Need Your Opinion On My Website

[Shadow-Knight]

Me and my friends have been working on a video game site for a while now, but with the recent addition of a people tracker I've come to realize were not getting as much traffic as I thought. I need your opinions: are we doing something wrong? Is their something we could do to improve? Any helpful criticism would be helpful, thank you.

www.allbitgames.com

 

[Legion]

The first thing I thought of when I looked was "cluttered", I am not sure what to look at first, or what the site is actually about.

Your home page shouldn't have lot's of side bars etc. it should be an explanation of what the sites about with links to all the other info once you enter the "main" site.

As for traffic, advertisement is needed. Although not here, as it's against the rules.

EDIT 1: So basically an "intro" page is needed, so we know what the sites about and what it has to offer, once we enter then we should see the home page as it is now (although it still needs neatening up).

EDIT 2: The main pic needs to be higher quality, it is the thing that grabs the attention after all.

Advertisements are always bad, I know they make the site free/cheaper but they can really detract from the site unless they are all relevant .

Get rid of the 'Systems' section as it stands out, in a negative way.

EDIT 3: Like others have said, the red/black doesn't work well for sites, if you do use it then choose a softer red as this one is far too bright.

Apart from this, all is good.

 

[Cherry Cola]

Boring layout. More colors!

 

[Shadow-Knight]

The first thing I thought of when I looked was "cluttered", I am not sure what to look at first, or what the site is actually about.

Your home page shouldn't have lot's of side bars etc. it should be an explanation of what the sites about with links to all the other info once you enter the "main" site.

As for traffic, advertisement is needed. Although not here, as it's against the rules.

Thank you for your criticism, I'll see if I can make some changes. As for advertising here I'm just trying to get feedback, not actually advertise.

 

[Distorted Stu]

I found th navigation simple but effective, nice site. Simple yet effective. All i ask is that you change the colour scheme.. MY EYES! I hate red, black and white. It laves that horrible burnign senstaion in the eyes after reading it for too long and i start to strain. Try some softer colours like light greens, blues & white. They complement eachother great and are easdy on the eyes.

 

[The Austin]

Well, hate to say mate, but black and red is never a good color scheme for a website.
The first thing I thought when I logged in was "Oh shit, virus alert".
Try to go with a White/Black color scheme to make the site look more trustworthy and professional.

Also, you're Homepage shouldn't have lots of sidebars.

A great example of a good website would be http://www.xgenstudios.com/

 

[SturmDolch]

You're on your way. The top banner shouldn't be blurry, though, and your font is uninintersting. As others have said, black on white is easiest on the eyes and stands out the best, despite it sounding boring. Have a few more blocks and stuff around your site maybe.. Like the sidebar could be a different colour. You want things to be seperated. For example, here's my site: http://seventhcirclegaming.com

Your content, however, is good!

 

[Shadow-Knight]

Things to change:
1.Color scheme
2.Amount of sidebars
3.Etc. etc.

 

[Quoth]

I'd like to be constructive but I can't really see the point in the site. So there needs to be some catch or lure to get people to flick to the website and stay there or at least bookmark it for later viewing. At the very least there needs to be some nice lines, simplify the banner, to draw your eyes from one place to the next.

Older bit games are typically free and available to EMU users and once something becomes free there's very little need for someone to provide a review for it. After all you can find out for yourself in a matter of seconds.

Unless of course you're were pushing the bar for people interested in that kind of thing and being very judicious in what you reviewed and found the best games out there for the appropriate systems. Of which I see no evidence. So a statement about why you should be here would probably help.

If you are going to do old consoles then you at least need to cover everything. Wheres the ZX Spectrum, Vic20, Commodore 64, BBC B Micro, Amiga and Atari ST?

I'd also make a comment about the rating system, with multiple reviews and no indication on the rating system. What does assigning something an A- mean to me as an individual? Hell, what does it mean to you? Particularly how do you compare a B- on a game such as Brutal Legend to an A+ on NHL94 for the Megadrive.

Sorry to be deconstructive but there used to be dozens of sites about old systems on the net and I've watched them close down over time and have to invariably remove the bookmarks for the ones that were actually really good. I make the assumption that this is because people really don't care and when their traffic never generates the numbers their egos are hoping for they simply lose impetus and close down when the host finally gets bored.

The point here is that you've chosen a particularly niche topic to make a website about. Without wanting to squash your creativity - which is commendable - if the others couldn't maintain impetus, why should you?

By the way, your entry in the Intellivision has an html code error on the only review.

 

[cuddly_tomato]

Retail magnate Theo Paphetis has this "5 second" rule with his high-street stores. If your shop window doesn't catch the attention of a passer by within 5 seconds they won't go into the shop. The same thing applies to websites.

Your front page needs more of a "headline" feel. Look at the escapist or destructoid for examples.

Something big and colourful, with screenies from a game or two that people might be more familiar with, in order to get them to hang around and view the rest of the site.

 

[GreyWolf257]

It looks pretty good, but I have found that some people tend to associate black backgrounds with sites that are bad, meaning they are either infected or have something deemed socially unacceptable about them. It is a sub-conscious thing that tends to drive some people away from places. You might want to add more color.

Also, that tab on the left-hand side of the screen is in great need of a description. It has nothing to tell people what it does, and someone who is cautious won't click on something that they don't know about.

 

[Kamaitachi]

Most "people tracker"s suck, I had one, And I could boost it by refreshing the page :/

 

[Daveman]

1)no advertising (as in this thread isn't really allowed...)
2) actually it's not bad, you just need to make it a bit more user-friendly, like simplify all those old games into one "retro" area or something
all in all though I'm not sure, there's a lot of competition out there, good luck.

 

[Shadow-Knight]

Most "people tracker"s suck, I had one, And I could boost it by refreshing the page :/

The people tracker we use doesn't have that problem.