It’s been a while now since we last had a major update to the site, 5 years to be exact. We are finally ready to push the next site update and we are aiming for a launch mid December. Before that we need some help with breaking stuff so we are opening up beta versions of all 5 newsboiler sites today so that we can do some stress testing and sort out the last bugs. So for those interested in helping out, or just want to see how the new site is turning out you can access the beta at
http://beta.n4g.com
Login: You current N4G account
The new site works a bit differently from today's site. Here are some of the changes and improvements that the new site will have.
- Front page and its algorithm is completely redone. The default front page is now similar to today's tabloid mode. Instead of having a “stale” top list and a stream of latest news the front page is now much more dynamic. This makes it feel more fresh and up to date and will make it easier to get to the interesting stuff right away. The new algorithm focuses on the stories that has the most momentum. The story cards are dynamic and will change size according the live activity in the story. When a story gets less activity they will go back to normal size. Since the algorithm in the beta pulls its data from the current site that uses a different layout it won't work properly until we switch all traffic over to the new site.
- Content navigation is much easier and on articles pages we have added fully native navigation of related articles under the story.
- Pending stories are now featured around the site to help with the flow of approved articles.
- Content from the other NB sites is better featured and has more powerful navigation
- Submitting process is now a lot faster and with better UX
- Site search is finally useful
- User blogs and reviews are now featured in the main news feed. Temp to these will be added soon. We are also working on a new submission form for these so that one can make a blog post look much better than today.
- Better looking improved public profiles for users.
- Improved PM system
- The sites are finally mobile friendly. It’s not the best user experience at the moment but updates will be pushed soon to improve that.
With this beta build we are testing the core loop. There are a lot of new features that are still in development that will be roled out in coming weeks and months. We are now moving to continues delivery instead of pushing big updates like we have done in the past. Colors and graphics will be updated before launch to make the sites shine a bit more.
Here are some of the stuff we are working on that will be added to the site in the near future.
- Dynamic PopUp Cards: On the home page there will be cards that pops up when a big game is getting a lot of reviews showing the current meta score, number of reviews and they will expand in size according to how many reviews are submitted. These cards can be used for anything really. Under E3 they could show all available live streams, or be a news ticker showing all incoming E3 news. They will help make the site feel more alive and dynamic. These will be automatically triggered when a certain tag gets a high amount of heat in a short period.
- Improving the algorithm of the front page. We will work on balancing the algo to get a good mix of news, media, articles and user content.
- Real time temp signs, updating without having to reload page.
- The ability to “boost” the temp of articles and comments. A limited number of boosts will be available each day for each user to give this feature some real value.
- The approval process will be improved but we are still working on how this should be done. So we are keeping it as it is for now. We will go over all guidelines and site rules to update these to make things a bit easier for everybody.
- Choose between grid and list view for the news feed. The grid will still be default but users who prefer a list view can save this so it becomes their default rendering. You will be able to set hottest or latest instead of featured as default, this also goes for story types.
- At the moment the beta still pulls data from the backend of the current sites. This will affect the content that is displayed when navigation around the site, like a lot less stories will show up from the archive when browsing content for a specific tag than we have in the database. When we move to the new backend all stories will be easily accessible (all 2 000 000! )
You might wonder how we managed to spend 5 years on this update. I can reveal there is one really big feature (and that is an understatement) to the new newsboiler platform that can take most of the blame for the big delay. We will reveal more about this when we do the full launch next month :)
Oh, and all data in the beta is live data. So all your actions will be reflected on N4G.com. If you find bugs please use the feedback label on the right side of the screen. Thanks!
Wonder's role as Persona 5: The Phantom X's protagonist has thrust him into the spotlight, and there are clear parallels to the original's hero Joker.
The Xbox version of Final Fantasy XVI has failed to enter the platform's top 20 paid games list, indicating weak launch sales performance.
Day One Release vs One year later release with zero marketing to build excitement/hype.
Both Xbox and SE should know better.
Also fewer than half the consoles sold compared to the PS5 so much smaller customer base.
I get that the game was older.
But so were Sea of Thieves and Forza Horizon when they came to playstation and those made it into the top download lists for awhile. So the coming a year later excuse doesn't really fly anymore.
look at stellar blade on PC. over a year later and it's already sold over a million copies. this has nothing to do with marketing or hype. the xbox audience, broadly speaking, just doesn't purchase games.
Excuses lol. Everyone already knew this would be the case. 90% of Xbox players don't buy games.
If it ain't on gamepass, they ain't interested.
Great job MS for training most of your player base to not want to actually buy games, maybe SE will realise releasing FF on xbox isn't somehow going to help them match their exaggerated sales targets. Hopefully remake fairs better, probably will on Switch 2 at least.
You realize it got most of its sales on PS5 right? Not even the PC version did all that well. One platform will take most of the sales as it had moat of the hype.
No game, especially a AAA one, deserves strong sales after taking years to arrive on a platform and still asking the same price as everywhere else. You can’t just ignore a platform for that long and then expect people to be excited by the release. That cycle came and went already, there is no hype for it anymore.
Either you're all in from the start or you're not. This lazy, bare-minimum approach of tossing out a late port and calling it a day shouldn't be rewarded. If you're not willing to respect the platform, don't bother showing up at all.
But the formerly exclusive Xbox games like Forza Horizon enjoyed great sales on PS even after years past their initial release.
Your references to deserving and "shouldn't be rewarded" implies that gamers are buying games based on some moral platitude that simply doesn't exist in practice.
Gamers buy games because they want to play them.
Nah, it implies how it should be. If gamers weren't the dumbass consumer class around, being played like freaking dumbass because they can't get over the hype for a freaking second and think if that purchase even make sense.
This is EXACTLY why they wouldn't and shouldn't bother im the first place. I can't remember which FF game launched on Xbox with the Switch and Playstation version and ONLY did 4% sales on Xbox. So lets not pretend these sales would have been better because if you believe that you are absolutely delusional
"Either you're all in from the start or you're not. This lazy, bare-minimum approach of tossing out a late port and calling it a day shouldn't be rewarded. If you're not willing to respect the platform, don't bother showing up at all."
Weird. How come you don't say the same about Xbox studio games that show up some YEARS/DECADES later as well?
Sea of Thieves
Grounded
Forza Horizon 5
Pentiment
Hi Fi Rush
Gears of War
Mostly at full price and selling well. Oh right doesn't fit your BS narrative
Survival Kids tries and fails to rekindle an old Konami franchise by bringing it to the Switch 2, but ends up leaving it stranded and to fend for its own.
Looking forward to testing out the new site!
Can't seem to click on any news without being re-routed to the beta login page (or login anymore, so can't report via feedback).
I'm curious as to how the comment system has or will change. The bubble system aside, will comments still be sorted by Time, as in the people who post first always remain at the top? It seems a bit counter-intuitive, as dozens of worthwhile comments are buried at the bottom or on the second page onwards, while a very large comment thread goes on to the point where you can't even reply to the comments anymore and have to resort to replying to yourself.
I like the style of it so far, one thing though. It should be a requirement to submit articles with higher resolution thumbnails, the lower res ones look god awful in the new layout.
One thing I really like with it is the comment system, no bubbles and being able to sort comments based on age/rating is nice.
" - The sites are finally mobile friendly. It’s not the best user experience at the moment but updates will be pushed soon to improve that. "
I think that is a bit of an issue here, it seems you fellas focused more on Mobile users than PC users.
Maybe it will grow on me later on but for now, i have to say i like this one more.
And are you getting rid of the bubble system with the new update?
I like this one better. I'm a mobile user myself and that site dosent work for me :/
Plus, the current one is easier to navigate through. :)