Eachann Equestrian College - Constructive Criticism!

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Jan 1, 2010, 11:27am

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Topic: Constructive Criticism! (Read 99 times)

Rebecca
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Constructive Criticism!
« Thread Started on Apr 29, 2008, 8:45pm »

Love to hear a different point of view. What would make this site better? What's good about it? What's completely wrong?

« Last Edit: Apr 29, 2008, 8:45pm by Rebecca »

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Marty
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Some criticism for you all ;)
« Reply #1 on Apr 30, 2008, 2:40pm »

Alright, let's get started.

Actually, before we start, I'm going to remind you that this is indeed constructive. If I sound harsh, I don't mean to be. And if you've been RPing yourselves for quite a while and I act like you don't know anything, don't take it personally - I have a habit of that :/

Now, I've been RPing for about 7 years now and owned quite a few games. There are several patterns I have noticed. To be honest, I haven't checked out your game completely, but here are some things to keep in mind:

1. There are a hundred games out there, and at least half of them will ALWAYS be better than yours. Your goal is to make people join your game, of course - so how do you do it? There will always, always be games better than yours. You need a selling point. What does your game have to offer that other's don't?

Things like "Great community!" and "Active players!" don't count. What twists and quirks does your game have? Good twists are ones that set a goal for players, so they aren't playing without a purpose. For example, in one of my RPGs, you could "win" the game after reaching certain goals, and the list of characters that won became very prestigious. In another, there was a 4-level hierarchy, and after you reached the 4th level you had a chance to ascend and become a god or goddess. In another, there were "cheat" codes (to make it more like a 'real' game, I said

) that were hidden around the site - you could redeem them for tons of things, from extra money to access to hidden areas to immunity from the next bad random event, and so on.

Basically, you need a selling point.

2. Players judge games on the rules. What you want is to have the shortest rules in the history of all gaming. Take out *everything* that is not a specific rule. All the extras, like 2. Characters must start at age 16, in the first year, and age at the beginning of each new year. At the end of each year, players can be moved into the next year or can be held back, should be taken out of the rules and put into a Guide Book. To make myself more clear, your rules should look something like this:

RULES:
1. Respect the admin
2. Be active - less than 1 post/month will get your characters deleted
3. Be polite
4. You can play as students and horses
5. When you join a student, you get a Student ID, and when you join a horse you get a Brand - do not loose these! You will not be able to post without them.

All the other things, like how time works and how students graduate, should be put into a Guidebook, How to Play or About Us page.

Alright, now. I have a bone to pick with y'all. Ready?

BAD. You are bad, bad people.
What is up with these rules?!

8. You can be a Student, Horse or both (max 4 characters)
9. Posts must be in first person
4. You may have up to 1 character of each gender
3. You may have up to 1 character of each gender

Bad. BAAAD.

First, players hate restrictions on their characters. You should NEVER, EVER tell players they can only post in first person - first person is hard for a lot of people to pull off, and many beginners only know how to do third person posts well. Why do you even NEED this rule? What's the point?

Second, why do you need a cap on characters? Don't you WANT more characters? If you're worried about people joining too many and then becoming inactive, WAIT until you see this happen, then post a reminder on the main page asking people to either be active with all characters or quit them.

And why can people have only 1 character of each gender? What if someone wants to play two stallions? I can understand that all stallions are geldings automatically, but COME ON.

Take out the rules. Please. If you start to have problems with people not joining male humans or mares or whatever, simply post on the joining page that you are only accepting mares and male humans.

Alright, I think that's it... Marty out <3

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