Forum Update Forum Theme Update!

[V]

Forum Theme Update! ​

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Greetings, adventurers of the digital realm! Our community's landscape has transformed, embarking on a new era. We're excited to unveil the enhancements that redefine our forum's aesthetics. Here's what's new:

• Wallpaper & Colors: Embrace our reimagined aesthetic, featuring a dynamic new wallpaper and a palette of colors that bring our digital world to life.
• The Main Logo: We've optimized our main logo, making it sleeker and smaller to allow more room for content while maintaining its core identity.
• Streamlined Features: In our quest for a clutter-free environment, we've said goodbye to the Album of the Day and User Quotes. This change paves the way for new features and streamlined navigation.

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How to Switch to the New Theme​

Want to experience the full glory of Mariana Bay V1? Here’s a quick tutorial to change your forum style:

• Scroll down to the very bottom of the main page.
• Look for the brush icon — that’s our theme selector. (It's going to say Mariana Bay Classic right beside it)
• Click on it, and a menu will appear.
• Select Mariana Bay V1 from the list to activate the new theme.

Enjoy the fresh look and feel! If you encounter any navigational troubles or want to share your thoughts, don’t hesitate to let us know. We thrive on your feedback to continually make the forum better.

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Check Out the New Look!​

Take a sneak peek at the new theme through these screenshots:

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[Tabula Rasa]

cool

 

[Khastle]

FYI: I should state that Album of the Day and a Random Forum Quote are coming back in the future in their way. I got rid of them as the front page felt too busy with both of them and I now want to find a better way to implement them so stay tuned for that.

The node/board images, which faced a lot of criticism from most of our harshest critics, are no longer a thing and instead will be replaced with node icons which will indicate when a board has new posts or not, hopefully this will be a favourable aesthetic improvement and give the boards some character still.

 

[Khastle]

Forgot to mention: This new style still needs work and is very much in a beta stage so expect certain things to not look right here and there. Hopefully will be in an ideal state by end of this month but can't guarantee anything.

 

[chmod]

excellent work, this looks kick ass

 

[Bibr]

Yall... Is anyone actually using that new V1 look thing ?
How tf you can't see any issue with it ?!

My favourite thread category: the qutter, or is it gutter ? I can't tell cause q and g are so similar

Excuse me sir, is that font size 2, 5 or 8 ? Only God can tell cause those numbers look so similar.
Readability people !!!

Also. I have a minor thing against the plain blue top footer for categories. When you switch to "old school" background, it looks so out of place. Again, I think this wacky font is adding to the uncanny feel when you go to the "old school" background.

I think removing images from categories is also a bad idea. Sure front page looks more busy wiht them. But it's way easier to take a quick glance on the front page and identify categories.

I will remain silent on that ai generated background image shame on you

 

[V]

Yall... Is anyone actually using that new V1 look thing ?
How tf you can't see any issue with it ?!

My favourite thread category: the qutter, or is it gutter ? I can't tell cause q and g are so similar

Excuse me sir, is that font size 2, 5 or 8 ? Only God can tell cause those numbers look so similar.
Readability people !!!

Also. I have a minor thing against the plain blue top footer for categories. When you switch to "old school" background, it looks so out of place. Again, I think this wacky font is adding to the uncanny feel when you go to the "old school" background.

I think removing images from categories is also a bad idea. Sure front page looks more busy wiht them. But it's way easier to take a quick glance on the front page and identify categories.

I will remain silent on that ai generated background image shame on you

Problem?
Jokes aside you can’t make everyone happy this is why you have the option to switch themes
Some people like the images and some don’t use whatever fits your tastes
As for the font if we get more feedback that it needs to be modified we’ll look into it

 

[chmod]

Yall... Is anyone actually using that new V1 look thing ?
How tf you can't see any issue with it ?!

My favourite thread category: the qutter, or is it gutter ? I can't tell cause q and g are so similar

Excuse me sir, is that font size 2, 5 or 8 ? Only God can tell cause those numbers look so similar.
Readability people !!!

Also. I have a minor thing against the plain blue top footer for categories. When you switch to "old school" background, it looks so out of place. Again, I think this wacky font is adding to the uncanny feel when you go to the "old school" background.

I think removing images from categories is also a bad idea. Sure front page looks more busy wiht them. But it's way easier to take a quick glance on the front page and identify categories.

I will remain silent on that ai generated background image shame on you

works on my machine

 

[Khastle]

Yall... Is anyone actually using that new V1 look thing ?
How tf you can't see any issue with it ?!

My favourite thread category: the qutter, or is it gutter ? I can't tell cause q and g are so similar

Excuse me sir, is that font size 2, 5 or 8 ? Only God can tell cause those numbers look so similar.
Readability people !!!

Understandable concern, I agree certain letters and numbers do look odd with this new font also. Remember: the new style is still in a beta stage so we are still experimenting with different fonts and what not until we find a suitable contender. I'm not personally fond of the old one and have for ages have tried to find a better one to replace it but have struggled to find good contenders (and to make the finicky code to work until now lol). Rest assured this font isn't final and am looking around until one is found that most people are happy with (This one looks promising: https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Press+Start+2P?preview.text=Hello%20world&query=Press+Start+2P). Also the old style is still available if you prefer how things looked there.

Also. I have a minor thing against the plain blue top footer for categories. When you switch to "old school" background, it looks so out of place. Again, I think this wacky font is adding to the uncanny feel when you go to the "old school" background.

My apologies, I'll look into fixing that. Xenforo has weird universal attributes for certain site properties and I might have to manually readd things into the extra,less on the older styles so legacy styles are not effected so much by changes on the new style(s). Moreover, on the classic style I will be readding Album of the Day and Quote of the Day as they were to preserve the OG style as it was.

I think removing images from categories is also a bad idea. Sure front page looks more busy wiht them. But it's way easier to take a quick glance on the front page and identify categories.

I will not be readding these on the new style(s), for reasons I'll discuss in a bit, and instead they will be replaced by icons that will help identify what the catergories are about instead. Something like this:

The reason I will not be readding the large catergory images is that they were one of the most harshly criticized elements from critics and general users of the site. They were badly colour coordinated (and even if they were it still wouldn't work imo), made the text hard to read, caused the front page to look overall too busy, and contributed to the site take longer to load too. I understand certain users, like yourself, liked the old style hence I've maintained it on the legacy style but it won't be returning as even I agree with the critics now that it didn't look the best and unless someone wants to step up in the future and make it work as a style it won't be returning on new styles in the foreseeable future.

I will remain silent on that ai generated background image shame on you

for now it's temporary and obviously in the future I want something hand-drawn for the main site background but at the moment it's too risky finanically. We are still experimenting with the new style as it is and it would be stupid to start pouring in money for a new background when we are still working on things here and there for the new style that we don't even know 100% that we are sticking to. As a placeholder it was either nick someone else's art for the temp background or generate something which is in line on what we are looking for and we chose the later because we liked what came out of it. I'm a university student in the end and not currently working, last thing I want to do is pour $70 on a high-quality and original background image only for it to not go with our aesthetic and for it to go to waste.

All in all your concerns are valid and thanks for being upfront about them as it helps us improve the site for you fellas for the foreseeable future.

 

[jotnarr]

needs more minmalism

 

[jotnarr]

needs more minmalism

fuck

 

[Khastle]

needs more minmalism

Could you elaborate in what ways exactly?

 

[jotnarr]

Could you elaborate in what ways exactly?

cut down on elements & more concise formatting.

 

[Khastle]

cut down on elements & more concise formatting.

I'll look into this, cheers. What in particular bugs you? @Daryl is better at this than me so he will have a better input on this tbh.

 

[V]

cut down on elements & more concise formatting.

This can also mean a number of things just tell me what bothers you
Is the readability bad? Too many buttons I need the exact things if possible because Personally I’m not bothered by anything really

 

[Khastle]

I did some of the last icons last night, a few tweaks here and there and I think this new style is ready to become the default one tbh, it ain't 100% polished but mogs the old one to obvillion lmao.

 

[Dwayne]

Considering pirate related names for the boards and 4chan identifiers such as /x/ and /ic/ so people know what they are about, thoughts? I just changed General Discussion to 'The Tavern' to experiment.

Btw Entertainment and Hobbies has an easter egg on the icon if you read all the threads ;)

 

[V]

Considering pirate related names for the boards and 4chan identifiers such as /x/ and /ic/ so people know what they are about, thoughts? I just changed General Discussion to 'The Tavern' to experiment.

Btw Entertainment and Hobbies has an easter egg on the icon if you read all the threads ;)

What is the point of the easter egg if ppl know lol

 

[Dwayne]

What is the point of the easter egg if ppl know lol

 

[Dwayne]

As I feel the new theme is now in an acceptable state it's now been set as the site default. Prefer the old style? That's fine, it can still be accessed from the bottom right of the footer by clicking the paintbrush and is under "Mariana Bay Classic"