it's time to shut it down

But unless there is a specific subject point (or points) of interest we won't get any new members and this place would die even faster. You all remember what happened to the Miraigamer forums don't you? I really don't see it working at all.

 

Okay.
The Cave Story Tribute Site Forums. The CSTSF. How much must I owe this place by now?
It's the only true constant I've got.
My dad's at times one of the nicest guys I know, at other times someone I'm scared to be around.
My mom's always busy, with her schoolwork and taxiing around myself and my younger brother.
My older brothers either are in another province or are swamped with homework, and don't pay much attention to me.
My younger brother spends his entire life playing Minecraft, as his way of escaping the world.

Skype used to be a constant, until my dad banned me from it, leaving me only able to use it at my mom's.
IRC also used to be a constant, but then everyone noteworthy left until it's always just Noxid, GIR, and Fab yelling at passing_by, or Zarrot pestering me to stream.
School's a joke, at best. My friends there, with one exception (whom I only see at school) are either losers or have moodswings and hate me half the time. Video games are a temporary escape from reality, but I always end up leaving them behind.

What's left?

The forums. Every day, I wake up, turn off my alarm, grab my phone, and read all the new posts. Sometimes I'll make a post, too. Then I hop in the shower and continue with my day. After school's over, I come home, and I check the forums. If I'm at my mom's, I hop on skype, and talk to my friends from the forums. If at my dad's, I turn on IRC and idle. But every 15 or 20 minutes, I check the forums. The forums are like a clock. After 3 forums checks, it's been about an hour. They're legitimately the easiest way for me to tell time. There's usually a post or two. I read them, maybe reply, then continue with what I was doing. The forums being down, even for a few minutes, is hard for me. I can't focus on anything else until they're back up. That happened today, actually, with an SQL error for a couple of minutes. I couldn't focus on the game I was playing, and I ended up screwing something up with one of my friends. Were the forums to be shut down forever, I'd just lose track of my life. I'd lose the one thing, the only thing, that's always been there, for the past 2 and a half years, and I'd simply be lost. I'm sure my grades would plummet. Then I'd get in huge trouble with my dad, and lose Skype totally. I'd lose my computer, likely. I'd end up working as a tradesman against my own will, because he's made it clear that's what will happen. My life will begin to just suck. I have no way of knowing whether I'd go that far, but I could very well commit suicide.

Change has always been hard for me, but the forums acting as a constant have really helped me out. To lose that...
It's impossible to imagine how hard that would hit me. Yeah, I made a prediction up there, but hell if I know that's what will really happen. One thing I'm sure of, though, is that I'll lose my drive to work on a couple projects I've been labouring over the past half a year or so.

I know this sounds like a stupid emotional rant, but it's my real feelings about this whole thing.
I'm not sure what point I'm trying to make, because the emotional well-being of one member, honestly, doesn't matter that much in the long run. But I wanted to express my feelings about it.

TL;DR: Losing the forums would ruin my life, in ways that wouldn't seem immediately obvious to most.

EDIT: Looking back, I realize I put more personal information into this post than I likely have any other post. Not sure how I feel about that.

 

This has more than a personal outlook in my opinion. We've been discussing this on skype for a little while but after years of being here I've honestly come to think of this place as a home, or at least a place where I can talk to any of the friends I want. Literally every internet friend I have originated from here. I check the forums every day and always look forward to new posts. I don't know if other people feel the same way, but it seems like Dunc does and I hope that people see this as less of a chore and more of a pseudo-friendly environment for acquaintances to stay.
Regardless of how it improves or if anything is contributed (which I really expect to be honest), I want this place to stay.

 

A lengthy response regarding the quality of the modding section, which you are not required to read:

Spoiler

It is notable that Most of the mods these days are quick jobs made by newcomers, who often just give up soon after the initial first mod or two, and often fall into the usual tropes done over again.

It is notable that a Few subactive modding-members, after multible months, are still releasing crap without even pretending it isn't something made in a single day.

It is notable that Very Often, if a mod is planned out and with a noteworthy amount of gameplay, it is canceled part way through it, whereas the mods that are completed are Often very small.

Yes, In general/broad terms it is bleak and helpless, but it still has possibilies. There are still a few mods that are given thought/polish/respect that are amongst the rubbish. It's an allegory to finding Cave Story amongst a bunch of other unheard of titles that deserve to be unheard. These are the few mods that are nominated for Kanpachi's, that reach positive pages above 10 within the forums.

Here is a sadistic but true principal: Most of us treasure the good mods of only our day. I grew fond of some of the mods coming as I joined the forums, but now I don't touch them. There has always been good and terrible mods, we just get bored of finding them eventually, biased that they are all bad now.

Plus, I can name four active members who have openly/secretly been working on new quality mods for months, but have rarely mentioned them and waiting till they shine brightly before they break-apart the layer of mostly dung present here. A mod can be made and released in a day, but the good ones we must be patient for.

---

A more general response:
I wouldn't mind a more-general forums, as long as it was done right and not just going to die quicker from the lack of people coming in.
I've noticed that there are trends to what we enjoy as a group (La-Mulana, VVVVVV, Undertale, Artwork, Cynical Sarcasm), so it's not just Cave Story that can keep us together, it would just stop people from finding us. 11-year olds are everywhere online, you can't take them all down with canceling a single site.

 

I vouch against the forums getting shut down. It's the one place where I met my first online friends (and Pomfy), as I'm normally introverted. I've had the most fun talking with you guys and I don't think it'll be the same for me if I were to have not joined at all. I probably would've been alone, stalking you guys, wanting to talk to some of you. I've been more open now since I joined these forums. And honestly, it would be upsetting to see the forums shut down before I've been around for a whole year. It'll be as if that year never happened, and that I never talked to you guys at all.

Bottom line: Why join these forums only to find this thread 9 months into being part of something I might as well not have been a part of?

 

Yes, I know this sounds ridiculous.

Yes

The lot of you are rolling your eyes and saying "Ugh them again?".

This is what I'm saying, because I don't remember your gender.

There's has been a major degrade in these forums in the past year or so. Obvious complaints are that Cave Story's ever-growing popularity has attracted a younger audience, and therefore causes piles of problems and and overall diminish in intelligent discussion. All of our other discussion has been exhausted since, what, 2009? Most of the talk here just happens in the Satellite Lounge. Anything else is just stupid questions with the same sassy responses and failed mod ideas. Most of it just ends in disaster.

Yes, everyone who's been here long enough to notice a change is in agreement that this place sucks now. Or at least, used to be better. The younger mean age of new members means lower-quality discussion, and instills a lot of apathy in older members. Why bother trying to have a decent discussion? Shit won't happen.

So age is a problem, but so is ageism. Don't bother trying, because 12-year-olds will ruin everything. A lot of us, myself included, think that way, and it's not helping. It's doing the opposite of helping. Whether it's true or not doesn't matter, it's still a counter-productive mindset.

And then there's the problem with running out of new material. Every thread in Cave Story General gets its babby teeth punched out by people who have seen the same shit a dozen times. There really isn't much left to say about Cave Story. That's why restructuring the forums to put less emphasis on Cave Story might make people feel like there's more to talk about. Recreating conversations from years ago is not shit-tier posting. I see the same fucking AskReddit threads every month, but people still love them. The main difference between those and "wat if cav stur was anime" threads is that the AskReddit threads aren't all about fucking Cave Story.

So basically, rename and expand the Satellite Lounge. It's the main focus of the community outside the modding section. New members will understand that they can and should chat it up in there.

Not to mention, the baby new Skype group has more and more members (not including me) added to it each day. People have created their own off-shoot communities.

Offshoots don't make the source redundant. If a clique wants to make their own special place to hang out and be different, that's fine. Skype is different from forums, and they can co-exist perfectly well.

Some of us are too old for this stuff, and the ones who are still too young should just go elsewhere for baby's first forum. This place is too far gone to deal with any more of that stuff.

If someone's too old for this stuff, they can leave. No one's stopping them. We don't need to make that decision for them. Besides, once the old fogies leave, wouldn't this make an ideal babby's first forum? Why can't one group stay if the other group leaves? I don't see why shutting everything down is better than just letting it change.

I truly do love you guys, I mean that with the utmost sincerity.

Yes, some of us are emotionally attached to this database. We want it to be great, we want it to be like it was, we want it to stay the same. Some users here have shaped my life in enormous ways, and I'll never forget them. But new users are joining every day, and some of them like it here. It's not fair to kill their forum, just because we don't like it anymore.

My past threads have been mostly a concern of your well being, believe it or not.

I believe it. I don't believe that you know what's best for everybody that uses the forums, however. Leave if you want to, but don't shut down a website that hundreds of people use just to get some closure. Keeping it running isn't hurting anyone, except for those who cling to the past too tightly.

As for me, I'd like to keep things going so I can procrastinate more effectively. Checking the forums makes for a good coffee break.

I agree. There isn't really any point in these forums anymore, and I have seen almost no meaningful content (that I wouldn't have been able to see somewhere else, like deviantArt for the nice drawings) in months.

But I don't have to go to deviantart to see these drawings, so the forums still have a purpose for me. Like, fuck, you're not going to experience shit like highheelgamer on deviantart.

All it seems I get out of it is a daily chore of cleaning out spambots and griping about how nobody is funny anymore.

Because Hiino's here, and I'm here, and norevenge is here. You can't leave the forums without leaving part of your life behind, even if you can still talk to all your favourite members through Skype or whatever.

TL;DR You wouldn't demolish a playground just because you grew up.

 

The concept of remade forums gives me a little more hope. Andwhy's concerns are valid, though...if we can think of why Miraigamer slowly died...we might have a better chance of keeping things fresh for a fairly long time. That's difficult at best, though...I wish I could help with that more.

But I know there has to be a solution somewhere. I can't think super well. Perhaps I'm overreacting. But I'm sure this forum can survive in one form or another. Maybe we can just do something to this forum on its own, without drastic action...we've been sitting idle and letting it stagnate for far too long. Maybe all we need is new changes. Who knows.

 

I really don't know what to say about this.

I love coming here and post my opinion on things, kinda like dunc i come over here daily to check things out and kill some time. But there's so much more to that, i really like you guys and girls a lot and it'd would be very hard for me to find a better community that this one. There's a good reason i was motivated to work on a massive image for all of the forum's members, even though i never was a part of your years-spanning history. No matter how hard i'll look, i'm never going to find another Polaris, WD, Fab, Noxid, Dunc, Tpcool or Doors. It really sucks that i'll probably never be able to hop over to a cave-con, no matter how impossible that idea might be in general. I know this might sound all like ass-kissing... but sincerely speaking you are an unique crowd to go along with and i didn't feel this connected with any past forums i was at.

Even then, i'd have to realise i'm getting old. I'm not even sure if i should be talking to people a decade younger than me. Not sure if i should go out and make the most out of my life. I'm turning 24 two days from typing this, should i still be typing on messageboards when i turn 30? What about 40? I don't know. Most people on the internet are around 12-30 years old afterall. All of the veterans around here are around their twenties. Is it still a mature thing to keep doing this? Are people going to call me creepy?

And then there's the fact that Cave Story is a dead little pile no matter how much life Nicalis tries to wrangle from it. This game has nothing left going for it, nobody plays it anymore outside of modding or getting a new record on sancturary runs. A sequel is never going to happen. As much as i like coming here, i really don't talk about CS anymore and i certainly haven't played it for years now. All that's left of this site are it's original members. This site is slowly becoming deader over time, with the older crowd leaving one-by-one to more vibrant places.

I really don't know if terminating the entire forums is a good idea. Activity might still be very low but there's still a lot of people online, lurking. Whenever there's a new topic (like this), it reaches several pages quickly. This forum might be stagnating, but it's not entirely dead yet. I'd say wait a few months before trying again... And i still don't know. Re-naming this forum sounds like stripping the soul of the site, and it really doesn't sit well with me at all. It's kinda like a desperate attempt to stay relevant.

I know this will eventually happen in the near future, no doubt, but i'm having a lot of trouble letting this site go. I'll still be there on Skype and DeviantArt, but still i'm going to miss all of you people.

 

I'm pretty sure everyone's already pointed out what I want to say, so I'm going to cut the fat and get straight to it:

Old user base is still mostly here, but don't forget that we have a lot of new people who are seeing everything with fresh eyes and enjoying it. It seems sort of unfair (and bizarre) to suggest migrating away, closing down or rendering inactive something that is actually receiving influxes of new people who are eager to talk about something.

Cave Story discussion in and of itself? Yeah, maybe we've exhausted it, but we have a general and indie games subforum and an off-topic subforum where topics are virtually endless. Not to mention that people still build mods and Pixel himself is still making games (... very slowly), and there's really no better place to discuss/showcase those two things.

EDIT: I think Andwhyisit and GIR have the right idea how to proceed. I honestly think this forum should be kept -- it's actually still active (believe me, I know inactive) and has a community worth preserving -- but it needs rebranding.

Keep a Cave Story subforum. Move focus to indie game discussion and modding.

 

TL;DR You wouldn't demolish a playground just because you grew up.

Speak for yourself.

I don't like looking back as I go forward in life. That's why I like to get rid of all the things that remind me of my past (and why I'm glad I'm finally out of the city I grew up in). So maybe it's about time we cut this old ball 'n chain off our leg, and finally leave the forums behind.

Sure, you could say that maybe if that's what we want to do then we could do it on an individual basis, but I think it's cleaner this way. A fresh start, a new plate for a new serving of life for all of us.

 

Speak for yourself.

I don't like looking back as I go forward in life. That's why I like to get rid of all the things that remind me of my past (and why I'm glad I'm finally out of the city I grew up in). So maybe it's about time we cut this old ball 'n chain off our leg, and finally leave the forums behind.

Sure, you could say that maybe if that's what we want to do then we could do it on an individual basis, but I think it's cleaner this way. A fresh start, a new plate for a new serving of life for all of us.

That's... incredibly selfish. Don't assume that this is the best way to proceed just because you function this way, come on GIR, I know you're self-centric but you're smarter than this. If that's honestly how you feel, either push for the rebrand/rework or leave. Don't make us suffer and take away something other people are enjoying because you personally stopped deriving enjoyment from it. That's what he was trying to say.

Also have an eloquent (lel) image of what I'd do if I was a mod and this motion was widely supported

Just because like this it gets the focus shifted, but all the Cave Story things are still there and the Cave Story fansite can still viably route to here.

EDIT: > typoes in the image

That's what I get for a quick job I guess

 

That's... incredibly selfish. Don't assume that this is the best way to proceed just because you function this way, come on GIR, I know you're self-centric but you're smarter than this. If that's honestly how you feel, either push for the rebrand/rework or leave. Don't make us suffer and take away something other people are enjoying because you personally stopped deriving enjoyment from it. That's what he was trying to say.

Oh I never said I've stopped deriving enjoyment from this place. But clearly everyone else is sick and tired of the forums (for some reason or another), so I just thought I would take my lumps and help bury old yeller after we've shot him.

I mean sure fab says we shouldn't bury the forums now but he's often one of the people I hear complaining about "the good ol' days". Frankly I'd almost want to shut this place down just to shut all of the old member base up about how this place sucks because boy oh boy do they know how to complain.

If we have this many people complaining, then surely something here isn't right, right?

 

Oh I never said I've stopped deriving enjoyment from this place. But clearly everyone else is sick and tired of the forums (for some reason or another), so I just thought I would take my lumps and help bury old yeller after we've shot him.

I mean sure fab says we shouldn't bury the forums now but he's often one of the people I hear complaining about "the good ol' days". Frankly I'd almost want to shut this place down just to shut all of the old member base up about how this place sucks because boy oh boy do they know how to complain.

If we have this many people complaining, then surely something here isn't right, right?

I get the slight irony of the fact that Fab is one of the people who talks about glory days but makes that argument and admit that I didn't get you were shooting for that point in your post.

Ok, now that I better understand what it is you're trying to say, I get what you're going for. But those people complaining are actually really a pretty vocal minority who don't have the interests of other members at heart/in mind. I love Desu, I really do, but her original post was virtually "Me and a few other vet members have exhausted this place and I don't care about the new members because they are very young and I can't connect with them".

The fact of the matter is that this community (or communities, since different people post on different parts actually) is still very much active and I don't want to pull the rug out from under people's feet. Unfair and a premature move. The only times I remember forums going under was if A) most of the admins/mods just didn't have enough time for the commitment/upkeep anymore and left or B) the activity was really, really slow. Like one post a day or less.

If andy etc really did lose all time for these forums and motivation to keep them running I do hope it would at least go into a read-only mode.

 

Not sure if people would really accept this, but

If some people aren't that comfortable with the new crowd, maybe we can have a new (small) forum section exclusive to the older people from the forums? Just an idea.

 

Not sure if people would really accept this, but

If some people aren't that comfortable with the new crowd, maybe we can have a new (small) forum section exclusive to the older people from the forums? Just an idea.

But how would that even work when the moderators are older members? The older members section might get all the focus leaving the younger members section in complete disarray. Those sections will then be closed, all discussion would move to the older members section and aside from the newly added mess we will be right back where we started.

Plus as I have mentioned before, such systems are elitist and horribly abusable.

 

I will agree to this only if everyone but me is locked out of posting, so I can fulfill my dream of being the last active member here

 

Not sure if I like the idea of expanding the forums to focus on gaming in general; it's quite generic. Maybe if the focus was more to a specific type of game, like indies, it would make this place seem less overwhelming while broadening the main area of interest.

I always got the gist that new members aren't very welcome here, but it wasn't enough to turn me away. I came to these forums to improve my composition skills but unfortunately I was a couple years too late when its activity piqued. I've learned a lot through listening to other people's works, though it isn't the same.

 

Okay guys,

I decided to hold my tongue and see what everyone else said and here's what I think....

Before we begin:

#1 I've only been here a year, but I've also only see pretty much the crap here and that's all so I think it's the norm.

#2 I just got through my first year here as stated above, so I definitely have that bond to this place, I haven't gone more then a week without visiting this place, and am usually on every day.

Spoiler

Well, I have to say that though I have had to deal with all this stuff, I like you guys, a lot even.

Were a tight nit community, everyone knows each other, and It's just like I've reach the status of "accepted and cool" (after going thorough a lot of battles with you guys a few months ago) And now that some of you want to leave? I don't want that.

I've met my best internet friend here, I've learned some important lessons about maturity, respecting others beliefs, and even perseverance from modding.

BUT, I also see the cycle that everyone else sees. the daily lurking and posting, the Skype thing, IRC whatever.

It's like, well, I don't know how to say it, I like you guys, but i we have to part ways, then we have to part ways. CS just hit it's tenth birthday last month, and I don't see a big celebration. Also I see more spambots signing up then members nowadays.

(sorry, I'm looking for words)


I want to stay with you guys, but if we must part, then we must part, it's painful, but I'm willing to do it if it's for the better.

E: if we do end it, can it wait a while? I wanna finish SS, that other thingy in my sig, and my ASM hacking guide.

 

Well with the direction the conversation went ir seems that we'll become a miragamer forum, and make the cave story stuff read only, but keep the modding section for how much goes on there. So dont worry about this place ending.

 

It's still up to the staff though
Also I don't really see a need to put the cave story stuff in read-only? as long as it has a specific category then people should be able to post cave story things there
Assuming the site does become a mirai clone of course