Scratch

I am not reposting this topic; the one in the Text-Based Games is called "Should I suggest that the Text-Based Games be deleted?". Note the "Should I suggest" part.

If you agree, copy this into your signature:

A suggestion: [url=http://scratch.mit.edu/forums/viewtopic.php?id=23404]I suggest that the Text-Based Games be deleted.[/url]
If you're one of the people who agrees with me, copy and paste this into your signature. [b][color=black]Twenty-two[/color] others agree with me.[/b]

Don't forget to update your signature as the number increases!

Please Scratch Team, consider and read this. Especially you, Andrés. Nothing's going to happen without you. Please post giving us your views also; we'd love to know what you think. 


Contents (so the lazy people will know what's in it)
The seven reasons why the Text-Based Games should go
Why the Text-Based Games were created
The options that we have (along with agreeing with why the Text-Based Games were created)
Some questions that we should use to decide if the Text-Based Games should be deleted or not (and a link to a topic about it where you can see more)
A list of the twenty-two users who want the Text-Based Games to go (and a link to a survey asking people about their opinions)
Numerous quotes from everyone who agreed and got on the list of supporters (you can see loads of information)
Very short epilogue thing

________________________________________________________________________________________________

Yes.

The seven reasons about why the Text-Based Games should be deleted (and why we don't care if you don't have your fun):
1. The Scratch Forums are for helping people, suggesting things, reporting bugs, and things like that. Not for playing games.

I'll have to stop right there for a moment. It is vitally important that you grasp this. The Scratch Forums are supposed to help the Scratch Community! They are not for playing games. All of the ignorant people don't seem to grasp this important fact.

2. Some people only have an account so they can play games in the forums. This is horrible. If you don't think so, chances are that you're one of those poor people.

I have to pause here too. It is important that you grasp this also. Do you think that it is right if people join Scratch only to play the Text-Based Games? Do you?

3. Forum moderators have to moderate the Text-Based Games. If the forum weren't there, they would have more time to moderate other forums. This will help keep the forums free of spam and bad stuff. You non-moderator people probably don't care about the waste of time. The moderators do. Have a heart, people! They diligently do their job. And as cheddargirl has stated, it gets really annoying when you get reports that have stuff of little importance. But the moderators put up with it.
4. People might view other parts of the forums instead of the Text-Based Games. They might actually view interesting things, and hopefully contribute to the Scratch Community (instead of wasting your lives).
5. If they want to RPG or play games, they could use a project or a gallery. And they'll be able to actually see something (whether one project or several).
6. Most of the posts are in the Text-Based Games and not in useful spots where we like them.
7. The Text-Based Games are an easy way to get 50 posts for a signature. Text-Based Games addicts probably will be able to get 50 posts in a day.

There is only one reason why the Text-Based Games should be kept. The very same reason it was created: to stop games appearing in forums like All About Scratch. This is easily remedied: forum moderators can simply close or delete the topic (placing a post first asking them not to post topics like that, and then they can do what they want). People will learn. If they don't (for some stupid reason), in forums like All About Scratch there can be stickies reminding people not to post topics like that.

There are three things to do.
1. We simply delete the Text-Based Games. People will be upset, but this will go away after a week (or maybe less). New Scratch users won't even know the difference! Yes, topics may pop up in All About Scratch, but forum moderators can simply close or delete the topics (you can report those topics if you want to be helpful). If people don't learn, there can be stickies. And it isn't that hard to remove all of the topics that are games.

2. We move the Text-Based Games to a different website. The people will play there, and we'll all be happy. The problem is if the Scratch Team wants to run a seperate website just for those games.

3. We remove the Text-Based Games posts from the post count. This may seem silly, but it gets disaterous. First, the Text-Based Games addicts will have their post count change from 500 to 10 (or 3500 to 50). They will feel ashamed of having such a low post count (everyone cares) while the Scratchers that care about the Community will have 500 or 1000. They will want a higher post count, so they will visit and post more in the helpful parts of the forums. Which means that we'll get more Scratchers who care about the Community. Or the users will just quit Scratch once the post count rule takes effect.

Do you see something with these three ideas? They all get rid of the useless users who don't care about the Scratch Community. This means that we don't really care what happens; we'll have a more caring Community. Though 3 means that we keep the Text-Based Games... but it's better than what we have now.

The question to non-supporters (cheddargirl's idea):

If you think that the Text-Based Games should not be deleted, tell us what it does to help the Scratch Community.

Along with reading some other posts, I believe that this is complete. Non-supporters should ask themselves this:

Does the Text-Based Games belong in the Scratch Forums? Is it part of Scratch? Does it help the Scratch Community?

For all three questions, I answered 'no'.

I believe that we should base our decision about if we delete the Text-Based Games or not on these three questions. If the Text-Based Games belong in the Scratch Forums, it's part of Scratch, and it helps the Scratch Community, it should stay. But if it doesn't belong in the Scratch Forums, it isn't part of Scratch, and it doesn't help the Scratch Community, then it should be deleted.

I posted a topic about this. It includes the things that people might say when it's actually quite silly. Anyway, here's the link: An important question about TBG (ignore it that it's a new topic)


Before I suggested this, I posted a topic in the Text-Based Games, asking their opinion. After a while (and plenty of nasty insults saying I was an idiot), I received nine supporters. Their names are down below, along with their posts.

Here's the link: Should I suggest that the Text-Based Games be deleted?

Twenty-two people want the Text-Based Games to go:
archmage
cheddargirl
Chrischb
coolstuff
dav09
deatheater
demosthenes
ElPapa
fireball123
floatingmagictree
floppy_gunk
illusionist
Jonathanpb
LSUUSA
Maki-Tak
MyRedNeptune
Paddle2See
pinochio
ScratchScripter
steppenwulf
TimeFreeze
The-Whiz
TheSaint

archmage wrote:

Scratch is a little bit about getting to know others, but its main focus is using the program. When 80% of the scratch forum's posts have nothing to do with scratch it takes away the focus from the actual program that the site revolves around.

I think that there should be a separate forum website for non scratch topics with separate mods. It should be easy to back up the forum data and just move it.

cheddargirl wrote:

Perhaps... but it seems that many threads in the Text-Based games forum doesn't appear to really support that too well.

I know the Text-Based games are fun (and yes, I myself used to go into those threads and have a little fun there, too) but I'm finding that I agree with Paddle2See on this one. I'm also finding that they're slowly becoming a way for people to get signatures and become involved in the forums while having little or nothing to do with the Scratch community (or sometimes even against it). Same kind of goes for 'Inspiration and More' (Look here, the original purpose of the 'Inspiration and More' forum no longer seems relevant. Maybe I'm being a hypocrite for having posted in threads that do not seem to follow this original goal, but still...)

cheddargirl wrote:

You know, while reading this thread, I'm just a bit surprised to find out the outcry of the opposition to Jonathan's post on the basis that the 'Text-Based Games' forum is 'fun'. It makes me a bit worried that this forums, and not Scratch projects, is slowly becoming the basis of entertainment on Scratch.

Chrischb wrote:

Yes, the Text-Based-Games are fun, but the forums are actually to help others and such. This was just an expirement, so it could have never happened; and you wouldn't mind it at all if it hadn't started... but who knows, it could have been suggested at one point; I'm actually too lazy to check.

coolstuff wrote:

I very much agree with this. The forums are for helping people with Scratch not playing games. I 100% want that forum to be removed.

dav09 wrote:

I actually agree. and no animation projects is the exact same as saying this so i agree!

deatheater wrote:

Are you suggesting people can't go any place else to play text based games (name of someone that deatheater was argueing with), they have to do it in scratch, otherwise it's not fun?

demosthenes wrote:

I wish I had found this topic sooner, I totally agree, TBG needs to go. Back in the 'good ole days' yes I always talk about them, the community was a lot more focused on scratch, now it has become an RPGing website.

ElPapa wrote:

RPGing is incredibly fun, undoubtedly. But people should stick to the dedicated galleries for that. RPGing in the forums is... time-wasting, space-wasting... and the mods have to monitor that stuff. I didn't know about this until a few minutes ago... and well, yeah, like previously stated, the forums are helping others, not helping yourself to some ill-minded Text-Based Game or whatever. I completely agree.

fireball123 wrote:

I for one, agree

floatingmagictree wrote:

Meh, I'm a little on the fence over here about this one. Someone mind to take me to a side?

Okay, I've thunk it over, and I have realized that I support the idea of TBG being deleted. This forum became a lot less fun with all these pointless chatrooms that call themselves "RPG's". With 50+ active RPG's, there are no more actually fun games now, and then I also realized that I don't NEED the forum in the first place.

So I'd like to get a place on the list, your honorable listy list.

floppy_gunk wrote:

I like the text-based games, but I have to agree with you. The forums are for improving and helping with Scratch, not for playing games that are completely irrelevant to Scratch. Add me.

illusionist wrote:

I agree with archmage.

Textbasedgames are becoming a big no-no.

LSUUSA wrote:

I agree with you, put me up there for the people who agree. I don't see why people play them, they are all about the same thing, I tried it once because I was bored and it gets old fast, and a lot of the topics are just spam. So get rid of them!

Maki-Tak wrote:

STOP CRITICIZING JON! Seriously, he was just trying to make a point. I've seen people like "I have more posts than you!" When all they do is hang around in WOTF or something like that. The original point of forums was to help develop Scratch, report problems, and ask for help and we're turning it into a social network. I know this is crazy, being an RPGer myself and everyone's probably going to hate me for this, but I have to agree. Sorry.

MyRedNeptune wrote:

I do support Paddle2See on this one.

MyRedNeptune wrote:

Not really, I wish the forums would be as they were before, in other words, no Text-based games/Insp. and More.

Paddle2See wrote:

Actually....there are some days when I agree with you.  This website is for supporting Scratch...the fact of the matter is, the Text-Based Games take a fair amount of monitoring which is time and effort spent away from actually helping people do Scratch.

pinochio wrote:

Although, I like text based games (sometimes) I agree with you... U can add meh to teh list. I just think it takes up space, and time, and a lot of times there is innapropriate stuff.

ScratchScripter wrote:

I agree.
When I joined, Scratch was a programming oriented community, but now the Text-Based Games forum contains over 57 932 posts compared to 206 930 total Scratch forum posts.
Only few months after its opening, the Text-Games forum now makes up about 25% of all posts.
Originally being a community for young programmers with great ideas, Scratch now evolves into a 'regular' community. The Scratch homepage slowly loses connection to the original concept of Scratch: imagine • program • share.

I'm against the Text-Based Games forum. I want Scratch to be something for kids interested in programming, not a social network.

steppenwulf wrote:

I support your idea.

TimeFreeze wrote:

As for this issue, honestly, I really don't care. I never go on the TBG forum, I think I posted there like, once...? No, it doesn't help the scratch community. Yes, it's a waste of time for the mods. I wish there were robot mods. That would make everything better.

ADD MEH 2 TEH LISHT!

The-Whiz wrote:

I agree. It seems like there is too much spam and RPGs on both Inspiration & More and Text-Based Games.

TheSaint wrote:

I don't know, he has a point, as most of the posts are here, and not in the regular forum...

TheSaint wrote:

Some things I think should happen:
1. Don't count posts in from Text-based games. Alot of the topics are just ways to inflate post counts, such as whoever posts last wins, and Can we get to 10,000. I see poeple like Blade-Edge and Robot-Kitty with counts of over 3000 I know that if the ones in this forum didn't count, they would have around 300. It just makes it way to easy to spam.
2. I think that those pointless topics as mentioned above are a waste of space on the servers. The team actually has to pay for server space, and 10,000 posts of "1,2,3..." doesn't help it at all. That money/space could be more focused on helping scratch.
3. Without either Inspiration/Text Games, the Scratch team would make alot of people angry. However, it would also focus scratch onto the programming language, and make it a more tightly knit community. Like Archmage said, you can create another forum for your games, there are free services online for this.

I may have more thoughts later, thats just for now.

Also, To all those people who keep insulting Johnathon, lay off. Don't be the person who runs him down. What Would Jesus Do? Or, better yet, What Would You Do If Jesus Was Standing Right Next To You? (Sorry, and inside joke from yesterday. I will shut up now.)

There you go.

I have to agree with cheddargirl about a very important thing: that people don't want to Text-Based Games to go because they're fun. It scares me.

Last edited by Jonathanpb (2009-10-05 00:11:12)