Status Updates

[Nanor]

I had been talking to Ronin about this idea a few months ago and I thought I'd throw it out to the rest of you guys to see what you thought.

Right now I want to seed the THN Team Fortress 2 server. I could shout in the shoutbox but it's possible it will get lost amongst idle shouting. I could also make a quick thread saying I'm going to start seeding but my desire to seed the TF2 server could be a regular occurrence and the Games Chat forum would get awful spammy awful fast. There's always X-Fire/Steam. I could message a few people on there and see if they want to play but then the people who's X-Fire/Steam I don't have will be left out.

So here comes Status Updates. Think of it like Twitter but game related. In this instance I would type in the status window, say:

/me wants to seed the TF2 server.

Now what would happen would be when Ronin decided he was up for some TF2 he would type:

/me wants to play some Team Fortress 2

When he sent this he would be told that I, or whoever else has said, want to play some TF2 and then we can all get together in the shoutbox and organise it.

This could also be linked to the Play Finder. People could click on the Play Finder and then select something like "What's happening?" to be greeted by something like this:

 [URL="http://games.thehavennet.org.uk/member.php?u=2"][COLOR=red]Ronin Storm[/COLOR][/URL], [URL="http://games.thehavennet.org.uk/member.php?u=38"][COLOR=green]Nanor[/COLOR][/URL] and [URL="http://games.thehavennet.org.uk/member.php?u=140"][COLOR=tomato]waterproofbob[/COLOR][/URL] are now playing Team Fortress 2.
 [URL="http://games.thehavennet.org.uk/member.php?u=47"][COLOR=limegreen]thatbloke[/COLOR][/URL] is now playing Civilzation IV.
 [URL="http://games.thehavennet.org.uk/member.php?u=246"][COLOR=green]Traxata[/COLOR][/URL] is now playing with himself.

Or something...

The names of the games could be made hyperlinks to bring you to an information page about the game. Say you click Team Fortress 2. You'd be brought to a page showing the THN server details, forum posts relating to TF2 and who is playing at the moment or, indeed, who wants to play.

Thoughts?

 

[Ronin Storm]

As you know, I think this is a good idea. The pain of it is that it'd probably need to be PHP and PHP makes me sigh with dismay at the moment.

Still, on your idea:

I could also make a quick thread [or] I could message a few people on [Steam or Xfire]

Both true. Let's explore those:

The forum thread is available but it is also permanent. Events that don't happen aren't cleaned up. Events that do happen get comments well after they're finished. Thus events that you want people interested in now are in the mix with stuff that isn't for right now. Said a different way, this particular vector is already quite full and adding to it is just adding more noise. Sure, it'll have some impact, but not the clarity of "right now, 4 people want to play TF2" or whatever.

Steam and Xfire are both synchronous communication channels. They rely on a person being available to talk. You can't, when you send an IM, tell if the person on the other end is even there at all, or even if they claim they're not if they're actually there and have forgotten to set themselves as being back. They're a live communication method. Also, exactly as you say, they rely on you having all the contacts up front and that you walk each one individually (or spam a bunch of people of who only a few are actually going to be interested).

What we're needing, here, is an asynchronous communication method, similar to the forums, but without the permanence.

Think of it like Twitter but game related.

That's an interesting analogy. I'm not sure it's entirely like that but I can see the similarity. I think it differs in that a tweet is short but permanent, where you want a game request to last for a short while and stack up as people declare themselves interested. Still, I like the way you're thinking.

This could also be linked to the Play Finder.

It's there that this idea steps off into needless complexity. While connecting to Play Finder is a nice idea, it's certainly not something to start with because it makes the project harder. Play Finder does Play Finder things. Let this do its own thing. Then, later, we can see if they should be cooperating.

 

[Nanor]

I was only really suggesting integration with the Play Finder to give more weight towards it's raison d'être.

I was thinking this could be incorporated with the Shoutbox (I.E. Another tab) but, as far as I know, the Shoutbox was bought so I don't know if you're able to edit it?

 

[PsiSoldier]

What's wrong with, y'know, just announcing it in the shoutbox?

 

[Nanor]

I could shout in the shoutbox but it's possible it will get lost amongst idle shouting.

I could shout "Hey! I'm seeding the TF2 server. Wanna join?" but then BiG D complains about some stupid support ticket he got, Trax complains about his job and thatbloke makes a boob joke. It's gone and no-one knows I'm seeding (EXCEPT THE LAAYDEEEZ AMIRITE?). With this you can actively see what people are doing by clicking some sort of link to bring you a list of what people are playing.

 

[Ronin Storm]

Yeah, part of the thing here is getting a the level of visibility and persistence right.

But, more fundamentally than that, is just getting some basic UI up.

Really could do with some more PHP coding experience for THN.

 

[PsiSoldier]

Duplicate the shoutbox and call it Announcementbox and stick it in a collapsable tab (or at least make it hidable).

 

[Nanor]

So basically a shoutbox but just for game shouts? So "Nanor is seeding TF2" gets lost in amongst "Traxata is playing some CoD4". To quote Ronin:

Yeah, part of the thing here is getting a the level of visibility and persistence right.

I'm thinking of something like I posted in the OP:

[URL="http://games.thehavennet.org.uk/member.php?u=2"][COLOR=red]Ronin Storm[/COLOR][/URL], [URL="http://games.thehavennet.org.uk/member.php?u=38"][COLOR=green]Nanor[/COLOR][/URL] and [URL="http://games.thehavennet.org.uk/member.php?u=140"][COLOR=tomato]waterproofbob[/COLOR][/URL] are now playing Team Fortress 2.
 [URL="http://games.thehavennet.org.uk/member.php?u=47"][COLOR=limegreen]thatbloke[/COLOR][/URL] is now playing Civilzation IV.
 [URL="http://games.thehavennet.org.uk/member.php?u=246"][COLOR=green]Traxata[/COLOR][/URL] is now playing with himself.

 

[BiG D]

Steam already has this functionality, really.

 

[Nanor]

There's always X-Fire/Steam. I could message a few people on there and see if they want to play but then the people who's X-Fire/Steam I don't have will be left out.

Steam and Xfire are both synchronous communication channels. They rely on a person being available to talk. You can't, when you send an IM, tell if the person on the other end is even there at all, or even if they claim they're not if they're actually there and have forgotten to set themselves as being back. They're a live communication method. Also, exactly as you say, they rely on you having all the contacts up front and that you walk each one individually (or spam a bunch of people of who only a few are actually going to be interested).

C'mon D, read the thread!

 

[BiG D]

I ALREADY DID.

Open steam. Open the friends list. Look at the THN group. OH LOOK IT LISTS WHAT GAME EVERYONE IS PLAYING!

 

[Nanor]

OH MY GOD IT DOES?

What's this? elDiablo is on the forums but not on Steam or X-Fire? How shall I convey the message that I'm playing TF2 if he so happens to want to play?

What the hell? This new guy on the forums doesn't seem to be in the THN group on steam? Well I guess he can't play, then!

Does Steam Friends also support games people might like to play too?

 

[BiG D]

1) If he's not on Steam, I would surmise that he's not looking to play games!
2) I question how this new guy would join you without having you in his Steam friends list
3) I was refering to the specific post I replied to, not the OP. That would be why I replied to a specific post.

 

[Nanor]

1) But he might be?
2) Presumably by joining the THN server, conveniently linked to in some URL after it lists who's playing.

The names of the games could be made hyperlinks to bring you to an information page about the game. Say you click Team Fortress 2. You'd be brought to a page showing the THN server details, forum posts relating to TF2 and who is playing at the moment or, indeed, who wants to play.

3)I'm not getting what you mean here? What, specifically, where you replying to?

 

[KillCrazy]

Not all games we might play will be on steam either, so, those people couldn't possibly be contacted via steam.

 

[BiG D]

What if he wants to play games but doesn't have THN or Steam open?

What if he wants to play games but doesn't have steam open but has THN open but you forgot to update your status so he can't see that you're playing TF2?

What if he wants to play games but all the entries on THN are stale and no one is actually playing anymore and then he starts up Steam an no one is playing and he is totally offended that he just wasted his time and leaves the community FOREVER? WHAT THEN?

You can 'what if' all you want, but the assumption that someone who is interested in playing a game has the primary gaming platform open is a solid one.

 

[PsiSoldier]

Can't argue with trolls.

 

[KillCrazy]

I can agree that there are these many circumstances in which this idea may not work for everyone, but I don't think it would do much harm to implement and try it.

I certainly doubt it would make someone frustrated and leave the community. They would just find some other means as people do already.

 

[DocBot]

I disagree. I would most definitely be more likely to participate in games such as TF2 if I could see on the forum that people were playing them. Then again, this would of course be relying on people changing their status when they stopped playing / wanting to play / whatever...

 

[thatbloke]

And to re-state BiG D's point, that's what XFire and Steam do.

You can change your status in XFire to a custom message. Set it to "let's play TF2" and see how many people contact you.

If you are serious about gaming with friends then there are tools like XFire and Steam that can be used to better facilitate it by telling you waht and where they are playing...

Having something on teh forums aswell is, IMHO, overkill.