- Marianan ID
- 4
- Joined
- Apr 2, 2023
- Threads
- 211
- Messages
- 2,236
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- 1,251
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- Location
- Dwayne's Basement, Mariana Bay
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Hello, I'm writing on behalf of Ignika and the mod team on the direction of the forum going forward. After a brief period of inactivity on here, due to migration errors and our mod team being busy with irl matters, we have finally decided on where we plan on taking the forum. In short, we are making it a hub for creators, big or small, unknown to infamous, if you make content we want to hear your ideas, help promote you, and discuss how you could improve in an open and honest community. Naturally with this change of theme there will be a few changes here and there that I wish to discuss to hear feedback and opinions before we go full throttle with implementing these new additions:
1. The New Boards
With user creations taking the front seat of the forum's new direction new boards will be added to accommodate this, these are not final and will be subject to change before they are added but this is what we have come up with so far: Art & Animation, Music, Videos & Streaming, Coding & Technology, and Books & Literature. Whilst these boards will be used to discuss these topics in general the main idea will be to not only to do but for creators to share their own work for feedback, promotion, and who knows potential collaborations too. In the short two years this forum has been up we have had really creative people come and go, and this forum becoming a centre for that talent is our new directive from here on out, however, this being said certain boards will be merged, split, or outright removed and I believe current members should be aware of this as these changes are being made so I'll lay these out now:
Tavern, Paranormal Conspiracy Current Events, and Entertainment & Hobbies will remain the same though name changes may be implemented at a later date.
Art & Content Creation will become the Art & Animation board and unrelated threads will go the appropriate boards.
Mariana Underground will simply become Music.
Help Desk will be removed from front page, the two boards within it merged and will be accessible either from a new help tab on the navbar, a new alerts system on top page, or latest posts. This is being done so there's less clutter on the front page as these two boards didn't really need boards to begin with.
Members-Only Boards such as Saloon or Gutter may be removed entirely, they are barely used and we can hide threads to be members only on any board anyways, moreover Gutter is just spam and if we grow will just clog up server space, nothing of value will be lost with its removal, however this needs to be discussed with staff.
At least on the V3 design, latest threads and profile posts will now be on the top of the page in contrast to a sidebar on the previous designs. This is a quality of life tweak being done due to the side bar coming last on mobile which can make finding new threads and posts annoying as you have to constantly scroll down. Moreover, the new creator the day addition will allow you to submit your content to be featured on the front page!
Anything else I've forgotten in regards to changes I'll make in upcoming posts on this thread.
2. Theme Upgrade
A common criticism we have had towards the site since the beginning is the forum's styling was all over the place: colours that constantly contrasted with each other everywhere, node images that made text unreadable, etc. We have heard these issues loud and clear, and from now on we will be sticking with a more basic colour palette for boards and layout so the forum is more pleasing to the eye: black, gray, red and white. Black and gray will be used mainly on the dark theme as Xenforo 2.3 has light and dark themes we have to account for when doing new styles now (thanks Xenforo!), white and gray will be used in the light theme whilst red will be used for node icons and the main wallpaper primarily (though we will have different colours for backgrounds too to pick so don't worry!). Why red? Because it's a cool colour and the other useable colours (red and blue, Ignika didn't like purple :( ) are used by way too many other boards so we are going for something a bit different. But essentially in short, we want the Mariana Bay to look less busy going forward so its easier on the eye, if you don't like the themeing for the new style you're in luck as V2 and Classic will still be accessible (Classic needs some repairing however) though will have less support as they are not as compatible with the Xenforo software we are currently on, however we understand there's still fans of these themes so we are making an effort to keep them alive as people enjoy using them, V1 isn't coming back as no one likes that one.
3. New Logo
With the distancing from the music theme we will be changing the old cassette and crossbones logo to something else which will be none other than our own mascot, Dwayne the Cat. The mod team felt people forget he exists so because of this we plan on making him a central part of the site by making him part of the main logo. This design is a work in progress so you're free to shoot suggestions, maybe we will do a design thread at some point that everyone can chip opinions in on, but yeah new theme new look. Maybe for nostalgia sake the old themes will keep the old logo but on all the new themes going forward it will be Dwayne, Dwayne, Dwayne.
---
That's the main news of the hour for now, would love to hear opinions. There's still energy in reviving this place and giving it a new use, and we are happy to hear what you all think. These updates will come gradually and won't be instant, and will take a bit of work to be done, but yeah any feedback is appreciated and thanks for hearing me out. Btw, the new V3 design is accessible in the theme picker if you want to see the progress on it so far.
1. The New Boards
With user creations taking the front seat of the forum's new direction new boards will be added to accommodate this, these are not final and will be subject to change before they are added but this is what we have come up with so far: Art & Animation, Music, Videos & Streaming, Coding & Technology, and Books & Literature. Whilst these boards will be used to discuss these topics in general the main idea will be to not only to do but for creators to share their own work for feedback, promotion, and who knows potential collaborations too. In the short two years this forum has been up we have had really creative people come and go, and this forum becoming a centre for that talent is our new directive from here on out, however, this being said certain boards will be merged, split, or outright removed and I believe current members should be aware of this as these changes are being made so I'll lay these out now:
Tavern, Paranormal Conspiracy Current Events, and Entertainment & Hobbies will remain the same though name changes may be implemented at a later date.
Art & Content Creation will become the Art & Animation board and unrelated threads will go the appropriate boards.
Mariana Underground will simply become Music.
Help Desk will be removed from front page, the two boards within it merged and will be accessible either from a new help tab on the navbar, a new alerts system on top page, or latest posts. This is being done so there's less clutter on the front page as these two boards didn't really need boards to begin with.
Members-Only Boards such as Saloon or Gutter may be removed entirely, they are barely used and we can hide threads to be members only on any board anyways, moreover Gutter is just spam and if we grow will just clog up server space, nothing of value will be lost with its removal, however this needs to be discussed with staff.
At least on the V3 design, latest threads and profile posts will now be on the top of the page in contrast to a sidebar on the previous designs. This is a quality of life tweak being done due to the side bar coming last on mobile which can make finding new threads and posts annoying as you have to constantly scroll down. Moreover, the new creator the day addition will allow you to submit your content to be featured on the front page!
Anything else I've forgotten in regards to changes I'll make in upcoming posts on this thread.
2. Theme Upgrade
A common criticism we have had towards the site since the beginning is the forum's styling was all over the place: colours that constantly contrasted with each other everywhere, node images that made text unreadable, etc. We have heard these issues loud and clear, and from now on we will be sticking with a more basic colour palette for boards and layout so the forum is more pleasing to the eye: black, gray, red and white. Black and gray will be used mainly on the dark theme as Xenforo 2.3 has light and dark themes we have to account for when doing new styles now (thanks Xenforo!), white and gray will be used in the light theme whilst red will be used for node icons and the main wallpaper primarily (though we will have different colours for backgrounds too to pick so don't worry!). Why red? Because it's a cool colour and the other useable colours (red and blue, Ignika didn't like purple :( ) are used by way too many other boards so we are going for something a bit different. But essentially in short, we want the Mariana Bay to look less busy going forward so its easier on the eye, if you don't like the themeing for the new style you're in luck as V2 and Classic will still be accessible (Classic needs some repairing however) though will have less support as they are not as compatible with the Xenforo software we are currently on, however we understand there's still fans of these themes so we are making an effort to keep them alive as people enjoy using them, V1 isn't coming back as no one likes that one.
3. New Logo
With the distancing from the music theme we will be changing the old cassette and crossbones logo to something else which will be none other than our own mascot, Dwayne the Cat. The mod team felt people forget he exists so because of this we plan on making him a central part of the site by making him part of the main logo. This design is a work in progress so you're free to shoot suggestions, maybe we will do a design thread at some point that everyone can chip opinions in on, but yeah new theme new look. Maybe for nostalgia sake the old themes will keep the old logo but on all the new themes going forward it will be Dwayne, Dwayne, Dwayne.
---
That's the main news of the hour for now, would love to hear opinions. There's still energy in reviving this place and giving it a new use, and we are happy to hear what you all think. These updates will come gradually and won't be instant, and will take a bit of work to be done, but yeah any feedback is appreciated and thanks for hearing me out. Btw, the new V3 design is accessible in the theme picker if you want to see the progress on it so far.
