I was looking on dream17 today and found something and wanted to know what you guys think:

The slow death of the Team17 Forum

I've watched as Team17's official forum has slowly changed from a vibrant, fun place to visit, to a place that... well, that isn't. There are some who have chosen to blame this change on the existence of a so-called "secret" forum populated by "Elitist veterans", but the truth is far less conspiratorial: over the past few years - since the released of Worms 3D, I believe - people have signed up to the forum and begin posting without spending any time actually looking at how the community works or, it seems, without looking at or thinking about what they're actually typing. Generally, people spend some time lurking on a forum before they do any actual posting, but more and more people are ignoring this basic courtesy. The forum has suffered for it.

I've spent a lot of time and energy trying to turn things around. I've started new discussions, posted a thread of advice for newcomers to the forum, and I've posted comments in threads that usually I would have turned a blind eye to in the past. Unfortunately, things haven't improved. People are still asking stupid questions about why the DS version of Worms Open Warfare 2 doesnt hav hats y doesnt it ths suxxxx , or making ridiculous statements such as the Queen's English being the root of all spoken English in the world, or that removing the Quit function from the PSP version of WOW2 will stop people from quitting in the middle of an game even though they can still turn off the WLAN switch. Generally speaking, the quality of posting on the Team17 Forum has gone remarkably downhill, and to be honest it's not a community I feel part of anymore.

At the moment, I would advise anyone looking to discuss Team17's games with intelligent, like-minded individuals to avoid the Team17 Forum, unless they fancy pulling all of their hair out. At the same time, though, I can't really advocate our own forum because no one ever posts there, although I would like to invite people to start doing so. It seems, at the moment, that Team17 and Worms fans really don't have anywhere to go...


I partly agree with it. some of the stupidest questions are in the W:OW2 section showing that the phrase "there are no stupid questions" is false. I think this is still a great site to turn to for news on worms, and we're usually the first few people that know about a huge event. for example, spadge has said that he will tell us of a new 2D game for the PC soon and I don't think the average person will know it when we do.;)

im agree,thre's have been STUPID questions on WOW2 forum i saw one saying
''Why the PSP is EVIL?'' i mean WTF!!!

im agree,thre's have been STUPID questions on WOW2 forum i saw one saying
''Why the PSP is EVIL?'' i mean WTF!!!

Yes. Exactly. :)
Reminding everyone to sneak out when poninja has got his back turned

This doesn't sound like a too bad idea. Sign me up! say I.

maybe that's slick.

Personally, I don't think this is a Team17 Forum specific problem. I think this is a problem with the internet in general.

The internet community is getting worse and worse. I wouldn't want to point the blame at "younger, less mature people", but I believe this is the case. The internet's just turning into a spam pit of stupid unfunny memes and general idiocy. It doesn't matter where you look, if something is popular, it'll become contaminated with morons.

Have you ever looked at youtube comments? That's one of the most popular sites in the world, and the level of stupidity is immense. Look at MySpace. Look at popular facebook groups.

I've heard a lot of people mention that the "Golden Age" of this forum was before it became popular due to Worms 3D. Coincidence?

The Team17 forum needs another webmaster, one who actually bans people for daft or non-contributing comments. I believe the only way to clamp down on this sort of thing is with a heavy fist. Will it happen? Probably not, I don't think Team17 want to employ a full-time forum admin.

Harsh? Yes.
Necessary? That's for you to decide.

Team17 want to employ a full-time forum admin.

maybe they should...

Necessary? That's for you to decide.

i think it really is..

i want! i want! :cool:

yes! vote me!

i will guarantee lotsa fun!

I hope you're aware that posts like these were the sort of things that got people banned when APJ was around.

This is exactly the problem we're having.

that was my cousin! :(

Dream17 is the truth.

you have to realize that the fact that people are not lurking is t17's fault. people tend to lurk on the forum using a guest account. they then register and start posting. by forcing people to register to view the forum, t17 has effectively compelled people to start posting without lurking. if before, most of the people who came here to see the answer to one of the questions simply left, now we see most of these people drop by some other portion of the forum and leave a stupid comment, or start a pointless thread, often ignoring all rules of the community.

you have to realize that the fact that people are not lurking is t17's fault. people tend to lurk on the forum using a guest account. they then register and start posting. by forcing people to register to view the forum, t17 has effectively compelled people to start posting without lurking. if before, most of the people who came here to see the answer to one of the questions simply left, now we see most of these people drop by some other portion of the forum and leave a stupid comment, or start a pointless thread, often ignoring all rules of the community.

They could always register without posting.

But fair play to you, I always did wonder why they hid the posts.

As I suggested on D17, reading those stupid threads is non-mandatory. Any thread that doesn't have either 'help' or 'problem' in it's thread and isn't made by a respected forumer could be safetly ignored.
Of course, there is the four or five people who post in those threads anyway, but nearly all of them are only inexperienced newbies, and shooing them away won't get more respectable people in the end.

As I suggested on D17, reading those stupid threads is non-mandatory. Any thread that doesn't have either 'help' or 'problem' in it's thread and isn't made by a respected forumer could be safetly ignored.
Of course, there is the four or five people who post in those threads anyway, but nearly all of them are only inexperienced newbies, and shooing them away won't get more respectable people in the end.

Yes, I guess, but that doesn't mean we should keep those threads and/or let stupid people continue to post them and in them.

I'm not sure how you could do it without banning and without starting some sort of really complex karma system.

Yes, I guess, but that doesn't mean we should keep those threads and/or let stupid people continue to post them and in them.

I'm not sure how you could do it without banning and without starting some sort of really complex karma system.
I think the most efficient way of doing it would be by removing the feature of being able to register at all.
That's what everyone wants, right? No newbies at all?

They could always register without posting.
that would be rational, yes. only people generally aren't. what stops most people who accidentally stumbled onto the forum from posting a 'hello, i'm new' thread in every sub-forum is the hassle of registering. if you force people to register to find solutions to their problems, that barrier is now gone.

that would be rational, yes. only people generally aren't. what stops most people who accidentally stumbled onto the forum from posting a 'hello, i'm new' thread in every sub-forum is the hassle of registering. if you force people to register to find solutions to their problems, that barrier is now gone.
While that might be, most of the stupid topics here aren't introductions, but genuine topics that have been done a thousand times over. And these generally aren't threads that are made "just while I'm here..."

what is squirminators problem? I'm glad he took my advice and hs taken a break from this website. He seems to think that I am to blame for team17's demise. He seems to think that he never does or says anything untoward but he often gets angry. For instance the whole fiasco about stating wether people have a psp or ds version. Often he would get angry and ask what version of WOW2 they had when they didn't state it, then when they said what version they had he wouldn't answer their query.

I said the removing the quit option would reduce quitters, which he has huge problem with and still insists that i say removing it would eliminate quitters when i have not said this once!

Also that stupid remark about the queens english being the root of english spoken in the world today being false. Okay then mr smart alec if english from ENGLAND isn't the root of what is spoken around the english speaking world then what is? Pakistan?

I don't think this forum is degrading at all, ok i haven't been here long but its far better than most drivel on the net and if forums get bad moderators soon sort that out, which i fear they may do with this post as it seems saying anything bad about squirminator is not allowed here.

(look i even have what version of wow2 i have on my signature squirminator!)

what is squirminators problem? I'm glad he took my advice and hs taken a break from this website. He seems to think that I am to blame for team17's demise. He seems to think that he never does or says anything untoward but he often gets angry. For instance the whole fiasco about stating wether people have a psp or ds version. Often he would get angry and ask what version of WOW2 they had when they didn't state it, then when they said what version they had he wouldn't answer their query.

I said the removing the quit option would reduce quitters, which he has huge problem with and still insists that i say removing it would eliminate quitters when i have not said this once!

Also that stupid remark about the queens english being the root of english spoken in the world today being false. Okay then mr smart alec if english from ENGLAND isn't the root of what is spoken around the english speaking world then what is? Pakistan?

I don't think this forum is degrading at all, ok i haven't been here long but its far better than most drivel on the net and if forums get bad moderators soon sort that out, which i fear they may do with this post as it seems saying anything bad about squirminator is not allowed here.

(look i even have what version of wow2 i have on my signature squirminator!)

I really don't see where Squirminator2K has ever yelled or hated you. and maybe he didn't answer the persons questions because he didn't know them. Don't you think you're being a little harsh?

I think the most efficient way of doing it would be by removing the feature of being able to register at all.
That's what everyone wants, right? No newbies at all?

Every good forum member starts from somewhere.

by forcing people to register to view the forum

I never understood why they forced people to join in order to look at posts.

Look, as Melon said, it's an inevitability. Eventually, nobody will know anybody and it will be just a proving ground for spambots. The 'core' of the forum will collapse and cause a humongous Red Giant effect that will destroy the forum and cause the demise. What's left afterwards? Well, since I'm comparing it to astronomy, a white dwarf would be next, but that wouldn't make much sense, would it?

I think I just confused myself into a corner there. Help! :p

I really don't see where Squirminator2K has ever yelled or hated you. and maybe he didn't answer the persons questions because he didn't know them. Don't you think you're being a little harsh?



Every good forum member starts from somewhere.



I never understood why they forced people to join in order to look at posts.

pieman280 it doesn't matter if he doesn't know the person, what he did was just plain unhelpful. The newbie asking a simple innocent question probably didn't know squirminator either! I'm being harsh? I understand that he tries to keep the community running but i actually think that his efforts are counterproductive sometimes, he takes this worms community thing WAAAY to seriously. (When all the matters is the worms games themselves.)

Haven't you ever wondered why Dream17 has so few members and posters?

I think the most efficient way of doing it would be by removing the feature of being able to register at all.
That's what everyone wants, right? No newbies at all?

Yeah, maybe, we haven't been getting very good ones

Maybe start newbies off on a trial period where if they post family guy references and image macros they would be banned. That would be freakin' sweet!

I am not the oldest of forumers, infact I was around during the first spurt of new forumers. I had wanted to display my art to get it on the W3D website, and decided to stick around. I had been playing since worms 2 came out with a 4 game pack. I think Hasbro made it or something. The forum since then had begun filling with people that think they can just act like mods or the coolest people in the world, without even getting to know us first. The latest spurt of newbies, so far, has to be the worst.

This does not go only for this forum, either. It seems that moody and uneducated 13 year old (even though I am 13, I don't consider myself uneducated) kids are taking over wormnet. It seems to me that the world is slowly becoming more and more retarded, and it will end up like that one movie where they water plants with gatorade type drinks.

I might have yelled at S2K before, but now I am really seeing what he means.

pieman280 it doesn't matter if he doesn't know the person

When I said "them" I meant the question. sorry, I really should have said that better.

So what I meant to say is that maybe he just doesn't know the answer to the question.

Also that stupid remark about the queens english being the root of english spoken in the world today being false. Okay then mr smart alec if english from ENGLAND isn't the root of what is spoken around the english speaking world then what is? Pakistan?
Yeah dude I think it's obvious indeed that the queen invented english.
That queen is really good at inventing languages. :cool:

maybe he made a mistake and talked to the wrong person :p

When I said "them" I meant the question. sorry, I really should have said that better.

So what I meant to say is that maybe he just doesn't know the answer to the question.

Thank you SO much for acknowledging that post I spent about 20 minutes thinking about and writing down. I mean, Jeez.

Thank you SO much for acknowledging that post I spent about 20 minutes thinking about and writing down. I mean, Jeez.

:( I was just pointing out to wave that I meant the questions, I still read your post.

Considering there's already been a heap of post reports about off-topic nonsense in this thread, I think I can safely say this thread has served its purpose...


*Thread closed*