How can we contribute to the Launchbox Games Database? Beta & Moderator Signups!

[DudeManL57]

I would love help contribute and moderate.

[wkLeon]

I'd love to test out editing the database, especially dealing with conflicting image uploads. (I've seen people upload transparent logos as front boxes at the other site, and like to see how to solve those types of problems).

[Hexxxer]

I would love to help out. I've contributed alot of higher quality stuff to the GamesDB as well as the cover project over the years.

[JourneyOver]

For submissions and moderation you can count me in. Contributed a lot to gamesDB in the past and still do whenever I can so would love to do so here as well along with helping make the database the best that I can.

[im4potato]

I am also interested in helping out with moderation of content. I contributed quite a bit to thegamesdb and I'd like to help out here as well. I love the website, definitely a lot more modern and clean than the thegamesdb. I'd also like to talk about the idea of submission guidelines and consistency, which has generally been lacking on similar sites.

[SentaiBrad]

im4potato said I am also interested in helping out with moderation of content. I contributed quite a bit to thegamesdb and I'd like to help out here as well. I love the website, definitely a lot more modern and clean than the thegamesdb. I'd also like to talk about the idea of submission guidelines and consistency, which has generally been lacking on similar sites.

We'll address all of that when we are ready to start the testing.

[Jason Carr]

Thanks all. @im4potato, I'm planning to implement a community moderation strategy. Here's what I'm thinking: - In order to add games or submit any changes, you'll need to create an account (of course). Users who create an account will immediately be able to submit changes for moderation. - Once you submit your changes, all changes are put into a moderation queue. No changes are made to the site until they've been approved by at least three moderators. - You'll be able to become a moderator only after you've successfully submitted and have been approved for changes or additions to a certain number of games. Once you prove that you're submitting useful data, you'll be approved as a community moderator. I think this should work well. It'll take some development magic, and obviously will require a good group of moderators to keep things going, but I think our community here is large enough and committed enough to handle the load. I am still open to suggestions though. :)

[releasethedogs]

I have added a bunch of data where missing to obscure games from japan in both japanese and translations where available. I'd like to help on the beta team also.

[im4potato]

Hi Jason, nice to get a reply straight from the top. Those rules seem like they would be very effective, but like you said would require a good group of mods to maintain. I do want to elaborate on what I was talking about regarding submission guidelines though, because I think they could be just as important as having a good mod team. In my opinion, there were quite a few issues with the consistency of the content submitted to thegamesdb, such as: 1. Lots of duplicate or hacked titles cluttering up the database. 2. A very broad range of quality for the box art. I realize that it's not always possible to get a totally clean scan, but the quality of some of the images was just terrible. 3. No set resolutions for box art. Having consistently sized images is the first step towards having a decent set of box art. The size could be chosen based on the physical dimensions of the systems original box and some PPI value. 4. This is probably my biggest issue with the other databases. The game descriptions need to come directly from the maker of the game, and in the case of boxed titles, it should be the text directly from the back of the box. There are so many games listed in other databases that have descriptions that sound like someone casually talking about it to a friend, instead of the colorful, entertaining language that's usually on the back of a box. That's most of what I can think of off the top of my head, I'm sure you've already thought about some of these problems. At the end of the day, I'd really just like to see a database that had a higher focus on quality. PS. LaunchBox on Linux would sure be nice!

[Jason Carr]

I'm with you, @im4potato. We do have to keep in mind that we're starting with all of the data from TheGamesDB, so right out of the gate we'll unfortunately have the same quality issues. That said, going forward, we can strive to improve the quality significantly. Would you like to put together a set of submission guidelines to post on the site? Then we can work through them as a community, but it'd be good to get a good starting point going.

[Tognee]

I would like to help with game informations for the database. I have a lot of old games so I might be helpfull

[Shades2585]

I would like to contribute as well. I have a few suggestions: I think it would be good to have suggested and supported emulators. This way your tool could recommend the suggested first. Since you have a Dos and Windows division I think you should remove the PC division or you could merge them and call it PC: MS-DOS, PC: Windows 3.1, etc. On the PC side of things I think http://pcgamingwiki.com has a good start of things to add. I really like the idea of linking to the respective GOG, Steam, etc. websites so people can purchase them. Adding known version might be helpful. ie v1.11 Supported hardware would be a good idea. I don't know if it is possible but say there is a Sound card category. If you click the "edit" link for the sound card you would be given a list of all known sound cards. You then select all the desired sound cards and click save and it only shows the selected sound cards. Just an idea. I know it is complex though. Keep up the great work. :D Sincerely, Shades

[hubz]

I'd like to join and help out in filling out information. Also I've been slowly scanning lots of Japanese games I have (Mainly Famicom Disk System) in high quality to help with projects like this. You can check those out at - www.gamingalexandria.com Thanks! - Hubz

[CliveBarker]

The only issue about having a strict quality control about the box art quality is that it could lead to have a lot of games without box art (since a lot of box art are awful at TGDB). So here is my question: Do you people prefer to have something bad or nothing at all? Like if there is a submission(OF A GAME THAT IS NOT ALREADY IN THE DATABASE) with a low resolution box art, is the whole entry going to be rejected? Or only the box art will be? My solution to this issue is the following: Accepting the submission but labeling the entry with a special tag "Could be improved" (The text can be different) Making a special filter in order to be able to browse through games with this tag so users can improve the entry. Or alternatively; accepting good quality custom made(non official) box art. I have made some high resolution box art for games that I can't simply find the official box art. The problem with this approach is that it could lead to problems between the ones whom approve or disapprove the entry and the ones that submit it. Since "good quality" could be a very subjective term specially in creative areas; the user can argue against the final decision leading to possible forum threads and rants.

[Jason Carr]

Great idea, @CliveBarker. I agree that a "could be improved" signifier would be useful. I'd prefer not to resort to fan-made box art (outside of creating a category specifically for it); I'd rather just use the best quality available. That said, there is a lot you can do with bad scans to fix them up in Photoshop.

[SentaiBrad]

Shades2585 said I would like to contribute as well. I have a few suggestions: I think it would be good to have suggested and supported emulators. This way your tool could recommend the suggested first. Since you have a Dos and Windows division I think you should remove the PC division or you could merge them and call it PC: MS-DOS, PC: Windows 3.1, etc.

Yea, PC will be divided so that DOS isn't in PC. We've talked about that a lot actually. Also, LaunchBox already suggests emulators we recommend, but I do think that this needs to get modified and refreshed a bit. Not only are some newer emulators out and better, some systems don't have them and now need them, and also it's a bit strict in what it suggests so I think it needs revamping a bit.

[releasethedogs]

Something I'd like to see is better sorting genres. I import games all the time and there is "action adventure", "Action Role-Playing", "Action Puzzle". This should be "Action", "adventure", "role-playing" all separate and you can check multiple boxes. Also a consensus on therms would be good too. Is it Platform, Platformer or Platform game? I see similar things with shooting games with half a dozen takes on the same term

[SentaiBrad]

They're all valid and as time goes on and genre's get mixed and obscured it changes what we call older games too. There's no AP Style Writing guide for game names or genre's. We'll probably come up with something more concrete so there isn't 80 different genre fields and half of them mean the same, but it's all a matter of opinion so what we choose someone else might think it should be different.

[releasethedogs]

Why would we have a listing for "action adventure", "action" and "adventure" when we could just have "action" and "adventure" and it accomplishes the same thing.

[SentaiBrad]

Because an Adventure game is not the same as an Action Adventure game. An adventure game would be something more like Monkey Island, and Action Adventure would be Uncharted. Point and Click Adventure is certainly more descriptive though, as is Text Adventure. There is also Puzzle Adventure like The Witness though too. So modifiers on the genre's can help, certainly it's not easy and is very complicated so I think GamesDB went for more simplified terms.