SPS Accounts Priced Too High?

Remove all ads!

Certainly I've never considered the perks of the SPS account to be worth it, but then I've never got the SPS account due to the perks.

I got it because I've been coming back here for nearly a decade and wanted to give something back.

 

It's not free though, ultimately someone has to pay for it. It costs money to keep the lights on.

 

I’ve been wanting to say this for a while, and this seems like a good place to do it.

Tal, SP is great. It’s perhaps the best community I’ve ever been to. There are no spam, no trolls, and everyone is genuinely helpful and kind. The reason I keep coming back – and the reason everyone seems to keep coming back – is for the community, the people, the memories. I can honestly say SP changed my life. I’ve managed to make friends from here and have wonderful cross-continental meetings with them in real life (Octara, Eze, Aikanaro; I may be meeting Loreseeker in the not-too-distant future). Winning people’s loyalty is maybe the hardest thing on an internet forum and you’ve done that. Look at this thread – there are people willing to give you money not for any benefits, but just because they love this site. That’s freaking amazing, and the reputation is well-deserved (what the community did for Kitrax’s family and Octara’s wheelchair comes to mind).

But the problem is, the site and forum are outdated. Forgive me for being blunt, but every time I come back here, I find some new, useless, tacky gimmick. Last time it was the achievements and the ridiculous “XP” system – I have no idea how it works and I doubt anyone cares about it (besides, doesn’t post count and tiers mean the same thing?). This time it’s this ridiculous “Likes” thing you can apparently do on posts now. What the hell is this, Facebook? And isn’t giving reputation the exact same concept?. Forums are about PEOPLE. The longtimers aren’t gonna care about these new little gimmicks and the newcomers won’t join because you have them. They’re just distracting. Look at reddit, look at imgur – all you have is a username and karma (which does nothing). Simple, but it works.

And another thing – the number of forums. I have to press the page down key eight times to reach the bottom of the main page. Do we really still need separate pages for SoA and ToB? Or even IWD1 and IWD2? Do we need the Sensorium and Techno-Magic when people can just use Whatnots? Sure, once upon a time when the forums were bustling it may have been necessary, but now that there isn’t that much activity, isn’t it better to consolidate and streamline? I can imagine, to newcomers, the amount of forums would be pretty daunting.

With Torment 2 and Project Eternity on the horizon, SP definitely still has a niche on the internet – a place for intelligent gamers to discuss things without being trolled by annoying 14 year olds (like yours truly). But there needs to be changes, and we need to try to absorb new, intelligent members to the community.

Just my two cents.

 

I'm not going to like that because the irony may well kill me.

Another thing (which I have said before) is that people are doing a LOT of console gaming now. There is the big focus on PC games, and yes that's what this site used to be all about, but people are using desk top PC's less and less and switching to consoles. Skyrim and Dragon Age (amongst others) are coming out for the Playstation and Xbox because their developers have realised that they need to move with the times and they'll get a wider audience by adapting to consoles as well. I know that there's a forum on here for consoles but that's ONE forum for a whole group while we have single forums for everything else.

There is a definite need to update/modernise this place and move with the times

 

I decided to like your post for that delicious double-irony. Mwahahaha.

To add to what Silvery is saying, I think we need to have new game focuses, but I also don't think it's a good idea to pander to what people want blindly and throw up new forums just because. There's already dedicated sites for discussing Warcraft or Starcraft; we don't need to jump on the bandwagon unless it will actually attract new thoughtful discussion.

 

Absolutely, adding two dozen new forums would just kill things. I meant that there should be an equal emphasis on all gaming, not just PC stuff. Not every game needs an individual forum, as you said, it's a pain in the arse!

 

For me personally it has nothing to do with the costs anymore at this point. It's mostly about usage. SP is not anymore the useful resource it used to be. I don't play computer games like I used to and for most new games there are frankly more up to date resources with more content (the age of wiki).

While I do appreciate the site and its history. And it has been an important resource in the past, it's not that anymore. The forums are certainly less active than they used to and while I write on them occasionally it's not really enough for me to find a reason to renew my SPS account.

So I guess at the moment I wouldn't donate no matter what the price was.

 

I know the purpose of this thread is not to debate this and that, but I'll just state for the record that I like the 'Like' thingie and the number of forums. I've always had the impression that fewer forums and/or fuzzier lines between them is 'dumbing down' a message board, and I always figured that SP types were a bit more sophisticated than the typical teenager who can't process a page with more than 7 different pieces of data without getting confused and losing interest and wandering off.

So fewer forums, ala -

GENERAL - discuss anything not game-related here!
GAMING - discuss anything game-related here!

would be pretty dumb IMO. Do you really want Baldur's Gate threads mixed in with Skyrim threads, and political rage threads mixed in with funny video threads?

 

And out of curiosity, I notice I don't have my SPS status restored yet - is there a step I'm missing here?

 

Thanks Tal!

 

I have to say I am about to load a "Master " collection that has BG 1 & 2, both Icewind Dales, Elemental Evil and the Torment games. Where will I go for mods and additions if not here?
I have often been help by Tal and others here who have taken their time and sometimes a lot of effort when I asked for help. I pay to suport this site because as other have said "it is the best". I live on the minimum social security amount (a hair more than 7000 a year) and do not consider $35 a year to help keep this site up and running a large amount. Remember, you get what you, or someone else pay/pays for. It's well worth paid membership.

 

I've been supporting SP for a while now (but not quite long enough for "distinguished") and will for the foreseeable future. If you want to give us a good SPS account bonus negotiate a GOG discount for members -- I've bought a bunch of games from GOG (and they'd better be paying you for them) and have only gone there through SP. You'd think they could give an incentive for your members.

 

We need more threads like this one. It's been one of the most popular discussions for a while.