News & Opinion

Life is like a box of chocolate Squigs

Just a little note to apologize to you guys for so few updates lately.  My life, like many of yours is just nuts sometimes.  So while building the new version of Find Gamers I am trying to sell my home and house hunt for a new one.  My wife has also had the kidney stone from the lower planes of hell during this adventure.  So all of that is slowing things down a tinsy bit and naturally it's all my fault.  :-)

Still, if you would like to see some screen shots of the new version (coming soon to a web browser near you), just go over to the Find Gamer's Facebook Page and take a look, I hope you'll be impressed.  The focus is on making the site more feature rich but easier to use.  For instance, there will be Sent Messages so you can easily read messages you've sent to other gamers. 

I've been considering how to add Board & Card games to the site.  Unlike other branches of tabletop gaming, there are thousands of board games out there and it would be impossible to include enough to make folks happy.  But it would be nice to give you guys some options and eventually include a way to search for gamers who enjoy playing them.  So I'll be adding a new section on Board & Card Game Preferences.  Right now I'm considering these preferences: American, European, Dice, Card, City Builder, Cooperative & Competitive.  Any feedback from you on new types of Preferential Categories would be amazing. I look forward to your comments.

One of the other new features I've added for the upcoming FG version are Site Preferences. You'll be able to change the Font Size of the site (great for people with high-res monitors & folks with bad eyesight) and change the main menu styles to accommodate your personal interests. There are also options to control how often you get email notifications about specific things.

Also like the new gaming preferences mentioned above, there will be a new way to expand your Gamer Profile by rating your interests in specific Roleplaying Playstyle Preferences.  Those are things like Sandbox, Casual Gamer and Hack‑n‑Slash.  Only the ones you select interest in will appear in your expanded Gamer Profile.

Major Theme Update

Unfortunately the tools & options I'd like to give Find Gamer users has outgrown the web theme, or the visual layout, for the site. And annoying little bugs are creeping in that are causing problems for IOS 8 users for instance. So I've got a new theme for Find Gamers on the way.

It'll work better with cell phones and tablets, not just desktops. More importantly it'll allow new features and allow me to grow the site allowing more gamers lost in the wilderness to find gamer buddies.

If you are interested in being a beta tester of the new layout as it develops, shoot me a message either here or on Find Gamers.

Some Random Information About Our Users

Back in February the most populous states on Find Gamers were Tennessee, Alabama, Washington, Texas and Colorado.

Ten months later things have changed a bit.  The new top 5 populous states are California, Tennessee, Texas, Washington and Illinois.  Isn't it interesting how 4 of those are the same but have changed places?  It makes me curious why those 4 are still on top.

90.9% of you are using postal codes but only 73.6% of the users are searchable.  Guess some people like to lurk.  :-)  

A surprising 11.2% of you are using my quirky but somehow still functional Facebook signup & login.  I consider you the brave few.

Reize the Little Stuff

Hopefully all of you gamers are having a wonderful early holiday season.  And although it isn't a huge deal, the Gamer Search & News Page(s) have some new buttons that allow you to resize text in those pages.  Just look for the - and + buttons on those pages to reduce or increase the size of the in-page text.  For folks with high-res monitors or over 40 year old eye-sight, you'll probably enjoy this the most.  I'll be adding this feature to other pages like the Convention listing very soon.   

Note:  This news article was for the older website theme.  With the new Find Gamers theme you can change the font sizes for the web site in your Gamer Bio under Basics, Website Configuration.

Gaming Groups Now Available

Hey guys, since we're speedily coasting toward the holiday season.  I'm giving a new gift to Find Gamers users - Gaming Groups.  Now you can build game groups and advertise them along with your own personal Gamer Bio.  As with all new features, please let me know through Feedback if there are problems, bugs or oddities.

To build a new group, click on the user's icon on the right-side menu, it looks like 2 heads.   Then you can click Make a New Group to do that very thing.  From my personal experience, no two groups are the same.  So Find Gamers allows you to rate Roleplaying, Wargaming, Card & Board Games and Larping on an interest scale of 1 to 5 for your group.  Give it a try!

Feedback Captcha Replaced

I've recently had a lot of complaint about the captcha on Feedback and Signup.  But as of right now, the Feedback captcha has been 100% replaced.  The sign-up page is next and should be fixed within the next 24 hours.  I've leave a note here after it's been updated.

Edit:

I've updated the sign-up form too.  Both dice captchas have been replaced.  If you have problems and  all else fails, send an email to support at the findgamers.us website.