Breaking down the numbers

[Spriggan]

I was looking through our site report for last year and though you might find some of these numbers intresting.

Obvisly the Forum is the busiest part of TWG, but it was looked at 10x more then the actial main page.  Now most of this activity comes from page reloads when you load new topics.

As for most looked at deparments, video games  comes in #1 with webcomics comming in a close number 2.  Surpriseingly RPGs is a distant 3rd.  I find it odd that deparments that rarely get updates are our #1 and 2 respectavly.  In fact they beat out the main site page (wich is right after RPGs).

here's the complete list:

#1 Videogames
#2 Webcomics
#3 RPG
#3.5 main page
#4 Movies
#5 Table Top games
#6 Tower of Cheepness
#7 CCG
#8 other
#9 books

January saw webcomics comming in #1 and VG #2 with rpgs falling behind the main index page.

Now maybe, since webcomics and VG are currently the main draw to the site, we should have more articles.  I'm working on a VG one now, and can do others once I get my hands on a working PS2.  

[Entsuropi]

I'm planning on a review of the NWN expansion packs, once i finish HOTU and try out a few of the prestige classes in multiplayer.

[Spriggan]

And just to take care of this before people start posting it.  I wasn't saying we should shift our focus at all, I know most of our reviewers are RPG buffs, and that actauly getting artices up (no matter what they are) is more important.  I was just pointing out that RPGs, despite being the largests section, is a sunificant 3rd place (by about 18% less views then the number 2 place).  And try to encourage those that have been thinking of doing reviews for these deparments to do so.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

no, i think you're right. it'd be great to have more content fo the areas that are drawing more viewers even when they dont' have content.

It only makes sense, after all.

I guess I'll start reviewing all the web comics I read.

Of course, the problem is getting the reviews done. From what I understand, we dont' get NEARLY as much VG material to review. And people don't write as many reviews. If we had people contributing more, that'd be nice. It's hard for me to do VG reviews and articles because I'm short on cash and my current computer just won't run new stuff.

But Web Comics and free stuff.... well.... we have little excuse for that. Let's get some people doing that stuff.

[House of Mustard]

I'll really try to get my Commandos 3 review done this week.  I promised it a month ago.

[EUOL]

Okay, okay.  I'll review some more webcomics.

BTW--the reason we get webcomics pageviews is because the comic artists like to link our reivews of them.  I'll bet the reason we get video game hits is because far more people do searches for VG reviews than other types.  Realize that neither of these reasons are all that likely to keep people coming back.  Our RPG and tabletop content, however, is more unique, and I think it will be more likely to attract repeat visitors.  

It's not all just about the raw numbers.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

no, it's not. But we dont' have much of a problem providing content for table top or RPG. if we can give unique content to those areas, people may come back.

[Spriggan]

no EUOL's right on the numbers, but one I think does matter is that more people look at those pages then the main site page.  That shows that people are going to different deparents to see what we got.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

on this note, I do have a huge list of regularly read comics. But while I like EUOL's format for reviewing books, I dont' so much the format he's been using for Web Comics. Would it bother anyone if I reviewed comics with a different format?

[EUOL]

You mean paper comics?  I wouldn't mind at all if you ignored my format--you would have to treat them much differently than webcomics.  Very different genres.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

actualyl, I meant webcomics. I've already reviewed print comics much more like a book.

[EUOL]

Oh.  We've generally tried to keep webcomics to a select few reviewers, but you're a special case (seeing as to how you're an excellent writer, not to mention a comics expert.)

However, I kind of like the uniformity of the review styles.  The other concern I have is that you'll give us a huge influx of positive reviews, since you would be reviewing the comics that you like.  I think that the collection is already too slanted toward the positive end.

Anyway, what would you like to change about the review format?  If you were to begin doing webcomic reviews, I would rather change the current format and have us both use a new one than have two separate formats going for new reviews.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I was mostly planning on writing it as prose instead of breaking down the categories. The categories implies they're independent. To me, it's the integration of art and story, or art and joke, or all three that makes a comic good. By flowing it all together as prose, my review would show that fundamental assumption better.

I can do the standard format. It just feels more like homework and less like "this is why you should/should not read this"

If you're worried about not havign enough bad ones, I can put out some ones for comics I've stopped reading for various reasons (I got bored, they became unreliable, they stopped being funny, etc)

we should also review every comic that gets self promoted on our board. I go try them out at least, even though many are not very good.

[Spriggan]

do you think we should go through and update any old reviews?  Like how Megatokyo is no longer funny and had been turned into a romance novel.  Or how Sunday Morning Breakfast Cereal has ceasted to exsist.

edit:ah, found it in keepspace, which is the hellhole of webcomic hosting (even with a broad band connectoin it took like 5 minutes to load), but it appears to now have been updated for months.  but the comic is completely different (art and other wise) and I can't find and of the older comics from when we reveiwed it.  http://smbc.keenspace.com/

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

Yeah, Keenspace is inherently evil, but at least it provides free hosting. Keenspace/spot is having load issues today though. It's not usually THAT slow, though Keenspace is notoriously slow.

I was wondering if that was the same guy. I didn't think it was.