different map. Or vice versa, remove a poor section from an otherwise good map.

One important contradiction to what Campaignjunkie has said; whatever Snarkpit does, please do not delete the userbase and existing forum threads. I've seen many communities fall apart because of this. Rather, you can purge the existing databases and remove accounts based on whatever. (example: user accounts with 0 posts, 0 maps, 0 everything)

Forums, I would suggest General Banter, Editing Help, and Maps. Having thread options in Editing and Maps to be more specific. Maps already has this implemented, Editing could probably add a feature to select what kind of editing problem, or for what game.

As for user profiles, in an effort to promote a more 'portfolio' atmosphere, I'd suggest that news be moved into the side bar, or made less drastic. Bringing maps to the forefront, in a style similar to the "favourite/most recent" maps listed on our profiles. Perhaps moving the screen shot from the right of the 'map box' to the bottom, and making the thumbnail about 300x300 pixels so they can be a little easier to see before clicking for the full image.

/2 cents

haha, CJ if anything you were too generous with that review :razz:

EDIT: well prefabs perhaps, I love prefabs, but I was more referring to my own mapping style, which is make lots of different sections of maps and then toss them out and release nearly nothing. I would post pictures of interesting bits to get advice for future endeavours or encouragement to continue on it, but there's really no appropriate place for it, since I'll have little intention of ever finishing it. It doesn't belong in my profile or in the maps forum, so it just languishes on my harddrive as a reminder of broken dreams or something.

For example on an old comp I have a bunch of chunks of Natural Selection maps spread across like 8 different files that if put together would probably make a full map (with mismatching themes). That was a couple solid months of mapping that was pretty much never seen by anybody.

I like the idea of a point base review system. Yak is right in the fact that what really matters is how well a map plays, but one man producing a quality map takes so much time, effort, practice, talent, it really is a art. You can't ignore how a map looks. Plus even the best layouts wouldn't go over well if the map looked like crap.
Possibly we could have 2 part scoring system. Each map would have 2 different scores. One being the visual and the other being the play quality.

for example

Visual
lighting
architecture
sound
texturing
exc.
Total:

playability
layout
weapon placement
flow
balance
exc.
Total:

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Reality has become a commodity.

Good point Redwood.

My suggestion was based on the fact that 90% of maps don't get feedback (unless you really beg for it in a seperate thread). While on the other hand most of us here are interested in taking a look at screenshots, and we form opinions on them, but putting them in words takes too much effort for most maps. Now if you could just click on a scale, that's something else. And yes, Yak, i agree gameplay is more than half the story. But how will 90% of maps get reviews if most of us don't want to write words, let alone download it and take a look. And reviews is what ppl need to hang around snarkpit and keep working on improving new maps.

Redwood's suggestion of adding gameplay scoring scales could help here.. and maybe if a map gets good visual score, more ppl could get tempted to download it and fill in the gameplay scores.

But i wouldn't dismiss the visual scores. without them there would be almost no feedback at all, unless you beg for it.

Good idea about the single-author-eternal-thread-of-work. But i would make a subtitle about the current project, which the mapper can change to keep ppl easily updated on what is currently being discussed.

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These words are my diaries screaming out loud

Would be nice if you could see more than 15 results when searching.

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What the Snarkpitters listen to!

<BLOCKQUOTE id=941c7523>I only have a[/quote]
couple moments to say hey but... I would like to say that as long as the roster remains intact I have few complaints about a revamp.

However, I would like to say once more for clarity... Any revamp that would include "Critiquing" as a bit more of a prioity/payment unit of any new Snarkpit would be a plus IMHO.

As time is sshort for me I cannot even take the time to read any of the previous postings in this thread so if its been mentioned already, forget I said so.

See'yas

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Good to see the old coot Orpheus pop his head in, holding a good majority of the forum posts his opinion has to be here :wink: Just to say, for Orph and the other 56k'ers I will look to implement code which disallows hotlinking of large images as well as the on site curb.

So there is a general concensus on an improved reviewing/grading format, which is good because I had this in mind myself :smile:

I will of course do my damndest (is that a word) to retain the userbase, but it will all fall on the opinion of my delicious coder - personally, I think it can be retained, just perhaps we will have to refill our details. Retaining existing threads however, may be more difficult.

I don't like the idea of having a big review scale. I think that scores should be outta 5 and no more personally. We could have multiple scoring categories - gameplay, presentation, and performance, perhaps - but I don't like having a huge range you can score within. If there was only those 3 categories it would be less daunting to go through assigning scores too, which might be less discouraging to potential reviewers. With only 5 possible scores (maybe allow half marks too?) we could also lose the numbers and have more of an iconic display of scores. 5 snarks, for example, instead of just 5/5.

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[img]http://card.mygamercard.net/sig/Default/reno84.png[/img]
Designer @ Haiku Interactive | ReNo-vation.net

What ever it is that's gonna happen, I trust Gwil to do what's best for the place. Either that or screw things up so bad that even he won't know what to do :heee:
I just hope the editing questions forum will still use the "suggest answer" system we have now. If anything, it encourages people to help even if only for getting that extra "solved editing problem" mark.
Oh and the statistics page, those are just plain fun :wink: .

If you had 0-5 with half points you would effectively have 10 point grading system. I do like the idea of having points be measured as snarks or stars or something like that.

EDIT*

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Reality has become a commodity.

blah

I was arguing for letting each individual reviewer create his own interpretation of the 1-10 scale and having a small page on the site or profile or that explains this interpretation. I wasn't arguing about the interpretation itself. The map would receive a 'metacritic' type rating through multiple reviewers/users reviewing/rating the map. This allows for more freedom/leeway in reviewing and more diversity in opinions.

Be careful pushing those buttons, Gwil! :biggrin:

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Why snark works.

I've never bumped a topic before. I feel dirty.

Anyway, how goes things, master Gwilliam? I imagine Finals are winding down for everyone around this time. Snare your eager web community a coder! Use sexual favors if necessary.

Campaignjunkie said:
Use sexual favors if necessary.

Spoken by someone with "Tools" for an avatar. :biggrin:

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The best things in life, aren't things.

i know we talk about this nonstop, the puzzle map, or the group map that's passed around, what about if instead of a thread we had an official page for that

I have literally "just finished" today, CJ - arguing that Franco was not a fascist, merely a conservative was the last demon to slay! Active recruitment to the PHP campaign starts this week when I hopefully can catch my good UK friends on the slip and get good rates.

Unless of course any Snarkpitter with good, provable skills wants to volunteer (there is a monetary incentive). Christmas for me will family jigga bob and putting pen to paper on my much delayed 2nd year study on Gallipoli, so work wouldn't be expected til mid Jan/Feb. Ultimately, I'd aim for a launch around March/April.

Again, I can't stress enough the monetary incentive OR indeed the potential for a good coder/designer to show off their potential in adapting to code and making a userbase to meet demand... etc :smile:

Be just a bit... Picky, Gwil.

Every website I have ever joined seemed to have an eventual problem with the so called "indispensable" people.

I'd much rather see this ol site remain stagnant, then allow someone new on the roster with a big head ruin it eventually with an superiority complex.

The world does have a few smart people, who can and do play well with others...

/2 cents

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Yeah, two posts back to back, but its also two entirely different thoughts and I didn't want one overlooked. :/

As far as a next site version desire: I would like someone to ascertain why long and or many posted threads take so long to load? If someone could check the coding to determine this, I'd think the site as a whole would benefit in terms of access times.

Threads with as little as 10 pages, take an exorbitant long time to load. The only thing I can think of is, for some reason the code doesn't access ONLY the last page but starts from post number one and works upward.. or downward if your thinking leans toward the negative... NO I AM NOT THINKING OF OUR OREGONIAN MEMBER!!! Truly :heee:

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Oh fine, I was going to tell you the reason why it does that, but never mind now. It's all important and everything too.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Be just a bit... Picky, Gwil.
Every website I have ever joined seemed to have an eventual problem with the so called "indispensable" people.
I'd much rather see this ol site remain stagnant, then allow someone new on the roster with a big head ruin it eventually with an superiority complex.
The world does have a few smart people, who can and do play well with others...
/2 cents

The person who makes the site will be a coder and that's all. They won't hang around to participate in the discussion. Plus i'll be making the administrators all have equal power/access (saves hassle, more than anything).

Gwil said:
Plus i'll be making the administrators all have equal power/access (saves hassle, more than anything).

I wanna be a peon again. Please sir?

Unless, you can do what we discussed, long ago? Otherwise, just a peon would be perfect.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

I can do graphic design work along with CSS work. I'm quite good with CSS plus would love to understand php a little more. Also working for a pr0n site has given me a good deal of experience with usability theory.

And ontop of all that I dropped out of college so I have lots more free time now.

As for the new features wish-list:

I was thinking about how the individual map-profiles could be improved. How about...

• a version-system to hide obsolete comments and descriptions in folders for the older versions they were made for
• last comment first (so that outdated ones don't fill up the first lines)
• text-descriptions for screenshots (and an equally comfortable way to upload custom screens for reviews)

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Why snark works.

Just a thought... maybe the Snarkpit server should be removed. Seeing how it hasn't been in existent for years. It's kind of misleading. Seeing how it doesn't exist... redundant maybe, repetitive yes.
Shouldn't be to difficult ether.

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Reality has become a commodity.

There's been this debate ages ago about adding another forum for "general mapping discussions".

I know, I know "we already have a General Banter board"...

But I'd really like to see a non-restrictive board where more general discussions on mapping are encouraged and can survive for a longer period of time than in Gernal Banter (where they get overshadowed by political and philosophical debates quickly). Of course it had to be very clear that it is neither a place for individual map-threads nor concrete "HELP!!1 my lighting is messed up" editing questions.

I know there's this concern about splitting a forum over too many sub-boards. It's something I've criticized since the earliest days of my internet usage. We currently have 6, including one dead, one semi-dead. IMO we could even merge the editing boards so I don't think we had any kind of inflation. And, come on, there should be enough to write about here to keep a "general mapping" board alive. At least I think so.

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Why snark works.

I concur with both these statements! I handed in my big ass project today and don't have any Uni til the end of January now so i'll dig in.

Using an existing forum and/or wiki software package as a base for the new site might be an interesting option. Building a site like this from scratch isn't a trivial job. Some TWHL members are building a new version of their site, too, and it seems to move along nicely, but their efforts started 1.5 year ago. It doesn't seem like a good idea for Snarkpits revival to take that long.

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Create-ivity - a game development blog

I also volunteer my graphical talents wherever needed.

I'm not too bad at web coding myself (CSS / HTML / Javascript), so I could lend a hand where needed. PHP experience is limited, though.

I've got experience with various CMS'es too (ModX, Joomla, ...).

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:: Forceflow.be :: Nuclear Dawn developer

Im no coder or even close, but one thing I kinda like on forums is the ability to hover over a thread title and see the first line of the post in a popup

RE Map Review system

When a map gets reviewed, the review is highlighted on the front page
People read the review, and score the review ala Amazon - so the best reviews finish up nearer the top with "8 people found this review helpful"

That's a suggestion from our potential coder, and it's one I like - what do you guys think?

edit:

Also, a new colour scheme is in the pipeline as the default scheme - sorry guys, but I feel it needs an update/shake up to rejuvenate it. Nevertheless, to please the people who prefer old school white on black look, it will be switchable (and will work LOL)

Our "potential coder"? Who can he be? mystery

He certainly has good ideas IMO.

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Why snark works.

Gwil said:
RE Map Review system

When a map gets reviewed, the review is highlighted on the front page
People read the review, and score the review ala Amazon - so the best reviews finish up nearer the top with "8 people found this review helpful"

That's a suggestion from our potential coder, and it's one I like - what do you guys think?

I'm not a fan because my smart elitist critical eye will not jive with the common "wow this map looks beautiful 10/10" view when it plays like ass buuuuut...

make sure that the map's author cannot rate his own map's review, and that the reviewer can't rate his own review as well.

Listing systems of all kinds need to be dynamic. It's a good idea to make the default "by best rated, descending", but, you should be able to, for example, click the column somewhere (like the label or something) and be able to sort it by that value, click it again to change between ascending and descending, etc.

A lot of sites have the issue where they'll list the best whatever, and so new and unrated stuff (which in most cases gets a rating of 0) will always be at the bottom of a potentially long list and no one will ever see it in the listing.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

At a site like the snarkpit lol10 reviews should go to the bottom of the list quite fast.

Also both the main/news and the general review section should have a "newest review" window, so they don't stay unrated for too long.

I too like having some freedom of how to sort, though. Newest first should be an option for all the lists.

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Why snark works.

I think a rating system that has only three choices is a good way to go. I imagine it would be like "digg this" but your options would be: "I: LIKE - NEUTRAL - DON'T LIKE"

Reviews could have a out-of-ten score *
(though I'd want something my dynamic so people could weight their numbers, for instance I feel that a 5/10 is a good score, 10 is so outstanding that very few people should archive while 3 is a few steps above kill box) * but the reviews would be rated by the community "I: LIKE - NEUTRAL - DON'T LIKE".

Like could just be a +1, neutral = 0, don't like = -1. Then you could sort by the number.

We could also have a flag system, flags for the normal stuff (bad words, spam, etc.) but also for things the community doesn't like (l33t speak, lame stuff: "lol n1ce map"). Enough flags could change the color of the post color.

We should so some chatting on our steam community chat room.

...but swearing is fun!

I'm sick of having to search the forums if I wont to post a new thread in the half-life editing board, its common sense to search the board first than post a topic if you couldn't find anything. Anyway, there is no harm in a question being asked twice or three times or more on the board.

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Aaron's Stuff

It used to be that way ... but then people never searched.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Good news people! My coder has been snared, and soon enough we will have a working beta (well, best part of a month or so he reckons) for you to comment and feedback upon for the final version.

Now is a good time to start working on new maps, textures, prefabs, sounds, tutorials, props etc etc for the re-release! Also, tell your friends! If you do, I'll buy you a beer if we ever meet.

Perhaps.

Thats great news buddy :biggrin: . I have a couple of things (including a new tutorial) that I would like to contribute to the new snarkpit.

I just have a question, now I wont do this, but somebody from twhl wanted me to add my mp5 tutorial onto twhl as well, they said that you shouldn't mind unless "your anal with these things". Now I wont do this :wink: , but just curious, what happens if me or somebody submitted a tutorial to this site than later submitted the same thing to twhl?

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Aaron's Stuff