Great Opportunity for all Flash Artists

[BluMess]

Hey everyone,

I'm working with a small group of people to create a new, unique and user-friendly site for a handful of people to submit their flash works. This would be a great way to earn extra revenue from in-game ads, or a site which you could call your own.

All I'm asking is that if anyone would be interested in taking part in this (no contract, fees or anything - just being part of something new and having a laugh ). To see what we've got so far, you can go to: http://www.blumess.com.

Since this is my personal site, I've also bought a new domain for us to use when it's all done. This will be www.nocturnalhaunt.com

If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Thanks!
~Chris

[renderhjs]

yet another flash game website,- I assume that it is rather personal as there is absolutely no need at all for yet another one.

good luck anyway for what ever you intend

[BluMess]

Well, I think that all the flash games sites don't give much credit to the developers. I wanted to make a site where we can have a little community, making it much more personal to everyone involved.

It's kinda a team effort.
ty for the good luck

[Squize]

If it's developer focused, it'd be nice if you could break the trend and give every game it's own custom page, rather than it just being yet another swf in yet another templated page.

I'm not saying you have to do each page yourself, let the developers do it. Keep the "community" aspect ( ie the rating and a comments box ), but hide them away and bring them up in an ajax pop-up, same with the nav.

Think of newgrounds as the exact opposite of what I mean There you're presented with a page full of everything, and you have to click the play game button to actually fire that up in a pop-up box.
In effect it's giving the least priority to the game itself.
Doing it the opposite way around, so the game is key and the site is just a way to hold it all together, will win you a lot of love with developers.

( Here's an example using one of our games. To me there's no dispute which one looks better, which one looks the more complete package as opposed to just another game.

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/440351
http://www.gamingyourway.com/lotw/

)

Squize.

[tomsamson]

hm, interesting, i have a bit of a different view
I agree that its nice to put focus on the game rather than the surrounding page i think your example page and suggestion for user made page layouts can quickly become quite problematic on various ends.
What about traffic and load times? Its no good idea that every sub page of a site has lots of different big graphics. What about style? Not everyone has the skill, time or will to make a custom page for his game, maybe not everyone likes it that instead of just competing with the game then game developers would also compete in who has the flashiest site layout.
What about the users? It can quickly become hurting for the eyes or "only" unintuitive to use when every page is in quite different look & feel.
So yeah, i like the general idea, but the execution in that way and to that degree only works out for a single game imho, not a page with several games.

[Squize]

Yeah I'm not saying it's a 100% practical for a large portal, but BluMess has implied that this will be a portal more of friends work being uploaded, rather than just shovelware one, so it would be a good original angle for it, to make it stand out from all the dross out there.

Squize.

[BluMess]

I like your idea Squize.
Maybe instead, we could have a selection of graphics which the developer can choose from to be displayed, as well as the feature to insert your own graphics.

I also don't think it would be a great idea for every page to have a completely different feel - maybe just tweaked graphics. For instance, the purple background for each toon / game / artwork could be changed to suit the submission.

Overall, I think it's a great idea, ty
I'll see if I can implement it when I get the time. Shouldn't be too hard

[Wattz]

So it's like the MySpace for flash developers?

I like the idea of a few different page templates where some extra custom graphics could be uploaded or hotlinked in. Then fonts and background colors and the rest could be edited by the developer for the game in question.

If you're going to go that far, you might as well allow a developer to blog there as well.

[BluMess]

Already done that.
Infact, anyone can blog straight from their profile, as well as upload photos.
Comments system should be put in soon, when I get the chance! You can also add friends too, although that might not have much use until a chat system is put in.

Yeah, well maybe not as powerful as myspace, but somewhere which combines flash with social networking I guess

I've added in the ability to change the default background for your game / animation / artwork, what about the option to put in a banner below the game description? Do you think that's a good idea?

[BluMess]

No one?

Well i'd just like to say, the site's launching in 2 days and I'm still on the lookout for some game developers and animators

[renderhjs]

you mean looking for some free yet less used content- good luck with that

[BluMess]

Not really, this is a chance for people who don't own their own site to have their own place on the internet, without any charges or any hidden catches.

[Ray Beez]

www.ning.com