It’s been a while since our last update, almost 2 years in fact, but with the site starting to pick up more traffic and a healthy amount of content creators lending us their support, it’s about time I shift my focus back to fixing up the website. Many of my goals remain the same. Push forward on Patreon and now PayPal.me support, update the way we post articles so it is easier to create content, finally finish the jobs and resume section so that we can effectively help people turn their passion for writing about games into paying jobs.

We’re still looking to expand the emblems and scoring system in the near future while we build the channel system out. Channels will be custom user groups within the community that will come with their own dedicated news/review and blog feeds, as well as a channel specific forum page. Users will be able to create their own Channels and invite friends to join them once they have achieved the proper level. User levels will be based on posting news articles and reviews plus any likes those accumulate. Posting in the forums will eventually join the scoring system but on a much smaller scale(most likely 1 point for every 10 posts). Some of these features may be a long way out in the future.

The primary focus in the near term will be on enhancing the user experience for our guests. When I built this site we did not have a server capable of handling a lot of data-friendly methods. I’ll be researching ways to optimize the flow of data so that the site loads quicker and puts less of a demand on your mobile plan. Basically, I want the way this site performs to be as slick as our site looks. It’s not enough to put a nice body-kit on your car, you have to tinker with the engine too.

If you have suggestions on how we can improve this site do not hesitate to leave a comment below or find me on our Discord and leave me a message.

xsuicidesn0wmanx todo:

Basic Site Overhaul:

1. Update home page to display less posts but include more natural footer. Reduce data footprint to better suit mobile devices. – Done
2. Update footer to display lesser used links, add more of a site map to the footer and include links to our friends, our sponsors and registration links. – Done
3. Update News and Reviews pages to use a formal archive system with list of months and years. – In Progress
4. Finish updating and cleaning up the new registration page. – In Progress
5. Update home page to display name of user who posted a Video instead of the game title. – Done
6. Update backend/dashboard so Content Editors can post Videos. – Done
7. Build forms for posting news, reviews, video, jobs, and updating a resume. – In Progress
8. Build user resume single to feature user information and link their local work and external work. – In Progress
9. Build up our Twitch page – In Progress
10. Look into developer tools for Mixer and integrate into website.
11. Add PayPal support for individuals. – Done
12. Update quickie page to display author name. – Done
13. Research auto-posting to Facebook and possibly other social media sites to further expand our following.
14. Finish Jobs section.
15. Build Retro section.
16. Build new WP REST based front page.
17. Update frontpage to use mobile friendly methods, defer scripts and css as much as possible, use REST to load content below the fold after initial render.
18. Update frontpage to use Tinder style display that lets users swipe left and right to view news articles, offer option to view as list. Load 2 articles, one on top of the other, WP REST load next article below the visible article, use display none to hide most recent article.
19. Add options to hide elements of the page using hidden menu accessible via gear icon on home page. Users can check a box to make basic elements of the site appear and disappear. Main idea behind this is to make the menu system more accessible.

Author/Profile Pages:

1. Apply design changes to the profile landing page. – In Progress
2. Update Activity feed with new styles. – In Progress
3. Add Emblems Post Type and connect them to Users.
4. Add Emblems to the activity feed.
5. Combine Profile and Settings tabs into individual page.
6. Add Patreon and PayPal Emblems to user profile pages so that readers can help support their favorite creators. Patreon is done, PayPal still needs to be built up.
7. Look into BuddyPress Groups for potential groundwork for future ‘Channels’ project.
8. Design the leveling system, figure out what xp will be required for each level and what title the user will earn based on level.
9. Create a brief description for each level that injects a bit of humor into the site, breath life into the idea.
10. Current ideas for user levels…. 0-4 (Noob) 5-9 (Rook) 10-14 (Meat Bicycle – Borderlands ref) 90-99 (Dragonborn – Skyrim ref) – Added list of ranks along with scoring requirements at the bottom of the page.
11. Give users the ability to toggle profanity on/off.
12. Fix notification links so that they go to the correct page/reply.
13. Create a dropdown menu for Notifications if unread > 1.
14. Add ability for Users to connect their favorite articles. Top 5 in the order will be displayed on their resume page for the jobs section.
15. Finish building out Jobs pages and Portfolio page.

Comment/Vote system:

1. Start NodeJS demo to replace current comment polling system. – In Progress
2. Update comment system to use similar styles to the new messaging system single.
3. Update comment system to show icons of users who vote and the direction they voted. Users will be held accountable for their choice. Basically means people can’t downvote anonymously, if you don’t like what someone has to say, own up to it.
4. Add featured comment system, enable users to earn the ‘top comment’ emblem, maybe add multiple top comment emblems based on popularity of the feature.
5. Build ‘balance’ system to keep users from abusing the downvote system. This will be a mathematical calculation based on the users last 20 votes, of which a limit of 10 can be downvotes. In addition the same calculation will be applied to the last 20 votes on articles posted by the same user UNLESS the author has had a minimum of 100 votes and their upvote to downvote ratio is lower than the ratio of votes from the user for that author. i.e. If the author has 30 upvotes and 70 downvotes, the user will be able to downvote up to 14 articles for every 6 upvoted from that author. – Need more traffic for this to become feasible. 

Forums:

The forums are currently not being used. Some of these updates have been completed, some not even started. Will not be revisiting this part of the site until traffic picks up and having a forum makes sense again.

1. Update single threads to have paging again.
2. Update forums header to resemble profile page header. – Done
3. Update look to resemble the look of the new profile messaging system. – Done
4. Add update to forums to display top posters. – Done
5. Add a square in the forums that shows the latest -or- hottest topics.
6. Update forum home page to display more information about latest posts – at least user name and thread title, total posts etc.
7. Update forum styling so that it isn’t broken on phones.
8. Update all icons with working code, Edit/Flag/Trash currently unresponsive.
9. Make sticky topics more easily recognizable.
10. Add button for last read post.
11. Add icons to indicate whether user has posted in a thread and if there are any replies since they last read the post.
12. Add Like/Dislike option to forum posts.
13. Build a leaderboard page.
14. Individual threads missing paging system.
15. Add posts per page toggle.
16. Fix the upload interface once again and find out why it keeps reverting…

Custom Page Templates:

1. Finish cleaning up the new Login/Register page, work on mobile design. – In Progress
2. Update Platform pages to display all game art if total connected games is less than 48. Use pages instead of alpha.  – Removing game list in favor of recent releases, upcoming releases and latest reviews. 7 game boxes max.
3. Add min height to box art section of platform page so the page won’t jump as much when loading next page of art. – Done
4. Update Retro page to list all consoles by category with image and short description. – In Progress
5. Create games page that accepts console=’xbox’ to display a list of all games on that console. – In Progress
6. Add author name to article lists on home page and all 3 list types. – Done
7. Add ability to rate a game without having to submit a review, store scores as review w/out content so user can add a review later and scores are still the same.
8. Add ability to download/export your review ratings and reviews as an xlsx file.
9. Add container to display information about the highlighted game on the Ajax loaded content including title, avg review score, esrb rating. – Scope changed, no longer necessary.
10. Limit ‘Recent Reviews’ to 6 on platform page and 4 on game page with link to view all that redirects to the reviews page. – Done
11. Add ‘highlight text’ into the review/news template. – Cancelled.
12. Update AJAX on home page to use custom loop. – Delayed due to updated layout, no longer possible with current application. Cancelled, removing Ajax from the site.
13. Update trio of ‘list’ pages so that ajax only post-loads content from current month + 7 days. – Will need new design for archive pages. Being replaced with standard link archive pages for better ux.
14. Connect related games to each other (i.e. connect Call of Duty 2 to Call of Duty 3). – In Progress
15. Add ‘Related Games’ section to full news articles, reviews, and game pages. – In Progress
16. Add ‘Related News’ section to full news articles, reviews, and game pages. – In Progress
17. Update News and Review singles to display Patreon Emblem next to the names of any author who have their Patreon account linked with us. – Done
18. Update News and Review singles to display top Emblems for the author(i.e. highest ranking post count emblem, or likes count emblem). – In Test Phase.
19. Update news and review singles to further promote an authors Patreon account to increase potential patron growth.
20. Update news and review singles to display details from the authors Patreon account including how many followers they have, current patron amount and total patrons.

Ads:

1. Create the Ad pages. Create 3 different tiers for the 3 different types of ads we can make money off of and create a page for each. These pages will only have ads on them and are intended to be a way our users can help us pay the bills. Tier 1 would be for game related affiliate deals and banners. Tier 2 would be for game and technology related banners from other advertising partners. Tier 3 would be for Taboola and outlink generated garbage. These pages are optional to the user and will not be required for use here, they are only for those kind enough to help us pay the bills by lending us their eyes and a few clicks. Cancelled, we can do this with affiliate links only.
2. Create a page for donating funds through PayPal or Patreon to help us pay the bills, the dedicated server we have picked out will be $90 per month, we hope to move to it between January 2017 and February 2017. – Add to Our Recommendations page at the bottom, and on the registration page/login.
3. Integrate non-intrusive links to buy the connected game from our affiliated partners at Best Buy, Amazon, and GameStop(Pricing not available via API on GS). – Done, Added ‘Our Recommendations’ page with links to 15-18 games recently released or coming soon that we think will be enjoyable. Currently does not include price comparison, need Node JS(meaning new server) before we can use the NodeJS API’s to pull prices from retailers.

Note: We have affiliate status with Amazon.com, Best Buy, and GameStop. We will have links posted that you can click on that will give us credit for any purchases made on those 3 online retailers websites. We make roughly 1-2% of the total sale, which is not much but it adds up. 

Data Entry:

1. Connect boxart to game. – On Going… 
2. Update database with complete list of modern games. – On Going…
3. Update database with list of retro games.
4. Create custom forms for adding news and reviews t0 provide users with a better, more intuitive GUI when posting new articles.
5. Connect Amazon ASIN’s for current games. – On Going
6. Add new metabox for secondary box art(i.e. Nintendo Switch boxes) – Done

New Features:

1. Build ability for users to create ‘channels’ where multiple users can post under a single unified group. Channels will allow multiple users to post on a single article, and increase the chances of being featured on the main feed.- Coming December 2020 or earlier. Need more users for this feature to be feasible.
2. Build collection features into Games Post type and allow users to track their collections through the site. – Collections built but not enabled, will be part of the user profile page update in the near future.
3. Add ability to download/export your collection as an xlsx file.
4. Allow user-to-game post relation to also indicate games that user is currently playing. Display this on their profile page and in forum signature.
5. Increase amount of user levels available to users who use the site frequently, these will be based on their overall score from posting news & reviews plus likes received.
6. Add Emblems to the user profiles that are awarded for achieving various tasks(i.e. 100 posts, 1000 likes, 500 comments, 2500 forum posts, etc) plus custom Emblems to be awarded for specific events that we will hold in the future. Include Editor Emblem to be given as a special emblem for users who help us correct mistakes on our website(i.e. typos).
7. Example Emblems… Founder(given to contributing members during our first year, 2016) Popped Your Cherry(posted first news article or review) Wat(wrote a confusing article or post that made zero sense at all)
8. Blog of the Month – Need more users, foundation already built.
9. Link Blog Posts to Forums.

Killer todo:

1. mock up new archive pages for News, Reviews and Blogs.
2. mock in product placement on quickies and videos. – Done
3. mock up PSA 1920×1080 image for deal finder section on home page, this will replace the featured article with a post that lists on-going sales from our affiliates to be updated daily. – Cancelled
4. Mock up Add Article/Review form page.
5. Mock up full ‘Start Here’ page(mentioned adding in small images before certain blocks of text?)
6. If not done already, mock up the Portfolio page with 5 linked articles/reviews.

Collective todo:

1. Get more writers for the site.
2. Adjust CSS for responsive stages 2-6.
3. Get more writers for the site.
4. Throwback Thursday gameplay sessions and write-up, possible user interaction where users decide what game we play.
5. Get more writers for the site.
6. Week in review post on Sundays(maybe build the week in review post during the week in the forums and let users create & submit articles to be featured in that post, great way to build a following.
7. Get more writers for the site.
8. MST3k style youtube series
9. Get more writers for the site.
10. Buy remaining items for our podcasts
11. Get more writers for the site.

Proposed User Ranking System:

1. Level 1 – Starts with 1000 points – Title: Virgin – Emblem: Cherries
2. Level 2 – 1070 points – Unlocked Title: Noob – Unlocked Emblem: Popped
3. Level 3 – 1145 points
4. Level 4 – 1225 points
5. Level 5 – 1311 points – Unlocked Title: Half Chub – Unlocked Emblem: Eggplant
6. Level 6 – 1403 points
7. Level 7 – 1501 points
8. Level 8 – 1606 points
9. Level 9 – 1718 points
10. Level 10 – 1838 points – Unlocked Title: Grub – Unlocked Emblem: TBD

Comments do work, so if anyone thinks of something that can improve the site or has any questions please drop us a line. Feel free to also use the comments below as a place to report any bugs, glitches or annoyances you find while we build the site.