Dark Whispers 360 Turns 2 Today
Its hard to imagine that DW360 is now 2 years old.. For most people it will be even harder to imagine due to the current state we are in. Considering after the achieving, the site looks virtually dead (no pun intended).
I hope this current situation will be remedied soon, As yours truly is currently hunting down a new place to call home.. I could go into details, but that would turn this happy moment into some Emo Myspace page. Instead.. Lets take a look at where we started and a glimpse towards what we have for the future (What? You thought I was spending all this time giving my fiancee piggy back rides?).
In the beginning.. A concept
When first starting Dark Whispers 360, The original goal was to create a community site for the Gothic gamers. With a sea of various sites catering to specific groups, I have yet to run into a dedicated site for those with a taste of the morbid. Although I had ties to a few well known community sites, There was this sence of being alone in a crowd. Once the concept was put into action I tried to search for other like minded people to help in the project. I even went so far to approach some of the night clubs up here in the New England area for collaborations. But despite a high level of interests.. All the plans fell apart. Which was sad, for even Voltaire (A singer - songwriter - stop motion animator) was showing some interests in this little project.
Conformity - The best of times, and the worst of times..
Most people will be familiar with this time period. It was when we did our whole Halo 3 Legendary Edition giveaway. Using a new software platform that expanded our possibilities, I attempted to discard most of the previous ideas and run a bit more mainstream. Exploring not only new avenues on delivering content, but also the way members can interact with each other. Despite a lot of growing pains during the before mentioned giveaway, We started to hold our own for a bit.. That was until a combination of server and software issues basically shut us down for some time. But even when things where going good. Something felt missing...
You can't keep a dead man down
During the downtime and in need of a more stable working environment, I started to look back on the original idea for DW360. Trying to explore what worked, what failed, and to figure out what was that "missing" piece to the puzzle. While I've basically given the middle finger to the Gothic community aspect, I started to realize one of the reasons I was creating the site in the first place.. Very few sites have delt with the more morbid games.. Vampires, Zombies, or the other various forms of creatures one would associate with the stuff of nightmares. Sure there are a hand-full of dedicated fan sites, But the majority of them are focused on one particular game (if you google Resident Evil Fansite, you would get at least 234,000 hits). Or you find horror movie sites that have a less than stellar games segment. This is the birth of the Horror Game Database, A collection of games covering a wide range of genres, And the refocus of the site.
Here and now..
While the software and server issues have been fixed since August 08, There is still a lot of work that needs to be done. The recent rebuild of the Gallery, and addition of the Video sections are just the tip of the spear (trying to work a stable age gate on the video section was a nightmare all by itself). Soon the updated Database will return with a more user friendly interface, and the Community section will also receive some new perks. I'm also actively looking for a team of people who can help keep the site updated.. Oddly enough, this is harder than one might expect. But its only a matter of time before the site gets back to full speed.
For those who stuck with us durring the hard times.. I thank you. For it was your support and feedback that kept the site alive.
For those new to the site.. Welcome, And I hope you enjoy the ride. Its only going to get better from here.
Comments
You my friend can write,
im gonna turn to you when i gotta write a report :]
Hmmm…Im not sure if im one of the new ones or the old…
But still.
Im here.
And i plan on staying.
Good job with the site so far,
hope you keep it going strong!