The New Shiny Escapist

[Headdrivehardscrew]

I've left other aggragator sites completely because of "more open" designs that basically only resulted in enough white to go snow blind, and the total and utter absence of boxes, frames and other things that made looking at it and interacting with it easier.

I liked the large portion of original content, and the amazingly personal and deep reviews and comments where the competition seems to like it very shallow. And I liked the non-white appearance. Why ruin my display and my eyes with blaring white I cannot seem to theme away freely? Why rape my eyes with the same #FFFFFF everyone else is going for as we speak? I just don't get it. Good to work under the hood and make things better. Good for you, good for us. Making everything blaring white is just... not cool.

Now, maybe it really is time to dig up that greasemonkey *sigh*. If that doesn't work out, aloha.

PS: As was and still is the case with the latest, "more open" and all-white gawker sites, the escapist has turned very, very slow today from being very sleek and very functional just yesterday. If it is as sluggish and non-responsive as the competition now, I really have to wonder and ask: WHY?

 

[Natdaprat]

Change? I hate change! Change it back! Change is bad. I fear change.

Also, rage.

 

[Joshimodo]

Here's a rundown of my thoughts and issues:

Cons:
-As everyone has already mentioned, far too bright. Did nobody tell the designer that this is to be used on screens, not paper? Bright white with high contrast elements is effectively like looking at a lightbulb. Unpleasant and causes eye strain.

-The main/home page is jumbled and ugly. The old version was cluttered, but at least it had a hierarchy. This one does not. Primarily the top right - It features largely useless and banal information (latest badge/friend, etc.). That cuts off a chunk of screen real estate from the primary feature of The Escapist - The shows. Make that area take up the whole column width.

-There is also far too much going on in the home page. It would be better if the video features took up the whole column at the top as I suggested, and then the rolling news feed and video advert/thread (currently the Mass Effect 3 thing) were beneath the other features, or elsewhere entirely. The news feed could potentially be made smaller and placed right at the top, just beneath the header and banner. This would allow the video features and the articles/comics to create a much neater visual layout, as opposed to the current disjointed one.

-Again, hierarchy concerns. Latest/Hot posts should be above the "Write for the Escapist" buttons. It's more important.

-In threads, the grey bar between posts should be a little more accentuated, either via contrast, texture or a line of colour. As it stands, posts melt into each other a little.

-Alignment issues. Others have already brought this up (predominantly to do with the videos/video banners).

-Typographic anomalies. Is there any reason the creator and date of any given feature is stranded at the bottom, instead of neatly placed beneath the title? Why is the menu typeface such a thin/light type? The rollover variant is much more pleasing to the eye. Roman/Bold would be a better choice than ultra-light and Roman.

-Site performance. I'm hesitant to bring this up, as it's a moot issue since this is likely to happen with any major overhaul of a website.


Pros:

-Mostly better readability, but less legibility. Very fine sans serif typefaces do not make for particularly great body text, but that would likely be remedied by turning the background white down a bit.

-Cleaner threads. Less cumbersome and bulky looking.

-Superior menu features. The addition of the dropdown menus is a benefit.

 

[Metaphysic]

Huh... so when I jump to the forums via the drop-down menu at the top, I can't see any topics at all, but when I load them through escapist portal>forums>subforum it works just fine.

Captcha: natural islysion... exactly.

 

[drisky]

Then leading seems off on the left, between the user name and tittle and such, they are really hugging each other. Don't throw out the whole design, but it still needs tweaks. I'm also in the party that feels it is not blue enough.

It would be nice if polls worked though, I was wonder why it was never fixed and I guess it was because change was coming anyway.

 

[Madmanonfire]

For those of you getting your retinas fried by all the white, I'm going to repeat what I said over in the off-topic forum:

Those of you running Firefox can install the NoSquint [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/nosquint/] add-on, which lets you set your own colors for background, text, and links. Just right-click on the page you want to change settings for, and you'll get a menu that lets you set everything.

I've got it installed right now, and the background is a nice soothing dark gray with white text. Ahhhh.

If only this post were in the first few pages. Thank you! My eyes don't burn anymore.

I'm used to Google's change, though it's slightly worse. I'm almost used to Youtube's change, which I don't mind too much. Now this... this is depressing. I'm sure I'll miss the old site for a long time.
To compare in a score out of 10, I'd give the old site a 9 and this redesign a 5.

 

[Nimcha]

Too much white space everywhere. Everything is so disjointed and it looks just incredibly inefficient. Also there was no need to simplify the design, what's with all the hate against gradients these days?

I suppose I'll get used to it, eventually.

 

[Lewieroo0]

Why must every website change their interface in such a drastic way?

The old interface was just fine, why was it necessary to change it?

As the old saying goes "Don't fix what isn't broken"

 

[Captain Booyah]

I'm in agreement with the majority here -- the new Escapist home page looks too cluttered and unorganised. I remember my first visit to the site and being able to navigate it pretty easily, but even now as a familiar user the new set-up is a tad disarming. I'd be discouraged if I were a new user who'd never been to the Escapist before.

And boy, THAT'S A WHOLE LOTTA WHITE. To the point where it's a little bit too bright to look at. The old pale blue, I thought, was perfect -- the "duskiness" of it was easy on the eyes and much warmer, and it complimented the site rather than commanding your attention like the cold, garish white does. I've known of a few sites that allow their users to change the site's colour schemes themselves in accordance to their personal preferences -- perhaps something like that could be implemented? Or better yet, a system where the user can choose either the "new" Escapist or the "classic" Escapist layout? Because that would be perfect.

Lastly, but most importantly -- and I realise that this isn't exactly constructive -- but I agree with someone else who posted that it feels as though the Escapist now looks more like a gaming blog than an actual gaming website. The new look is overly basic, and personally, bland and boring. The old look at least had a little character to it: it felt warmer and more homely. When I say that the new look is too professional, I mean it in the sense that it looks cold and clinical.

Also, I'm getting lag. Is this the new site while the kinks are ironed out or is my Internet connection rebelling against me? Jesus.

 

[Sir Thomas Sean Connery]

One main video at a time, little flags stapled all over everything and a general lack of sense to the format. Lot's of wasted space on both sides as well as the fact the the "news" column is squeezed down in the bottom. In addition, because of the format, I'm having a hard time telling what things are.

Now, I am willing to give it a chance, but I just don't see the point. Even IF it doesn't reduce availability, as far as I can see, it hasn't made it any better.

If anyone important reads this, do one thing. Please. For the love of all things sacred. TONE DOWN THE WHITE.

 

[swatmajor1]

Here is a little something I made up to fix the colour scheme abit.

Fixed Escapist [https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B3p-kVDFuGfKMzA5MWM1NjMtODJmYi00OWU0LWJiNTEtMzM4OGYwZmQxNmI5]

I added a slight gradient on the sides, as to frame the content, and reduce eye strain from all the white. And darkened the light blue text to a darker shade.

All the colours exist in the dark blue strip at the top.

Also moved the right end of the "Quotes" bar so it ligned up with the "Log Out Button".

Thoughts community?

 

[havass]

First thought: AHHHHHH FLASHBANG!!!
Second thought: Good god. What's with the boxes and feeds?
Third thought: Why is everything loading so slowly?

 

[Marcus Kehoe]

I don't like it, it isn't pleasant to look at.

 

[eternal-chaplain]

I have to admit, it does seem to be running a lot more smoothly...though today I did just get my 'good' computer back from a friend and this is my first time using it in weeks.
But the optimist in me says its the site!
Regardless, I like the smoother design a bit more.

 

[KingmanHighborn]

And for the record I HATE drop down menus, they are always glitchy, and never stay where I need them, leading to me clicking things I didn't want to click.

 

[CJ1145]

I REALLY hate the new layout. Really, REALLY hate it. The old visual style was much better.

Plus, it takes over a minute to load a page now. Seriously, unacceptable.

 

[F4LL3N]

I'd like the option to change themes. I like black/dark backgrounds with bright text (pink, orange, whatever). Which is kinda the opposite of what's current.

Fixing the lag is the most important thing though. It's terrible. The layout feels kinda messy too. But that's something you can get used too.

A bit of image invertion with Paint and I already like this place a whole lot more. Right now it feels like the page has failed to load 50% in.

Spoiler

[http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/38/escapistblack.png/]

[http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/683/escapistblack1.jpg/]

 

[Baresark]

To me it feels like one of those ad sites that you stumble upon when your searching for another site, like when you enter the URL with one letter off and you get directed to a website offering to sell you domain name, with lots of crap google links at the bottom.

OT: I'm not a fan. And it's slow as fuck to boot. No sidebar for the the common columns I like either. I'm sure that if you wanted to find certain things it may be easier now that you added all sorts of new navigation, but I usually just came for the news. And now.... well, it's ugly and it makes me sad to look at.

I know nothing anyone says will get it changed back. I don't know why you don't simply offer different styles to get rid of this annoying ass color scheme though.

Also, why the hell is all in the center of the screen? All this open air could be replaced by content that isn't surrounded by two open bars on either side. At least before it had something on the side... Now it's just in the center of the screen for no good reason.

Edit: I see you took the time to hide all the videos that originally brought me to this site. That is just... well, it's stupid.

 

[havass]

Here is a little something I made up to fix the colour scheme abit.

Fixed Escapist [https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B3p-kVDFuGfKMzA5MWM1NjMtODJmYi00OWU0LWJiNTEtMzM4OGYwZmQxNmI5]

I added a slight gradient on the sides, as to frame the content, and reduce eye strain from all the white. And darkened the light blue text to a darker shade.

All the colours exist in the dark blue strip at the top.

Also moved the right end of the "Quotes" bar so it ligned up with the "Log Out Button".

Thoughts community?

I raike. The current one is too...bright. Ignoring the boxes and feeds, that colour scheme you edited is much better.

 

[Joby Baumann]

Ive noticed that everything is significantly slower to load, especially videos.
complaints about the color are stupid in my opinion, but slowdowns suck