I'm slowly getting back into continuing my work on the new site design and code. Today I made a bunch of adjustments to various things which I think will help users navigate the site better.



Search from Navigation Panel
The search in the left navigation column is somewhat functional now. While it still doesn't let you search the entire site or the forum, it does let you search the Retro Game Room, Video Game Room and Memberlist. Simply click the dropdown next to the Search button to specify where you want to search, type in what you want to search for and then click Submit (by default it'll be set to search within the section of the site you're on). No matter what page you're on (as long as it's been migrated to the new site), you'll be able to search different sections of the site quickly from the navigation search.

I noticed a lot of users were actually using that search without realizing that it doesn't work so I had to give it some sort of functionality until I can get around to putting together a more powerful site search feature. It should also help users find stuff on the site.


Search from Game Pages
I've added a basic version of the search box that appears on the index and search pages of the RGR and VGR to the game pages of the RGR and VGR. It appears right below the graphics section on the VGR game pages but by default it doesn't appear on the RGR game pages. Once you've clicked 'PLAY GAME' on an RGR game page, then it'll appear right below the 'PLAY GAME' area. It lets you search for games, specify which game systems to search for and provides links to each additional available system. It also provides a link to the game browser page and the system browser page.

The reason I didn't make it appear by default on the RGR pages is because there's already a lot going on with those pages and I didn't want to add anything that would push all of the content on the page down any further, especially the ad since that would drop ad revenue. Plus I figured that a user probably isn't going to be interested in searching for a game until they've played the current game.

Hopefully this new update encourages users to continue searching for more games to play after they've finished playing their current game. A lot of people land on the site on a game page and may not even know about or ever see the RGR or VGR index search so adding a search to the game pages themselves could get those users to stick around on the site longer.


Link Adjustments
The green box links that appear toward the top of every page have been organized a little bit better. The parent link displays first and is highlighted letting you know where on the site you are and giving you easy access to go "up" a directory. These links, and the links in the Navigation column, are now in alphabetical order.

Hopefully this helps users make sense of the site's navigation and helps them find what they're looking for without getting lost on the site.


Other Adjustments
I've done a ton of other little things here and there, most not worth mentioning but I'll briefly mention the things that are.

I've removed the 'Top Genre' section of the 'Retro Game Room' box on the index page of the site and replaced it with a 'Top Pages' section which provides links to the Netplay Lobby, Stream page and Rom Hacks in the RGR.

I'm currently experimenting with some new ads. You can read more about what I did earlier today here.

I added a link to the Game Streamers page with the rest of the primary links on the RGR index and search pages.

Slightly lightened the color of links, hopefully they grab a little more attention without being annoying.



If anyone has any questions or suggestions regarding these updates, please let me know.

It was brought to brought to my attention by gamerforlifeforever2 that the search bar coding is messed up. I'm assuming this was from when you recently coded the widgets stuff.

The search bar in the left navigation pane works like it should, but the other search bar in the center of the page redirects to a 'multiple choices' error page.

tRIUNE : It should be fixed now. Thanks for letting me know.

That may have been broken for up to 10 days which is when I did these updates. That may also explain the slight traffic drop lately.