Poll: Has the Escapist community changed? Or is it just me?

anthony87

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cookyy2k said:
Greni said:
For the love of one-or-more-gods-or-fewer will you people please stop feeding the attention seeking troll!
Yeah, after reading some of the back catalogue of this guys posts he is just a troll upon this site. Expressing things such as MW3 is not fun as an absolute fact on a MW3 thread. Then saying that smokers are idiots and noone should actually want to, but alcohol and caffeine are different stories on a thread about smoking.

When you go reading at length you'll realise that his every post is presenting his opinion as an absolute fact whilst dismissing everyone else's as incorrect.
Soooooo.....it's just Jimbo then yeah?
 

Astoria

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Oct 25, 2010
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will1182 said:
Yep, it has changed. Not only in attitude, but there seems to be less and less interesting threads, increasingly draconian mods and strict rules, unnecessary banning of fun community members and more uptight, condescending responses than there used to be.

I used to post up to fifty times a day. Now I stay away from the site from weeks at a time. I'm just tired of all the bullshit.

Maybe the site hasn't changed and it's just me moving on. But it's nice to know at least one other person shares the sentiment that it's changed.
I definitely agree with this. Since I've joined I've noticed a decline in thread quality and people just generally seem to be colder to each other. It rare now to see an actual discussion about something instead of an arguement. There are so many more 'this happened to me and you should be angry about it' type threads now and maybe the odd one is ok if it's something that can be discussed but so many of them are just people wanting someone to agree with them. Also, every week there seems to be a repeat of the previous weeks threads just with different wording. Is everyone out of ideas or something?
 

Greni

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As we leave the cold and dreary 2011 behind, with its dull threads and flamewars, we welcome 2012 with open arms as it warms our weary souls, filling us with positiveness and much entertainment. Interesting and joyful threads pop up on every reload, never ending flow of good fun and merriment. Then apparently ending in disastrous doom. Damn Mayans!
 

Fire Daemon

Quoth the Daemon
Dec 18, 2007
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Yeah, no shit The Escapist has changed. It has been changing for a long, long time, and will probably keep on changing until it shuts down. That is what happens to all communities, and on the Internet it is thrice as fast. The most notable change in The Escapist community has been the rise and fall of those "big names" everyone seems to lust after in a nostalgic haze nowadays. The reason you don't see those types as much is because of the publishers club and user-groups, I think. They can more easily carve out their niche, get the attention they way and more easily get away with one line posts that attention demands. Mind you, their decline took time, but now it seems that it is very rare to find someone with >10 000 posts, which used to unheard of, and before that a post count of more than 5000 was a big fucking deal. Hell, I remember when Purple Rain first got 1000 posts, that was a big thing back then, for whatever stupid reason. A large number of the people that you might call "greats" were openly despised when they were active, and perhaps not only for unjust reasons. That is one of the more interesting changes.

But all these changes to the community are minor. You still have the same core of the community. The majority of the threads, and the comments, feel largely the same as they did 4 years ago. It is the small changes that people get worked up over, and seem to feel are a big deal. Individual people, groups and cliches that go against one another, Escapist employees, all of these will come and go, but you will always find a thread bitching about an IW game, only now instead of it being Call of Duty 4, it has become Modern Warfare 3.

I can't help but sit back and laugh at all of you though, mainly because long ago I was you. This is a dance I have danced before. Use the search bar.
 

That's Funny

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Jul 20, 2009
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Well no, not entirely. It hasn't changed much since I've joined the site (And I was a lurker for long good time). However I can see why people feel it has, what with some older members not posting any more or the new rules etc.

I just see it as the next step in the evolution of this website.
 

cookyy2k

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Aug 14, 2009
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The Cool Kid said:
TopazFusion said:
The Cool Kid said:
should "a child at heart" be commendable or acceptable as an adult? I say no, because children are inherently immature, and that is something we should grow out of, especially as an adult.
On the subject of maturity, I recommend reading this quote:
"Critics who treat 'adult' as a term of approval, instead of as a merely descriptive term, cannot be adult themselves. To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence. And in childhood and adolescence they are, in moderation, healthy symptoms. Young things ought to want to grow. But to carry on into middle life or even into early manhood this concern about being adult is a mark of really arrested development. When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up." - C. S. Lewis
The Cool Kid said:
So you think it's unreasonable to ask a bunch of teenage males, and adult males, why they are watching a show made for little girls...? Everyone I've mentioned it too has been utterly confused by the prospect. Are you saying that reaction is unreasonable, and therefore questioning it is also unreasonable?
Questioning it in itself is not unreasonable.
Not accepting any answer presented to you - THAT is unreasonable.
The Cool Kid said:
But ask yourself why you are unwilling to participate in intelligent debate, something which isn't inherently bad, but would be seen by many as a source of self-development.
I apologise if others have been less than intelligent.
But I thought every post of mine was comparatively very intelligent. I have not resorted to comments such as "Deal with it" or "U MAD BRO".
Oh put the CS Lewis quote away:
1)it's a fallacious appeal to authority. He's an author, not Freud or Adler.
2)Being mature is an inherently positive trait in an adult, by definition: "Suitable or intended for adults". The real mark of a man is not to be childish, not blushing when caught. If you have lived a full life, you should no longer revel in childish past times as your view on life is different:

"A man who views the world the same at fifty as he did at twenty has wasted thirty years of his life."
Muhammad Ali

There is accepting answers when they are coherent and make sense, then there is debating them when they do not e.g. MLP is for adults, when it isn't.

cookyy2k said:
Yeah, after reading some of the back catalogue of this guys posts he is just a troll upon this site. Expressing things such as MW3 is not fun as an absolute fact on a MW3 thread. Then saying that smokers are idiots and noone should actually want to, but alcohol and caffeine are different stories on a thread about smoking.

When you go reading at length you'll realise that his every post is presenting his opinion as an absolute fact whilst dismissing everyone else's as incorrect.
So alcohol and caffine are just as dangerous as smoking? Guess you aren't aiming to be a doctor...
Alcohol causes almost as many deaths and disabilities globally as smoking or high blood pressure, researchers warn... The researchers found 4% of the global burden of disease is attributable to alcohol, compared with 4.1% to tobacco
source [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4232703.stm]

Alcohol seems to be doing as good a job as smoking for damage levels.

Here's one for you... MLP can be enjoyable to adults, That's A FACT as I am an adult as are many here and we enjoy it. I don't need to be able to defend each and every one of my opinions as they are just that. If my opinion contradicts fact then of course it is incorrect but my opinion that MLP is good is not possible to dismiss with fact or logic.

People's thoughts and opinions are too complex to be completely dissected with logic or science. If everyone's thought patterns were pure logic the world would be a much more boring place.
 

Outcast107

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anthony87 said:
If you are looking for episodes, I'm sure I can (Or someone else here) can help you look for episodes. Also I was raise mostly on the same stuff, and I turn out just fine.

But back on topic. I just want to add one more thing. Perhaps it didn't change at all, perhaps it just because people can't read at all or just to damn lazy to actually see if a topic has been done already and is still fresh. I mean hell, look at half of the Skyrim threads. I LOVE Skyrim but damn, some of the users here have to use the damn search bar once in a while. I spotted at least five threads of "Stormcloaks vs Empire." And they were ONE after another.
 

Westaway

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Nov 9, 2009
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Suicidejim said:
The quality and intelligence brought to the forums are what we, the users, bring to them. I haven't been on here particularly long, so I'm hardly qualified to address the subject of how much the community has changed, but I personally have found this site to be a remarkably sane and intelligent one for the duration of my time here. True, you get some threads or posters who don't do a great deal to further any deep intellectual debate, or even the sense of fun and enjoyment, but there are a lot of intelligent and open-minded people on these forums, and I love reading many of the discussions that go on. It's not perfect (nothing is, or ever should be), but it's still pretty damn good, in my most humble opinion.

On another note, perhaps one reason that a lot of intelligent discussion is slowing down may relate to the fact that people are always called out for threads that have been made before. I understand this practice, and it is certainly justified, but at the same time, you have to wonder how many times the average person is likely to come up with a completely original discussion point that nobody has yet addressed. I mean, realistically speaking, it's likely that the average person doesn't have as much as a single thought that hasn't already occurred to somebody else in the sands of history (or that the few original ones are either ill-informed or not very discussion-worthy). A repost of a thread that has already happened before does have the benefit of revitalizing a conversation that had wound down simply by virtue of the fact that newer discussions had smothered it, and pushed them out of the view of other users. I'm not really advocating a 'don't check the search bar policy,' since that would be chaos, and indeed cause the site to become little more than repetitive nonsense, rather I'm pointing out one reason why well reasoned and intelligent debates are becoming a rarer beast - simply because there are fewer to have.
You don't always have to use big words. It makes it almost as hard to read as if you were bad at english. Obvioisly a good vocabulary is good, but not every word needs to be embellished. Anyways, good post
 

KefkaCultist

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Must not feed the troll. Must not feed the troll. Must not feed the- ah fuck it.
The Cool Kid said:
KefkaCultist said:
The Cool Kid said:
anthony87 said:
The Cool Kid said:
anthony87 said:
If that's how you think then why do you hang around on a video game site?
Last I checked games weren't always for kids. Let's take Heavy Rain, GTA's and Amensia: Dark Descent. Are you going to give those games to a 12 year old?
Well my 12 year old nephew plays games like Call of Duty, Assassins Creed and GTA while I was playing action and survival horror games on the original Playstation at his age so I'm gonna go ahead and say that yes I would.

You say that games weren't always for kids? I say the same about cartoons.
Well that's bloody bad parenting right there.
How can you justify letting a child play wholly inappropriate games? Because you did? How is that a good justification?

I never said cartoons are for kids; MLP is though, as it is based on a little girl's playtime fantasies.
Oh just go away. I played Diablo and Resident Evil at age 6, AGE SIX! And I'm perfectly fine.

And stop with the My Little Pony "debate". You're allowed your opinions, but this thread was not even originally about MLP and the minds of neither you nor any bronies are gonna get changed about the show. So please, I ask nicely, just stop.

Also, if you want my logical reasoning as to why I wish you to stop this MLP "debate" it's because, to be blunt, it's bloody annoying.
Oh yes because you represent every child out there.
Considering the verbal abuse now in games like MW3 do you still think a 12 yr old should be at the end of a 16 year old's hormonal rage?
Sure, if they're able to handle it. You're right that I don't represent every single child, but saying that every child should be protected by the ESRB ratings is bullshit. Yes, the ratings are a good guide as to what age should be playing the game, but if a parent thinks the child has the stability and understanding to let them try the game then why the fuck not? We submit kids to worse stuff these days through the just TV alone which has no rating system to bar them from watching, so whats a little virtual game gonna hurt. I understand that there are kids that definitely should not be allowed to play the violent games. Mainly the ones that can't separate them from reality and a parent giving violent games to a child like that is bad parenting, but giving a perfectly normal kid an M rated game is hardly bad parenting.

Now please, I ask to not turn this thread from a derailed MLP "debate" into an even more derailed video game ratings "debate". If you continue with this, I will not respond.
 

Sylocat

Sci-Fi & Shakespeare
Nov 13, 2007
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Pimppeter2 said:
Look kid, I'll give you a little hint of what the forums used to be like.

This topic has been done over and over again. Since 2007.

Use the search bar.
Ah, but don't you see, THIS time it really HAS gone to shit permanently.

Honestly, I think a jump from 200 members to 2,000 hurts more than the climb from 2,000 to 20,000 or however many we have now.
 

Greni

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Jun 19, 2011
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How lovely to be back in the bouncy ball country.

OT: This thread has gotten past weird, above strange and is now heading towards utterly ridiculous.
Lets get this thing back on tracks!
 

idarkphoenixi

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Guess it's just me but I didn't notice any real change. Sometimes you get crappy threads of people complaining, sometimes you get one that's of genuine interest.

Kind of just luck of the draw really, whatever happens to be popular at the time.
 

DeltaEdge

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May 21, 2010
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Such is the fate of any internet community that becomes popular. Your only hope is to play the role of the rolling stone hipster and hop from community to community while the website is still fresh and consists of the core people who visit and create the initial image of the site before the site becomes "cool" and gets flooded my the masses of internet folk ,both smart and idiotic. Any website that is growing in popularity will eventually succumb to internet poisoning and the "golden days" of the community will come to an end. The community leaders will become whores to meet the demands of the users, abandoning all of their pride, the site will become unpopular eventually, and be abandoned leaving the whores and their community in shambles, forgotten by the internet and it's people. Moral of the story: Don't think that anywhere on the internet possesses an "untainted" community immune to internet poisoning because every community of susceptible. Unless you have to be interviewed and cross-examined before being allowed to join on a probational basis, the website is just as vulnerable as any other forum. Note: Even this kind of secret society is still vulnerable to internet poisoning, just less so than other sites.
 

Greni

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The Cool Kid, Topaz Fusion I now pronounce you man and wife. You may kiss the bride.