Gamingforce reviews

[Demon_Skeith]

Here is collection of either old or new reviews on GF. this post is for reviews only and no comments are to be posted! Instead post all comments here


Forum the Review was done by: Advertisement Centre
Reviewer: Shane

First Time Opinion: 4/5
well when i first went to the site it was not really that active there were only to other people on. the skin and banner both look great as i like darker skins good job there over all at first sight it looks pretty good.

Number of Members & Posts: 17/20
over all amount of member and posts is pretty good but for the amount of member you seem to have you should have more p[osts as i would think might want to work on getting some of the inactive members to come back and posts.

Activity: 3/10
the activity of the site really needs to be worked on i know people come on mostly at night and are in different time zones but i am sure it can still be worked on try to get the members intrested into the site.

Originality: 8/10
looks to be all orignal witch is good it should bring your forum to new heights witch is good as most game forums seem to be the same to me but yours is different good work keep it up.

Appearance & Layout: 18/20
over all the layout of the forum is great was very easy to find what i was looking for witch is good for new members who are new to forums.

Atmosphere: 10/10
of course its a good atmosphere its about games wht could go wrong right well no problems here.

Administration Skills & Staff Etiquette: 23/25
over all in this area is pretty good as there have been staff watching over the forum everytime i was on witch is good to watch for spam.

Total: 84/100
over the forum is looking alriht might want to work on the activity makenew things new contest prizes etc.

 

[Demon_Skeith]

Forum the Review was done by: Mokata
Reviewer: Mini Maul

Positives:
Appearance
Although most of the skins is not completely fixed, i love the original borders and the color scheme on the blue one. I love the banner which goes very well with the overall color scheme and the buttons also look made perfectly for the appearance of all the skins. Overall, I love everything about the appearance because it fits well and you have a wide variety ont he board.

Member & Post Count
Looking at your board stats, you have over 20,000+ posts which is a great feat if you look at how many members you have. You have 300+ members which also is really good for a gaming board because they are hard to keep active. This gives your average post count to a member is around 57 posts. This is a great stat because its hard getting the members in let alone keeping them active. You also have lots of members over the 57 posts which is also a very good thing to see.

Staff Activity:
Looking at some of the activity of the Staffers is very promoising to see. You have 3 admins all over 400 posts which is great news and one being over 3,000. This shows that you dont want to give up the board without trying your hardest. You also have some really active Community Staff, one member nearly at 1000 posts. This shows that they are staying active in the community which will again, encourage new members to post and join the community..

Range Of Topics:
Although you only have 2 pages of active topics. Looking through all the topics, i can see that all the topics are not coming from the same place which is very good to see. You want the whole board to grow rather than just one section of the board. This also means that your members have quite a variety of topics they like to contribute to which gives you even more reason to get posting in every section with new topics because the liklihood of those topics getting replies is quite high.

Improvements:
Skin Adustments
Straight away from looking at your board i can see that some of the skins have little erros in them, for example on the blue skin. the maintitle is repeating of the page and dissapearing underneath the border on the right. This needs to be edited and then the skins will look fine. You also might want to cut the number of skins you have in the selector down a little. Most people tend to use 1 or 2 skins and some of the skins might not be used. So maybe update some or take old ones off and add new ones just to keep the original content going.

Layout Changing
Looking through your layout, I can see that some section are not used and are inactive. You need to either group them up together to double the post counts inside those inactive forums. This will make the forum look a little more active and will encourage members to post inside that section because there are ready made topics inside. Theres a graphics Area where people can post, it says there is no posts or topics at all. This needs to change but can be changed quite quickly. If you ask around, some people may be willing to put one or two graphics into the database. If you get 5 or 6 members to do that, suddenly who start to have quite a range of topics and graphics in there to comment on.

Overstaff & Understaffed:
In your forums i have seen that the staff in some areas are well overstaffed for the amoutn of members you have at the board. Take Admins for example. You currently have 4 admins which is way to many for a board your size. You coud easily make one of these a community Manager which you could have. The Community Area has 3 staff which is about right for the boards size. You also have 4 graphics designers which is a good size if they are all active. I think one of the staff members is one around 4 posts which just isnt right. You might need to ask these staff to wether they want to stay staff or retire.

Activity:
Looking at the activity, you have around 2 pages of new and active topics which isnt the best in the world. You really need to get your community Staff to keep regularly posting new topics so that new members have a wide range of topics to reply to. A perfect area to post in would be the graphics database. Members always look in the databases and you can get lots of comments and graphics in there to boost the new topics per day up.



Overall:
Overall, i really like your board. It has a few errors on some skins but the graphcis and banners fit perfectly with the skins you have. Keep rotating those skins and keep mixing it up with new stuff. You layout again is fine the way it is but you need to group some inactive section together to bulk them up. The graphics database needs to be used because you can gain topics and replies quickly in there. This leads me onto your staff team. Your Administrations is a little overstaffed but i think everyone contributes to the board which is good to see. The only team i worry about is the graphics team purely on the basis that they do not post and the database isnt very full, you need to get this staff area sorted.

 

[Demon_Skeith]

Forum the Review was done by: Forum Promotion
Reviewer: Online
Date done on: Sat Aug 09, 2008 7:08 am


Number Of Members: Well, let me clarify that this forum has been open for around 10 months or so, and you have done fairly well advertising your forum. You have a great amount of members that you have attracted, and guests that join your forum daily. Although you have a great amount of forums, I can see only a small minority of them posting an introduction of themselves. I suggest you try to get more members that will be at your forum more often. Such as the following:

- Contests that revolve around your forum
- Newsletters that remind your members of any new updates going on in your forum

Although thats not the case, that I am not talking about the activity, but its great that you have a large member count going on.
9/10

Number Of Active Members: I have remarked before that your activity is quite low, and this has to be improved. I have also suggested to use Newsletters as a way to remind your members of your forum. Such as adding updates on your MMORPG that you are secretly working on. Possibly some new contests that you can remind your members about. Also, try to update the content as much as possible for I can see some old posts in some forums, in order to have members post in more forums that have something of their interest. 6/10

Number Of Posts (Spam or Otherwise): I have seen many forums that have old posts, some from the previous month. So try to update your forums everyday with new topics and replies to members posts. But overall you have accumulated a pretty large amount of posts, though I've seen some forums that manage to get a pretty high amount of posts. Updating content, will make guests know that your forum is booming with posts and activity which makes them want to join in on the fun that you guys are having there. 7/10

Appearance (First Impressions): My first impressions on the skin on your forum is really nice, I like the blue around the forum, because it is my favourite color. I think the logo is very nicely done, blending in with the forum with ease. Although the ads usually throw me off, because I don't like using ads and seeing them on the forum. Overall, I think the forum looks really nice, and this should pull more guests in to join your forum. 15/20

Layout: The organization going on in your forum is really clean, and I can see that forums are in their appropriate category. Down at the statistics, I am not very fond of the IBstore, which confuses me at times looking at it. You have a really enticing introduction for guests to read, and affiliates are put in a good place for a gaming forum. You have some nice attractions going on, such as an RPG and arcade. My suggestions are to remove your IBstore, or move it to the store itself. 13/20

Moderation: I am quite disappointed about the moderation because, you have far too many administrators on your forum. The moderators on your forum are inactive, because I haven't seen any on at all, even yesterday, before checking it out. You need to remind your moderators about your forum, and probably having to remove an administrator. You have to find some trustworthy staff, and probably having to remove your current administrators which is possibly the hardest thing to do. 6/10

Activity: I can see that you don't have many active members, but the members that are put a lot of time into your forum. Your admins as well put time in your forum staying active and trying to update some content. Though this needs to be improved with what I had explained before. 5/10

Spelling and Grammar I can see some small minor spelling and grammar mistakes along your introduction for guests and that can be fixed without a doubt. But overall, your forum has great descriptive English put on it, with fine grammar and spelling. Announcements seem to be really descriptive along with normal chat. Having great spelling and grammar will attract more traffic on your forum. Having bad spelling and grammar repels your guests away from your forum and possibly having minimal traffic. Though you do not have to worry about that currently and your forum is doing fine in the English Department. 8/10

Overall Mark (Out Of 100): 60/100

You have a lot to work on, activity wise, you have though of some unique content but you should try sending out newsletters making your forum look attentive. Try to attract different varieties of guests which will enjoy certain topics on your forum.

 

[Demon_Skeith]

Forum the Review was done by: Infinite Results
Reviewer: futilesoul

• Generalization & Layout - Your forums as a whole is great, layout is not messy, activity is alright and the content is stable.Improve various sections of your layout, there are some forums needing a bit more posts for it to become activity stable
• Get others to be desired in all the forums, not only focus on one(ie. GF News Wire)
• Get more posts in near empty forums(ie. All the forums in the Zero Studio & Share Information)

[*]Skin & Graphics - The skin is all good, needs a bit improvement though.

• My advice for you is to get a better skin, but that's hard I know
• The current banner/header you have is not of good quality(no offense to the maker), maybe requesting a better one would be your great option

[*]Activity & Downtimes - There are certain times of the days where you activity seems low.

• You need to harvest various members with different time frames.
• More advertising in publicity will surely attain your goal, try major gaming sites, fansites and more
• Try to get some staff that has different time frames too, so nothing bad would happen to the board
• Just keep on advertising, and you'll surely get there

Thanks For Requesting a Bullet Point Review.
Enjoy, & Good Luck with your Forum.

 

[Demon_Skeith]

Forum the Review was done by: iWebBuddy.com
Reviewer: phio69

iWebBuddy.com Forum Review - Gamingforce​

Graphics :

Logo/Banner :

I think your logo of “Gamingforce” is good, but not special. I suggest changing the font of the words into something more unique. It’s a standard font and not very eye-catching. As for the whole header, it’s also good, but I think it somehow does not match the theme of gaming for your forum. Change it into something which can also be an identity to you as a gaming site.

Marks - 5/10

Navigation Menu Design :

Your navigation menu is a standard one. It’s right below the header (logo/banner), simple and clean. Easy to spot because it’s right on the top, but it can use some works to make it more decent. Maybe change the fonts, add effects, change the style (put it in center of the page, for example), and many more. Have fun experimenting. ^^

Marks - 3/5

Forum layout and design :

Green! It’s fresh. That’s my first impression with the green colors you’re using. I like the motive at the top of the page. I think it’ll be more beautiful if you add some kind of motive at the footer too, to make things brighter. Nice favicon you add there. It’s straight forward as an identity. Another thing that surprised me is the big red cross at the middle of the page. It somehow gives me an impression that I’m not accepted at the forum or the place I’m viewing is currently closed or something. Maybe you can change it with something more ‘friendly’. Icons of some games, probably?

Marks - 18/20

Overall Marks For Graphics = 26/35​

General :

Categories and Forums :

I think you have enough numbers of categories and forums. You have site’s main category, two gaming categories, and two off-topic sections. I think everything is okay and well done. To be honest I was a bit surprised when I saw advertising section there. Not that it’s bad, but it gives risk that members who come to your forum only registered to advertise. I think you can use that affiliate bar instead. Besides, you’re a gaming site, so I don’t think that section is very much needed.

Marks - 19/20

Organization :

Organization is well done. One thing that makes me wonder is the place of “Technology” section. I think it’s closer to media than only in off-topic. Nevertheless, everything is very well organized.

Marks - 9/10

Overall Marks For General = 28/30​

Activity :

Search Engine Rankings :

I tried to search for “Gamingforce” in three search engines. Your forum is displayed on Google as the fourth result. You’re on the fifth position on Yahoo and MSN/Bing (after your website). That is a pretty great work. Keep your hard work and don’t give up until you reach the first place. Read some SEO articles posted by Marc here to get some reference if you'd like.

Marks - 13/15

Forum Activity :

When I was reviewing, I was only with other 19 guests, making a total of 20 guests online. Most users ever online is 100. Those are pretty good. But only 6 users active today. Compared to the total number of members you have, which is 561, that’s not very good, I think. You might need to work more on making your members stay active. You’ve gained quite lots of traffic, so you need to work on inside too.

Marks - 3/5

Overall Marks For Activity = 16/20​

Usergroups :

Usergroup members | Group population :

You have 11 usergroups with banned group counted. That is quite a good number. The composition of membership groups is pretty well composed, as well as the composition of staff membership groups. I think you can add more members to staff groups which only consists of one member, like GF Website and Gaming Lords. Three members are in Game God Admins and Uber Game Mods. It’s enough for a forum with almost 600 members.

Marks - 13/15

Overall Marks For Usergroups = 13/15​

Overall Marks For Gamingforce = 83%

Congratulations, the forum passed:

 

[Demon_Skeith]

New review with the update to IPB 3.3.2

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Large Forum Review​

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First Impressions Your forum looks fine in first impressions. Your theme looks absolutely fabulous, those two shades of red go together extremely nicely, I don't think I have seen much better of a red theme in my entire experience in foruming and reviewing. Your forum looks pretty active, not the most active, but pretty good. Your forum has an arcade, a Facebook, and a Twitter. Facebook and Twitter are important things to use because I think that it is just a better way to connect with the members of your forum and an Arcade will attract many fun people to your forum and they might even be active because gaming is exactly what your forum is centered on, I think you have a great thing going.


(Score: 13/15)

Appearance Like I said, your theme is perfect, top to bottom, you have a great red color scheme, a great banner + forum icons (which are alike). You have many things that members can use on the index like the chatbox and lots of great information including the latest high scores on the arcade, etc. The only thing bad I can see about the appearance is just the emoticons, I just think they don't look the best and they are overused, I would just like to see more of a varitety of smileys. Another thing I noticed is the fact that some of the staff colors look pretty dark and depressing and don't just look that amazing, this includes Devil Gamers and Gods. Other than this, I'm having a rather hard time trying to figure out some cons of your appearance.


(Score: 19/20)

Statistics and Activity I can see your activity is okay, but not the best. I think you should try to do the best as you can, get a group of advertisers, and don't make the forum soudnd dull, be friendly, keep adding content that will attract the kind of people that you want on your forum. I think you can do much better in the four and a half years your forum has been up, I highly encourage you to follow my instructions throughout the review because I know just how to get your forum to be a better community.


(Score: 14/20)

Ratios Now, you have 33 posts per day, which is good, but it could be better. You should be getting much more like 60-100+ by this time, but don't get discouraged. You still have a greta rate that your forum is still growing, and it is growing consistently. I believe that you follow the golden rules of being friendly, making members at home, advertising the forum by putting many extra details, and just adding anything that you want that will help your forum that you desire, you have to make your forum 100+ gamer friendly, and I will hint some of that later in the review. Just don't forget, forums take time, and you always have patience. It isn't too late to get your forum to become thriving with active members who catch up with everything your forum has to offer.


(Score: 6/10)

ContentYour forum could have much better content. I think that in the XBox,Nintendo,PlayStation gaming forums, etc.could just have more about PlayStation and XBox and Nintendo gaming in general. I think that all over the forum you need some better content for the forum, this might help your statistics (as far as activity goes, anyway) by at least a little bit. I can tell you are excellent at making good content, but I think you need better content for your forum.I'm sure you could do better, I highly recommend you do this immediately. Don't forget to put it just in the gaming forums, gaming is not the only thing people ever want to talk about


(Score: 13/20)

Navigation I think your forum has special navigation. Your forum is easy to get around and I like that, your theme navigation just seems so compact in my eyes, I think this is essential for most members of your forum because it surely seems that your forum is easier to get around than other forums, your forum page is short and like I said-compact. Don't change a single thing about Navigation!


(Score: 15/15)

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Total Score 80/100

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Final Remarks Nice theme with compact navigation, the only thing I am concerned of most is the activity, but the content suffers as well.


you can discuss the review here