Shipped Bugs and suggestions for improvements

[Frode]

Bugs:
- When scrolling down the main page /games, when your cursor comes to the “trending” widget, you can no longer scroll. This is actually pretty annoying hehe..
- In regular search, the result is tagged with “games”. Should be “Games” with capital G.
- When trying to bookmark a game:


Suggestions for changes/improvements:
- Search bar should be at the top of the page for better visibility.


- Auto-complete on the following:

• Designer
• Publisher
• Expansion
• Search field

So, f.ex if you have already added Electronic Arts, it should appear as you add a new game and type “elec…”. This is to prevent there being many different variants of the same publisher/developers. (f.ex EA, Electronic Arts, EA Games etc etc).

- Option to REMOVE all ratings given by a user in ACP. (Purge ratings from X user). This is to remove ratings done with malicious intent.
- Rating number should be given a bit more space on the game banner on the game page as well as a text beside it.
Larger and possibly have a color? Example: One star – [rating nr in color as below] Very Poor – 3 ratings.



- Info text alongside the rating area to help users give correct ratings. Better and more accurate ratings is important, as it improves the data-set in your database. You WANT to avoid at all cost, users just adding 1 and 5 star reviews, it really ruins the value of the ratings.

“Rate the game overall, try to be precise! 3 stars represent a good game you would play again; reserve 5 stars for exceptional PERFECT games only. See guideline below:”
Do you want to play this again?
1.0 Never again (game breaking flaws)
1.5 Generally avoid (more frustrating than enjoyable)
2.0 Rarely want to play (some good ideas, but significant shortcomings)
2.5 Very occasional play (mixed, enjoyable in parts, but with some clear drawbacks)
3.0 Play now and then (an enjoyable game)
3.5 Happily play again (strong game with good theme/mechanics)
4.0 Always ready to play (excellent game - very enjoyable!)
4.5 Prefer over most games (exceptional game! One of the best ever played!
5.0 Always excited to play (PERFECT game, you are just stunned how incredibly addicting and perfectly made this game is – ZERO flaws or shortcomings!).

- Smart SEO URL on the database entries. Instead of “game 1-2-3 etc”, use the name in the URL (as well as the unique number ID).
- Allow to select in ACP which forums are “open” when you press button “+Discuss this game”.
- Could you allow full thread editor for this? So maybe two buttons – “quick post thread” or “view full post editor”? (open new page).
- Should the title of the game be greyed out when creating thread? So, users are forced to name them [game name] – [their title]. This will keep all threads related to X and Y in the thread list east to see what game it belongs to.
- Discussions tab having support for thread prefixes? Would be awesome for visibility on the game page, so you can have [game balance], [strategy], [news] etc.
- Integration with XFMG and XFRM? (add files or add images to game).
- Compare games page: Should be field for auto-complete instead of drop-down no? With 1000 entries a drop-down isn’t very feasible?
- Subscribe to a game? Will notify the user if new games are posted (linked to that game), new reviews, new posts/threads.

 

[Gwendal]

Frode, almost all of this is in GameHub 1.2.0, which just went live on the store. Point by point, because you took the time to write it properly.

The three bugs

• The trending rail blocking the page scroll is fixed. A handler was turning the vertical wheel into horizontal scrolling and cancelling the event, so with the cursor over the rail the page could not move at all. You were right that it was annoying: it was worse than annoying, it was a dead zone on the main page.
• Search results showing "games" in lowercase is fixed. The content type declared no label at all, so XenForo fell back to the internal identifier. It now says Game and Games.
• Bookmarking a game is fixed. The form posted to a relative address with no game id, so it could only ever fail.

Your suggestions, shipped

• Search bar at the top of the page, full width.
• Autocomplete on developer, publisher, franchise, expansion and the hub search box. Exactly your reasoning: type "elec" and the existing values are offered, so EA, Electronic Arts and EA Games stop multiplying.
• Purge a member's ratings from the admin panel. There is a new member page showing everything someone contributed, with a targeted purge for ratings, reviews or screenshots. Every affected game average is recalculated immediately.
• The rating gets its space, a word and a colour on the game banner, from Very Poor to Perfect.
• The guidance text you wrote. There is now a collapsible rating guide on the game page, and a Rating scale page in the admin panel listing all nine steps from 1.0 to 5.0 with a label, a colour and a sentence saying when to use it. Every label is a phrase, so you can rewrite them in your own words. I also added something you did not ask for but that follows from your point: if more than half of all ratings on your board are a 1 or a 5, the admin panel tells you. A scale used only at its ends stops meaning anything, and you should know before the data is spoiled.
• Names in the address: /games/view/elden-ring.1/ instead of /games/view/1/, the same shape XenForo uses for threads. Old links keep working and every game page declares a canonical address.
• Choosing which forums the "Discuss this game" button opens, from the options.
• A full editor button, for attachments and formatting.
• The forced title, optional: the thread becomes "Game name - member title", so game discussions stay recognisable in the forum list.
• Thread prefixes on the Discussions tab, with the list following the chosen forum, and filters on the game page.
• The compare page no longer loads the whole database into a dropdown. Neither do the Series and Expansion fields. On a 1000 game database, typing is responsive again.

Partly done

• XFRM is in: attach resources to a game by URL, id or title, shown on the game page with their category, download count and rating. XFMG is not yet. Images are a different job because of how the media gallery handles permissions per category, and I would rather do it properly than bolt it on.

Not done, and honestly

• Subscribing to a game is the one real gap. It is a good idea and it is on the list, but it needs its own notification plumbing rather than a quick hook, so it is not something I want to rush into a release.

Thank you for the report. The screenshots made half of these findable in minutes rather than hours, and the rating scale is better than what I would have written on my own.

Full release notes: GameHub 1.2.0