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[GregWS]

FINAL EDIT: OK, in hindsight I think I shouldn't have brought all this up, but I think neon has answered the question PERFECTLY!

Tigsource is a forum geared towards people who create.

I couldn't agree with this sentiment more; so then I guess we are fine the way we are 

EDIT: So a lot of people are misinterpreting this as a suggestion that TIGS would be better if "celebrity" indies were here.  After reading a few of the comments and thinking about it at bit, I think what I was trying to get at is that the forums here are completely out of sync with the blog.  Both are great, but I think if we really are "The Independent Gaming Source", and our forums are "The Independent Gaming Discussion" then there should be more player-focused stuff here.  We could change the forum's name to "The Independent Game Development Discussion", and that would be fairly accurate.  The blog is already an almost entirely player-related affair, so why should the forums be so development focused?  It's not like we'd have to cut back from development stuff in order to have more player stuff.

Here's my point: if we want indie gaming to ever be taken seriously (in a way that I don't think mainstream gaming ever will, or, won't for quite some time), then we need to have a large base of players who aren't creating games themselves.

I love indie movies, I love trying to make sense of them, I love the experimentation that takes place in many of them, and I love the taboo subject matters they deal with, but I have no intention of going out an making one.  So that said, why are we afraid to have (intelligent) players around here?  Just because someone has never designed a game before it doesn't exclude them from looking at it critically.  And even on a more basic side, we already already like talking about indie games here, so why not have a more organized forum than simply our current all-encompassing "Indie Games" sub-forum?

The reason I mentioned Cactus' and Nifflas' forums in my original suggestion was that I think they're the perfect example of "player" forums.  My suggestion that it would be cool if we had sub-forums for threads about prolific indie "celebrities" games, was, in hindsight, a reflection of how I wish the forums were a little more player friendly.

Just to be clear, I am a hobby developer, and have been using GM for almost 5 years, so I'm not just an indie game player hanging out here and trying to change things.

Here's the original suggestion:

OK, so here's my topic about what I think would make TIGS so much more awesome than it already is.

Wouldn't it be better for everyone (read: the indie community) if TIGS offered prestigious indies (eg. Cactus, Nifflas) their own sub-forums here?  I'm not a fan of being on a bunch of different forums, and I don't think I'm alone in that sentiment:

I'd register at such-and-such forum, but I don't really feel like it.

I love the vibe here, and I think it would be great if TIGS became the place where all the best indie creators hang out, instead of them being split between TIGS and their own forums (like Cactus), or simply not being here at all, like Nifflas.

It was actually Nifflas who indirectly gave me the idea when he said on his forum:

The whole thing is tricky, because of my limited time the ideal thing for me would be if someone else hosted an unofficial board and I was just a regular member without any kind of responsibility. That way I could still chat as much as I usually do, but not have to take the blame for things that happens on a forum which I have no time at all to maintain.

Assuming he still feels that way, this is a total win-win for everybody.  Derek could choose which devs to offer sub-forums to, and I'm sure some of them would jump at the chance.

And it would help push TIGS even closer to becoming the ultimate destination for indie gaming, instead of having everyone splintered across the web.  I think TIGdb was a great first step in making this a reality, and I think this consolidation of forums would be a great way to keep moving forward.

Discuss.   

[Tanner]

I liked the niffforums better pre-ks.
Of course, I'm a xenophobe at times.
But then again, I'm still a beta-tester.

[Renton]

I believe it would bring along too many gamers and "idea people".

[increpare]

Well we don't entirely want to fragment the community within these boards either.  Which might happen if we had a bunch of different boards for different big devs.  It would increase the workload of the admins also.  What would be ideal would be to have some sort of shared membership database.  These sorts of things don't exist though, to my knowledge(unless there's some forum software that supports openID).

If somebody doesn't have time to post on forums other than their own, they're not really going to have time to deal with a big monstrous forum either.  Nifflas's comment could be taken to mean as much that they want someone else to host a nifflas-specific forum, rather than they want their forum to be consolidated into a big giant.

That said, it's an interseting idea.  Will be interesting to see what other people say.

Look at how crazy* things have gotten over at the GG2 thread?  Imagine if we had lots of places like that?  How would we deal with the resulting lack of boardwide social cohesion?

EDIT: also: renton's point is good.  This forum is chiefly aimed at oriented around people interested in the creation of computer games, not players.

(*crazy as in crazy-busy, not the other sort of crazy, which hasn't been a problem for the forum to my knowledge)

[Renton]

Look at how crazy things have gotten over at the GG2 thread?  Imagine if we had lots of places like that?

I was gonna say that, but I'm too hateful towards the GG2 thread and it's folk. They need their own forums. Good game, though

Anyways. Look at Nifflas forums or, I dunno, Facepunch forums. A lot of talk, not much done. I think we already have too many idea people (one being me, a game making enthusiast who never actually managed to finish a project) and having all the popular indie developers' fans would only pollute and corrupt the overall forums. I mean, the GG2 4chan raid, anyone?

[GregWS]

I believe it would bring along too many gamers and "idea people".

Unless I'm mistaken, don't we already have a lot of those?

OK, maybe not so much among the "regulars"...

Good point(s) increpare; in the end it's that shared ID that I'd like too; more so than the single big forum idea.

I hadn't been aware of that GG2 thread until Valter's about "what's happened to the neighborhood," and yeah, I guess I hadn't thought of that.

Some coder really needs to develop that shared ID, as I think that would nicely solve this problem.

[moi]

I have nothing against gamers and idea people, IMO TIGS isn't restricted only to devs, never been that.
That being said, I don't see the point of offering forums to "celebrities", for what? Cactus and nifflas don't seem to be very talkative people, and the threads would start to become a bit boring and/or fanboyish.
When I read the daily "new posts" I am already obliged to skim through dozen of "werewolf" and other uninteresting to me threads, that would only increase the clutter.

[Valter]

I got quoted! I'm famous!


I agree with moi, too. Think about what the acronym means: The Independent Gaming Source. It's a place about indie gaming, not specifically game playing or making. I think the thing that sets us apart from them is that we're a hybrid. We do pretty much equal parts game discussion and game creation. This should be a place free for anybody interesting in independent gaming to come hang out.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

I kind of think this is a bad idea. Or rather, a good idea that won't work (hence making it a good idea in theory but a bad idea in practice). It'd eventually strain TIGSource's servers and moderators if there were too many new forums. There'd be arguments about who got a forum and who didn't. I don't see any real advantage except to the people too lazy to register on multiple forums (it takes fifteen seconds most of the time).

I believe Manifesto Games once tried creating a subforum for every single game they have listed. It didn't work out too well, the vast majority of them had 0 posts.

[___]

Nothing against said developers, but I don't think having their own sub forums is necessary, nor a good idea.  In regards to the example of Cactus and Nifflas, both have their own forums and pretty much their own community, so why would they need more of a spotlight in TIGS?

I believe that TIGS is a place where everyone should be on the same level just sharing everything related to indie gaming, and not a place where the spotlight should be pointed to a few successful developers.  I love me some cactus and nifflas games (and cactus personally...), but they already have their own corners of the internet set up for their fans.

[GregWS]

I have nothing against gamers and idea people, IMO TIGS isn't restricted only to devs, never been that.
That being said, I don't see the point of offering forums to "celebrities", for what? Cactus and nifflas don't seem to be very talkative people, and the threads would start to become a bit boring and/or fanboyish.

That's not really accurate.  A lot of both their forums are simply threads or sub-forums devoted to their games.  Basically just threads that would exist in the Indie Games sub-forum here.  The big reason I'd say to use a sub-forum is for clarity and organization.  Both of them have fairly large game libraries, and having a bunch of different Cactus game threads all split up in the Indie Games sub-forum isn't that organized.  Especially when people may be looking for threads on a certain Cactus game (his games break video game "rules", and people do get stuck).

I agree with moi, too. Think about what the acronym means: The Independent Gaming Source. It's a place about indie gaming, not specifically game playing or making. I think the thing that sets us apart from them is that we're a hybrid. We do pretty much equal parts game discussion and game creation. This should be a place free for anybody interesting in independent gaming to come hang out.

This is definitely what I believe, and hence why I created this thread.  I think there is a really interesting split between the blog and forums.  I mean, the blog is dedicated almost entirely to posting about games and the playing of them, whereas the forum is staunchly about creating them.  I guess that's one of the only things I find strange about TIGS; that we only have two sub-forums about the playing of games (and anything else) when our main blog is devoted almost entirely to that aspect of the indie community (I like the blog the way it is, just to clarify).

You know, I seriously wonder how many of those manbabies are just players of indie games who joined after being long time readers of the blog and then realized that the forums were very development focused.  They probably just feel out of place in such a development focused place when they're not doing any developing.

I think the independent film industry's model is something we should be striving for.  There are a huge amount of people (myself included) who prefer independent film and support it but never go out and shoot our own movies.  Currently I think indie gaming is (for the most part) a community of people who make games and play each others games.  Do any of us know someone (OK, maybe a few people is a better target) who plays indie games but has no desire to be involved with the production of them?  I think this is something we need to overcome soon, because the sooner we can overcome this, the sooner indie gaming can get itself an intelligent and devoted audience, like independent film currently enjoys.

[Seth]

I believe it would bring along too many gamers and "idea people".

This is not the first time I've heard this sentiment around here, and I'm all for it.  You know games are on their way to being treated as a valid art form when game creators only want to associate with other game creators.

[deadeye]

If celebrities want to come here, they will.  There's nothing stopping them.  There are already a few celebrities here and none of them are expecting to be treated like royalty.  We're all pretty much just regular folks here, and I really like that it's all laid back like that.  I don't know, if I were famous for my games (yeah right) then I would think it kind of creepy, if not just plain odd or annoying if someone said "Hey, come to TIGS... we've made a special place just for you."

And this desire to make TIGS prestigious by luring in the bigwigs... well, that's a little pretentious and artificial imo.  "If only we had some cooler people here it would make TIGS (and the rest of us) seem cooler ."  I mean it's nice to want TIGS to have more coverage, but I think reporting indie game news and having cool contests and get-togethers and stuff is doing the job just fine, and those kinds of things are bringing in new people every day anyway.

[GregWS]

If celebrities want to come here, they will.  There's nothing stopping them.  There are already a few celebrities here and none of them are expecting to be treated like royalty.

The point was never to have them around, it was to have the information and opportunity for discussion here.

Like I said in the thread title, consolidation.

I've made a very significant addition to the first post to clarify all of this, please check it out.

[Lucaz]

It find it inadequate to create sub-forums for some developers, I find that elitist and arbitrary, as if Derek, the community, or whoever was in charge decided who is good and who isn't. I mean, yes, Nifflas and Cactus would have their place for sure. But what about all the developers that are good or well-know but not THAT good or well-known? It's out of place to make such a judgement.

EDIT: For the new subject of the thread. I don't think I can add much to that, I don't know what this place I suppossed to be. Anyway, I'm just a developer wannabe, more on the gamer side, and at no point I felt out of place, unwellcome, or anything similar.

[Alex May]

Awful idea. Why must every other thread be an insipid navel-gazing examination of this community?

[Hajo]

I believe it would bring along too many gamers and "idea people".

I read such statements a few times across this forum. Why are idea people bad? I actually often lack ideas how to make my projects more fun and entertaining - I'm too much of a technician and too little of a designer or artist.

I often go and ask the few fellows whom I know a little better, how to make a project of mine more interesting to players. Ideas are really welcome. I mean, ideas, not blurry visions. Ideas about game mechanics that actually work, ideas about features that players will embrace, ideas about little details to make the games world more immersive, interesting and catching for the player.

I guess you mean different idea people. But we should be clear which we mean. I definitely think a game development community needs idea people, who inspire the less creative but technically skilled with their ideas.

[Renton]

What I meant by "idea people" is people who go around telling others how to make their games, or those who open a thread, write and write about their game ideas and ask others to make the game for them. They are just, "idea" people (and usually bad ideas at that, too); no skills or desire to work whatsoever..

[Hajo]

On a second thought, I like the focus on game developers or at least on people who are inclined to create games.

From many discussions here I could already draw a lot of ideas that will help me to improve my skills, and eventually my projects. In between the usual chit-chat there are sparkling messages that tell of really high knowledge in the one or other area, from math to artwork. It'd be a pity if a change in the focus of the forum would make such people wander away. Even if the knowledge gets harder to find in between the static, because of a higher number of chat messages.

There are already lots of forums that cater for gamers and games. I guess it's good that this one caters more for those who want to create games.

[increpare]

Both are great, but I think if we really are "The Independent Gaming Source", and our forums are "The Independent Gaming Discussion" then there should be more player-focused stuff here.

I like the balance of things as they are at the moment.

Awful idea. Why must every other thread be an insipid navel-gazing examination of this community?

Every other thread?  You exaggerate, I think: this is the only such one I can spot that's active at the moment.

I don't like this use of the term "idea people"; irony notwithstanding, it has rather elitist, condescending, and anti-intellectual airs.

I think this is something we need to overcome soon, because the sooner we can overcome this, the sooner indie gaming can get itself an intelligent and devoted audience, like independent film currently enjoys.

FWIW, I personally have no desire to 'overcome' this.  I like the blurred line.  I don't particularly like the audience/creator divide.

I think that's all of my two cents now.