charlequin
Banned
Here at NeoGAF, we've had |OT| threads for each significant new game to serve as a single landing point for people to talk to each other as they play. |OT|s serve several purposes: to concentrate information about a game (platforms, features, screenshots, press coverage, helpful resources, etc.); to provide a central place for players to express and debate their experience with a game; to help users find co-op partners or opponents; to ask questions about the game to other people who are playing; or just to find jumping-off points for more specialized discussion (spoiler threads, technical analysis threads, etc.)
Since we've solidified the |OT| model, it's worked pretty well. These threads provide a useful resource for users and a good place to find active discussion. Historically we've posted these a week in advance to give people a chance to get started pre-release and talk through anything that comes up with the release.
As the forum has grown, though, that particular timeframe has become less functional. Because we're such a large forum, a week becomes an eternity; for popular games, a week can produce a gigantic thread, making it difficult for people jumping in on release day to find what they're looking for or to follow the already-rapid pace of conversation. In addition, thanks to our "new threads for new news" approach, big games tend to have quite a few active threads immediately pre-release, so having the same types of pre-release discussions happen in the |OT| for a week is somewhat redundant.
As a result, we've decided that from now on, |OT|s will go up on the day of a game's release instead of a week in advance. This way, everyone getting the game can come into a thread on a relatively equal basis and start discussing with the title already in hand.
Since we've solidified the |OT| model, it's worked pretty well. These threads provide a useful resource for users and a good place to find active discussion. Historically we've posted these a week in advance to give people a chance to get started pre-release and talk through anything that comes up with the release.
As the forum has grown, though, that particular timeframe has become less functional. Because we're such a large forum, a week becomes an eternity; for popular games, a week can produce a gigantic thread, making it difficult for people jumping in on release day to find what they're looking for or to follow the already-rapid pace of conversation. In addition, thanks to our "new threads for new news" approach, big games tend to have quite a few active threads immediately pre-release, so having the same types of pre-release discussions happen in the |OT| for a week is somewhat redundant.
As a result, we've decided that from now on, |OT|s will go up on the day of a game's release instead of a week in advance. This way, everyone getting the game can come into a thread on a relatively equal basis and start discussing with the title already in hand.