[casual_games] Casual games user groups (player side)

Wed Sep 28 05:11:28 EDT 2005

Hi Colin,

The only thing remotely similar that I can think of (although now flooded with popups and adverts, which for me grinds the speed of the site down to virtually un-useable) would be ArcadePod.com. This used to be a very good site for putting games onto, but slipped somewhere along the way into a spam-fest both from the site itself in the form of popups and the users in terms of insulting each other in reviews.

One of the biggest things that I notice about arcadepod was that the reviews were mostly absolutely useless. It was almost as though most people just went on there to swear and post childish comments about everything... not at all useful for either the developer/client or potential player. Even the larger sites like Shockwave.com are flooded with total guff in the reviews ... things like 'my browser broke' or 'dave is a ****' etc.

If you're going to include reviews, I know swear filters are mostly useless but it may cut out one or two of the kiddies. What I'd suggest is that, if a post contains offensive language (or even possibly offensive keywords like those related to sexuality which seems to be a favourite talking point on arcadepod!), it should re-direct the user to an 'offensive post' page and NOT actually submit the post at all.

Just a thought. I got really tired of reading non-productive reviews of my games on arcadepod and so ditched it ...

Any ideas on how you'll deal with this yet?

Great work so far - glad it is taking off so well and I hope it continues for you. Anything that promotes online games is ok by me!!

Parrot. 

	-----Original Message----- 
	From: Colin Cardwell [mailto:colin at 3rdsense.com] 
	Sent: Wed 28/09/2005 02:54 
	To: 'IGDA Casual Games SIG Mailing List' 
	Cc: 
	Subject: RE: [casual_games] Casual games user groups (player side)

	As some of you know, we've launched MOG (www.millionsofgames.com) in the last couple of weeks. The very purpose of the site is to provide a community for casual game fans. Although at the moment Moggers (our members) can store their favourite games and rate them, they will soon be able to add comments/reviews of games. We also track game plays and who has Mogged a game. The data is time based so once we have sufficient volume of usage, we'll be releasing daily, weekly, monthly charts overall and in each game category, hoping to give everyone who is interested in casual games a very valuable source of useful data.

	The growth of the site I think is interesting. It has been picked up by quite a lot of news sites, the home page of Slashdot helped a lot. What's key for us though is that almost 900 games have been added in only 3 weeks by our Moggers and if that rate continues, we'll pretty soon have the largest list of online and casual games around, which is our goal. Add to that reviews and the other data we're collecting and you can begin to see the potential of the site. 

	I'm not just trying to tell you how wonderful our site is by the way, I'm just trying to explain some of its potential, it certainly still has a long way to go. We very much want this to be a community site so we would be very interested in views/ideas/feedback/requests from this group in particular. If this site builds to the level we anticipate, it will be a great place to promote any new games you have (and old ones for that matter), get ideas for games, see who likes what, find out what doesn't work, etc etc. 

	I hope this was useful.. 

	Colin

	Colin Cardwell - Director - 3RD sense Australia Pty Ltd
	T. +61 (0) 2 9959 1008     M. +61 (0) 401 888 322   
	E. colin at 3rdsense.com <mailto:colin at 3rdsense.com>     W. www.3rdsense.com <http://www.3rdsense.com/> 

	www.playaholics.com <http://www.playaholics.com/>  - play games and win stuff
	www.chickstop.com <http://www.chickstop.com/>  - for girls who like to play
	www.millionsofgames.com <http://www.millionsofgames.com/>  - source, save and share your favourite online games

  _____  

	From: casual_games-bounces at igda.org [mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Wade Tinney
	Sent: Wednesday, 28 September 2005 12:30 AM
	To: 'IGDA Casual Games SIG Mailing List'
	Subject: RE: [casual_games] Casual games user groups (player side)

	Just to clarify, James. You are asking about groups/sites where casual games are discussed and/or reviewed by players, right (and NOT links to sites that simply distribute said games)?

	It's a very good question. I've had a tough time finding such sites in the past. I'd love to hear what you uncover. 

	There is a lot of player-to-player interaction on Pogo, of course, but it happens in real-time during play. 

	Also, if you've never checked out the contest winners pages on WildGames, those are pretty interesting/entertaining as well. At the bottom of this page, you'll find a whole set of "view winners" links: 
	http://www.wildgames.com/ECS/htdocs/contests.aspx?dp=wildgames&bw=high

	I realize it's not exactly what you're talking about, but if you're looking to better understand the casual audience, I think its pretty useful. 

	-Wade

		-----Original Message-----
		From: casual_games-bounces at igda.org [mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Jack Pearson
		Sent: Monday, September 26, 2005 4:16 PM
		To: Andy Makely; IGDA Casual Games SIG Mailing List
		Subject: RE: [casual_games] Casual games user groups (player side)

		www.tournamentgames.com  online pay to play tournaments. All DirectX casual games online since since 1997.
		236 million games played to date.  350,000 played each week

		Jack Pearson, CEO
		Tournament Games Inc,
		www.TGPool.com
		www.TournamentGames.com 
		jack at tournamentgames.com

			-----Original Message-----
			From: casual_games-bounces at igda.org [mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org]On Behalf Of Andy Makely
			Sent: Monday, September 26, 2005 1:39 PM
			To: IGDA Casual Games SIG Mailing List
			Subject: Re: [casual_games] Casual games user groups (player side)

			www.jayisgames.com is a great games blog that covers primarily web games, but also touches on downloadables sometimes.

			-- 
			andy

			On 9/26/05, James Baker - WDDG/Inferno <james at wddg.com> wrote: 

				I'm trying to put together a database of user-groups and/or websites on
				the user/player side that are dedicated to casual games.  Anything from
				forums dedicated to word games to yahoo groups to newsgroups to websites 
				would help me out.

				Thanks!

				James Baker
				Principal
				WDDG/Inferno/Funtank
				212-219-9222
				james at wddg.com
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