Lazlo Falconi : I'll have to be brief with your response (as in only spend a half hour as opposed to many hours) because I don't have a lot of time on my hands so even if I don't respond to everything you said, I did read it all and I do appreciate the support.

I've created a ton of features over the past few months and over the past year and those features aren't quick and simple to make, especially if they're to be done the right way. When I create features, I optimize them the best I can, I fully secure them and I give them plenty of options. Things don't seem like they would take a lot of time to program until you get into them. I doubt you're around enough to see all of the features and updates I constantly make. I don't need to convince you that I'm spending my time on this site in ways that I think will be beneficial.

I wouldn't say that the site is failing. Sure it's traffic isn't nearly where it use to be but it's still getting 30,000+ people a day which is way more than what most sites get on the internet.

My portfolio is this site though. Almost this entire site is custom coded by me and that should be enough proof that I'm more than qualified to create any site or any feature for a site that a client would want.

The reason that this site looks outdated is because this site initially launched 12+ years ago and any time I try to change it a little, users get real upset so that kinda holds me back from doing serious graphical updates to this site. Instead I've been working on doing small updates here and there until the site eventually gets to a point where it looks more modern. If I completely change it overnight, I completely risk losing most of the active users.

I actually do own a house and this site was actually bringing a ton of money up until 3 years ago so that proves that I'm capable of acquiring success but so many people have wanted to see this site fail so hard, many of them actually making attempts at making it fail by DDoS attacking it, hacking it, etc that I've struggled to recover from those things. Also, as I mentioned before, I have more competition than I did in the past which is why I've been expanding the site in different directions over the past year or so.

My kids are well fed, I prioritize them over me. The site is still bringing in a full time income but the problem is that my wife and I have a lot of bills. My wife is a stay at home Mom since day care would cost more than what she'd make. So what this means is that in order for me to provide, I have to make up for her lack of income. If I ditched this site and got a job (assuming it was a factory job), I would still not be making enough to provide so my only hope at this point is either land a job that pays real well, get a great amount of freelance work or try and prevent this site from losing any more traffic (which I've actually been somewhat successful with over the past few weeks).

The newsletter isn't my big plan but it's one of my plans. Seriously, have you seen how many users are signed up to this site? A good enough newsletter being sent out to 500,000+ users can definitely help.

Targeting an older audience just means I'd be promoting different games within the RGR throughout the internet as part of my advertisement campaigns.

I would create a script that keeps track of the patrons and manually remove them when they discontinue.

I'm not sure why that site says the site should be earning that much but 2 reasons why the site isn't earning as much as it could be with the current traffic flow: 1. A lot of users use either mobile devices or had ads blocked which really hurts (which are both a huge increase over the past few years) and 2. I don't flood the site with ads like a lot of sites do.

I do appreciate your concern for me but if I didn't think there was anything left to do for this site then I would've ditched it already but I know there's still hope in it to be as big as it once was again.



Lord Leggy - King of IT : He raised some good points but he doesn't know or understand my situation as well as I do. He's looking at the situation as someone who barely uses this site and doesn't see what all takes place.

If I can't land freelance work or if the site doesn't pick up financially by the end of the month, I told my wife that I'll be applying at the nearest factory here in town. Doing so will mean I'd be working 36 hours there (it'd be three 12 hour shifts but it pays 40) and 10-20 on here.

I'm sorry you had to go through that. Trust me though, I'm nowhere near a deadbeat and I would never let myself get to that point.

The thing that made you rich is now holding you down. What am I talking about here? The hosting fees that it costs to host all those rom files. It's probably time to ditch them and you'll save $1000 a month on your hosting bill. Traffic will drop but at the end of the day if you are losing money on it then why bother paying such an outrageous fees to run this site? You cannot afford the plugin, you are no longer making decent income on the files, the competition is too great and gaming companies are re-releasing old games.

Ads are no longer a reliable source of income for sites such as this especially with millions of people installing ad blocker each year. Income will only get worse from here on out unless you make a drastic change by removing the roms or charging membership fees to only those who want to play them.

This site was never about the RGR anyway (even though it is most of your income), it was a community and always has been first and foremost. It's time to revert back to the good old days and just turn the RGR into an information center. Seriously, people need to go and buy the games if they want it so bad, cheap bastards. Lazlo is right this is not a legit business model, it's illegal and no longer reliable income for your family.

Cut your hosting fees by trashing the rom files and this site will survive on its own, don't and you'll be working a full time job within the next month. My worry is that sooner or later that income from your factory or freelance job will end up having to pay for this site ...then what? Then you are really screwed as it will be taking money away from your family and will become too much of a burden. It's just too much for one person to handle anymore. I know you got staff but I think you may have gone overboard with all the additional features. At this point you are digging a hole for yourself and as Lazlo said those features you make are not really benefiting you financially.

VizzedFan2016 : First of all, I was never actually "rich" from this site but I was at one time making 3 times more than what I am now. Also, I'm not actually losing money by hosting these rom files since these rom files are the biggest source of traffic but I really do agree with you that it might be soon time to get rid of at least the iso files since those are massive and removing them could cut down fees without dropping traffic too much (way more users play the cartridge systems compared to the cd systems).

You're definitely right though, this site was never about the RGR and believe me, I've been trying to expand away from the RGR for a long time so that the site could fully survive without it. I've also considered separating the 2 sites, giving the RGR its own site and then leaving the RGR pages on Vizzed as informative pages as you sorta mentioned. Not only would this no longer put Vizzed in that gray area (which could turn off people from the site) but it'd also mean that I'd qualify for Google Adsense again which is by far the highest paying ad network in the world (2nd closest network probably doesn't even pay half of what Google Adsense does).

Actually some of the features I've made over the past 8 months have helped out the site's traffic a bit. The Video Game Music Room gets around 1500-4000 visits per a day. The Vizzed Market (along with other features that have helped raise the value of Viz) has resulted into a lot more users contributing to the site which ultimately helps draw in traffic from Google. A lot of various updates I've done throughout the entire site over the past 1-2 months has helped increase the site's traffic by around 10,000 visitors over the past month.

But yeah, I agree with a lot of what you said and I'm sure I'll be making some big decisions over the next few months.

I've recently started getting very bad ads around the site. Partial nudity, pop-ups covering the page, text that doesn't belong to any known human language... There are two possible solutions to this issue: you get ads from another network (which only you know if it's a real solution) or I activate adblock. The second one is the easy solution, but I doubt it's the correct solution.

Therefore, I recommend you take down the RGR, and better do it ASAP. We already have "Play Your Games", which is totally legal and allows users to bypass the complications of downloading and setting up an emulator by themselves. You already have a thread with all the details we need to make it work, so we don't need the RGR anymore, we only need the emulators ready to go to easily play the games we "own".

You could start making countdown threads so people is ready to say goodbye to the RGR. Since it will be done in phases for the sheer volume of games, this will give people enough time to prepare to use the "Play Your Games" feature. I honestly doubt we'll see a traffic drop, while games are not ready to go in the loader I bet it's easier to dump roms rather than setting up emulators, so we would still have the complicated work done.

You could also run tests. For example, try to "deactivate" the RGR for a week or two and see how people react to having just "Play Your Games" available. This would give us a hint to see how many users would prefer that feature over a separate site hosting the current RGR.

But really, you cannot allow more vague answers. You don't have "a few months" anymore, your situation is critical and you need quick solutions. Here is the easiest one, which involves only you and Vizzed without relying on third parties or potential clients. If you're going to ditch the RGR, then you must have a clear answer by the end of the month. Either a "yes" or "no", but no more "I'll consider it". Time is not on your side, so sacrifices must be made, and this is the sacrifice most of us would be willing to offer.

EX Palen : I've been trying out another ad network lately so it could be that. If you could provide a screenshot or possibly any other details regarding the ads, that'd help me narrow it down.

Taking down the RGR ASAP is, no offense, a terrible idea. More than 50% of the site's traffic comes because of the Retro Game Room and just cutting it off now would result into the site's traffic and revenue dropping in half. Plus, a lot of users like myself still enjoy using it.

I do see it being a traffic drop because the site received a huge traffic drop after the Nintendo games were removed, even though users can still play those games using the 'Play Your Games' feature.

If I can only give a yes or a no then I'll say no. I already made it clear that I plan to eventually separate Vizzed and the RGR into 2 different sites but at the moment, just dropping the RGR all together would be the worst thing for the site. I wouldn't do this until the site was getting enough traffic without the RGR.

EX Palen : Unfortunately, all ad networks are like that and tend to display irrelevant or inappropriate ads. Switching to another ad network at this point is unproductive for David due to the hassle involved with it and the fact that it would screw up his payout schedule. I use ad blocker myself and don't feel ashamed by it because I never click ads and my pageviews would only be worth a fraction of a penny if anything.

David should remove all the ISO files though as those are just a waste of money to host at this point. Not sure how much extra it cost in hosting fees but removing those alone could very well save him a few hundred dollars. I agree though eventually he should probably remove all the roms here and use them for one of his other sites only.

Davideo7 : I said you were rich simply by looking at your hosting fees. If the average low waged citizen works full time minimum waged job that doesn't add up to $1500 so the fact that you can pay that off tells something. You say your financial situation is really bad but I assure you there are some people here including myself in worse positions. Just know that if worst comes to worst you can get foodstamps and medicaid for yourself and your family as a temp solution while you look for work. You are talented guy so I don't think finding a job will be a problem for you it just sucks though that you are the only one in household who brings in income but I understand your situation.

There are churches who have food banks inside you might want to look it up. You can go each week and the amount of food you get depends on how many people are in your household. I personally would recommend foodstamps, sometimes you get sick from foodbanks because people often donate expired goods so if you go be sure to check the dates on the items.

Davideo7 : While the pop-ups are rare, on my way here I've found these two. I've encountered games with similar "graphics" when doing my Sony Manager role and they weren't "allowed" to be added, so I highly doubt these ads should be displaying.
https://www.dropbox.com/home?preview=Ad+2.jpg
https://www.dropbox.com/home?preview=Ad+1.jpg

I said to take down the RGR for two reasons:

1- Cutting down fees + more potential income from ads: This is the first thing you can think of when you're low on income. Plus, this formula could let you "withstand" a certain drop in traffic, seen as how you were able to make a living years ago without these many users around. If you have several reasons to not do this, then I'll retire back to my cave.

2- Alternatives to the RGR - We currently have "Play Your Games" and our affiliate playromonline. The first was your choice when Nintendo took down their games, but the average user doesn't want to use it because they want a site with the roms already loaded. You could always derive users to playromonline, because the RGR is a lot easier to navigate with the many filters it has, so people would still use the RGR even if they are redirected to an affiliate site.

Of course, my knowledge of this site is like 1% of what you know, but there's one thing bugging me over and over: "things will be done eventually". Critical decisions require critical solutions, so if you have plans to take down or replace the RGR, then they should be your first priority. Time is not on your side, and we're going to the point where the RGR could be closed down because you don't receive enough income anymore, so once again, focus on whatever plans you have for it, for Vizzed's and your own sake.

VizzedFan2016 : I've been here for three years and only now I've started to get these bad ads, so whatever network David was using before definitely had some good taste. And you don't have to click ads, just letting them display helps, and that's why I don't want to use adblock if I can avoid it.

Also, I'm kind of surprised the ISO files would be the first to go down. After all the hype for PSX and Dreamcast and they're the first considered to be sacrificed... We could start with all those games that don't work with the RGR plugin before sacrificing any system that was requested by users to be added.

EX Palen : Removing broken roms is a waste of time and won't solve any urgent financial issue. ISO's are massive in file size which take up bandwidth and disk space. He will be saving hundreds of dollars by doing this and will probably have one less server to worry about. Yes it sucks but he really has no other quick turnaround options here.

Man, this thread is just a physical manifestation of the word pathetic.
The only thing more pathetic than Davideo is the code of his sites and games.

Edit: Gosh darnit guys look at the thread title

Maguc : His "pathetic" site accomplished more then you ever could in real life.

VizzedFan2016 : Of course a newbie would know enough about my life and the site to compare both of them

Maguc :

Dude what the f***.

Maguc : And yet here you are 6 years later.

I'll take the heat for jumping the gun for closing this but it seems like it needs to be done.