savnt Posted June 21, 2006 Report Share Posted June 21, 2006 Chayesh, The Fl website is looking good. I also was scanning around and saw this : http://forum.forsakenlands.org/showthread.php?t=205&highlight=website .. perhaps we could take a little of both and have one very professional and usable site? Granny is an amazing artist, and you have many superb ideas for content. My favorite thing about this place is the adaptability and open-ness to positive change. As a webmaster, and player, I can say this. There are several news letters for webmasters claiming the following... (1) A black backgrounded website is seen as less professional and more as a first homepage to many individuals in the website business as well as casual users. (2) A website with background music with lose traffic due to the music alone. (3) A website that loads slower than others with lose traffic to speed demon designs. Perhaps, with the advent of a more stable fl, it might be time for a slight face lift? Why not take advantage of and utilize Granny, he is a free graphic designer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JJJon Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 I really like the music but i really hate that I Have to listen to it every time I log onto the site. Sometimes when i'm surfing the net i have my own tunes going etc. And I do agree that black background sites are generally seen as less professional looking. I honestly think that for a black BG site this one looks really, really good. I kind of liked the one in the thread with the orange and the cloud. I think that the most important thing for site traffic is that everyone VOTE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zrothum Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 Savnt and Granny....back at it again lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Celerity Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 I prefer a black background because it is much easier on the eyes. Dark yellow on light yellow on white doesn't do it for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheNewGuy Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 The site is very functional, but I have to agree that a black background makes it look unprofessional. If would have been cheking around on tms for a mud to try, then opened that page, I would have turned it down in two sec. The homepage is the first thing a new player will see. If we want new players, then maybe we should give granny a shot at it at least. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Celerity Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 Note that this website has a black background. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheNewGuy Posted June 22, 2006 Report Share Posted June 22, 2006 Note that a black background is what I said was the problem. But I'm no expert. Just know that I wouldn't even had tried the mud with that website as a first impression. Maybe it ain't the background, but for sure it is something. I say again, give granny a shot. If it ain't better, keep the old one, if it is, well... Great! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Designated_Driver Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 I would like to say, without being smacked for my opinion, that I am not a fan of the current site layout. While I can navigate it, because I know exactly what I'm looking for, I think a new player would find it moderately difficult to go through the site. I think it would be interesting to see what could be come up with as an alternate design, if a challenge was given to the playerbase. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MeleeCrazy Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 Note that this website has a black background. And is quite professional looking...I love the way this forum is designed. I honestly haven't visited the Fl homepage in forever. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shaun Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 I enjoy how the website is currently laid out..I don't have any music on mine.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
One Way Up Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 I wish I knew a thing or two about computer animation. I would love to see, somewhere on the sight, CGI'd charcters or something. Kind of like a Flash intro with the CGI characters duking it out in flashes of battles, cutting in and out with cool words like Turnip, or something along those lines. Or when you're checking out the About FL link, when you check out the classes, have a small CGI pic of the class doing whatever it is it does against, say, a crash test dummy suspended from a scaffold. A berserker ripping it to shreds, or a Paladin coming in from out of nowhere and mangling the dummy with a mounted charge, or a Battlemage hacking away with it's blades/sharpmetal. You get the point. Anyhow, if I knew anything about computer animation, I'd be on it today. Maybe some of you do? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
savnt Posted June 23, 2006 Author Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 Savnt and Granny....back at it again lol Yep, silly me... pointing out something no one wants to say, but should most likely be said, in order to generate more traffic and whatnot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jackal Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 Honestly, as a new player and as someone who has done site design for a couple of years, I don't find the site to be very usable. It is overly large - there is way too much unnecessary code, graphics need to be optimized, and there are fonts set in the styles (Palatino Linotype) that don't appear in almost anyone's browser. Navigation isn't clear at all, and it's really unnecessary to make a simple navigation menu as multiple divs with z-indexes. That's all pretty technical, but the upshot is this: the site is slow to load, hard to navigate, and it's not valid HTML. I think the fault is the software being used - WYSIWYG editors like SiteSpinner are notorious for producing bloated pages that will have display problems in different browsers. While the look and feel of the site are good, I think that having a site that is slow and hard to use doesn't give a good first impression. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brsingr Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 I really like the music but i really hate that I Have to listen to it every time I log onto the site. Sometimes when i'm surfing the net i have my own tunes going etc. And I do agree that black background sites are generally seen as less professional looking. I honestly think that for a black BG site this one looks really, really good. I kind of liked the one in the thread with the orange and the cloud. I think that the most important thing for site traffic is that everyone VOTE ahm.. you dont have to listen to it to PLAY. telnet:\\216.136.9.8:1848 in address bar, or get a client Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chayesh Posted June 30, 2006 Report Share Posted June 30, 2006 I haven't posted in this thread because I wanted to read what was said and glean constructive input where it was mentioned. Truth be told, in what time I have available, I've been working on an upgraded website to replace the current one (if for no other reason than it needs its info updated). As for the web design things mentioned, white background sites are considered more professional if you have a professional site, that is to say, if you are running a business from it. Most gaming sites, be they MUDs or other type of game, run black sites or whatever fits the theme of the game. Remember, the most important aspect of a website is not the thematic elements, but rather does it fulfill its role, i.e. communicating the information it's intended to convey. The design then either hinders or helps this. Plenty of well done sites in the gaming community have black backgrounds, TMC, TMS, Carrion Fields, D&D Stormreach, Guild Wars, Blizzard Entertainment, just to name a few successful, well-known sites. Now, for the FL site, I look at it and see several things I could do better. My frames work needed to be cleaner and the site now looks busy to me. Don't get me wrong, I still think it's cool and fits our theme, but I plan to take what's there and improve upon it. The delay has been that I'm branching out to some uncharted territory and I've been experimenting with a completely Flash-enabled site. Making it work, however, has been....interesting. Much Pepsi, beer, Ben & Jerry's, and foul language has been consumed along the way. It will happen however. When it does, I really hope you guys will feel as proud of it as I will. Bottom line: Background colors do not matter nearly as much as how well the information is conveyed. It was being worked on before the players mentioned it, but I didn't want my silence to imply I was ignoring this thread or not listening. P.S. To those having trouble hearing the embedded music, you either don't have an .mp3 codecs/player, or more likely, your comp is blocking ActiveX content from running. My comp pops up an ActiveX warning each time that I have to approve to make the music play. The new site may have music, but perhaps only as a Flash intro rather than the whole site. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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