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!
NoobFeed editor Jay Claassen writes - One Last Breath looks great from a distance but that notion changes very quickly when you start playing it. There’s endless potential and it needs a ton more polish before it can really take off but even then, there needs to be more intrigue to hold anybody’s attention.
WTMG's Leo Faria: "I tried not to compare South Park: Snow Day to The Stick of Truth and The Fractured But Whole, but considering it is still a sequel of sorts, it’s hard not to feel massively disappointed with this game. We went from gorgeous and hilarious RPGs to a bland, boring, uneventful action roguelike with baffling graphical design choices, underwhelming controls, and an overall gameplay loop you have experienced dozens of times before. The sense of humor alone is not worth the admission ticket. After being given some high quality wagyu from Obsidian Entertainment and Ubisoft San Francisco over the past years, it’s hard to go back to this spoiled truck stop beef jerky."
PC hit Seed of Life is finally coming to consoles, with a release date announced for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation and Xbox.
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. :)