WOAH THE WEBSITE LOOKS DIFFERENT (again)

Yup. With the new year comes a new visual direction for the site., and (hopefully) this one will last for a while. This change has been in the works for some time now. I’m going to take some time to talk about the major changes here.

Content First

First and foremost, the redesign for the main page puts an emphasis on the amount of content that fbb has to offer.

I’ve said time and time again that the focus of this site is on high-quality articles and tutorials, and the design is meant to emphasize that. The bulk of the content on this site is NOT intended to be consumed like typical blog content: pixel art tutorials or articles about game design will always be relevent, not blog posts that should be cycled through and ignored after they’ve had their time at the top of the front page. In theory, the new design for the main page should help users discover the vast amount of topics that I have to offer. This website showcases a LOT of articles and tutorials that I’ve written over the years, and I think that the new look of the front page helps users unserstand that.

I’ve also removed the forums (not that anybody used them, haha) and other things (nobody ever submitted any content, so the “submit content” page is gone. It still exists if you know the URL, though ;) ). Fbb is never going to be some sort of place for social gathering, and the new design puts the focus on what the site IS: my collection of quality articles and tutorials for game designers and game artists.

In a way, the redesign is focused on making the site both more AND less self-focused. I hope that makes sense. :P

Blog Section

As a counterpoint to the above, the blog section of the site now has more prominence. In the past, I’d primarily used this category to provide short updates on the state of the website, but those posts were hidden in the sidebar and often ignored.

One thing that a blog section offers is the opportunity for posts that aren’t as deeply thought-out as the full articles. I often have thoughts and ideas on subjects (game design, art, and plenty of other topics), that I think that fbb’s audience will find interesting. But most of the time, these thoughts aren’t worth a full article. An example of this is the more recent blog post On Hearthstone’s UI. The post shares some thoughts and insights that I came to while playing Hearthstone. Not worthy of a full article (at least not yet), but worth sharing. I plan to make use of the blog section for more posts like this in the future.

And because the blog section naturally has a more personal nature, I can also use it to share pieces of things that I’m working on, like the recent post that showcases the map that I created for the City of Prosper.

In theory, this means that the site should begin to have more frequent, smaller updates in the blog section. It should help provide a balance to the article content, which admittedly takes a LOT more time to create.

State of the Podcast

You’ll see that the podcast section on the front page has moved to a small section underneath the other content. :(

We’re TECHNICALLY between “seasons”. As I’ve said a bunch of times to people who have asked, it’s been very difficult for us to set up a regular recording time, now that our hosts have new jobs and schedules and whatnot. I very much want to continue with the podcasts, but it will probably be some time before we can commit to a regular schedule again. For this reason, I’m calling this extended break a hiatus between seasons. When we’re able to produce regular podcast episodes again, I’ll announce the second season and move the content to a more prominent section of the main page.

Other

Of course, as with any major redesign, there might be some little errors. If you find any broken links or strange visual glitches, PLEASE LET ME KNOW. Over the next few weeks, I plan to take the time to look at and clean up some pages or older articles. If you spot anything that seems broken, bring it to my attention. The quicker that I can fix this stuff, the quicker I can get back to creating new content.

Thanks all. I hope you enjoy the new layout, and I hope it makes it easier for you (and for new users) to find the content that fbb provides.

Let’s have a strong 2015