Website refresh

[ddavison]

Thanks for the feedback everyone.

We will discuss and respond once we have a plan of action -- or like I often do, we will just make changes as we go and then announce them. I'm going to be traveling later this month, so I'm on a shortened schedule to get some important stuff done before I am away. I also wanted to strike while the iron was hot and get some major tasks knocked out as quickly as possible.

We do have a couple known issues about how we can surface other content in an effective manner. One of the strengths of FG is that we support a large # of systems and we also have Forge offerings. This also presents a major challenge on how we can make that easily presented without overwhelming new customers as well. We are also evaluating whether or not our older methods were effective at this as well. So far it doesn't seem like they were. Our hope is that we can do so in a better way and that will translate into more support for those systems that are great, but perhaps not as popular.

[BadEye]

So if you only want to show 16 rulesets on the home page why have 2 rulesets for D&D and Pathfinder. Couldn't you show the different versions like you do in the top right for those systems by combining them? That would also allow combining the 2 Savage Worlds and Traveller editions.

The D&D and Pathfinder editions / versions were separated specifically because Fantasy Grounds still sees significant usage for D&D Classic and Pathfinder 1e, and it was determined to be important to highlight both are available in addition to the newer versions.

I am also curious how the 16 were chosen. Some of them are very obvious but a couple aren't to me so more insight into it would be helpful.

A variety of factors - sales, variety of genres, experimentation to see what "works" best on the homepage, etc. That list is a starting point that could be dynamic over time (or perhaps not if we see the data shows what is there is effective for the purpose that section is there for).

Just went to the new store page. One thing that is annoying, not all products show the ruleset they are for, unless I click into the product itself. It would be nice to see the ruleset before I click.

Sure - this is something we'll evaluate. Part of the consolidation / streamlining of the products listing was pairing down to are core of information and then seeing through feedback if there was anything else that was important for people to see.

That is I suppose fair.
The site did however have twice as many games listed on the front page previously as opposed to 16 now.
Right now it takes a minimum of 4 clicks to find the other officially supported games - and that is if you know what you are looking for and know that games are called rulesets. And there is no obvious link to Forge rulesets (some of which are official/licensed) from there either.
The current Browse all games button does not take you to more games but to the catalogue as presented by the algorithm (newest releases, best sellers and current sale items?).
A suggestion - with the new listing format you can probably fit more titles per page.

As I and Doug mentioned, we'll be doing additional work on the overall presentation of products and discoverability in the store that would address most of this.

Oh and DNDB and Alchemy list all their games or at least publishers on the front page.

Pretty sure we could list all our games / publishers on the homepage if we only had one or a handful too. We have considerably more than that and need to go another route.

That should have definitely been 1) announced in the initial post that the refresh was a WIP (it was presented as a website refresh, not a WIP, so quite a few of us assumed that it was a "complete" refresh), and/or 2) the browse all rulesets button should have either acted like Dakadin suggested, or if it is eventually going to go to another page that lists all the rulesets, it should have gone to that page with an "Under Construction" sign on it....

Web / software development works differently than this - everything is always under construction, and we'll continue to iterate to make improvements continually. In that process, we won't be releasing things that don't work (at least not on purpose, accounting for the occasional bug), but things might not be in their final form since that iterative process is always there. We'll always monitor feedback and make adjustments as needed, but we also want to take action to make those improvements and will keep moving forward.

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Thanks all - much more to come!

[BaneTBC]

One request is can we get it so that when we log in that it returns us to the page we were viewing, versus being an absolute redirect back to the home page? Outside that, like the refresh and can't wait to see what comes next.

[Griogre]

My biggest feedback is in the store bundles. It's hard to see at first which products you already have. The only way of telling is the "Download" button graphic which is small and at the bottom right (last thing to read). I'd suggest instead you do an "Owned" banner in the left top corner (for left to right languages) or a large font simi-transparent "Own" with background diagonal across the product image.

Edit: Now I think about it a big green simi-transparent check mark with Own under it is better than the diagonal "Own".

[Griogre]

Also for those who don't know, one of the biggest criticisms on Steam that turned people off was the list of all 3,175 paid DLC. Now DLC does have a different connotation than RPG types, but that list on steam is awkward (and Smiteworks did add some better search tools).

I'd suggest the top sellers / played games on the landing page to assure people that FG can handle some of the best known games, a link to all of the different RPGs, also verbiage to explain how FG can be used generically for systems without a ruleset and a rotating group of the other systems that didn't make the landing page.

[deer_buster]

Web / software development works differently than this - everything is always under construction, and we'll continue to iterate to make improvements continually. In that process, we won't be releasing things that don't work (at least not on purpose, accounting for the occasional bug), but things might not be in their final form since that iterative process is always there. We'll always monitor feedback and make adjustments as needed, but we also want to take action to make those improvements and will keep moving forward.

I am actually a software engineer/web developer for a major corporation. Public-facing web pages are never "always under construction", at least not the released to production versions of them. They are meticulously tested from a UI/UX, content completeness, and legal perspective before they are released for public consumption. Failure to do so can easily lead to potential regulatory (license to operate), legal, reputation, or loss of business issues.

As you are "probably" less likely to face regulatory or legal issues due to invalid/incorrect information (unless you say it is one price, but charge more, for example), but you do have to deal with reputation and loss of business issues.

[deer_buster]

Also for those who don't know, one of the biggest criticisms on Steam that turned people off was the list of all 3,175 paid DLC. Now DLC does have a different connotation than RPG types, but that list on steam is awkward (and Smiteworks did add some better search tools).

I'd suggest the top sellers / played games on the landing page to assure people that FG can handle some of the best known games, a link to all of the different RPGs, also verbiage to explain how FG can be used generically for systems without a ruleset and a rotating group of the other systems that didn't make the landing page.

Yeah, I don't purchase my FG content from Steam, one of the reasons being that the Steam DLC listings are akin to word-vomit. Nothing logically sorted. Leaves a LOT to be desired.

[ddavison]

One request is can we get it so that when we log in that it returns us to the page we were viewing, versus being an absolute redirect back to the home page? Outside that, like the refresh and can't wait to see what comes next.

This is what I was trying to do, but vbulletin was not cooperating with this. I will see if I can get that working within their system. It's easy to redirect on a basic level in webpages, but the issue is how to get it to work through vbulletin's system of hooks.

[deer_buster]

This is what I was trying to do, but vbulletin was not cooperating with this. I will see if I can get that working within their system. It's easy to redirect on a basic level in webpages, but the issue is how to get it to work through vbulletin's system of hooks.

Another thing I would like to see, is a consistent page header regardless of where you are (e.g. the header on the forums is different than the one from the home page/store, etc.)

[deer_buster]

Also, even though I am signed in, it still offers a "SIGN IN/REGISTER" button on the home page.