It's worked for us for a good couple of years. Why should we change now when we're still enjoying it?
"If people in here are smart enough to write a 1000 or so words post about how a certain game is l33t, and why some console owners are somehow better than others, then they are smart enough to write a fucking constructive post as well"
Er... if we're smart enough to write a 1000 or so word post which proves what we're saying, how is the not constructive? Just curious because, for example, I write these "review things" sometimes for Martin, as do others on occasion. A review is nothing if not constructive criticism with justification, and I really don't get how applying said writing skill to posts affects things other than further the discussion. Surely a long intelligent post is preferrable to, say, "Yeah, but that game sucks because it has poor graphics" or are we `dumbing down` Emulation 64's boards now? Sorry, we're mostly intelligent people here and we like our discussions how they are.
Incidentally most of these critical posts the `regular`loyal members have been making ARE constructive. We state opinions, observations and offer comments based on personal preference and back it up with facts. Talk of the town has as far back as I can remember always been about debate. What is debate if not that? The boards are becoming exceedingly fragmented as it is lately with all the additions, focusing on narrower subjects such as specific emulators, which are populated with specific groups all the time.
Talk of the town is the best forum for debate since most regular members find there way in here, and saying "ooh, it mentions a game or two - get this in the Gaming forum" misses the point of that. Limiting the audience is a stupid idea really, as I said when I started the SMS thread.
Admittedly this very thread has strayed from the initial debate, but at least it comes along a logical path. If someone posted a thread every time they would stray slightly from the topic, the board would be swamped, nothing would ever get discussed the way it deserves, and boredom with a nice helping of useless, pointless topics would occur. So I think we'll continue our debates, expressing things in detail with word-counts as high as we need to justify what we're saying.
After all, how are we supposed to discuss things otherwise? Go the UK's Official Nintendo Magazine route and simply say "this game rules 'cos the graphics are brill and has wicked gameplay!" (pointless but short), or to actually explain WHY we reached that conclusion which does require word use (sometimes a good read and elaborated)? People may learn something that way, see?
I really don't see how you can criticise long posts of explanation as not being constructive, when the alternative is... short posts where you haven't the chance to explain anything. How would that alternative be more constructive?
The question stands ready...
