NEW + OPEN DISCUSSION

[tripled_mods]

Hey everyone! First of all, I've got some great news! We finally have a PREMISE PAGE! This will help all members, new and current, to describe what the game is about. Enabling will be easier and figuring out just what we do here will as well. (I know that was something a lot of people asked when first thinking about joining the game-- I get asked it all the time, so hopefully this will help everyone out!)

SECONDLY and very important, the moderators would like to launch an open discussion about methods to help make the game more accessible, bring in new players, and improve the game overall. Anon comments will be enabled so long as there is no harassment of other players. Please use this post to give suggestions, things you would like to see in the game, current problems with the game itself that you would like to bring up, or anything else you can think of related to these purposes. Bear in mind that this is for constructive purposes! If you have a comment, make sure to provide a possible solution or improvement that you would like to see.

THIS DISCUSSION IS OPEN TO ANY WHO WISH TO PARTICIPATE: MEMBERS AND POTENTIAL MEMBERS ALIKE.

( A Note: This is not a complaint, love, or HMD post for specific players, as usual please use the suggestions/complaints page or wait until the next HMD if you have a situation that you need to bring up with another player. )

Comments

[selfished]

I don't exactly have an answer to all things, but there's at least one point I wanted to bring up. And that's the presence of the mod team, to put it simply. I don't know if I can bring it into words very well (maybe someone else can do that better than I could), but I feel like even though we have a fairly big mod team, it doesn't seem to show very often. I usually only see it through Tay's Virus and event related posts and the fa/fr posts Orly makes. I think this was discussed too the last time there was a post similar to this one, but it might be a little better if the mod team was a little more.. transparent, maybe? Like sometimes pop up and inform us as a group of what you're working on at the moment or something similar to that, it might get some blood flowing in the game again. Just as something I've noticed as a player!

[slowdown]

I agree with the mod team statement, I've only really seen Tay's virus and info posts even though there's a fairly big mod team. I know stuff does get done but it can be a turn off to some people when there's a working the shadows vibe when there's no communication.

Only other thing I can think about would be that everyone I've tried to enable seems to think the game is fast paced and extremely comment-spammy (which I don't think is true at all.) I think the premise page is going to help a lot with that. Also maybe offer more CR and friending memes on the ooc / crack comms? I feel like it's the one thing that's been lacking since I joined mainly because I'm used to a CR/friend meme going up every month near ATP or after apps close for most games.

Otherwise maybe offer a monthly test drive meme as well. I know a few people who I've talked to that have wanted to app didn't know what would be the best way to voice test with people in-game because there wasn't a test drive post up.

[wildmelody]

I'm going to second a friending/CR meme every month near ATP or so, or at least around the first of each month give or take. It's great we know quite a few people depending on what our characters are or who they tag, but having the opportunity to get to know the older players from a newer player perspective is a good idea. Especially since some of us don't have plurk, it'd be a good way to know a good, concrete way to get in touch with someone for plotting.

Also, monthly test drive helps a LOT to keep interest in a game. Those are really useful.

[lifeisbrief]

The mod team has been working to make the game more open, and to make our roles clearer and continue to involve the playerbase. The elimination of the modpole role and the institution of lists of mod duties to accompany our contact information was a part of that. Just looking at the first page of the OOC community right now, we have not only this post and the October virus poll, but Andy's post to get us ready for ATP, and the runoff poll regarding the ic newsletter. And, of course, that game newsletter is a project we're enacting with lots of input from the playerbase, though it was delayed by the departure of the mod who was originally going to run it.

It is a good idea to put some information about the pace and general style on the premise page. It sounds like the people you're talking to have an impression of the game that's rather outdated at this point, so the more channels to give them an accurate idea the better.

Regarding the CR meme, the virus/event plot posts are usually more fruitful. More friending memes and open conversations to involve players more with each other are definitely ideas we like. You can also post ic and ooc memes whenever you want! The system in DDD is open to allow a lot of player participation like that.

A regularly scheduled test drive would be great, thank you for suggesting that!

[(Anonymous)]

I'd definitely like to see the adddictions community used more for both IC/OOC memes. I don't know too many people OOCly anymore due to timezones but when I first joined and that comm was active, that's where I really felt welcomed and got into the swing of the game. I'd do it myself if not for the mailbox spam that comes with it.

I'm still not clear on whether stuff on the crack comm can go canon or not though. Mods? If so how does that work with some of them putting characters who don't have world hops in the same place?

[bag_has_snapped]

I think One thing that could help out a lot is something more than just "canon rehash". While I'm not saying to turn the game into a jamjar and I'm not saying to do away with canon bumps, I think having something more than just touching on various points of their series. Perhaps bigger events than just the usual 3-4 day virus events that involve a character's canon or an attempt to allow more derails.

[(Anonymous)]

You don't have to do canon updates a lot. You can interact with other characters the whole time, and you don't even have to be going through canon if you don't want. The viruses and events can be fun, but, they're not the only thing you can do. Think of what you would do when talking to people from an online site. Engage other characters in conversations, and get non-canon based discussion going. Even when you do canon updates, maybe find indirect ways to mention things that happened in canon, and ask questions about behaviors or opinons to encourage getting to know other characters on a level beyond 'this is what happened to me today' 'that's cool.'

I don't know maybe you already do that. I'm pretty busy sometimes, but, I think that can usually be a good way to do it.

Though, I do agree we should have more events like spontaneous worldhops, or fun in -person events. For canon-based events it can be difficult to get into if you don't know the canon very well and it's very detailed though. Would it be possible to have more open events in general?

[(Anonymous)]

I don't feel welcome in the game anymore. I don't feel like I'm having fun anymore. And I don't feel like the mods are approachable anymore either. I'm hesitant to even say this because I don't know how to fix it. And the viruses aren't helping. None of them grab my attention like they used to. Maybe it's all me and I'm probably just whining but... I don't know, maybe saying it can get things worked out and I can feel welcome here again. I'm sorry.

[dual_wield_hax]

Its okay to feel like this honestly, from my opinion. People get burnt out, tired, and just don't have enough time on their hands to do things. This game has been running for a very long time from what I know of, and it should be okay to step back, take a break and refresh yourself. Maybe rewatch/re-read your canons from start to finish, and then tackle things directly with the force of a non-too subtle sledgehammer.

There's no shame in admitting defeat, but you should definitely find out what you want to do with any direction you have. And suggestions to help facilitate including you and your characters will also help as well if you speak to people you know.

[tenminutes]

I agree with the person above me, and don't be afraid to suggest your own events or viruses that you think would be fun or let us know how you feel like we could be more open with communication. It's our job as mods to help you feel comfortable and happy in the game, so if there's something you can think of that you would like to see more, let us know. I try to be as approachable as possible (and you can always reach me on plurk, AIM, email, or private message-- and you can always just talk to me if you want too)!

I'm really sorry that you feel this way, anon! I really hope there's something we can do to help it, but if you don't know what you need, there's not much anyone else can do..

[(Anonymous)]

Just the opposite of Tsubomi's player above, I find too many posts are only canon updates. I think that the mods have enough general events going on (good job on that by the way, events mod), but canon move events can be hard to get into if you're not in that canon.

Players are free to post whatever they want and right now canon moves are the popular choice, but I've had a lot of CR burn out once they got through canon as if there's nothing left of interest to do with them outside of canon . I'd like to see more general posts and taking advantage of DDD as a general chat/journaling site, lives outside of canon. Those posts are easier to tag into for new CR, and once you have CR it's easier to tag into their canon moves. It's difficult to tag a canon move when yours is the 5th or so character going "Oh my god, is everything okay?" or "I'm glad that turned out okay." If you have a little more of a history with them, even over trifling things, it comes more naturally even if you are just another person saying a character-voiced variant of the same thing as everyone else.

[rosejam]

If I'm completely honest, I agree with this comment. I've been with this game for a long time and I've adored my time here.

What I miss most, though, is the times when characters could do internet things not related to fandom at all. (Finding cute cat pictures, playing flash games, searching for YouTube videos...silly things like that.) I won't say I haven't done just canon updates lately. I have, though I've been trying to do various things to change it up a bit. Whether that's successful or not, I don't know.

It's a complicated feeling. I feel that while being able to go through canon and doing forth wall stuff is part of DDD, its not all what it can be. The mingling events are good and if I'm honest, I'm more active during them than not these days.

[slowdown]

I've noticed that a lot lately, not that it's a bad thing because people do need to canon update from time to time, I think the problem is when everyone in a cast does it at once. Which can't be helped sometimes but it also causes the problem of floods of canon update posts on the comm.

I don't really know if there's anything people can do to stop that since it's just part of the game, but I do agree with the posts outside of canon material happening more.

[(Anonymous)]

I know DDD's always been pretty lacking in overall plot, but maybe there's something we could do as like a long-term event that could inspire more activity and interest in the game. If everyone has a similar goal, it'll be easier to open up new CR and have things to talk about even beyond slice of life and canon-related things.

[(Anonymous)]

We've never had an overall plot because in the past players generated ones that everyone could react to or get in on if they wanted. There was Edgeworth and Phoenix's community justice effort that actually had a trial go down. When a bunch of villains were living together on Creeper Island, they plotted evil stuff and blew up the White House which you can imagine caused other characters to react against them.

I'd like to see that, players working across canons to pull off crazy stuff. It's not hard, people just have to be willing to actually take advantage of the game instead of passively doing everything according to canon or only teaming up with castmates.

[mightletyouknowme]

I really like the idea of a more frequent test drive, too. I know they wouldn't be as big but timing can affect a lot of things and having fun threads with characters already in the game may be the final push someone needs to finally join. It could also help people get those 20 comments they need to finish an app sometimes, as more obscure characters are harder to get tags with on D_M.

Also, this may have been asked before on one of the other things, I don't really remember, but what happened to the NPCs DDD use to have? I remember hearing about the Weeping Angels when I first joined and really liked the idea of characters that could just pop up like that. ^_^ I know time constraints can make those hard, though.

[tripled_mods]

I NPC'd the Weeping Angels after our first player left in 2008 or so! I gradually stopped playing them because no one really seemed interested, but if that's changed I'd be happy to pull them out again.

[(Anonymous)]

There seems to be a real focus in the game on characters from crazy canons or characters with superpowers. And, honestly, there are a LOT of characters from kids' shows. It makes me worried about players who might want to app in characters from a prime-time drama, or serious characters from a pretty dark canon. I don't think they'd be able to get a character like that off the ground here, and that's really limiting.

[planktonic]

I think it's more of a sliding scale? I'm pretty sure everyone would agree that there's a lot of magical girls and stuff here, but there's also some canons that might not exactly be live action dramas without superpowers or whatever but that are still more serious or darker - like Umineko for example, and I've played here just fine from that for a long time already.

EDIT: .. Oh this is Jelle on.. the wrong account LMFAO. Sorry for that.

[makewayforroze]

There are a lot of character like that but I don't really see that as a bad thing, as I enjoy my CR with them. I do see what you mean about there being fewer characters from live action dramas or very dark characters.

The best thing I can really think to do about this though is ask that they give us a chance. Almost all of us here seem to be willing to mix mediums. Dark characters can find things in common with others, rather they be with from live action or not.

I can't speak for an entire game obviously but I would love to see more of those types, too. If you're wanting to app someone like that, or know someone who is, please do or encourage them! :) I'll have your back as enabler.

[alldevouringabomination]

Like Tay said, people will like what they like and app who they want to app. The fact that DDD has a lot of a certain archtype and genre, however, should not dissuade you from aping who you want anyway.

Fact is, this game? It's pretty chill. You may be surprised at how well your pup does here. The worst thing that may happen is that you drop.

[(Anonymous)]

The game took a nosedive after we dropped video embeds. Consider bringing those back.

[bag_has_snapped]

What I'm afraid of is that what happened was a bit more extreme. Because the mods wanted to cater to the players who can't use their phones for video embeds, everyone's taken it as "can't post nothing ever." I know that wasn't the mods intention, but it's possible that's what the players interpreted it as.

ETA: IMO, I think the ban should be revised from "No embeds" to "No embeds for canon updates" because I believe that was the big problem - people were using videos to do updates and people couldn't respond to it because phones.

[idgiebay]

It's been over a year since I've been in the game, so I'm not up to date on its current status. Feel free to correct me if I'm way off base in anything I'm saying! I'm going solely based on the comments I'm reading here.

Being a game with no over-arching plot, DDD has always been loosely run and thrives mostly on what its players put into it. The game's obviously hit a dry spell, though. So what's causing it? Someone mentioned there weren't enough canon updates, while others said canon updates are virtually the only posts that get made in the community lately. Neither side sounds like the root of the problem. When I was here, there were always posts about canon updates. I think what could have made it different then was how those canon updates affected the rest of the comm.

So my first question is: HAVE any of those canon updates affected the rest of the comm? One thing I always loved about DDD was how the goings-on in one world affected others. With the paranoia surrounding anon memes and negative crit, I wouldn't be surprised if people were afraid to alter their canons to fit with the multi-dimensional "theme" of the game. If that's the case, I'm sad to hear it, although I do understand. But the thing is... that sort of canon tweaking has always been the heart of DDD. It's not a jamjar. Characters can't exist in a vacuum outside of their canon, so the players have to be willing to allow the game to affect not only their characters but their characters' worlds. The same goes for the opposite.

For example, when we had a sizable D.Gray-man cast, the players came up with the idea that world-hopping from the Ark left open rifts, allowing Akuma (demons) to invade other worlds. It wasn't necessarily a game-wide plot. Those who wanted to join in and have their characters react to their worlds being invaded were welcome (and encouraged!) to do so while the D.Gray-man cast did damage control. It offered a lot of CR opportunity, as Tyki and Cross went to each affected world and killed off the invading Akuma.

It doesn't have to be anything grand like that. Another example (already mentioned, I see) was when Phoenix and Edgeworth tried to create a community justice system. We drew from the canon and their personalities for inspiration. It didn't end up working out (the mechanics would have been too complicated), but that was okay, because it was interesting to deal with the fact that it failed. We also had them conduct a trial on their own world when one of their community friends ended up committing a crime there.

So maybe think about your canons. Think about how your canons can affect other worlds. Think about how other canons can affect YOUR characters' worlds. Don't be afraid to tweak your canon slightly to involve the community when you want your character to go through an update. It might be intimidating, but the results are so rewarding.

If that's not the issue, then allow me to hit on some other points. DDD hasn't been without its bumps in the past, after all! One thing I remember was viruses starting to feel stale. The way we dealt with that was temporarily randomize when viruses happened--I think we might have stopped them for a while altogether. We also discussed briefly taking it out of the players' hands and having "surprise" viruses that the mods kept under wraps until a few days before it would start. There were also events that encouraged group activities, like the Oregon Trail "virus" and the Jurassic Park event, not to mention player-run events like birthday parties, dances (some of which were dances that took place in characters' canons, like the ball from Enchanted, once again tweaking plot to work with the game's theme), beach parties, random Disneyland trips...

Do these things still happen?

There's also NPCs, like someone mentioned above. They weren't always a huge presence in DDD, but they did offer some excitement, on both an individual player and a community-wide level. I remember the time SHODAN caused everyone's computers to become infected with ACTUAL viruses. There were the Weeping Angels, who would comment randomly on characters' posts and shoot said characters back to a random point in history, should the player so choose. It doesn't have to be those same old NPCs, though. Maybe something different, to spice things up? Even a one-off NPC that never shows up again... Didn't Jack Skellington sometimes show up around Halloween and/or Christmas to deliver gifts?

I'd also like to touch on the medium divide. Let me first say I think the concept is absolutely ridiculous, and I'm proud to remember cross-medium CR flourishing in this game. The divide never seemed to exist here. That being said, it does look like the scale has tipped in the animated direction recently. There's nothing wrong with that. People should always play what characters they want to play, regardless of medium. However, I think it can sometimes seem intimidating to outsiders when one medium dominates, especially with the divide being such a hot button issue on the anon memes. If that's the case, I think the question would then be how do we encourage more medium diversity in the game? I don't have a good answer for that, unfortunately, but I think it is important to consider.

Here's a thought: when was the last fourth wall event? If it's due to come around again, maybe it would help to try to somehow make it inviting for a wide array of characters instead of the free-for-all it usually is. What if, each day, there was a theme? I can't say for sure it's a good suggestion or that it will inspire new blood to join in, but it is a thought. Otherwise, ATP is really the only venue DDD has to advertise, and chances are most people use that to find more castmates. Which is one of its purposes, of course, but it doesn't help bring in variety.

Anyway, those are the thoughts of a DDD oldbie who hasn't been in the game scene for quite some time and doesn't know the exact state of this particular RP, but I figured it couldn't hurt to throw my two cents in. Again, feel free to correct me if I'm off the mark!

[peacefulwinter]

(For anyone keeping score, this is Salsa.)

You made a few points here I kinda agree with, but I do want to mention a few things. I do agree that we could stand to let our canon updates, and possibly our canons in general, interact with each other - part of my whole idea of one of my characters (Chrono Harlaown) was to jump into worlds with issues and offer to help, as he would in his own canon. I also want to try and expand our collective Precure cast into other worlds, if players are interested.

Speaking of Precure, I think that's a big factor in the animation/LA divide - between us we control over a dozen characters from that one canon. Before we had Glee as a big huge canon, but we don't have the luxury of that anymore, so that's part of the shift. I am open to having more live-action characters, but our larger animated canons are going to be the biggest obstacle to that. If anyone has ideas on how to make that divide a little less apparent, I'm up for that.

...My other comments will have to wait, as my break is over. But I hope there's something useful here.

[mightletyouknowme]

Okay...sorry for the double comment i'm trying to help don't kill me. Also sorry if this rambles. I got sick my second day off hiatus.

This...isn't something I necessarily have a solution to so I'm not being the most helpful but reading the comments, there is something I noticed. Once upon a time, DDD had internal conflict besides the viruses and the worry of being spied on. Uh...the good internal conflict, the IC kind. There were good guys and there were bad guys.

I'm not just talking about super powered villains, as normal people (*raises hand*) want to be involved too. Conflict that could happen anytime, be unpredictable.

Umm...solutions. Yeah. Those. The only two I can possibly think of are to keep it in mind during ATP and/or the NPC thing which would probably be too large of a scale. It just seemed like a fast, probably temporary, solution until we got actual players in for it.

Another suggestion, kind of unrelated but kind of not, is to have events which players can actually affect? Like a mystery event, like Tay's whodoneit case during "Wreck it Ralph" or something similar. Just something for players to have to work together, possibly with new CR, to solve something until we get enough player run events on our own?