MFGG Monthly News - December 2008

(I don't care if this is early)

So it's January. Of a new year... hope you're prepared for another very long news topic packed full of fun information that you won't give a damn about

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IN THE MONTH THAT WAS DECEMBER 2008

- Christmas, Chanukah, whatever happened and stuff

- MFGGcret Santa. A nice turn-out this year. Enjoy those badges until December 2009.

- Ashura was fired for having secret relationships with our secretary downstairs in the boiler room when I called dibs first. And yes she was of legal age before you ask. Seriously though fans of the subject will know why Ashura was downgraded but that's not to say he didn't do a good job BEFORE he messed up a bit. But that's why the "moderator" titles exist - to test and train people before global mod-hood and then adminhood... on top of actually moderating the place. Either way, kudos to him for the work he did do.

- I fixed the search in the NSMB skin which I broke... hurray?

- Free Radical and Factor 5 went under and no longer exist. Two fine game making companies gone. Show those Factor 5 employees some love by enjoying classic Turrican games, and I dunno... play Timesplitters for Free Radical? Maybe say something nice about Haze, even if you don't mean it.

- I was going to do an IRC activity comparison thing this month but the stats page went down half way through. Things were looking good before it went down though, if that means anything.

- I optimized the flag icons because I could. Each flag was about 900 bytes, now they're all about 150 bytes, which means they take up about 83% less space. Granted, nobody cares, but still. Emoticons got optimized too.

- And that'll be it I suppose

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GAME OF THE MONTH™: DECEMBER 2008

Which game deserves an honourable mention at the end of the year? Well lets find out... now

December's Game of the Month™ is:
Koopa: A Winter's Tale, by Tech Wing
as recommended by Guinea


Tech Wing should really be renamed "Someguy + GUEST" since I haven't seen Kaepora in decades and the person helping seems to change each time. Someguy's the Tech Wing and Peardian this time's the mechanical feathers or something.

Once again I've already talked about this one so I'll be keeping this section brief again. Sure I suppose it's not the fairest of games to pick since it's only been out a couple of days, but meh, it's probably worth it, and I've already got it downloaded so yeah.

Koopa: A Winter's Tale is a winter's tale about a Koopa who goes on a quest to steal things from castles in order to surivive in a house that's too big for him (or her). It's like a mixture between this guy's stuff and Mario. You get upgrades which eventually allow you to fly about and there's half a dozen items to find.

Though it's certainly a lot more different than Tech Wing's usual theme of sticking Mario and friends in wacky situations with Gunpei Yokoi, that doesn't mean it isn't good fun. Sure it does get a bit bland and the button mashing isn't that great, but it's still a lot more enjoyable to review than SMB3 2314892374. Unlike SMB3, this formula hasn't got tired (yet).

So yeah, download. BUT NOT UNTIL YOU FINISH READING ALL THIS GARBAGE

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Review Drive #14

IT'S TIME FOR THE NEXT


I'm just putting logos in now to make these topics a bit more interesting. Also because I wanted to test out fonts earlier in the month. Also because I can.


Review Drives return! OHMYGODTHATSAMAZING

I'm using the same method as in November because I'm guessing it'll have better results than picking single games. However saying that, it does greatly reduce the amount of future review drives we can have. But that's probably a good thing.

MFGG Currently has 23 Games without a score.

Significantly less than last time, but still too much. So, TIME TO REDUCE THAT FIGURE. And of course, when I do check how many have been done by the end of the month, I won't be taking into consideration games that have been added since.

Getting a bit sick of seeing some of these titles without a score - every month or so I'm dishing out a game from this selection. I'd love to see all the ones from 2007 shifted up at least. So yeah, get going!

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but the main thing is that it's pretty much 2009 now. 2008 was a bit dodgy to say the least, and though it hasn't remained dodgy throughout, well, it's not exactly considered the "best year ever".

BUT FEAR NOT, FOR IT IS 2009

WHAT IS HAPPENING IN 2009

I HAVE NO EFFING IDEA

well okay I have some idea but I'm the sort of guy who likes to make stuff up as I go along. Though I've got a "Squirrelplan" it's ridiculously flexible so if I say "IMA DO THISSS" I might end up doing THIS in a different way. Regardless, if the end result is "better than 2007/2008" then I'll be satisfied.

If all goes to plan, 2009 should be the year of the Squirrel. "OH NOEZ" cries my little band of anti-Squirrel buddies, "TEH POWERR HAZ GONE 2 HIS HEAD! HEZ NAMING YEARS AFTER HIMSELFS CAUSING US TO TYPE IN UPPER CASEE WITH BLATENT DISREGARD TO TEH RULEZ OF TEH ENGLISH LANGUAGEE"

*gasp* *shock* *horror*

but seriously this is the year where my plans are shifted up a gear. They were currently in second, and the clutch isn't too happy about travelling at 30 in that gear, so I'm shifting it up to third

THE POWER GEAR


This allows MFGG to travel at faster speeds with more control over the car. MFGG runs in manual transmission because MFGG was taught how to drive a car properly. Do not give me your automatic transmission arguements - I do not care for them. I am the driver and I've heard nothing but bad things about automatics.

The future is bright, and possibly orange, and it's time to say to ourselves "this is the year we're going to make MFGG better". No more stalling or dwelling on the past, and the best part is, everyone can get involved. In fact, everyone HAS to get involved otherwise it won't work half as fast. It's almost guaranteed that people will stand in the way of MFGG's on-going recovery but screw them. As I have said from the minute I took this job, if you're not happy with MFGG, then feel free to go elsewhere. As ever, I'm always open to suggestions on how to improve, but glancing around there are still a good handful of members who probably shouldn't be here. No community requires members that moan for the sake of moaning!

Oh yeah and there'll be people who stopped mid-way through the first sentence of that paragraph and have already declared themselves as "not planning to change/do anything". But best not to dwell on that either.


But enough of that

where am I?

understand this? Yes? Good.

No?

well it's Squirrel's ongoing adventures through the world of Fribbulus Xax, or, MFGG, if it looked like Fribbulus Xax.

though looking back it makes very little sense since I'm not actually looking for an administrator, I AM the administrator. So this adventure is more-or-less pointless and needs re-branding. Though Commander Keen's babysitter wasn't eaten in Keen 6 either. It's all just false advertising! And what the hell is an 8 year old doing in space anyway? GO BACK TO SCHOOL. You might have a stupidly high IQ but I bet you can't woo a lady, Commander Keen! (though I suppose that isn't really taught at school either but it's a better place to learn those skills rather than Vorticon IV).

This section of the game is about a third of the way in, much like myself, if MFGG was this game. The player has a decent grasp on how the game is played and has got past that rocky cliff bit. If you have no idea what I'm talking about then go play Keen 6. Keen has a long way to go, and the adventure only gets harder from here apparently.

Squirrel is in a similar situation. He has a decent grasp on how to be an administrator. Yay. (Yes I know there are people desperate to prove otherwise, just live with it =) ). But there's still a while to go and it only gets harder from here apparently (though to be honest it probably gets a bit easier now that I'm not being thrown in the deep end as often). Don't you love Commander Keen metaphors.

But what will Keen Squirrel do now? Well, lets break it down into sections

THE MARVELLOUS MAIN SITE

... is in good nick. Though it wasn't in bad nick this time last year. Thanks to Techokami, Pucifur and MTC (the rest had their chance =P), the queue is pretty much dead. The majority of things get through within the first 48 hours... as opposed to the first week like before. Main site comments, though not on the same level of intelligence in general as here, have improved a bit. I'm not seeing garbage all the time anyway. Submission quality's a bit better too. Well I assume it is anyway, since I don't hear much about that subject anymore.

THE WONDEROUS WIKI

... isn't too bad. It's not really been used to the max, that'll be something I'll be trying to fix over time, but it's a bit better than it was. I'm still encouraging written tutorials and shizzle for fangaming, specifically advice and whatnot for programming languages that the main site doesn't "support", i.e. C, C++, Python, Perl, Lua etc. etc. etc. There's still a minority that complain about the use of GameMaker and Clickteam apps rather than full blown programming languages - well this is your opportunity to help change that. Go on the wiki and teach others how to do stuffs. At the moment it seems to just be geared around individual members.

THE INCREDIBLE IRC

... seems to be okay. Here's a section I can't compare to last year because I wasn't active on it then, but it's become more active within the last few months so that can't be bad. Would like to have more people talking outside of the peak hours but I'm guessing that'll come as the forums get better, and more exotic off-peak hour members come by and take an interest. I know there's concern of it becoming spam-city when the e-Fed comes to town, but I'm not too bothered about that right now. It would be nice if some of event regulars would drop in for normal discussion however. Turndawg gets lonely.

AND THE FANTASTIC FORUMS

... are slowly recovering. They're not in the best of conditions, but they're in a much better condition than the start of the year IMO. Things were a bit less hectic but then jumped up again around the Christmas period... I suppose that's to be expected... I suppose. The forums are an on-going battle and it's something that can't really be ignored, but rest assured I will not let it degrade into something unusable, even if I have to close all non-essential forums Whether you like it or not areas have got better, mainly due to the public closure of the CCC. Probably the biggest concern I have is forum attitudes. I've seen my fair share of internet battles but MFGG was not the home of them when I registered, so it shouldn't be the home of them now. I don't care how stupid a member is, it's the mods' decision on whether to keep them here, not yours. Educate, yes. Shoot them down, no. And mixing the two could result in some unwanted side effects.

Topics on religion for example... the idea of them existing in the future is on thin ice.


SO WHAT HAPPENS NOW

well, though it's been slow, my methods have worked reasonably well so far, so it makes sense for it to continue as it is (you can almost hear the thumps of heads hitting the tables of those who disagree). The only real solution to MFGG's "problems" is for me to dish out some permabans - that's not a nice thought for some of you. But I don't see any ridiculous layout problems or any major staff issues, the only problem really is content, and that boils down to the members. At the end of the day mods and admins can only make a difference by getting rid of garbage and more importantly, getting rid of garbage makers. Whether you consider yourself a garbage maker is something you may have to think about, but lets just say this place is due for a good bit of cleaning, and many will be swept up in that if they're not careful. But it isn't going to be ban city unless there's a cathedral.

But it's 2009! It has the potential to be a great year. So make it so!


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Yes we're still here.


If 2008 was a level we've just completed it. And I've got a whole load of level stats that I should probably post.

SO

SQUIRREL'S PRIME TIME STATISTICAL HOUR
(though not neccessarily in prime time and not neccessarily an hour)

The wonderful world of MFGG statistics awaits! Join me on our wonderous journey of numbers which very few will care about. And then after our journey you can question the reason why I calculated all this crap. Perhaps I should have just gone with another review drive last month!

FORUM ACTIVITY

FORUM REGISTRATIONS
2004 435 36.25 regsmonth^-1
2005 697 +262 58.08 regsmonth^-1
2006 1067 +370 88.92 regsmonth^-1
2007 1208 +141 100.67 regsmonth^-1
2008 821 -387 68.42 regsmonth^-1

2008 Highest: March 2008: 140
All time Highest: April 2007: 167

Registrations have been down this year, the first time since... ever. Not a bad thing however. Duplicate accounts popped up all the time during 2007 and the rollback eariler in the year compiled with several mod changes means that obviously the amount of registrations in 2008 would be less. But it's still more than the "glory years" of 2004 and 2005. Also, 2006 was the year when MFGG's main site moved to version 2.0, and as such there were a flood of new members around that period.

2003 hasn't been included in any of these things because I haven't got EZBoard/Vbulletin statisitcs and there was only two and a half months of IPB 2003 usage.

Also the 2008 stats will not be exact because this forum works on EST and I don't. There'll be a tiny error in each most likely. I might fix that later.


FORUM TOPICS
2004 3487 290.58 topicsmonth^-1
2005 8422 +4935 701.83 topicsmonth^-1
2006 12649 +4227 1054.80 topicsmonth^-1
2007 18329 +5680 1527.42 topicsmonth^-1
2008 27303 +8974 2275.25 topicsmonth^-1

2008 Highest: March 2008: 3358
All time Highest: March 2008: 3358

On the whole, topics have increased. Perhaps it was due to the fact we had more forums than ever this year. Perhaps not. However MFGG averaging 2250+ topics a month is quite impressive, especially with a closed CCC.



FORUM POSTS
2004 53207 4433.92 postsmonth^-1
2005 147475 +94268 12289.53 postsmonth^-1
2006 220216 +72741 18351.33 postsmonth^-1
2007 338636 +118420 28219.67 postsmonth^-1
2008 533038 +194402 16200.17 postsmonth^-1

2008 Highest: March 2008: 61694
All time Highest: March 2008: 61694

Forum posts have also increased this year. Again, just goes to show that the closure of the CCC did not effect posting activity. Not even the rollback stopped it. I think March was the "catch up month" for those who were lost in that rollback, hence why it broke so many records. Quality > Quantity when it comes to posts, and convieniently a closed CCC brings us closer to the former. To be fair however, it wasn't always closed. So I suppose we'll have to wait another year to see if the trend continues.


SITE SUBMISSIONS

ACCEPTED SPRITES
2004 253 21.08 spritesmonth^-1
2005 477 +224 39.75 spritesmonth^-1
2006 1069 +592 89.08 spritesmonth^-1
2007 1504 +435 125.33 spritesmonth^-1
2008 1019 -485 84.92 spritesmonth^-1


ACCEPTED GAMES
2004 41 3.42 gamesmonth^-1
2005 40 -1 3.33 gamesmonth^-1
2006 132 +92 11.0 gamesmonth^-1
2007 151 +19 12.58 gamesmonth^-1
2008 135 -16 11.25 gamesmonth^-1

Odd stats here. Submissions actually declined in 2008... not sure why exactly. Perhaps it's to do with the fact there were a few new "big" Mario titles released in 2007. Maybe the first NCFC had something to do with it. Maybe it was just a lucky year (because 7's a lucky number). I dunno. Not a huge worry though. It's only if this trend continues that it becomes a concern. Though maybe it's just down to the fact we've got better moderation on the main site. Could be a number of things I guess.

Can't be bothered to do the reviews (which probably went up because of review drives), howtos and misc so lets jump to the juicy parts.


ROUGH TOTAL OF SUBMISSIONS
2004 530 44.17 submissionsmonth^-1
2005 3080 +2550 256.67 submissionsmonth^-1
2006 4015 +935 334.58 submissionsmonth^-1
2007 5140 +1125 428.33 submissionsmonth^-1
2008 4040 -1100 336.67 submissionsmonth^-1

About 1100 less submissions. These include those that were declined. Sure 337 submissions a month isn't a bad thing, but still.



OH BUT WAIT. What about the most important statistic of all? The one that involves me complaining about having to replace site thumbnails?!?!!11

WELL


PREVIEW IMAGE REPLACEMENTS
2007 56
2008 22 -34

THUMBNAIL REPLACEMENTS
2007 514
2008 310 -204

I've had to do less work this year! Great! But I've still replaced too many. By staying clear of the submit-it, Techokami and the other staffers have had a share in thumbnail replacing this year. Good news for me... not neccessarily for MFGG as a whole but it doesn't look like it got worse anyway. The submit-it did get a clear out this year too, so many of the submissions that got put in the queue were actually from earlier years. That makes those red figures a bit bigger... hmm... But who cares, I've not had to crack open my image editor to do the job you guys and gals should have been doing!

It puts my totals at

15 + 56 + 22 (164) PREVIEWS REPLACED and
791 + 514 + 310 (1615) THUMBNAILS REPLACED

it's an approximate - I've changed like, 2 or 3 since I calculated these originally, but meh.

just thought you'd like to know. I can't take all the credit for thumbnail replacements - other staffers have had their share, but other staffers haven't got statistical information about their share! (Unless PK's secretly hiding stuff)

other figures... well... erm

SAGE was more popular, NCFC was more popular... it's a good indication that the fangaming community as a whole has increased, even if it's not neccessarily from here. More people are getting into the business of fangaming from all regions of the globe. Though, the internet IS growing I suppose, so it was only logical. The most important thing is that MFGG is probably the biggest fangame site on the internet now, even if we couldn't maintain our trend. We're not really in the world of 3D engines programmed in "real" languages yet (unlike SFGHQ), but we're not too far behind I suppose. It's a gap I'd like to close, though closing that gap requires your help too... well actually you guys are the only ones who can actually close that gap since I can't program much at all.

Will these trends continue for next year? Only time will tell. Either way it means I only have to do one set of calculations, rather than 5 sets.

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and my god we're finally over nearly

Other things to think about:

-THE FUTURE OF MFGG. If you've got any real suggestions for what needs doing in this year then give me a call. I only have theoretical solutions to problems I believe exist - not necessarily yours!






and that'll be it

enjoy 2009

and yes I do need to get out more

Nice.

whoa

lotsa words


anyway, I must say -- this has been a weird year, Maybe it was the lack of quality fangames or something, but I can't wait to see what you dish out for 2009

...
and honestly BS, this may sound cheesy, but I think you're the best admin mfgg's ever had -- you're doing so much for this community and you're so dedicated to making mfgg a better place

I know I've given you a lot of ****, but honestly I do that to everybody -- I'm really happy to see how much this community has changed


anyway happy new year guys

2008 has definitely been a drama year with loads of permas being added and removed. Not nessecarily a bad thing on both parts.

Keep it up, Squirrel!

This year made me feel warggly. But yeah, nice summary of the year BS.

This post has been edited by DR. Demon Lizardman on Dec 31 2008, 07:41 PM

Ah quite the read my good man! Keep up the good work!

Good year for MFGG. Lots of events happened too. It's too my real joining date (see posts), so I'm a 08'er. Shame that submissions got worse and less. I hope 2009 it's a good year for us!

Black Squirrel is our savior.

...

But I do find it somewhat odd that we had so much less submissions this year. (No, I'm not implying anything.) A lot of us need to get our butts in gear. I need to finish a game one of these days!!!

needs more fancy charts

I demand fancy charts

WAIT FOR IT WAIT FOR IT

someone still needs to get geshi to work, because syntax highlighting and boxes that don't run off the page and over the top of floating elements are nice

Took me a bit to sort through all this.

Good news, good news indeed.

Yep yep yep, this year was full of it's normal drama, staff switching, forum events and all that jazz. Here's to a great 2009 guys, let's enjoy it.

Worst. Year. Ever.
Yeah there was pretty much drama but cool nonetheless.

I'm keeping my expectations about all of 09 extremely low, so anything remotely neat will blow me away.

I can't believe I still go here.

join the club


NOT THAT I DISLIKE THIS PLACE OR ANYTHING

but honestly if any of my real life friends knew I came here my social life would p much be ruined :<

This post has been edited by Razz on Jan 5 2009, 09:01 AM

BTW I reviewed the Review Drive game before the Review Drive came up :cool:

Same...
But anyway, let's hope for an awesome '09!
Maybe this will be the year I actually submit something to the main site.

I've had my hand at a few thumbnails... but my 4 against the other thousand really doesn't look all that hot.

I've had a good year in spite of this.