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by
Joe - jgand@pcfootball.net
6/28/04
There
are a lot of things that have me excited right now in the world
of gaming. Not just in our little world that is PCFootball.net,
but in the gaming industry in general.
First
off, if any of you have been following the saga that has been
going on in our forums for the past few weeks, you know that
changes are forthcoming. You have already seen some of the
changes in the main website where we are moving towards a new
look for ourselves as part of a reshaping of our image. Now
don’t get me wrong, I like the classic purple and black look
that we had, but there are times when change is inevitable and
sometimes needed.
We
have needed change here at PCFootball.net for some time now, and
it has only been recently that I have finally taken steps to
bring it about.
To
that end, the changes you can expect to see in the coming weeks
are:
-
An
upgrade of our forums to vBulliten 3.0.0 or whatever the
latest version is. We have had this request for some time
now, but I didn’t feel qualified to do it myself for fear
I might screw something up. We are now in the process of
having one of the other owners of this site, who is more
qualified, to do it for us.
-
A
continued re-modeling of the appearance of the site in
general. There are some who feel that the graphatical
background that is currently on the pages is a bit too busy.
I can see that point, and I am open to suggestions for what
kind of background we should have. Wheather it is a graphic
background or a solid color, it should still be something
that isn’t going to hurt people’s eyes.
-
The
site itself should be undergoing some streamlining. Some of
the archived stuff that is on this site might be sent to the
scrap heap. In other words the news archives might be done
away with and some of my past columns might be deleted as a
way of making a break with the past and forging ahead with
our new future.
-
I
will not be the only one with the keys to this place. I have
come to wake up to the harsh reality that I can’t run this
place by myself. So I am asking my partners, BigBaldBen,
Concussion, JStrappe, Phenom, Crewe and Norm to help me out
in anyway they can. Concussion has done a great job
monitoring the UCFL activity (which seems to be the only
activity we have here nowadays), and I think he would make a
good administrator as well. Ben has expressed interest in
helping me re-design the site, and I have sent him a program
which should help him get started. Phenom is the one we have
asked to upgrade the forums, and JStrappe,
Crewe
and Norm are awaiting their tasks for instituting change.
-
We
will be getting back to our roots and expanding our focus.
The reason this place was created was so that PC gamers who
enjoyed football games could have a place to come to where
they could be with other football gamers so they could trade
tips, files and act as a consumer base to get more gaming
companies back into the PC arena when it came to football
games. We would like to get back to that goal, and we would
like to add a few new ones. Since the market for PC Football
is still so limited there is another aspect of gaming that
this site can address. That is the area of how games and
gamers are perceived by the media and the general public.
Whenever
I see an article in my local fishwrap or a story on TV nowadays,
it is generalu talking about how bad video games are and about
how games like GTA:
Vice
City
cause teen-agers to go out into the world and commit violent
crimes. Never mind that studies have shown the exact opposite,
if the lie is told enough times, people start to believe it.
What happens is that people automatically assume that all gamers
play
Vice
City
, so all gamers must therefore be criminals in training.
Personally,
I have never played GTA:
Vice
City
, Mortal Kombat, Doom or Unreal Tournament in my life. They are
just not my cup of tea. I am more likely to play games like
Madden, MVP Baseball, the NHL series and FIFA before I take on
the role of the Master Chief. But I , like so many others, have
been unfairly painted with the same brush that the players of
first-person shooters have. People just assume that all gamers
play violent games, therefore all gamers, wheather they play on
the PC or on a console, are bad people.
That’s
where the new mission of this site comes in. In addition to
promoting football games for the PC and working towards bringing
more football games to that platform, we would also like to work
towards getting the truth about games and gamers out towards the
general public and the mass media. We would like to tell the
truth about ourselves and the games we play so that all of the
negative stereotypes about us that have been around since the
shooting at
Columbine
High School
can finally be put to rest.
We
would like to say to the general public “we are not all
jobless slackers who do nothing but play video games by day,
spongue off of our parents and imitate our favorite video games
by commiting crimes at night. We are well-adjusted, happy,
productive adults who have jobs and families who happen to enjoy
gaming as a hobby. Some of us are lucky enough to have a career
in the video game industry, and we do not go around encouraging
young people to play games that they shouldn’t.”
In
order to do that and in order for that message to have weight,
we must change ourselves as posters on the forums. As I said in
one of my posts, we have too many people from the outside
already taking shots at us and holding us up as an example of
why gamers are such bad people. We don’t need to be fighting
amoungst ourselves. We need to be fighting the real enemy of
gamers everywhere – ignorance.
That
was why I started writing my book, to fight the ignorance that
so many people still have about us and the games we play. To
give people an insiders look into the world of video games so
that they don’t have to be so afraid of it. I think that is
the main reason that some people attack us, its because they are
afraid of us and they don’t understand us. The book is my way
of saying “calm down, its okay, let me explain to you what the
gaming world is all about, here is what you need to know.” It
will be a way of de-stigmitising us in the eyes of the world,
hopefully. And maybe, just maybe, video games won’t be seen as
a “childs play-thing” anymore.
Now
I know that some people out there are not going to be happy
about that message. Groups like Mothers Against Videogame
Addiction and Violence, for example. This is a group that, from
what I can tell, would like to ban videogames altogether and
criminalize anyone who plays them. I say good luck ladies, it is
now a $10 billion industry that shows no signs of slowing down.
In
order to get this message out, we need to do some networking. We
need to get the video gaming media on our side and listening to
what we have to say. We need to get the attention of outlets
like g4TechTV, PC Gamer, Computer Gaming World and Electronic
Gaming Monthly. We need to set a positive example in our posts
because anybody can come in and read what we write, so spamming,
flaming and talking smack about other sites isn’t going to
help this cause. We need to be the one thing that our critics
are accusing us of not being – adults.
Eventually
our scope may expand to include not only how PC Gamers are
perceived, but also how console players are perceived. How do we
do this? Well, it may involve aligning ourselves with some
gaming sites out there that mostly talk about console games.
Take a deep breath people, because this may mean having to
initiate a dilog of cooperation with the owners and operators of
MaddenPlanet and MaddenMania. Now I seriously doubt that they
will want to have anything to do with us given our history, but
we should eventually make an effort to extend an olive branch
even if it gets returned to us charred. But as we have all seen,
stranger things have happened. Barring that we can also contact
and promote ourselves to other sites like Gamespot, Gamezone,
1up.com, SportPlanet and the Sports Gaming Network. The list of
possibilities are endless.
Another
thing that will be happening to prove that we are serious about
change: my fellow owners and I will be taking a look at the
rules for posting in our forums again, and we will be re-writing
and clarifying those rules so that everyone will understand just
what is and is not acceptable here. The idea of free speech is
not dead, but as someone pointed out, free-speech without rules
led to anarchy, and no one wants that. We will also be looking
into the possibility of forgiving all bans as a way of starting
over from scratch. Yeah, that means there is a possibility of
GoChiefs and Marshall being able to come back. But let me
emphasise that this is only a possibility at this point, nothing
has been set in stone.
So
I am asking all of you who are registered here and who might not
have been here for a while to come back. Post on our forums and
contribute to the discussions again. Let’s open up some
dialogs again like we used to do “in the good ol days”.
Let’s prove to a skeptical public that we really can change
for the better, and make a difference for all gamers, not just
those who play on the PC. We have forums open that allow you to
talk about your favorite consoles if you wish. Let’s set an
example of everything that is good about gaming.
Our
future is now, because if this place doesn’t change and change
quickly, we might not have a tomorrow. The battle for the
preservation of our hobby has been joined. Let us fight these
battles with common sense, maturity, and above all else respect
for our opponents and allies alike. For that is the way we will
prevail against the poiticians and activists who wish to spoil
our fun. From now on let us act as one voice saying “we are
not dangerous, we are responsible adults who do not need to be
treated as you would treat children. We know the difference
between right and wrong, and we deserve to be looked upon better
than this.”
And
let that be our legacy.
Until
next time…
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