MadebyBacteria Forum Delete?
- Thread starter GarageFactory
- Start date
laingsoft
Formerly SteamDNT
There is no new blood in this community.
We have been killed by the dramatic increase in processing power/efficacy of emulators, coupled with the massive surge in the speed of cell phones.
In reality, there isn't much of a reason to build a portable any more, you can emulate almost all of the old consoles on android. I know that people on these forums have been touting this for a long time (hue hue guys buy a GP32X/Wiz/Dingoo/PSP), but now it isn't a fringe thing. Heck, the top 10 in gaming on the Android market is an NES emu last time I checked.
It's also gotten to a point where the OG hardware isn't as cheap as dirt any more, so people are a lot less likely to cut it up. Probably from the small resurgance in retro gaming that happened a little while ago. It seems to have died back down, but I don't see the prices going back down any time soon.
Honestly, the forums were mostly active when all of us (save for Rob, Crackteria, and that other italian guy that I forgot) were around 16, judging from the massive growth that XDA and a lot of programming forums, the mobile marketplace has essentially poached all of our "would-be" new blood. All of our older members can't contribute as much, and the vacuum isn't being filled.
The only way I can honestly see these forums surving is if the mod team manages to pivot, and pander to a different market. (Choose mobile programming, Phone modifications, anything newer than retro consoles)
We have been killed by the dramatic increase in processing power/efficacy of emulators, coupled with the massive surge in the speed of cell phones.
In reality, there isn't much of a reason to build a portable any more, you can emulate almost all of the old consoles on android. I know that people on these forums have been touting this for a long time (hue hue guys buy a GP32X/Wiz/Dingoo/PSP), but now it isn't a fringe thing. Heck, the top 10 in gaming on the Android market is an NES emu last time I checked.
It's also gotten to a point where the OG hardware isn't as cheap as dirt any more, so people are a lot less likely to cut it up. Probably from the small resurgance in retro gaming that happened a little while ago. It seems to have died back down, but I don't see the prices going back down any time soon.
Honestly, the forums were mostly active when all of us (save for Rob, Crackteria, and that other italian guy that I forgot) were around 16, judging from the massive growth that XDA and a lot of programming forums, the mobile marketplace has essentially poached all of our "would-be" new blood. All of our older members can't contribute as much, and the vacuum isn't being filled.
The only way I can honestly see these forums surving is if the mod team manages to pivot, and pander to a different market. (Choose mobile programming, Phone modifications, anything newer than retro consoles)
Bush
sweet justice
I agree, to an extent. There are plenty of portables being made, and as I said earlier, I see much potential in moving to embedded devices like the pi 2 for portables.
I think we should take note of the whole maker movement thing. Surely some people here have arduinos or pics and whatnot, so why not make a new subforum, attract a new user base? The whole IoT/maker/microcontroller scene is booming, and I don't see that sort of hobby as being too far from what we have here. I think we should expand the scope of the forum. I know we have mobile/pc/other, but I think a dedicated section of subforums would see a gain in users.
I think we should take note of the whole maker movement thing. Surely some people here have arduinos or pics and whatnot, so why not make a new subforum, attract a new user base? The whole IoT/maker/microcontroller scene is booming, and I don't see that sort of hobby as being too far from what we have here. I think we should expand the scope of the forum. I know we have mobile/pc/other, but I think a dedicated section of subforums would see a gain in users.
Re: Re:
With Bush and robm as well. I know I'm still a young pup when it comes to things here and other places on the net. But I've been at somethings for awhile now, would love a chance to help the community since I have gotten so much of the info I needed to make my portable.
I would love to get some new subs put together for some dev boards like the Edison board, arduino, beaglebone black, and pi. Heck the BBB has/had a cape designed with mobile gaming in mind, about the same size as a DMG, and emulates NES SNES and other systems.
Any suggestions on some starter projects you fell could get more people to frequent this forum?
Bush said:
With Bush and robm as well. I know I'm still a young pup when it comes to things here and other places on the net. But I've been at somethings for awhile now, would love a chance to help the community since I have gotten so much of the info I needed to make my portable.
I would love to get some new subs put together for some dev boards like the Edison board, arduino, beaglebone black, and pi. Heck the BBB has/had a cape designed with mobile gaming in mind, about the same size as a DMG, and emulates NES SNES and other systems.
Any suggestions on some starter projects you fell could get more people to frequent this forum?
Bush
sweet justice
I'm not very experienced. I've got an arduino I'm using to supplement my digital logic class, but I definitely love the devboard scene/industry.
So what are we going to do here folks? I say we come up with some concrete plans and present them to the staff.
What wiki platform do we want to use, and what topics/boards do we want added? We've been encouraged by several mods now so let's get to brainstorming.
So what are we going to do here folks? I say we come up with some concrete plans and present them to the staff.
What wiki platform do we want to use, and what topics/boards do we want added? We've been encouraged by several mods now so let's get to brainstorming.
Bush
sweet justice
I agree, but really think it should be limited to users above a certain (small) amount of posts. We should also consider an independently hosted/run solution if that is a better fit.
I also think we should add some additional subforums for 3D printing, microcontrollers/FPGA, and raspberry pi.
I also think we should add some additional subforums for 3D printing, microcontrollers/FPGA, and raspberry pi.
Well, here, have an independently hosted wiki.
For now, it'll have limited moderation, but if the need arises, I'll lock flax down.
http://wiki.ttsgeb.net
If MR decides to launch a wiki, I'm entirely willing to provide the information/redirects needed for migrating or mirroring any information over here, so if you trust my word, feel free to start putting flax there.
Yell at me on twitter or facebook or something if there are problems with permissions and such, but don't expect me to know flax about using a wiki yet, use mediawiki's help files for that stuff.
For now, it'll have limited moderation, but if the need arises, I'll lock flax down.
http://wiki.ttsgeb.net
If MR decides to launch a wiki, I'm entirely willing to provide the information/redirects needed for migrating or mirroring any information over here, so if you trust my word, feel free to start putting flax there.
Yell at me on twitter or facebook or something if there are problems with permissions and such, but don't expect me to know flax about using a wiki yet, use mediawiki's help files for that stuff.
Noah
Frequent Poster
Bush said:
To be quite honest (and sorry for the 1 month bump, but we need to get on this) I agree 100% with you Bush. If you go under popular console forums (e.g. N64, GC/Wii) you'll see a flax load of question threads and most if not all of the answers have already been posted before. We've let so much good information and so many good diagrams be buried under a bunch of random stuff.
A wiki much like the one geb is hosting would help a lot, but not unless we put 100% into it. There's a lot of information out there, deep in the subforums, just poorly noted. Then there are the posts with information that's pure gold (and even displayed as such) much like the guides Ashen writes.
As a lot of us get older, definitely staff as well, it gets harder and harder to find free time to dedicate to ModRetro. As it has been pointed out, the stickies haven't been touched since the stone age. We need someone to update the stickies, and no offense to any of the current staff members, but I don't really see anyone jumping the gun to do so. Its been like almost two months since this thread was posted and nothing really came out of it besides a mention of a revamp that will probably never happen and a link to a wiki that is still pretty much empty. Palmer hasn't logged on since the day he posted in this thread, and he obviously doesn't have the time to really do much anymore, so we need to step up our game and try and centralize the MR data mass.
Tchay
Frequent Poster
Hey all, sorry I'm late to the party.
If any of you notice broken links or stickies in the Gamecube section, please don't hesitate to shoot me an angry PM about it. I'm way too lazy to go in there and find the broken links myself, but if someone encounters one, send me a message, and I'll go in and fix each and every one you find.
Also, I think the core interest in this community is modding old consoles in one way or another. While maintaining this core interest, a shift towards arduino/FPGA/3D printing/PCB design might help reignite the community.
Arduinos are cheap and easy to use, fgpas can cost a little more and have a steep learning curve, cheapest 3D printers cost a few hundred bucks (peachy printer will be $100 when it finally starts shipping), cheap PCB fab I know the least about although I've seen some reasonable methods on Instructables. A lot of these skills require a shift towards programming and CAD.
But imagine how much cooler our projects would be with a community armed with those kinds of skills? I say "projects" because portable mods are starting to become unnecessary due to advancements in the mobile industry. Eventually it will make more sense to make your own controller for your smartphone than an entire portable (and that's assuming there aren't good smartphone controllers on the market).
If any of you notice broken links or stickies in the Gamecube section, please don't hesitate to shoot me an angry PM about it. I'm way too lazy to go in there and find the broken links myself, but if someone encounters one, send me a message, and I'll go in and fix each and every one you find.
Also, I think the core interest in this community is modding old consoles in one way or another. While maintaining this core interest, a shift towards arduino/FPGA/3D printing/PCB design might help reignite the community.
Arduinos are cheap and easy to use, fgpas can cost a little more and have a steep learning curve, cheapest 3D printers cost a few hundred bucks (peachy printer will be $100 when it finally starts shipping), cheap PCB fab I know the least about although I've seen some reasonable methods on Instructables. A lot of these skills require a shift towards programming and CAD.
But imagine how much cooler our projects would be with a community armed with those kinds of skills? I say "projects" because portable mods are starting to become unnecessary due to advancements in the mobile industry. Eventually it will make more sense to make your own controller for your smartphone than an entire portable (and that's assuming there aren't good smartphone controllers on the market).
Bakuku
Well-Known Member
I agree aswell that this forum is in need of a serious revamp. As mentioned before, alot of usefull info in some random threads are hard to find and need a deep dive in your mind to google search them and hopefully find them.
We as users and moderators should skim the forum and make a list of info that can be redeemd usefull and needed.
For instance, there was a post on how to get digital video from a rev C gamecube board and I can’t seem to find it anymore. Unless it has been removed it’s burried under a ton of radom question threads thats mostly go unnoticed and unanswerd. Believe me, I had my share of them.
I have a great deal of PAL GC knowlegde I am willing to share once there is a good sustainable wiki available.
We as users and moderators should skim the forum and make a list of info that can be redeemd usefull and needed.
For instance, there was a post on how to get digital video from a rev C gamecube board and I can’t seem to find it anymore. Unless it has been removed it’s burried under a ton of radom question threads thats mostly go unnoticed and unanswerd. Believe me, I had my share of them.
I have a great deal of PAL GC knowlegde I am willing to share once there is a good sustainable wiki available.
wallydawg
Active Member
If anybody needs something off of the Bacman site (Worklogs, etc.) our best friend Downing was able to grab a cache of the entire website that you can download:
https://desperatenerd.wordpress.com/201 ... man-forum/
https://desperatenerd.wordpress.com/201 ... man-forum/
bentomo
Frequent Poster
Until I see something like the Nvidia Shield running dolphin with as much compatibility as SNES emulation I would say that portables are still relevant. While games like Mario 64 will run smoothly it's only because the emulators are tweaked especially for those games because of the popularity of them. I still can't play other favorites like Yoshi's story, Jet Force Gemini, and many more that do not run at a playable level. Not to mention the amount of knowledge required to get into tweaking emulators to get unplayable ones playable.
With that said I still agree that portabalizing is very niche. I would love to see a bigger part of the forum dedicated to FPGA, raspberry Pi, arduino, and circuit board design, this is the real meat and potatoes that could provide new members. I might be able to do a write up for some circuit board design using KiCad.
I'd like to see some sub forums for these types of electronics work but 3D printing could be a good forum as well. I realize that there is a case sub forum but it is pretty buried.
I propose blowing up the general information forum by putting each of the sub forums in there own forum. And each console piece of information could be allocated to its respective forum below it. E.G. Batteries and power regulation will go in a power forum with information on setting voltages, and known good regulators. While the power requirements for a gamecube (voltages, current, etc) are all in the gamecube forum.
This, in theory, makes information like power more universal. Say someone needs to know how to make a battery pack for their raspberry pi. They can just follow the guide for the voltages they need and they'll be set, no need for a raspberry pi power guide.
These are just some of my thoughts on the forum and I hope we can get this place hopping again.
With that said I still agree that portabalizing is very niche. I would love to see a bigger part of the forum dedicated to FPGA, raspberry Pi, arduino, and circuit board design, this is the real meat and potatoes that could provide new members. I might be able to do a write up for some circuit board design using KiCad.
I'd like to see some sub forums for these types of electronics work but 3D printing could be a good forum as well. I realize that there is a case sub forum but it is pretty buried.
I propose blowing up the general information forum by putting each of the sub forums in there own forum. And each console piece of information could be allocated to its respective forum below it. E.G. Batteries and power regulation will go in a power forum with information on setting voltages, and known good regulators. While the power requirements for a gamecube (voltages, current, etc) are all in the gamecube forum.
This, in theory, makes information like power more universal. Say someone needs to know how to make a battery pack for their raspberry pi. They can just follow the guide for the voltages they need and they'll be set, no need for a raspberry pi power guide.
These are just some of my thoughts on the forum and I hope we can get this place hopping again.
The_Next_Guy
Active Member
I would LOVE!!! an Arduino/AVR Forum. I have many cool ideas and project that are either underway or completed that I would like to share, I don't post it in the general forum because I feel it is slightly out of place.
StabbyJack
Newb
Excuse the new guy posting here, but I've been a lurker here for a long time.
I agree with people saying the arduino and 3D printer sub forums should exist. Why not go one further and add specific raspberry pi forums? If you can't beat them join them.
All I know is that it would be a real shame if sites like this didn't exist!
I agree with people saying the arduino and 3D printer sub forums should exist. Why not go one further and add specific raspberry pi forums? If you can't beat them join them.
All I know is that it would be a real shame if sites like this didn't exist!
