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This topic is about the ideas and plans for 2010. The topics mentioned here may or may not come to be in 2010 and merely plans. It is a new direction the site will be taking and may be controversial and should be discussed by the members.
Alight then, lets begin. I imagine this topic is going to be rather long so only the more dedicated members will read it through completely, otherwise just read the sections that interest you. I will make headings and clear and distinguish the sections properly.
User Submitted Content
This is completely related to to the CCK(custom content kit) of the website, which was used to build the RGSS Scripts Archives(RMXP/RMVX). The beauty of a CCK is the ability to create any type of content you want, allowing RMXPUnlimited to have unique one of a kind systems.
I. RGSS Scripts
Arguably the most attractive attribute an RPG Maker website can have, the RGSS Scripts Archives have already been designed and since their introduction in April of this year, have been reasonably successful. Since then, there have been 66,000 hits on the items alone. Items refer to the individual script 'articles', or basically the content contains the information of the script.
I have been working on a Script Submit Component which allows members of RMXPUnlimited to logon and go through a simple form, uploading an .rtf file for the script, and multiple images, and hit submit. That content is then displayed through template to look something, for example, like this: GubiDs Tactical Battle System v1.4(we have permission to host this script).
I was actually quite successful and put a good amount of hours into developing this component and got far enough to create a release candidate. To see it in action, here is a video:
However, I will not be releasing this component as it operates outside of the websites framework. This is important, but I will not go into detail about it here. Instead of using the component I created I will instead start again from scratch and create the component within the CCK component, using it's code and building it within the framework on the website. The end result will hopefully look exactly like in the video.
When this is complete, it will take a very short amount of time for a member to submit their work to the site, and all the display work is done. And that is how members will be able to submit their RGSS Scripts on RMXPUnlimited. To view a mock-up of the form, I have set one up on the website: http://rmxpunlimited.net/contact-us
II. Projects
Projects are the next thing which will be developed using a CCK, and this will replace the current projects section on the website. This should be one of the most popular parts of the site, and hopefully a lot of people will want to have their projects up on display.
Once this is finished it will be a full project display section. There's not a lot I can say about what it is going to look like, of course I have not designed it yet, but it will have a lot of nice features. It will work almost identically to the RGSS Scripts Archive. There will be various textarea forms which you will fill out, and this goes text goes to the template. Just like the scripts explained above. In the project submission form there will be textareas such as storyline, characters, sreenshots, etc. Each section of the project template will be derived from forum topics and how members have done it in the past.
Project hosting(the actual game download), for now, is planned to be in the forums Download Manager. Now I know a lot of you are skeptical about it and think it's useless and this won't work for the big projects. However the Downloads Manager is going to be updated and will include a flash uploader which has features such as upload progress.
My overall goal of the Projects section is to be like a mini-site for that project, where the member will link to on other sites. Basically a reliable and attractive project hosting place.
III. Tutorials
I have been wondering about how to create a tutorials section using a CCK. I know that I want an archive of tutorials on the website and with proper styling and CSS. At the moment how I'm thinking of doing is this is creating around 30 sections. Each section is a step in the tutorial and contains a textarea and an option image upload. So, you have the step 1 part: write out step1 text and then upload an image for it if you like. Then step 2: repeat the process. And then at the end when the tutorial is submitted it will come out in the template as a nice step by step tutorial. There are however limitations to this, not all tutorials will follow a direct step by step method. We'll have to see how this goes, but it is planned for 2010.
IV. Reviews Section
This is me and Arkbennetts little project. He contacted me with how it's going to look, and sent me this mock-up:
This is how the category view is going to be. The review itself will have various sections offering critique or praise for various elements of game design. A new staff group will be created for this and they will do the reviews. I would prefer that not any ordinary member attempt a review. They need to be proper and full English, insightful and thorough.
V. Make money by submitting your content?
This is just an idea, but I had thought of how to do it and it's not actually too hard. Once all the above are launched here on RMXPUnlimited, there may be a radio button asking whether or not to display ads in the item(perhaps not in projects and certainly not in reviews), and if yes then an ad will appear on the page of the script/tutorial you submitted. I do have a google adsense account, but I'm not a fan of ads and at the moment there is no reason for RMXPUnlimited to be raising money, so the site is adless. Anyway, using google analytics it is possible to determine how much revenue is gained on a specific page, and this way it is possible for members to request the revenue earned from submitting their content. The only issue is paying the author, the author would have to be aware that money is available to them. That bit I haven't figured out. However, no one person is likely to earn large amounts of money from us, but it is still a little pay back for their work.
R & D
R & D for those who don't know stands for Research and Development. Heavily used in the marketing department of a business, the concept is simple, you research what is effective and apply it. So what is the application of this on RMXPUnlimited?
As the head of Admin of RMXPUnlimited, or the person who initiates the major changes, it could be said that I operate in a vacuum. That is to say, this forum being the only one I'm active on prohibits the necessary changes to keep with the constantly changing preferences of the entire RPG Maker community. It also means that in creating the various forums and advertising various sections is all guess work, how do I know what is going to be effective or not?
So, for future decisions, content and other things on RMXPunlimited are going to be based on the 'users' preferences. How this is possible is rather simple but has been neglected in the past. There is substantial information avaliable, in such detail as to what percentage of clicks each link gets on every page of the site. So it is possible to optimize, shift and create content from the information of browsing preferences of the visitors to RMXPUnlimited. To summarize, R&D = relevant content.
The most noticeable effect of this is going to be yet another forum re-structure. Not necessarily the entire forum structure, because those are not what RMXPUnlimited's about, but the RPG Maker forums. We have gone through and through various structures of the RPG Maker sections and I dont think any have been truely effective. In saying this I dont even know what I will end up doing with them yet, there is research to be done. It is necessary to look at other sites which accommodate more than one engine and see how they how they offer support, resources etc. My goal is to find the most effective way to facilitate multiple engines on a forum.
This R&D concept will be (hopefully) reflected through most sections of the site, and our visitors will be able to find what they are looking for.
A shift Towards RPG Maker VX
It is obvious that the majority of members on RMXPUnlimited are RPG Maker XP users. However there is a definite issue with this.
This is arguable, but it's my opinion that RPG Maker XP, better or worse than its successor, is fading and will die before RPG Maker VX.
My basis for this reasoning is the comparison of the most popular RMXP site with the most popular RMVX site. Their respective traffic ranks suggest that RPG Maker VX is becoming more popular than RPG Maker XP, and therefor it is necessary for RMXPUnlimited to become more RPG Maker VX orientated. That is not to say more so than RMXP, but more so than it is at the moment. I think this is essential for the survival of the forum.
This will be reflected in the separation of the engines on the forums. At the moment scripts, tuts and support topics are crammed into the same forums for both engines. For a start, i dont like the prefixing of topics, and also this is demoting RMVX with our clear bias towards RMXP. So this is set to change. How do you guys feel about this?
Exclusive Content
Can anyone find any exclusive content on the site? I'm sure there are a few nice things we have here, but not nearly enough. That is to say that as a forum of our age(3+ years) we have abnormally low exclusive content. Exclusive content is usually something that is generated from your own pool of 'loyal' members that are active in the operations or purpose of the forum..to offer support(which includes tutorials) and resources(scripts, images, audio).
It is therefor a goal of 2010 to create exclusive content that is easily found and accessible(remember, R&D). In reflection of this, it also a goal to, in so many words, train members of community in RPG Maker. Seems pretty obvious and universal, but let me attempt to explain...users come here and learn how to use the program. Perhaps we have a great eventing tutorials section from which members develop and build on, and then they share their eventing systems with he community.
What I would like to do is have sortof catalog or tour of the RPG Makers which breaks down RPG Maker starting from the most simple things you can learn, leading on to more and more advanced material and processes. All the new users would go through it and develop their own understanding of the program, which will provide a base for more advanced stuff. I think I will write the RPG Maker XP one myself, but I know very little about RMVX.
. I would say something about zombies, although this might count, but I don't want to put a joke on the whole "like theres no tomorrow" thing.
