Revitalising Randomselect.ie

Bento Sento

I am intending to give randomselect.ie a bit of a new look and a new purpose because lets be honest the website is terrible. It looks bad, the layout is nothing spectacular and the content is nothing to write home about.

Seeing as pretty much no one else does anything for the website I have decided to take it upon myself because I can barely stand looking at the site anymore.

The podcast that Nutrient has started doing is a great start to getting more content to the website but we need more. It was listening to the 2013 recap of said podcast that has inspired me to do something about it.

I want a website that we can be proud to call the Irish FGC's website. Now I know we have been through this exact same thing a couple of months ago with Chunkis trying to do the same thing that I am intending to do now and in all fairness all that accomplished was hiring me to the site to make a few posts which was a lot less than we intended to accomplish.

This could end up being a failure like most of the attempts end up being but I am willing to try if you guys are willing to help me.

The best way to start is by asking you guys for advice and pointers. What would you like to see on randomselect.ie?

Nutrient

Bento Sento wrote: »

I am intending to give randomselect.ie a bit of a new look and a new purpose because lets be honest the website is terrible. It looks bad, the layout is nothing spectacular and the content is nothing to write home about.

Seeing as pretty much no one else does anything for the website I have decided to take it upon myself because I can barely stand looking at the site anymore.

The podcast that Nutrient has started doing is a great start to getting more content to the website but we need more. It was listening to the 2013 recap of said podcast that has inspired me to do something about it.

I want a website that we can be proud to call the Irish FGC's website. Now I know we have been through this exact same thing a couple of months ago with Chunkis trying to do the same thing that I am intending to do now and in all fairness all that accomplished was hiring me to the site to make a few posts which was a lot less than we intended to accomplish.

This could end up being a failure like most of the attempts end up being but I am willing to try if you guys are willing to help me.

The best way to start is by asking you guys for advice and pointers. What would you like to see on randomselect.ie?

Less Orange

Bento Sento

Nutrient wrote: »

Less Orange

I KNOOOWWW

That wasn't my design choice.

PPC

Bento Sento wrote: »

I am intending to give randomselect.ie a bit of a new look and a new purpose because lets be honest the website is terrible. It looks bad, the layout is nothing spectacular and the content is nothing to write home about.

Seeing as pretty much no one else does anything for the website I have decided to take it upon myself because I can barely stand looking at the site anymore.

The podcast that Nutrient has started doing is a great start to getting more content to the website but we need more. It was listening to the 2013 recap of said podcast that has inspired me to do something about it.

I want a website that we can be proud to call the Irish FGC's website. Now I know we have been through this exact same thing a couple of months ago with Chunkis trying to do the same thing that I am intending to do now and in all fairness all that accomplished was hiring me to the site to make a few posts which was a lot less than we intended to accomplish.

This could end up being a failure like most of the attempts end up being but I am willing to try if you guys are willing to help me.

The best way to start is by asking you guys for advice and pointers. What would you like to see on randomselect.ie?

More Orange

bush

More interviews with the grand daddy's of the scene

Doctor DooM

Orange has got to go.

You have 2 choices- recycle and aggregate news or find a way to generate content yourself.

The first option is much easier to do with limited resources and you could keep an eye out for other people who might help generate the second.

Keep an eye on vids from me, nutrient, lythero et al as well as anything vaguely interesting is an article in itself.

There's a twitter account, right? Get active with that.


Also not enough doggies.

Sairus

Doctor DooM wrote: »

You have 2 choices- recycle and aggregate news or find a way to generate content yourself.
The first option is much easier to do with limited resources

Beware the news content route. I tried doing that before and burned myself out. Don't go nuts trying to report everything if you do!

Good luck with this though, seeing RS.ie active is something I've always really wanted!

chunkis

Sorry for leaving you high and dry bento, real life took over and i just didn`t have time for anything gaming related, fair play for sticking around and updating the site!

In fairness the website isnt that bad, its functional and has a lot of good information about the irish fgc, it could do with a facelift, but wordpress can be a bit naff sometimes, anyway good luck!

Kanped

Tournament announcements, results and if possible footage / stream / both would be great (maybe even a write-up for afterwards?). Other than that; player spotlights, and any content created by the Irish FGC guys with a paragraph editorial on it or some such thing. Tutorials or game spotlights could be good (and could maybe encourage TOs and players to try out some different games for fun). There's already a lot of general content out there, so I think it would really need to be locally focussed, at least to an extent.

It's kinda a hard thing to do right now, since everything is dying down this time of year but maybe use that time to get the cosmetic stuff out of the way and start making videos.

Murderous Neil

I was going to start a thread about this as well, because I found when I was searching for the IFGC, that the Random Select website and Facebook page was very bare bones, and that to me suggested that the IFGC was rather dead, and that might have been the case for other potential members of the IFGC. Sometime later, by off-chance, I found Doom's Youtube Channel and then Boards. As I am sure we all know, YouTube is becoming less and less reliable as a resource with it's Content ID system, and we ideally should have the Random Select website as the go-to place.

I think it would be also a good idea to revitalise the RS Facebook page. Just copy and paste whatever is posted on the main RS website. A lot of people would use Facebook for looking up places and communities.

Doctor DooM

I didn't even know there was a randomselect facebook page!

Murderous Neil

Doctor DooM wrote: »

I didn't even know there was a randomselect facebook page!

Shows you how inactive it is.

Fergus_

We should definitely be focusing on IFGC-specific content, no one's gonna really look at our site for news over SRK/Eventhubs tbh.

I think things like having more FT5/10s between decent players uploaded particularly in AE/MvC3 (I'm willing to have people come over and I'll record/edit/upload or give it to Doom to upload for the main channel if he wants to). I know I said this before but I think this is one good way to build competitiveness for the scene and showcase Irish talent to international viewers.

More advertisement/promotion is needed for tournaments for sure especially for the upcoming RTCs. I can stick up fliers around DCU and talk to their gamesoc for potential interest/new people.

Bento, if there's anything you want help with the website (more so on recording footage and streaming), hit me up.

GorySnake

Fergus wants another baa fights so he can own another scrub in a ft5 content or something

Bento Sento

I was in a very similiar situation to you Neil when I first joined the scene, I thought that it was pretty dead until I found the boards forums so that is one of the issues that I would like to tackle.

On the issue of content I normally lookout for notable videos and post them up but I haven't had a whole lot of spare time the past while so I haven't been out looking for things to put up. People seem keen to help out on the content side of the site which is great. As I said though there will be a lot of good content from our guys like ft5's or whatever that I may miss so if there is something you want up on the site or you feel that it deserves an article just message me telling me what it is.

As for the facebook page, that has been dead for ages and I would like to see it up and running again. Can whoever is in charge of that page or whoever is an admin get in contact with me. I have no problem taking over the running of that page either because I am on facebook 90% of the time anyway.

I'm gonna start work on the look of the site soon but at the moment I am still wrecked from new years so bear with me. :rolleyes:

Nutrient

Clearly

We should look into another Baa fights

But first, need decent players, and hissy fits.

Kanped

It'd be great to see another Baa fights with the long-fabled team tournament (North, Dublin, Galway etc.)

Nutrient

Kanped wrote: »

It'd be great to see another Baa fights with the long-fabled team tournament (North, Dublin, Galway etc.)

That'd be sick alright,

However, I'd hate to see Doom's video Dublin vs north 'n' galway flagged on youtube for r*** or fraud

Dublin too stronk

Kanped

How about North vs Dublin vs Galway vs Russia, then ?

Doctor DooM

I have admin rights to randomselect now, but I'm not intending to run it.

Bento, you want me to give you the same?

A-Trak

Bento Sento wrote: »

Can whoever is in charge of that page or whoever is an admin get in contact with me. I have no problem taking over the running of that page either because I am on facebook 90% of the time anyway.

I blame Dan.

PM me your email address attached to your facebook account and I'll add you as an admin.

Orim

Gave admin rights to Doom. Bento can you post in this thread and I'll give them to you as well.

https://www.facebook.com/randomselect.ie/posts/717125821632503?notif_t=like

Or what A-Trak. And I accept no blame for nothing whatsoever.

Orim

Doctor DooM wrote: »

I have admin rights to randomselect now, but I'm not intending to run it.

Bento, you want me to give you the same?

Twas me. Figure you can use if you're putting up videos. Plus adding admins is weird if they're not on your friends list.

A-Trak

Orim wrote: »

Or what A-Trak. And I accept no blame for nothing whatsoever.

This is like WWE, don't drag up the old hurt Dan - it'd force us out of retirement.

Bento Sento

I just commented on that post on facebook so whenever someone gets a chance can you sort that out please.

ayjayirl

A-Trak wrote: »

This is like WWE, don't drag up the old hurt Dan - it'd force us out of retirement.

Maybe it's just me but this sounds like old school run back talk that could be the makings of baa fights 2 - this time is personal.

FutureGuy

I think we need to properly define exactly what this page needs to do for the community. For me, it needs to tick two boxes before doing anything else.

- Cater for the ENTIRE Irish scene.
- Cater for potentially new community members.

I'd actually argue that the second point is the most important for the benefit of the entire community, and it's the one I'm going to focus on. The current website almost presumes you know all about the community as is, but for a new person, the current site is not really helpful. Let's say I'm a lad from Co. Galway who has played fighing games all my life and I find randomselect.ie. Firstly, there is no area for new players to gain the vital contact that I would need to even attend an event or even to get to know a community leader.

There should be an entire section dedicated to this and it should be very visible on the main page - "New Player? Start here". Either a banner or a site section.

This should link to a page with a well-written introduction about the community in non-FG speak - who we are, what we play and where we play. Further down the page, we should also have a community contact for each smaller community in our country, even if they are currently inactive (e.g. Limerick and Cork). I'll happily be the Limerick contact.

The community contact should be a friendly and approachable person who can help the new player integrate into the community, either locally at a regional event or at a national event.

We could have a little write-up on that person describing their love for fighting games, what they like to play and where they play. In addition, a contact e-mail should be listed (or twitter/facebook). This will help the new player understand that we are all passionate about the game and that the new player is very welcome.

It's been mentioned by many people including myself that the Dublin scene can be quite oblivious to the fact that a new player has turned up for casuals. They look around and decide that no one wants to interact with them. Poof! Potential community member lost. The primary function of the community contacts would be to ensure that anyone who has contacted them can be introduced to the community properly. I think someone will be far more likely to attend an event out of the blue if they knew at least one person that was going to be there, even if it's only via e-mails.

EDIT: Actually, I can write this for the website if ye think it's a good idea. I'll need someone from Dublin, Belfast, Cork and Galway to volunteer as community contact. Again, someone who is a good communicator and is highly approachable.

FutureGuy

Feel free to chop and change to your hearts comntent (or simply use as a draft). Whatever helps.


Hello there! Welcome to RandomSelect, the home of the Irish Fighting Game Community (IFGC)! We are a group of people who are just like you – we love our fighting games! We play all the most popular games such as Street Fighter 4, Marvel vs Capcom and Tekken, but we also play a myriad of other great fighting games! If you have heard of it, there's probably someone in the community that has played it!

We have have a superb community that play each other both online and in the real world. Wherever you happen to live, there is probably a group of players close to you. From Belfast to Cork and from Galway to Dublin, there are people who have the same passion that you do. The games they play might vary but the enthusiasm does not!

At some stage or another, the majority of fighting game players have had the same thought while sitting at home playing random people online –

“You know what? It would be really cool to meet up with fellow players for some friendly games (casuals) or even for a tournament!”

I know it’s probably a little scary to you right now – after all, you could find yourself meeting lots of new people quite quickly, but don’t worry – we are a friendly bunch who are always delighted to meet new people.

The IFGC hosts events all year round. For example, the players in Galway host an event every Monday night in addition to larger events every few months. Another group based in Dublin host some incredible high-level events which attract players from around the country and further afield.

One important thing to remember - It doesn’t matter how good you are right now. We have members who are currently sorting their “hadokens” from their “shoryukens” and their “assists” from their “x-factors”, but we also have members whose names are known throughout the global fighting game community as world class players in their respective games. Regardless of your current skill level, you will find people to play against and help you improve your game.

Playing online is great fun, but nothing – and I mean NOTHING – beats the feeling of getting together with your peers and playing live. If you are a top level player, you will find an incredible challenge from some of the greatest players in the country. On the other hand, if you are a new player, you will find opponents who may beat you but will then help you to become a better player by offering their advice. Sitting at home playing random people is all fine and dandy, but playing a top player from another city in front of a group of onlookers is exhilarating and nerve-wracking in equal measures. One thing is certain – whether you are a beginner or a pro, you will leave the event a better player.

So if you’d like to join the community, it’s easy!

We have a superb group of community volunteers who would be delighted to get to know you and help you out. Take a look at the list of volunteers below – any one of them would be delighted to point you in the right direction. If you are close to one of the areas listed, then drop the relevant volunteer an e-mail.

AREA: Dublin
CONTACT NAME:
ABOUT ME:
CONTACT DETAILS: xxxxx@randomselect.ie

AREA: Galway
CONTACT NAME:
ABOUT ME:
CONTACT DETAILS: xxxxx@randomselect.ie

AREA: Belfast
CONTACT NAME:
ABOUT ME:
CONTACT DETAILS: xxxxx@randomselect.ie

AREA: Cork
CONTACT NAME:
ABOUT ME:
CONTACT DETAILS: xxxxx@randomselect.ie

AREA: Limerick
POPULAR GAMES: Super Street Fighter 4: Arcade Edition, Killer Instinct
CONTACT NAME: Tony
ABOUT ME: Hi there! My name is Tony and I’ve been playing fighting games since I first saw a Street Fighter II arcade machine while on holidays many years ago! I love Street Fighter, Injustice: Gods Among Us and Killer Instinct, but will happily play any fighter! Since becoming involved with the IFGC, I have improved considerably as a player. I’m based in Limerick and would be happy to answer any questions you may have!
CONTACT DETAILS: tony@randomselect.ie

Of course, if you just want to turn up at any event out of the blue, then feel free to do so. Don’t be afraid to introduce yourself and get involved!
So pack your fight pad or your arcade stick and join us at any one of our events! We’d be delighted to have you along!

The IFGC

jimmypenguin

ill gladly be the galway contact

FutureGuy

jimmypenguin wrote: »

ill gladly be the galway contact

Couldn't think of a better person to be honest

D4RK ONION

Would be very happy to be the Dublin contact, but if anyone else wants the position and is better suited that's cool too!

Incredible posts FutureGuy. I miss the Limerick scene ;_;

FutureGuy

D4RK ONION wrote: »

Would be very happy to be the Dublin contact, but if anyone else wants the position and is better suited that's cool too!

Incredible posts FutureGuy. I miss the Limerick scene ;_;

So do I

MelficeVKM

I'm happy to be the Belfast contact (since a lot of our scene is inactive), but if someone else feels more appropriate for the spot that's grand too

Bento Sento

That was excellent FutureGuy I couldn't have worded it better myself.

I am going to start work on the look of the website tonight and get that done and dusted. Then after that I will start work on the welcome/contacts page. When I have started work on that I will PM those who volunteered to be the contact for each area and you can give me your details or whatever it is you would like me to put down under your name.

ayjayirl

All excellent!! One suggestion is that whomever is the point of contact for each area, it should be someone who is consistently at casuals and tourneys. And maybe more than one for Dublin. I don't mind putting my name down but I am rarely at casuals. Onion has my vote.

Linoud

D4RK ONION wrote: »

Would be very happy to be the Dublin contact, but if anyone else wants the position and is better suited that's cool too!

Incredible posts FutureGuy. I miss the Limerick scene ;_;

You've got my vote, you play most of the games in the scene and are usually around more often than not.

Seems like a really solid idea anyway, sounds good to me.

Scavenger XIII

MelficeVKM wrote: »

I'm happy to be the Belfast contact (since a lot of our scene is inactive), but if someone else feels more appropriate for the spot that's grand too

The way things are ATM it's pretty much you or me, but you volunteered.

Bento Sento

You know when one of my lecturers said that Wordpress is a piece of **** I thought that he was exaggerating but now I know what he is on about. Having the site looking all fancy and new is going to have to wait for a while until I can actually get something good working with that wordpress crap. For the mean time I just changed the background colour to look easier on the eyes.

I am going to start work on the new pages of the site tomorrow, bear with me.

Doctor DooM

AFAIK it's not just wordpress, Speedhaak did a lot of work customising the site...

OdgeXD

Wordpress is a piece of **** if you don't know how it works. Can do some pretty nice stuff when you actually learn it.

I don't know how it works

Bento Sento

It wouldn't even let me upload an image to the site or use an existing image so I can have a banner. Kept giving me errors.

D4RK ONION

FWIW, I made this from scratch, so if you need a hand on the html/css side of things or need banners/images made/resized etc. etc. hit me up.

PS: work in progress, tons of missing content, including that IFGC link!

Bento Sento

Well I am doing HTML 5 and CSS in college and I have no trouble doing that. For my Christmas project I even did my own version of RS.ie so things like that are no issue but wordpress is just not how I have learned to make websites. The only bit of code that there is on it is way too messy too understand.

But my main isssue is the fact that it would not let me upload any images to the site. I had been making the site look nicer with different themes but it would not let me upload any pictures for headers & backgrounds etc so I could actually make it look like a FG site. That is why I had to revert to the old theme because it already had some of the images on it.

PPC

That should be fixed now, try it again

Bento Sento

PPC wrote: »

That should be fixed now, try it again

No it still doesn't seem to work, it will allow me to upload a image into the gallery but if I try to use that image or upload an image anywhere else it just appears as a blank image with the small icon in the middle.

PPC

Just had a look there at the 2 drafts and they both had "width="1" height="1" " in the img code, removing that fixed it.
Hit me up on IRC if you have any questions.

Bento Sento

PPC wrote: »

Just had a look there at the 2 drafts and they both had "width="1" height="1" " in the img code, removing that fixed it.
Hit me up on IRC if you have any questions.

That slipped under my nose

Images still won't load as headers though.

PPC

Were the headers a different size to what was needed by any chance? Looks like I forgot to install the image manipulation software for the server after I changed host and was causing images not to save.
Its installed now and you should be able to upload again.

Bento Sento

PPC wrote: »

Were the headers a different size to what was needed by any chance? Looks like I forgot to install the image manipulation software for the server after I changed host and was causing images not to save.
Its installed now and you should be able to upload again.

Thank you very much

That seems to be everything that was wrong fixed, hopefully I can have it looking nice now. As usual bear with me lads, I'm am trying

Ramza

Two things :

Been planning on doing a tutorial series for how to get better at fighting games (will be done for street fighter, but could apply to other games too), starting at the bottom with the most rudimentary and basic stuff, and working up to intermediate and advanced, as well as other tidbits on how to improve, from my own personal experience. I'm no expert by any means but think it could help new players, or current players who want to improve. No idea if this is worthwhile since there are already tonnes and tonnes of similar content on YouTube etc. What do you guys think? I'll do it if people think it's a good idea but I'm pretty 50/50 right now. Would be done in the style of live commentary over gameplay in real time with explanations and other editing etc. Just a thought!

Also, if someone is good with graphics or photoshop, could they PM me? A nice stream/video overlay for live streams and videos would look great, randomselect themed would be even better. Excluding DooM (as he is a given as the main uploader/tournament streamer ) myself and a few others (nutrient, ladno, desosaurusx) stream and upload to YouTube, a randomselect overlay or something similar would be really nice, in my own opinion. If people think this is a bad idea then please do let me know, but if someone is interested shoot me a PM

Just my two cents to help improve the site or get stuff out there

ayjayirl

Ramza wrote: »

Two things :

Been planning on doing a tutorial series for how to get better at street fighter, starting at the bottom with the most rudimentary and basic stuff, and working up to intermediate and advanced, as well as other tidbits on how to improve, from my own personal experience. I'm no expert by any means but think it could help new players, or current players who want to improve. No idea if this is worthwhile since there are already tonnes and tonnes of similar content on YouTube etc. What do you guys think? I'll do it if people think it's a good idea but I'm pretty 50/50 right now. Would be done in the style of live commentary over gameplay in real time with explanations and other editing etc. Just a thought!

Also, if someone is good with graphics or photoshop, could they PM me? A nice stream/video overlay for live streams and videos would look great, randomselect themed would be even better. Excluding DooM (as he is a given as the main uploader/tournament streamer ) myself and a few others (nutrient, ladno, desosaurusx) stream and upload to YouTube, a randomselect overlay or something similar would be really nice, in my own opinion. If people think this is a bad idea then please do let me know, but if someone is interested shoot me a PM

Just my two cents to help improve the site or get stuff out there

+1..... This is most definitely needed. We need to level up as a scene to be taking anyway seriously AND am I the only one who is fed up with Ladno winning everything?

I'll ask one he lads workin for me to see if they would do an overlay but really I can see him saying sure, what you want....... So tell me what you want on it and I'll get it done.