This is it

[Marsh]

@Robin:

Well some good points were made. But more importantly now i feel old :(

[Murdoc]

@Marshy:

> Well some good points were made. But more importantly now i feel old :(

You're only 22 Marshy Dearest. Wait til you're 28, you'll feel much older lol. I'm personally dreading the day I turn 30… But I'll probably still be around this crazy place :)

[Myron]

Despite having my fair shares of me leaving and returning, I do agree with what's being said. I'm fully aware of myself not caring or bothering to comment to W.I.P topics, Questions or people advertising/asking for support in the shout box anymore since I just get the feeling it's the same anyway. I keep thinking "People don't bother to read/search, so why should I bother to answer?"

I only see a few W.I.P projects progressing towards release and more topics dead. Questions are sometimes practically the same and some I just can't help with because I'm not using CS;DE nor did I ever touch it.

It's just like your project is almost doomed to fail when you make a W.I.P topic, while it should be the opposite. It's purpose is supposed to push you to finish that game for people who liked your game. Heck, I don't even mention my game anymore and keep it under wraps.

[Murdoc]

I think the reasons why most WIP fail is because 1\. a lot of them are half-arsed anyway, and made by people who have no dedication to anything let alone making a successful game.. and 2\. some people just cannot handle criticism without becoming unmotivated to continue their work .. and a possible 3rd. many of us have lives and no time to put hours of work into a game, and eventhough we like the idea of creating one it just falls through in the end

[Myron]

I agree with the first two reasons, for obvious reasons :P. But I want to add that it's not necessary for people to post their games in the WIP board. They can just wait until they have something to show for, and with that I mean a demo or an Alpha of some kind.

One of the reasons I'm not posting in the board is because I'm planning on going full out with this game and take my time. And that could be a month or more.

I suppose I can't possibly blame the 'noobs' for posting in the board, I remember what it felt like to have the opportunity to make a game and you just feel so great that you have the chance to make one, you just want to share your game immediately and hope that people like your game and decide to tag along.

Of course this means forgetting that a good balanced game is not finished in a day.

[Murdoc]

@Rusher:

> One of the reasons I'm not posting in the board is because I'm planning on going full out with this game and take my time. And that could be a month or more.
>
> I suppose I can't possibly blame the 'noobs' for posting in the board, I remember what it felt like to have the opportunity to make a game and you just feel so great that you have the chance to make one, you just want to share your game immediately and hope that people like your game and decide to tag along.

It's a good way to go about it. To date I've posted about 3 wip projects (in a span of 5 years) that all have fallen through due to different reasons. If I was to do another I'd just wait until it was almost complete and close to testing.

[Dark Crusade]

I miss a lot of the old long-gone members. Balliztik1, Japez, Imago… etc

[saadhamza]

@Robin:

> Still, I'm used to people blindly blaming me for all their problems so go for it. Obviously I'm the cold Tyrant who does nothing for any one else and simply wants to sit here in a position of power on the internet.

Nope, you're just gay~ ;D

Personally, i had been a lot more active when there had been groups like S.B. and Taco Gods or whatever. Of course, we all ended up spending the day talking about boobs and shit, but it was till sort of nice, at least to my 12 year old mind. Though, i haven't answered someone's question in QandA in about 1 year i think, and i haven't used the engine itself in longer then that.

I still think that we're pretty close as a community though, some of the older members are still here and they all talk. I do generally dislike the newer members, but Robin already explained why that happens.

[Murdoc]

I've admittedly never gotten very close to anyone on eclipse over the last 5 years. That might explain why I never rage quit. Im mostly de-attached from what goes on in the forum, as far as what people are doing and saying. A couple years back I tried too hard to gain the respect of some other members, and I just ended up being a troll. Got banned a few times due to untamed frustration. Now I just sit back and laugh at all the drama that goes on.

[Ruins of Hell]

@ZoSo:

> Im not pointing towards anyone in particular, im saying for me, generally when ive been needing moderators, it has not worked.
>
> In the end when i did get a moderator to do something, he'd lock my topic off and i have seen the same thing happend to countless of other topics like newbs posting bad art and people bashing and spamming his topic to the end.
>
> I get it that its a hard job to keep track of all topics, thats why you get more moderators (in different forum sections aswell). Its just that ive seen so many moderators locking threads instead of deleting posts and cleaning topics. Usually i find that to work much better against the trolls and spammers.
> You cant say cleaning a topic is hard… then you're a lazy moderator.

Cleaning a topic _is hard_. It involves you to not only understand that one discussion: but also to understand the people behind the discussion (motivation, previous warnings, history with the other person). It ends up being a tangled web of connections. This means you have to make some tough calls. Sometimes it involves killing the topic off completely. Fragmenting the moderation system will only worsen the outcome. You could flame somebody in Questions & Answers, then do the same thing in Resources, you'd probably get a verbal warning for both, because both moderators think it's your "first offense". We do have a warning system, but it's not exactly useful unless it's used very frequently (including for verbal warnings, even if no warning level is given).

I also attribute the recent decrease in moderation directly to Skyrim.

@Murdoc:

> I think the reasons why most WIP fail is because 1\. a lot of them are half-arsed anyway, and made by people who have no dedication to anything let alone making a successful game.. and 2\. some people just cannot handle criticism without becoming unmotivated to continue their work .. and a possible 3rd. many of us have lives and no time to put hours of work into a game, and eventhough we like the idea of creating one it just falls through in the end

I don't think this is necessarily related to the discussion in this case, W.I.P's have been like this for quite some time now.

@Robin:

> We get way too many idiots posting this on genuine question threads, but we also get a huge amount of people who pose feature requests, team recruitment and thinly veiled begging as a question. "How can I make a guild system with inter-guild wars, tags, banks and instanced housing?" has a pretty obvious answer - by learning to program.

I once used to answer questions like these (back when we had scripting and Eclipse Evolution) by pushing them in a general direction, snippets of codes, some advice, et cetera. On the surface, it seemed like a wonderful idea. Maybe it's because I gave too much help, or maybe I didn't give enough help, but it never seemed to work out well. People ended up just copying stuff around and hoping it worked. When they got to the actual output, it was either very buggy (and then I got the blame for it) or when asked to do something of similar nature, they absolutely failed. They honestly had no idea how anything worked a basically attributed whatever code was there to the only code that worked.

Which leads me in to my next idea, writing some actual documentation for Eclipse (quick rundown of what each command does), and possibly a guide or two for VB6 (basic syntax constructs). I'm not suggesting anything huge, just enough so people can read Eclipse's source without asking a question every other line. I've always planned to get around to it someday…

But, I digress. This is about why Eclipse might be failing.

To be honest, I never say any merit in these arguments. You think Eclipse is failing, then do something about it. Some suggestions:

* Answer questions that others have neglected.
* Write tutorials about questions that people have.
* Report bad posts, do not backseat moderate, it makes it worse.
* Write code for Eclipse, debug throughly, and contribute it.
* Participate in threads and talk in the shoutbox.
* Welcome newcomers, show them around the forums.
* Create contests and competitions.
* Make a game, then share it. To make it more exciting, try a 24-hour challenge and post a time lapse of your computer.

If you wanted my opinion on changes I dislike, that's different. The things I have in mind are minuscule and certainly do not equate to Eclipse going to shit.

tl;dr: Do stuff, not complain.

(3 new replies etc.)

[evilbunnie]

@ZoSo:

> You cant say cleaning a topic is hard… then you're a lazy moderator.

Sadly most moderators/admins are old and have lives and don't have unlimited time daily that they can spend sitting on the computer not socialising, like you do.

[ZoSo]

@Soul:

> Cleaning a topic _is hard_. It involves you to not only understand that one discussion: but also to understand the people behind the discussion….

So its just better to lock the topic away?
I don't know if you actually do that, but yeah.. just sayin.
Also its not **that** hard to clean a topic.. not always, its mostly one guy that starts a chain reaction. I mean obviously your system here at Eclipse do not work if its THAT hard to moderate.
I mean… im just saying, instead of giving people warning here and there just delete their stupid posts, that way people will have no motivation to be jerks or act tough because its a big chance nobody will see their posts anyway.

@Captain:

> Sadly most moderators/admins are old and have lives and don't have unlimited time daily that they can spend sitting on the computer not socialising, like you do.

This just made me lol, its especially funny since ive been registered here since 2008 and you still have a higher post count even though you just said that.

[evilbunnie]

@ZoSo:

> This just made me lol, its especially funny since ive been registered here since 2008 and you still have a higher post count even though you just said that.

Did I ever say I had a life? No. Oh and by the way, posting on a forum interacting with humans is what you call "socializing". However deleting posts is not.

[Murdoc]

Warning - while you were typing a new reply has been posted. You may wish to review your post.

@Captain:

> Sadly most moderators/admins are old and have lives and don't have unlimited time daily that they can spend sitting on the computer not socialising, like you do.

Um yea, I hardly ever see ZoSo in the forum… *scratches head* And there are quite a few moderators/admins that are here frequently.

I'm not picking sides here, just saying that comment made no sense.

[evilbunnie]

@Murdoc:

> Warning - while you were typing a new reply has been posted. You may wish to review your post.
>
> Um yea, I hardly ever see ZoSo in the forum… *scratches head* And there are quite a few moderators/admins that are here frequently.
>
> I'm not picking sides here, just saying that comment made no sense.

Well he said it as if he could do better, therefore sitting on the computer all day deleting posts.
Also if you read what I said, I said "Sitting on the computer /not/ socializing". They come on here to socialize, not delete posts.

[Murdoc]

@Captain:

> Well he said it as if he could do better, therefore sitting on the computer all day deleting posts.
> Also if you read what I said, I said "Sitting on the computer /not/ socializing". They come on here to socialize, not delete posts.

You're kinda makin his point stronger. If you're a moderator/admin you have the responsibility of moderating or administrating, not exclusively socializing because you dont feel like doing those things. But anyway. <.<

[renzo]

@ZoSo:

> So its just better to lock the topic away?
> I don't know if you actually do that, but yeah.. just sayin.
> Also its not **that** hard to clean a topic.. not always, its mostly one guy that starts a chain reaction. I mean obviously your system here at Eclipse do not work if its THAT hard to moderate.
> I mean… im just saying, instead of giving people warning here and there just delete their stupid posts, that way people will have no motivation to be jerks or act tough because its a big chance nobody will see their posts anyway.

Our system isn't to lock topics just because it has one word spam.  Funny thing about cleaning topics is the rest of the community doesn't notice that the topic was dirty to begin with.  The Trash board is loaded with spam and troll posts.
If you're talking about topics with large pointless arguments then it really depends on the situation.  I don't know which topics you are talking about but for the most part our mods do clean topics that can be cleaned, but if it's at a point where both the OP and the arguing member don't want to let it go then we have to lock it.  Some times the problem is just an OP who can't take any kind of criticism, you can't just clean a topic and hope the OP himself will keep it that way.

You're going to have to post some examples because as far as I have seen, we don't lock that many topics, usually they are either locked by the OP or we locked it because the discussion is over or the topic cannot be saved.

[ZoSo]

I dont know, i don't post here so often any longer. Good point there with cleaned topics are not noticed, maybe it has gotten better. Im sorry i have no examples, its just something i did experience a while back.. as i said, i don't know if it has gotten better i just assumed it has not.

@Captain:

> Well he said it as if he could do better, therefore sitting on the computer all day deleting posts.
> Also if you read what I said, I said "Sitting on the computer /not/ socializing". They come on here to socialize, not delete posts.

I don't think i could do better, i would not want to imagine myself having that position.
Doesnt remove my rights to critism the moderators or complain. I just think having a moderator/admin position gives you some responsibility to make this forum a more pleasant place to post at.

May i point out you are making such a fool of yourself, you really should leave this argument.

[Anna Comnena]

Yeah pretty much everything Soul and Renzo said is spot on. Also if something doesn't look cleaned, it's because to clean it up would remove the context from the rest of the thread from then on out. There are tons of judgement calls to make when pruning a thread of dozens if not a hundred-plus individual posts.

[ZoSo]

Yeah i agreed no need to continue this. :)

[Sicarii]

I first started playing Odyssey back around 1997 when I was 19 which makes me 33 now.  Ive always been in and out as life permits. Im determined to make a decent game in my free time not for any prestige from online people that dont give a crap about me…Im doing it for my 10yr old son. Hell we dont even have internet right now so he will probably be only one playing. Hoping that it will inspire him to learn programming.

[SawQuart]

Let me add a few points because I still am a kid and don't have the nostalgia all of you do… yet.

* We need a new generation on here. We need something new that can attract the young crowd again. Eclipse used to be about ducking around on the community, while more recently it's becoming a lot more professional (which may not be a best thing when considering that most of the people who visit are young kids. Let the kids play and let them harass each other. Mods should still stop the flamewars, but allow the community to continue by lowering the expectations.
* Eclipse hasn't changed much for me besides the professionalism bit. When Robin took over it became a lot more focused around being well structured and organized. Since most of you guys were kids on here, a professional, boring forum isn't what draws you here (think the SMF default theme). What draws you here are the people. Lots of them. After coming back from my 4 (?) month ban, I can tell you that the community is a lot more quiet.
* We need more support for different aspects of game development. Now that all of you guys are older than when you first joined and some of you have now gone onto C++, Java, C, etc (even me…) then I think in order to get everyone back, we need to get more relevance for them.

That's just my take on it. I'm a kid and I still think we have potential, although I think it's becoming really hard to do anything anymore when we are using an outdated language (inb4flamewar) and now that we aren't up to the industry standard of either mobile 2D development or 3D. I think the only way we can get this to work is by making a Java engine for Android.

EDIT:
I still think the climax of our golden days were when we all used to play HnH together. After that it slowly declined. We need more community gaming to happen.

[mrmiguu]

I remember that these forums used to be much more strict on topic derailing. It seems that I can get away with murder nowadays. XD

The only personality traits I tried to pick up from Robin because they were genuinely good qualities are those of direct, blunt honesty. Seeing him tell people straight got me thinking, "wow, most really state the obvious fluff that noone wants to hear recycled over-and-over-and-over again…" Robin's way of letting people know is such a shock at first exposure that they're left in a daze, not knowing what hit them. Once they come to their senses, they realize that they're outputting bullshit.

I've always wanted to let members who post garbage work know how realistically bad their work actually was. So, like Robin, I figured being blunt was the best way of going about it.

However, recently, I have been trying to be cleaner with my words towards others and only provide harsher, more direct criticism when it is needed.

tl;dr: I don't aspire to be a Robin-clone. No–I do, however, notice how unique of a character he truly is and how we[Eclipsians] most likely will never meet anyone quite like him again in our lives; we should embrace his presence and learn from his honesty.

**:EDIT:**
Also: The boards seem to me much more mature than what they used to be. Like Jungle has said, we have become more "professional" in a sense. I don't see newb-gibberish defacing threads as they used to.

[SawQuart]

@MrMiguu:

> -snip-

The only thing I've borrowed from Robin is the will to improve my grammar and spelling. I used to always talk in newb language, but I've realized that being professional does make a difference.

~~Also, I became egotistical just like Robin~~

[ZoSo]

All the kids are busy building stuff on Minecraft, nobody will come here to create anything anymore.