Wednesday, July 14, 2004

Get Your Own Precious Moments
Threads in OtakuBoards' General Discussion, er.. Otaku Lounge follow a pattern of sorts. As such, it is only fitting that we go back to an old favorite -- threads about the boards themselves. With so little going on in the world around us, it makes sense that we use our message boards to engage in discussions about our message boards.

Of course, that's not the problem. I find these threads entertaining for a variety of reasons; a lot of it has to do with the fact that every members' experiences on the boards are different. While I was spending my days in the Digimon forum (it is weird to think that the forum not here anymore) other members were doing other things, talking to other people, creating an entirely different online life for themselves.

Enter: OB's Precious Memories thread. There are a lot of great memories here, but many are being told second-hand by members who weren't around to experience them, or had no connection to the events whatsoever.

I just find myself looking through the thread and thinking, "You weren't in Kill Adam," "You weren't around for Ginnylyn," "You just registered two months ago!" It's one thing to take an interest in world history, it's another to sit around and talk about your fond memories of Winston Churchill.

That's my complaint here; that some people in the thread weren't there for these things, and have no right to list them as "memories." The OB of today is much more conherent and "sterile" than it was when I was a n00b, but it's not as if people can't build great discussions and friendships on their own.

These are pretty much the same basic complaints I have with generic n00b-types: their posts aimed towards other members seem to come across more as kissing up than anything productive, especially when it comes to staff. *sigh* I appreciate the compliments, though. I just wish they were based on some sort of thought and not a half-brained scheme to win the hearts of Moderators and Team Leaders everywhere.

Case in point: The mind-blowing amount of praise that Kill Adam has received. Having some part in the creation of it, I'd like to be the first to say this is not the revolutionary RPG that many claim it to be. It was a wonderful attempt at a revolutionary RPG, but it failed in changing the ways RPGs are done in just as many ways as it succeeded. Sadly, it's most significant contribution to the Adventure Arena is not the Chapter System, or the great storyline -- it's the fact that you can curse in the Adventure Arena now. Had it not been Kill Adam, another great RPG would have come along and opened the doors for the high-profile things that are being developed in that forum today. "Kill Adam-mania" is a strong term. "Mania" implies that the entire board is swept up in it, I don't recall any sort of reaction to the RPG; other than the fact that a lot of us wrote about our posts in myOtaku, and we're established members... so new members read our posts and get the impression that if we are talking about Kill Adam, everyone must be doing it... now I see how this started!

James is cooler than all (well, most) of you, and if he wanted to create an RPG about canteloupe many would praise it as being the greatest thing since The Bible. That's just who he is, because he has been around for a very long time, and his history with the boards speaks volumes for his qualities as an individual. People respect and love and worship him for that.

These people don't have history of their own. The only thing more pathetic than someone trying to work their way to the top of an internet message board is writing a long post like this to criticize them.
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