Think the community's state is /worth discussing/?

Personally, I recall how busy the KS level releases area was only a year ago. When the heavyhitters (Farik, Drakkan, Googoogjob, to name only a few) were all active and making levels from time to time. Now it seems that there are only a few people that even make KS anymore. That's part of the reason I made and released one. I love Knytt Stories and it makes me sad to see it getting so little attention nowadays.

But who knows? With KnyttWaDF coming, maybe the surge of people that it will likely bring will spark new life here?

I know this has been said many times before but having a place to discuss stuff (like SOPA, the morality of pirating software, religion, etc) would be cool with this community. I feel like as long as it is decently moderated it will be fine. Imo most of the users here are mature enough to not make shit (aka troll) threads.

Btw: KnyttWaDF will bring more people, but it will probably be followed by another long gap of silence. Maybe if we could have a "General Disscussion" section (not Off-Topic section, mind you) if would cause people to stick around longer.

It's not just about trolling. Threads like religion vs atheism may easily provoke conflicts. What should certainly be good is a place to discuss commercial games, although I already mentioned it before in this thread. And, of course, getting more people to play Nifflas' games is the best thing to do.

Religion vs Atheism???  Why you... I'm offended!

I never mentioned religion vs atheism. Religion encompasses a large spectrum, that is not the only thread that can come out of religion, you know. I'm just saying that General Discussion board is not that same as an offtopic board and with semi-heavy moderation can add life to this dead community. I'm sorry though, religion may have been a poor example.

Religion vs Atheism???  Why you... I'm offended!

Are you seriously offended that easily? Nothing was said promoting one side or the other nor was there any hate, give me a break... 

Pretty sure that was sarcasm -.-
I slowly changed my opinion on this. Every time I see this discussion it just feels like people are being lazy, there is absolutely nothing to lose and with a community like this it really isn't going to make that much of a difference, but it would help. At least the general gaming forum should be there, not even all of Niffla's games are free, I really don't understand why there isn't one yet. Does anyone really think that by adding these sections to the forum it is suddenly going to become every other forum on the internet?

oops, if that was sarcasm I didn't catch it. sorry 

I really don't understand why there isn't one yet.

I think it's because the administration here is resistant to change/trying (well most people are, to be fair).

Trying never is a bad thing. It allows you to learn.

I have stated this so many times before, but it seems I have to again.

We have tried it in the past, and it attracted the wrong kind of people. People were lurking only in the general chatter section, and they chatted about absolutely nothing. Thats a serious waste of forum space. They just posted because they were bored. The staff stopped looking in that section even, and worse, Nifflas games weren't discussed anymore (posting a challenge, etc). Not to mention, that questions about Nifflas' games started to take place there too (eg: help, am stuck to get the 3rd ball in WaDF).

For some strange reason, whenever you have a general chatter section, people automatically assume that whatever question they have cannot be discussed elsewhere. So a general chatter section is out of the question. It nearly destroyed this forum once, and I'm not going to let that happen again.

A debates forum is the alternative that we've had. Basically its a form of general chatter, but much more organized. We had this before, and it did work, but discussions went in circles, and people just started to post to keep a discussion alive. When I asked for new discussions ideas, nothing really shown up. I'm not going to invest time into something that people just want, but aren't going to use.

And I hear you: But when you make it, I will use it! Sure you are, but for how long? Are you really missing it that much?

Ha!  Sorry.  "I'm offended" is an ironic catch phrase around these parts.  I sometimes forget where RL stops and the interwebs begins.  

And yeah, I have no suggestions on how to handle a chatter section, but as I've said before, the popularity or even activity in this forum has never seemed the point to me.  The point is that this forum attracts quality and often keeps it.  While there is not a ton of activity, what is here is most often quality.

A debates forum is the alternative that we've had. Basically its a form of general chatter, but much more organized. We had this before, and it did work, but discussions went in circles, and people just started to post to keep a discussion alive. When I asked for new discussions ideas, nothing really shown up. I'm not going to invest time into something that people just want, but aren't going to use.

A debate is quite different from discussion, and I don't think it will really have any long-term affects on people coming to this forum, like the arcade. I mean it might be popular at first, but people just get tired of talking about the same subject and it tends to go into circles, like you said.

We have tried it in the past, and it attracted the wrong kind of people. People were lurking only in the general chatter section, and they chatted about absolutely nothing. Thats a serious waste of forum space. They just posted because they were bored. The staff stopped looking in that section even, and worse, Nifflas games weren't discussed anymore (posting a challenge, etc). Not to mention, that questions about Nifflas' games started to take place there too (eg: help, am stuck to get the 3rd ball in WaDF).

For some strange reason, whenever you have a general chatter section, people automatically assume that whatever question they have cannot be discussed elsewhere. So a general chatter section is out of the question. It nearly destroyed this forum once, and I'm not going to let that happen again.

A general chatter section destroyed the forum? I wasn't around at the time, but that sounds kind of strange since most of the other forums that I go to are doing fine with a GD and Offtopic section. The forums based on games also maintain focus on the actual game. I'll take your word for it though, since I wasn't there. As for nifflas' games not being discussed, they aren't really being discussed now either, with the exception of KS. Anyways, now I realize that this forum is structured a little differently (there is really an emphasis on nifflas' games), and discussing about it isn't going to change anybody's mind.

I just hope that there isn't a year-long gap of inactivity between every release, but I'm a pessimist to the core so let's just see what happens.  

General off-topic forum is not needed becasuse of Niffchat but LPChip exaggerates the truth. it wouldn't kill the forum or make anything worse it would just be completely unnecessary.
What would be nice is shoutbox. Shoutbox is great for announcing level releases, nifflas news and act as a general chat. Keeps forum more alive and centered, it don't get in the way that LPChip say an off-topic forum would either.

A general chatter section destroyed the forum? I wasn't around at the time, but that sounds kind of strange since most of the other forums that I go to are doing fine with a GD and Offtopic section

Basically what happened at that point was this:

Nifflas was at the head of the forum, but didn't have time to make changes. Nifflas initially had made an offtopic board because every forum has one. The rest of the staff just didn't look at the board and 90% of all the chatter took place in that board. For both me and FastRecords this was bad. It was so bad for me that I was on a choice there. Either, things changed, or I'd left the community. If I recall right, FastRecords shared that thought with me. So I decided to step to Nifflas and told him. He told me he wasn't that happy with the situation either but he just didn't had time to make changes. So FastRecords, Nifflas and I sat around the table and discussed how to make things better. That basically meant that Nifflas gave us control of the forum so he could focus on game development.

Basically, if there hadn't been made changes, chances are high that the staff would've quit, things would've been a mess, and well, your imagination can do the rest. I suppose that Nifflas would stop coming to a forum like that if he didn't take it offline first. (it was still at his hosting back then)

There's not a lot of things I can add to what's been said by me and/or a few other people, but I do have a few notes.

Reading the latest of the thread it occurs to me that it seems like there's a hint of...well, haste in a few posts. They seem to be indicating that because the forum doesn't have "x" feature, there must surely be something wrong with the staff for not providing it. This is usually provided in a hasty manner. I can't reasonably say, as I am not staff- but I should think that more consideration would be provided in the context that an idea was provided nicely, and not in an accusative manner.

Secondly, it appears that although the staff has a bit of a method for doing things- or not doing things- a certain way, there's a few considerations on part of all of all of us normal forum members we need to consider. For example, this forum is actually named "Nifflas' Support Forum". This indicates that the forum is meant for support for creations by Nifflas. I must say that by using this logic, the fact we have something like 'forum games', or even the 'Development Showcase' is something of an extra considering it doesn't actually have much to do in scope with Nifflas' Games.

Thirdly, I can't be sure if the discussion is even still about the apparent 'lack' of activity, or just complaining about features we don't have, but I will pose a question: Do we actually need the requested feature to make the forum more active? And does the forum actually need to be more active? And if both are yes, then is the feature making the forum active for the right reasons? If any of those are 'no' or 'not exactly', then your answer is fairly clear.

Finally, I just want to make note that while a lot of the features requested would be enjoyable, you have to actually think about the amount of additional work the staff would need to do to keep it under control if it was mis-used. If the staff does not want to try it again right now, it might be best to let it rest. If the staff decides to add a feature at some point, it is because they think it is the right time to do that. Please remember that they have to make sure it benefits the forum overall, and doesn't make it less enjoyable.

And on my own personal note- I really wish there was more activity too, but I prefer this level of activity that sparingly talks about the games to one that simply uses a lot of features of the forum that end up taking away from talking about the games entirely.

I concur, especially with the use of logic.  That's always a good thing. 

I think there should be an off-topic forum. Honestly I don't see any reason not to have one except that the mods don't seem to want to keep tabs on one. Also, there's the possibility of controversial topics, but we could just have a rule against those. And if people make sure to use the report to moderator button when necessary there shouldn't be any problems. Right now I don't think we need to worry at all about an off-topic forum getting out of hand, because there aren't many regulars left, and new people won't be drawn specifically to our forum by a board they can find on any other forum. If we get a surge of newcomers with the release of the next game we can always disable the off-topic forum again.