Let's Abolish Profanity in Adventure Square/Reform thread

[Zen]

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Instead of abolishing said 'profanities' why not have some person skim the Arena's RPGs once in a while and look out for excessive naughty words? I mean, I thought the whole rule was that profanity would be allowed within boundaries, and yet there is no way to monitor this activity.

I mean, I'm the kinda guy who advocates an author's right to creative freedom, but the example Charles pulled up has merit to it. Putting a little bit of a 'tasteful filter' on the Arena might not be a bad idea in the form of an extra semi-mod or two who can just act as an agent to alert the higher ups of any distasteful language.

Think of Pulp Fiction without curse words. Think of Scarface without the profanity. While the stories could have still been told, alot of the personality behind the characters would have been lost, or atleast not as defined, if the film-regulators decided that cursing was a no-no. Which is why they have ratings boards who regulate that sort of thing.

I don't know exactly how such a feat would be executed, but hey, it's just a suggestion.[/color][/size]

[TheResplendent]

[FONT=Tahoma]It may cause more organization in the eyes of many, but I too think that if what is trying to be fixed here is the overall post quality then there is more to consider. With things being stricter there is also the possibility that people will resort to half-assing their posts and mass inuendo. I have a pretty solid idea on how ratings should be used as I have used the most appropriate ratings for the two RPs I have put up. M for [b]Sinister Nation[/b] and PG for [b]SSBM:R[/b], which describe the max amount of content allowed rather then the min or required.

I agree completely that it's easy for RPs to wear a rating that is not fitting for it's intended content, and that can be quite abused. While this "reformation" of sorts may aim to help that, I'm not so sure about abolishing it completely. [/FONT]

[Redemption]

[size=1]I think that most people relate the ratings to what we see on TV nowdays. Until I read Ozy's post in this thread, I realised that most of my RPGs that I rated with [M], I could have rated with [PG]. Guilty for not reading the ratings sticky properly.

As for the profranity filter, personally, I don't have a problem with it. As other people have mentioned, people who are good posters and only swear when they feel it is necessary to the story wouldn't really have a problem with it.

This discussion is extremely relevant to me at the moment as I'm creating an RPG that contains sexual themes. It is essentially about the relationship between man and woman. I'd like to think that people wouldn't take it too far (graphic sex scenes) but they would have to think outside of the box because of the specific situation that has occured in the storyline.

If the Adventure Square were to be reformed, what would happen to this RPG?

[b]- Redemption[/b][/size]

[Sandy]

Alright, this thread has grown so huge overnight that I really don't know where to begin... Well, everything I say here comes from the experience of nearly four years of OB roleplaying as well as having been a moderator of the respective section for half an year, thus at least skimming through each and every RPG it has gained over that time.

[B]1. Profanity[/B]

The way I see it, despite the fact that everybody uses M-LVS ratings, the amount of actual, offending profanity is very small. Coming from a country with very little censorship (we can actually see naked breasts in daytime shows), my opinion is that profanity is not a problem in Adventure Arena.

Having said that, because the amount of it is so small, I wouldn't really mind if the automatic censoring would be re-established. Now if it would exclude the word a.s.s., I would be perfectly happy (honestly, it's not even a swear word).

[B]2. Ratings[/B]

I don't want to say "I told you so", but when the ratings were first established to give more artistic freedom to roleplayers and writers, and to preserve members who didn't want to deal with such "freedom", I among few others noted that the rating system didn't work the way it was meant to.

The situation was exactly same two years ago: nearly all RPGs are M-LVS, when in fact very few of them would need that rating. After I became a mod, it stopped bothering me, because I understood why everybody used it: to give their game the opportunity to have mature content, even if the initial setting didn't apply it.

Besides, the word mature is misleading, in my opinion. Of course everybody wants a "mature" RPG - who would want to play in an "immature" game anyway? It's sad that both [E] and [PG] ratings got that tag on themselves.

But in my opinion the Arena has worked normally even though the ratings don't mean much - to many they are a necessary evil. I can't think of anything we moderators could've done to further inforce them, really. Lecturing about the proper use of ratings would be very iffy, because like Aaryanna_Mom said, we all have different standards of what's tasteful and what's not.

[B]3. Discontinuing the ratings[/B]

In my opinion this would make very little difference to the quality of the Arena. It would certainly "tidy up" the place, and make it more comforting to the eye without all those [M - GORE SEX GUNS DRUGS VIOLENCE SWEARING HERE!!!] signs (and really, usually those type of RPGs don't contain even half of what it warns about).

[B]4. Adding more ratings[/B]

This is something I wouldn't want to see. If the problem is that most people are using only one of three possible ratings, what's the point of changing that so that most people would be using only one of [I]four to five[/I] possible ratings?

[B]5. Staff should implement ratings to RPGs[/B]

We just have to admit that we OBers aren't the Entertainment Software Rating Board - we're just a diverse bunch of people coming from numerous different cultures and with numerous different ideals. I know I would slap very different ratings to many games than for example Ozy would. This would also burden our unpaid behinds needlessly, if I may say so.

[B]6. Let's take down the whole Arena and replace it with Games & Stories[/B]

Now this is an actual, constructive suggestion. It would be a big change that probably couldn't be implemented over night, but it's definitely worth thinking about. It would certainly bring similar things to the same place, and unite people like the separated sections never could.

I do have one problem with it, though. We need to think about the clogging up. Adventure Square is already one of the most active sections in this whole board, so what would happen if we added all the fanfics and games to it? It would really become a huge, [I]huge[/I] section with this amount of members. Even with the different tags in each thread, would people really find what they're looking for there?

It must've worked really well back in the day OB was still comparably small place, but nowadays... I just can't say.

[B]7. Closure[/B]

I really can't say what we should do about the situation (perhaps because I don't see the situation very problematic in the first place, although I agree that the rating system has become void). If we were to undergo such dramatic changes as suggested, we would all really have to think about the consequences it would have on modern day OtakuBoards, and whether we would really achieve anything by it.

But it's great that this issue has been taken under public attention, so that everybody can give their opinions about it. ;D

[DeadSeraphim]

[QUOTE=Sandy]Alright, this thread has grown so huge overnight that I really don't know where to begin... Well, everything I say here comes from the experience of nearly four years of OB roleplaying as well as having been a moderator of the respective section for half an year, thus at least skimming through each and every RPG it has gained over that time.

[B]1. Profanity[/B]

The way I see it, despite the fact that everybody uses M-LVS ratings, the amount of actual, offending profanity is very small. Coming from a country with very little censorship (we can actually see naked breasts in daytime shows!), my opinion that profanity is not a problem in Adventure Arena.

Having said that, because the amount of it is so small, I wouldn't really mind if the automatic censoring would be re-established. Now if it would exclude the word a.s.s., I would be perfectly happy (it's not profane, honestly!).

[B]2. Ratings[/B]

I don't want to say "I told you so", but when the ratings were first established to give more artistic freedom to roleplayers and writers, and to preserve members who didn't want to deal with such "freedom", I among few others noted that the rating system didn't work the way it was meant to.

The situation was exactly same two years ago: nearly all RPGs are M-LVS, when in fact very few of them would need that rating. After I became a mod, it stopped bothering me, because I understood why everybody used it: to give their game the opportunity to have mature content, even if the initial setting didn't apply it.

Besides, the word mature is misleading, in my opinion. Of course everybody wants a "mature" RPG - who would want to play in an "immature" game anyway? It's sad that both [E] and [PG] ratings got that tag on themselves.

But in my opinion the Arena has worked normally even though the ratings don't mean much - to many they are a necessary evil. I can't think of anything we moderators could've done to further inforce them, really. Lecturing about the proper use of ratings would be very iffy, because like Aaryanna_Mom said, we all have different standards of what's tasteful and what's not.

[B]3. Discontinuing the ratings[/B]

In my opinion this would make very little difference to the quality of the Arena. It would certainly "tidy up" the place, and make it more comforting to the eye without all those [M - GORE SEX GUNS DRUGS VIOLENCE SWEARING HERE!!!] signs (and really, usually those type of RPGs don't contain even half of what it warns about).

[B]4. Adding more ratings[/B]

This is something I wouldn't want to see. If the problem is that most people are using only one of three possible ratings, what's the point of changing that so that most people are using only one of [I]four to five[/I] possible ratings?

[B]5. Staff should implement ratings to RPGs[/B]

We just have to admit that we OBers aren't the Entertainment Software Rating Board - we're just a diverse bunch of people coming from numerous different cultures and with numerous different ideals. I know I would slap very different ratings to many games than for example Ozy would. This would also burden our unpaid behinds needlessly, if I may say so.

[B]6. Let's take down the whole Arena and replace it with Games & Stories[/B]

Now this is an actual, constructive suggestion. It would be a big change that probably couldn't be implemented over night, but it's definitely worth thinking about. It would certainly bring similar things to the same place, and unite people like the separated sections never could.

I do have one problem with it, though. We need to think about the clogging up. Adventure Square is already one of the most active sections in this whole board, so what would happen if we added all the fanfics and games to it? It would really become a huge, [I]huge[/I] section with this amount of members. Even with the different tags in each thread, would people really find what they're looking for there?

It must've worked really well back in the day OB was still comparably small place, but nowadays... I just can't say.

[B]7. Closure[/B]

I really can't say what we should do about the situation (perhaps because I don't see the situation very problematic in the first place, although I agree that the rating system has become void). If we were to undergo such dramatic changes as suggested, we would all really have to think about the consequences it would have on modern day OtakuBoards, and whether we would really achieve anything by it.

But it's great that this issue has been taken under public attention, so that everybody can give their opinions about it. ;D[/QUOTE]
[size=1][color=indigo][font=arial]I'm quietly amazed you agree.[/font][/color][/size]

[Lady Asphyxia]

[size=1][color=DarkGreen]I've just read this thread and I'm still thinking about everything, so I'm going to number my responses to make sure I get the information where it needs to be. :rolleyes:


[b]
1. [/b]Perhaps I'm reading the wrong threads, because I don't see a huge profanity problem. [I [i]may[/i] be reading the wrong threads, so please provide examples of these if you have them.]

When I first read this thread, my first instinct was to see what sort of real level of swearing there is, statistically. So I searched it.

The 's' word appears in 1121 posts in Adventure Square.
The 'f' word appears in 463 posts.
The 'a' word appears 132 times.
The 'c' word appears 14 times.

That's a total of 1730 posts that have the four most-used cuss words in them.

Let's put that into perspective here; there is [b]149,465 posts [/b]in Adventure Square. That's about [i][b]1.15% [/b][/i]of posts that contain cussing.

[/color][/size] [center][size=1][color=DarkGreen]Then I wondered if perhaps it was only reading the posts that had swearing in them, not the number of times it appears in [i]each[/i] post. But I checked them out a little bit. People rarely use the same swear word more than twice in a post. In fact, it was rare for me to see it more that once in a post. [/color][/size]
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So I must admit that I was a little shocked to see that profanity was suddenly seen as such an issue.



[b]2. [/b]I must admit that in Adventure Square, the ratings are an issue. The interactive nature of an RPG means that the creators have developed a 'cover my arse' mentality, which has led to the huge amount of M ratings we see.

[/color][/size][size=1][color=DarkGreen]Our ratings system was designed on the basis of 'the creator knows their RPG best'; we as moderators assume that the creator is the best person to pick their rating. But the thing is, [/color][/size][size=1][color=DarkGreen]ratings are implemented at the beginning of the RPG, which means that the creator is, yes, unsure as to what will occur in the course of the RPG. So they simply include the highest ratings and all the warnings to account for that. [M -- VSL]!
[b]
If you look at [/b][b]OB Anthology, however, [/b]you'll notice that the amount of M ratings is much lower by comparison:

[/color][/size] [center][size=1][color=DarkGreen][img]http://img378.imageshack.us/img378/6075/obanthuc7.png[/img]
[/color][/size] [left][size=1][color=DarkGreen]Why? Because generally they are the only ones posting their work in that thread. They already [i]know[/i] that what they've written [which is generally a short story or poem] is PG. The people who are writing longer stories have already thought about it; they know that their story is more likely to operate within the PG range.

So the issue here is that, in the Arena, instead of putting what they [i]think[/i] their RPG will be, they want to make sure that they've covered their arses [b][i]in case[/i][/b] it gets out of hand.



[b]3.[/b]I've seen people raise the issue of the names of the ratings. When it first came in, just after we'd first released it, I said that for me, M was not a big deal. I was seeing M movies when I was 13. I mentioned that R was worse for me -- it meant [b][i]explicitly[/i][/b] gory violence, graphic sex and excessive language.

Obviously people are still have issues with the fact that ratings have different connotations to people. Perhaps this is something that does need to be addressed, and perhaps just by a change in the letters we use. The PG rating doesn't necessarily have to be "PG". It could be "S" for "Some Violence/Sex/Language". That of course would end with confusion between the S ratings, so I would recommend that the middle rating be changed to "O" for "Occasional Violence/Sex/Language"

It could be difficult to adjust, but I think it would help dispense the remaining confusion over the ratings.

The other thing I would suggest [and [b]this links to point 2][/b], perhaps just create M to be an [i]actual[/i] 'in case' rating. Instead of allowing people to create M ratings straight off the bat, simply bring everyone down to and "O" rating [or PG, if it stays the same]. If the creator believes that they've exceeded that level, they just PM a mod and we'll change the rating for them. It's not difficult, and it takes two seconds to PM the mod. So too, if the mod comes across anything that is deemed 'too mature' for the level, then they can change it automatically.

So the process of rating would actually become an evolutionary process for each RPG.

So the process would become:

Creator creates RPG, rating it [E] or [O/PG].
Creator realises that their RPG is becoming too mature.
Creator PMs mod.
Mod moves rating up to [M].

It's not hard, it takes two seconds for a mod to change a thread title, and considering that most people rarely have an actually mature RPG, I doubt there'd be much demand for it, anyway. There are currently 5 staff members [myself included] at the Arena, so PMing a person isn't difficult, and it means that ratings stay accurate.




[b]4. [/b]The idea of amalgamating The Arena into 2 forums. I have to be honest -- the idea is interesting and I don't mind it. It makes some sort of sense.

But there's a couple of problems there that would definately need to be addressed.

Firstly is the issue of traffic. The Adventure Square is a high traffic area. Threads move up quickly, and threads that aren't posted in are lost relatively quickly. OB Anthology, on the other hand? Definately not on the same level as the RPGs. People just don't post as often in the OB Anthology threads, simply because it isn't interactive. They might read the story and enjoy it, but they don't get to [i]write[/i] the story so they don't post as often.

My worry would be that if the two were amalgamated into one, then the creative threads from OB Anthology would be swamped by the sheer volume of Adventure Square posts.

5 different people posted 'today' in Adventure Square in 5 different threads. Let's compare this to OB Anthology, where [b]1 person[/b] posted in a creative thread -- and that was the thread creator.

Many writers simply will not get the posts to stay on the first page. And as a reader, I often browse OB Anthology and then post in certain threads that I've stumbled upon. I'm much less likely to go searching these threads out on the second or third pages, particularly when the main reason I enter threads [apart from my being a mod, lol] is because of idle curiosity.


The other thing is that you say the problem is that OB Anthology's too slow, etc, and that by combining the non-creative threads with the Underground, it'll be better.

But the Underground really isn't that active. And at the moment, OB Anthology has [i][b]3[/b][/i] non-creative threads on the first page. That isn't much of an improvement on the current flow anyway, is it?

[/color][/size][size=1][color=DarkGreen]I don't know. I don't mind the idea, but I think the practicalities need to be ironed out.
[/color][/size][size=1][color=DarkGreen]
I wouldn't mind making the Underground a subforum, to be honest. I don't really see the need for it to remain a fully fledge forum, since it seems to go arm-in-arm with the Adventure Inn threads. It's quite difficult to find a way to incorporate it into any OB Anthology threads, and all the threads in the Underground seem to relate to RPGs.

Also, it's called [i]underground[/i]. Making it a [i]sub[/i] forum just works. XD

So that's my say. I think I've covered everything I meant to. I might be back with more later.

[/color][/size][size=1][color=DarkGreen]And Charles, I'm a little confused about what you meant by 'eyesore'. Did you mean the physical construction of the forums, or the posts, or...? If you could clarify, perhaps we could find a solution to your aesthetic displeasures. :p
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[Raiyuu]

[FONT=Trebuchet MS]I've always been under the impression that if I created an RPG and rated it [E], it was my responsibility as OP to keep my buddies in line and make sure the RPG remains within the [E] limit.

As a lot of people have already said, that's why every RPG gets rated M - because nobody wants to get caught out if i_liek_pie29473 decides to write a cunnilingus scene.

What I'm getting at is that this idea of PMing a Mod and getting your title edited when you go overboard is contradictory, because the level of profanity/gore/sex is, as much as the setting or the sign-up sheet, the OP's choice. If i_liek_pie29473 goes outside the rating, the OP should be PMing them to say "please edit your post" and writing them out if they don't comply. Perhaps if we just made that responsibility clearer to RPers, it could solve the arse-covering problem - but then half the problem is that people don't read the Rules.

Having written all that, I suppose that entire problem is symptomatic of the general brokenness of the Thread Ratings. I don't know if a complete restructuring of the forum is necessary just to reduce needless profanity or overzealous ratings, though.[/FONT]

[Charles]

[QUOTE=Lady Asphyxia][size=1][color=DarkGreen]
[/color][/size][size=1][color=DarkGreen]And Charles, I'm a little confused about what you meant by 'eyesore'. Did you mean the physical construction of the forums, or the posts, or...? If you could clarify, perhaps we could find a solution to your aesthetic displeasures. :p
[/color][/size][/QUOTE]

Well, Lady A, a picture is worth a thousand words. If you look at the image I posted and the front page, even as it stands today, nearly every thread has an "M" rating. Even if these threads aren't necessarily graphic stories, that [i]appearance[/i] is really disjarring when compared to the theme of the rest of the site. Even if you remove the moral aspect, as I've stated previously, the ratings system even [i]looks[/i] cumbersome and intimidating.

The numbers you provided only further the argument that it's not a problem to just go ahead and remove profanity though.

Putting creative writing in the Games & Stories area isn't an idea we had because of thread rating problems there--it's simply because that area is pretty dead and has been for a while. It could use the spark of change.

[quote name='Raiyuu][FONT=Trebuchet MS']Having written all that, I suppose that entire problem is symptomatic of the general brokenness of the Thread Ratings. I don't know if a complete restructuring of the forum is necessary just to reduce needless profanity or overzealous ratings, though.[/FONT][/quote]

The restructuring idea isn't meant to reduce profanity; it's just a structural improvement that recognizes the change of tastes. The popularity of games has proven itself to be more than a fad, while RPGs have fallen somewhat in popularity; OtakuBoards should change with the times to recognize that

[Gavin]

[SIZE=1]I have to admit a certain reluctance to see the Arena reformatting back into Games and Stories simply because many of the games which are posted in the Lounge serve often as spam conduits for people to up their post counts. Often you end up with two or three people who have giant post counts in these threads compared to everyone else who've participated. Eventually these threads are closed by one of the Lounge's mods because they've deteriorated to the point where they no longer conform to OB's rules, I have to wonder if these kinds of threads are what we want in the Arena.

I think even though it was said a little undiplomatically, Ken may have had a point when he spoke about the quality of current RPers in the Arena. Time was that you always had a pool of older members who'd been around the Square for a long time and demonstrated the kind of quality that could be exhibited. I'm not going to throw any names out, you all know people like this, but many of these people are no longer present in the Arena, so I also wonder if this also has had an effect. I know certainly that my own RPing skills were developed primarily from working with guys who were better than me.

Again these are just simply my thoughts on the issue.[/SIZE]

[Desbreko]

[QUOTE=Lady Asphyxia][size=1][color=DarkGreen][b]1. [/b]Perhaps I'm reading the wrong threads, because I don't see a huge profanity problem. [I [i]may[/i] be reading the wrong threads, so please provide examples of these if you have them.]

When I first read this thread, my first instinct was to see what sort of real level of swearing there is, statistically. So I searched it.

The 's' word appears in 1121 posts in Adventure Square.
The 'f' word appears in 463 posts.
The 'a' word appears 132 times.
The 'c' word appears 14 times.

That's a total of 1730 posts that have the four most-used cuss words in them.

Let's put that into perspective here; there is [b]149,465 posts [/b]in Adventure Square. That's about [i][b]1.15% [/b][/i]of posts that contain cussing.

[/color][/size] [center][size=1][color=DarkGreen]Then I wondered if perhaps it was only reading the posts that had swearing in them, not the number of times it appears in [i]each[/i] post. But I checked them out a little bit. People rarely use the same swear word more than twice in a post. In fact, it was rare for me to see it more that once in a post. [/color][/size]
[/center]
[size=1][color=DarkGreen]
So I must admit that I was a little shocked to see that profanity was suddenly seen as such an issue. [/color][/size][/QUOTE][color=#4B0082]Those statistics are a bit misleading since Adventure Square contains threads dating back to 2001 and the beginning of v3. So there's a few years worth of posts in there where the profanity filter was enabled, which is included in your figure for the total number of posts and skews the comparison.

But I do agree with you, Asphy, I haven't noticed all that much gratuitous swearing either. I don't think re-enabling the swear filter is really necessary, and doing so would severely hinder any RPG in the vein of Kill Adam.

As I see it, the actual content of Adventure Square isn't so much a problem, it's what is perceived to be the content because of all the unnecessary M ratings. As has been said, a majority of the RPGs with M ratings would be perfectly fine with a PG rating, yet people use M as a cover, "just in case." This situation isn't inviting for someone looking for a clean RPG to participate in, even though they most likely wouldn't have a problem with half of those M rated RPGs, so neither is it at all accurate. The root of the problem here, I think, is how people are using the ratings as a cover since that's what lead to the current situation.

Any changes made need to address that problem, and while removing ratings altogether and slapping the filter back in place would do that, I don't think it's the optimal solution. We'd be back to square one (haha, get it?) and after a while we'd get people complaining about the limitations of the filter again. That's an endless loop right there which only ever accomodates one side and I think there's a better way to deal with this.

After reading through the suggestions in here and taking everything into account, this is the forum structure I've come up with:

Epic Theater
-- Auditions
-- Theater Backroom

Herald's Forum
-- Forum Alcove

Names would end up being whatever (though I think name changes would do the place good if things are being reorganized), of course, but we'd have two main forums in the Arena. Epic Theater and its Auditions sub-forum would basically just be Adventure Square/Inn as we know them today, sans thread ratings. The swear filter would remain disabled to allow for minimal use of language and threads would basically have something like a PG rating by default.

The Theater Backroom would be another sub-forum, not displayed on OB's home page, that would house mature RPGs. M would basically be the default for threads in there, and people would not be allowed to create RPGs in it unless they actually plan and make known within its Auditions thread that it's going to feature mature content.

The benefits of this setup are that it removes the perceived need for a "cover," to make sure your RPG doesn't get closed for over-stepping its rating, while still allowing for the same level of creative freedom as now. If an RPG's content goes beyond what's allowed in the Theater, the thread can simply be moved into the Backroom and continue as before. I think this system will be a lot more user-friendly than the thread ratings and provide a more accurate description of what's actually contained in the threads.

Of course, different people do have different opinions on what would belong where, so the choice wouldn't be left completely up to the moderators' individual discretion. Like with the thread rating descriptions now, we'd have specific guidelines posted in a sticky to show what exactly belongs in the Backroom sub-forum. These would take some discussion to hammer out, but I think it would work.

The Herald's Forum would be a combination of OB Anthology and Arena Underground, while also providing a place for the forum games which currently go in Otaku Lounge now. As the name suggestions, it would be like a public forum where anyone can go to tell or discuss a story (the OB Anthology part), meet to hammer out details for their "play" in the Theater (the Arena Underground part), or simply gather for a public game. I think these three aspects would combine well into a single forum a lot better than combining Adventure Square with them, since the number of RPGs would swamp other threads like Asphy mentioned.

The Forum Alcove is pretty much the same as the Theater Backroom, but for mature stories and the discussion threads for RPGs in the Backroom. The same rules apply to it as the Theater Backroom.

As for the issue of people using swearing/gore/sex immaturely, just to do it, I don't think that's something that has a cut-and-dried solution. We can separate the type of content into categories, sure, but quantifying how that content is used as either "mature" or "immature" is a lot harder and depends even more on personal opinion. It's certainly not something I'd want to try and enforce as part of the rules, so I think the best we can do is just toss them in the Backroom and let them have their shits and giggles.[/color]

[Charles]

I like your take on the idea Desbreko, but if we're kind of revamping everything, do you think it would be possible to have people responsible for providing ratings or allowing rated M RPs into the "mature" board?

Even when it comes to film ratings, there's an official, objective board of people who decide what rating a film deserves. It's the same with video games and music. I think it helps when someone seperate from the project looks at it and decides what rating it should have.

I also think this would stop people from putting 90-99 percent of all RPs in the mature board.

Otherwise, I like where this is all going.

[Sara]

[color=#b0000b][size=1]If the ratings stay, I think they need to be completely renamed so that things like [PG] don't overlap with exisiting standards outside of the boards. Even something arbitrary like [A] [B] [C] would allow a blank slate where the ratings would be defined [i]within the boards, for the boards[/i].

I think this would help the situations where people opt for [M] over [PG] because they consider their RPG goes beyond the [PG] movie rating they're familiar with. [/color][/size]

[Aberinkula]

[COLOR=DimGray]Other message boards I'm on[/COLOR] [COLOR=Blue](EX: Gaia online) [/COLOR] [COLOR=DimGray]abolish M-rated RPG's. So this is the most mature of sites I've been on.[/COLOR]

[COLOR=DimGray]Yet censoring us would be a great idea. Normally I'd say "What the hell? No swearing" But in this case censoring the words is good. Yet not many have been said. [/COLOR] ([COLOR=Blue]Over 1100 isn't all that compared to the counts of threads.)[/COLOR]

[COLOR=DimGray]As[/COLOR] [COLOR=Blue]Sandy[/COLOR] [COLOR=DimGray]said censoring a.s.s would be stupid. As hell, damnl, and a.s.s are real definable words. (So is the F and S word but not all dictionary's have tem.)[/COLOR]

[Gavin]

[QUOTE=Sara][color=#b0000b][size=1]If the ratings stay, I think they need to be completely renamed so that things like [PG] don't overlap with exisiting standards outside of the boards. Even something arbitrary like [A] [B] [C] would allow a blank slate where the ratings would be defined [i]within the boards, for the boards[/i].

I think this would help the situations where people opt for [M] over [PG] because they consider their RPG goes beyond the [PG] movie rating they're familiar with. [/color][/size][/QUOTE]

[SIZE=1]Sara makes a good point here, I think that defining some ratings for OtakuBoards' itself might actually solve a lot of the rating problems affecting the Arena at the moment. People's own perceptions of what ratings mean, taken from outside of OB have definitely affected their perceptions of what ratings mean inside OB, some creating something just for the populace here would certainly solve that problem, or at least alleviate it.[/SIZE]

[Desbreko]

[QUOTE=Charles]I like your take on the idea Desbreko, but if we're kind of revamping everything, do you think it would be possible to have people responsible for providing ratings or allowing rated M RPs into the "mature" board?

Even when it comes to film ratings, there's an official, objective board of people who decide what rating a film deserves. It's the same with video games and music. I think it helps when someone seperate from the project looks at it and decides what rating it should have.

I also think this would stop people from putting 90-99 percent of all RPs in the mature board.

Otherwise, I like where this is all going.[/QUOTE][color=#4B0082]I figured it would fall to the moderators of the forums, and ultimately the category moderator, to decide what goes where, based on whatever guidelines are set up. They'd have more time to manage that, since there wouldn't be any rating-related stuff to deal with anymore, and they'd probably know what's going on in their forums better than anyone else. If something didn't belong in the mature board they could move it to the normal one and vice versa.[/color]

[DeadSeraphim]

[quote name='Desbreko][color=#4B0082']I figured it would fall to the moderators of the forums, and ultimately the category moderator, to decide what goes where, based on whatever guidelines are set up. They'd have more time to manage that, since there wouldn't be any rating-related stuff to deal with anymore, and they'd probably know what's going on in their forums better than anyone else. If something didn't belong in the mature board they could move it to the normal one and vice versa.[/color][/quote]
[size=1][color=indigo][font=arial]It'd be best if the guidelines were really really clear, perhaps using real world examples to show what a mature RP would be compared to a normal RP. Like, for mature you could have something like "Think Kill Bill, From Dusk Till Dawn, etc..." (you know, depending on the eventual rating of 'mature'). That'd save mods some work.[/font][/color][/size]

[Sandy]

I wouldn't want to sound like a nay-sayer here, but I'm worried about the practical side of having such a "backroom". To my knowledge, at this moment there are no active RPGs in the Adventure Square that would be so "mature" that they would need to be isolated from the others. It would be a place with very few threads anyway, if only the games that had real excessive mature content would go there, thus questioning the whole need of such a subforum (as fascinating as the idea of having a forum called "The Theater" with a "backroom" sounds).

What comes to Anthology, profanity or misuse of ratings have never been a problem there (as proven by Lady Asphyxia), and having a "backroom" there would be even more pointless than in RPGs, in my opinion. Aside from creative writing, Anthology is also a place for [I]discussion[/I] about literature, so where would those threads go? To the Music, TV and Movies forum?

Also, the threads in the Underground have nothing to do with the threads in Anthology, so I would definitely keep them apart.

Sigh, I'm sorry for not being able to provide anything constructive for this discussion, I'm just bashing everybody's ideas here... :/

[SunfallE]

[COLOR=RoyalBlue][QUOTE=Sara][color=#b0000b][size=1]If the ratings stay, I think they need to be completely renamed so that things like [PG] don't overlap with exisiting standards outside of the boards. Even something arbitrary like [A] [B] [C] would allow a blank slate where the ratings would be defined [i]within the boards, for the boards[/i].

I think this would help the situations where people opt for [M] over [PG] because they consider their RPG goes beyond the [PG] movie rating they're familiar with. [/color][/size][/QUOTE]I like this idea for the simple reason it makes the ratings apply to the boards and not to the ones outside that change depending on the person and even the country they are in. That in my opinion is part of what generates so much confusion in the first place. [quote name='DeadSeraphim][size=1][color=indigo][font=arial]It'd be best if the guidelines were really really clear, perhaps using real world examples to show what a mature RP would be compared to a normal RP. Like, for mature you could have something like "Think Kill Bill, From Dusk Till Dawn, etc..." (you know, depending on the eventual rating of 'mature'). That'd save mods some work.[/font][/color'][/size][/quote]The only problem I see with using previous threads as an example, is anyone who hasn't read them isn't going to know what level of stuff is in them without actually taking the time to read them.

I'm thinking that describing what types of violence, language or sex that would be acceptable for a rating would be more effective. If we are going to change them to one that is exclusive to the boards that is. [/COLOR]

[Claire]

[QUOTE=Dagger]Okay, obviously I [i]didn't[/i] see her point. :animeshy: I thought she was referring to consolidation and the [Game] & [Story] tags, instead of adding a PG-13 type of rating to the mix. Perhaps I should just call it a night now, haha.

~Dagger~[/QUOTE]
[FONT=Arial]
Actually, I didn't know that the movie was out before the PG-13 rating was created, but I guess the example works either way. Since I'm not very organized, I can't really offer any new ideas as to what should be done, though reading some of the earlier posts it seems that adding a new rating might help clear some of the M's out of the Arena.

As for what would happen to the literature discussions if the forum gets revamped, they could possibly fit in Music, Movies & TV. The forum is already a little on the slow side, and there doesn't seem to be much conversation about literature at the moment. I don't think it would be too much of a problem (for the mods, at least, I don't know how much work revamping would be for the technical staff and admins). Maybe MM&TV could be slightly changed into a kind of Media forum? (My first title was "uninteractive entertainment", but I think that one is a little more user-friendly).[/FONT]

[DeadSeraphim]

[quote name='SunfallE][COLOR=RoyalBlue']I'm thinking that describing what types of violence, language or sex that would be acceptable for a rating would be more effective. If we are going to change them to one that is exclusive to the boards that is. [/COLOR][/quote]
[size=1][color=indigo][font=arial]I meant media like movies, or TV. I didn't name any threads.[/font][/color][/size]

[SunfallE]

[COLOR=RoyalBlue][quote name='DeadSeraphim][size=1][color=indigo][font=arial]I meant media like movies, or TV. I didn't name any threads.[/font][/color'][/size][/quote]My mistake, I misread your post. I missed that you said Kill Bill and not Kill Adam. ^_~[/COLOR]

[Desbreko]

[quote name='Sandy']I wouldn't want to sound like a nay-sayer here, but I'm worried about the practical side of having such a "backroom". To my knowledge, at this moment there are no active RPGs in the Adventure Square that would be so "mature" that they would need to be isolated from the others. It would be a place with very few threads anyway, if only the games that had real excessive mature content would go there, thus questioning the whole need of such a subforum (as fascinating as the idea of having a forum called "The Theater" with a "backroom" sounds).[/quote][color=#4B0082]Well, it's not so much about isolating threads that are more graphic than what we see now, it's just to create a better alternative to the current ratings. I imagine anything that actually deserves an M rating now would be put into the Backroom and, being a sub-forum, it wouldn't require a ton of activity anyway.[/color]

[quote name='Sandy']What comes to Anthology, profanity or misuse of ratings have never been a problem there (as proven by Lady Asphyxia), and having a "backroom" there would be even more pointless than in RPGs, in my opinion.[/quote][color=#4B0082]But there [i]are[/i] stories which make full use of the current M rating, so we're going to have to do something with them. And getting rid of ratings in Adventure Square but leaving them in OB Anthology would just be a huge mess. Whatever system we end up going with, it should apply to the Arena as a whole.[/color]

[quote name='Sandy]Aside from creative writing, Anthology is also a place for [I]discussion[/I] about literature, so where would those threads go? To the Music, TV and Movies forum? [/quote][quote=Desbreko][color=#4B0082]it would be like a public forum where anyone can go to tell or [b]discuss[/b'] a story (the OB Anthology part)[/color][/quote][color=#4B0082]The discussion threads about literature would fit into the Forum just fine. It doesn't have to be a story or whatever else written by an OB member for it to be discussed in there.[/color]

[quote name='Sandy']Also, the threads in the Underground have nothing to do with the threads in Anthology, so I would definitely keep them apart.[/quote][color=#4B0082]It's not a perfect match, but given the lack of activity in the Underground, I don't think such threads can support their own forum either. Alternately, they could be placed in the Theater alongside the main RPG threads, but my reasoning for putting them in the Forum is that Underground threads are basically the same as discussion threads in Anthology, only about RPGs. Keeping with the "public forum" idea, it's a place where people can go to talk about their RPGs the same as they could talk about other written works.[/color]

[Rachmaninoff]

I?m not sure if I agree with the issue in regards to swearing for the simple reason I haven?t really seen very much that was excessive or redundant. Though to be honest I haven?t seen anywhere near as much as those who have been a member longer. I?m simply going off of what I?ve seen so far.

I do agree with the part about the ratings being confusing. And even if others are merely using the M rating to cover all eventualities due to others being a part of their RPG and not knowing what they intend to write. I can see how having so many rated that way would give the wrong impression as to what the RPG really is about. Or that there isn?t much in there that isn?t explicit.

I?ve only been here a short time, but within very little time it became apparent that the ratings didn?t give any indication as to what one should expect. At least for the M rating as I?ve looked at a few that didn?t have any reasons for being rated that way. They did have occasional violence, language and implications of sex, but not intensely graphic.

Seems like clearing up the confusion in regards to the ratings is what really needs to be fixed. Though seeing what others have said I'm not sure how you would go about that, only that I agree that it's not working as it was probably intended to.

[TheResplendent]

[FONT=Tahoma]I don't see a problem with simply creating a sub-forum for M worthy RPs and such. I see it being very probable that this "backroom" can just as easily be flooded by the majority of the participating members. While I am sure the normal "epic theater" will draw an ample crowd for itself considering the mass amount of ideas that can be conveyed within a non-M rating, issues based on the backroom possibly being more popular can't be a concern or else It will create a new slew of problems. The most problems I can see is that certain members may just commit themselves to one and not the other, which would decrease the amount of prospective members to participate in either non-M RPs or M only RPs.

Again, this hasn't been brought up as a problem and it probably will not be, but I thought it should be pointed out as a possible door opener for different issues.

Also, I agree with Sara's idea for a revamping of the ratings system itself. They could be made clearer in terms of what the RP will definitly entail, rather then what it could possibly entail. A big thing about the ratings that may even describe it's respective thread well is that I've seen plenty of them not even make use of the possibilities granted with the rating. So it's important to let people know what they will be including in their posts that pertains to the atmosphere of the story, if a particular one is in mind upon creation. As it pertains to the Anthology, it's already been said that the rating will be undisputed since the progress and content of story/poem etc will be completely in the hands of the writer.

Using words to describe every part of what an RP will include is a tedious task doing it time after time. So with Sara's idea to allocate the most popularly used (and anything else that may be connected) descriptions to letters (or whatever would be decided upon) seems quite appropriate. [/FONT]

[Charles]

[quote name='BKstyles][FONT=Tahoma']Also, I agree with Sara's idea for a revamping of the ratings system itself. They could be made clearer in terms of what the RP will definitly entail, rather then what it could possibly entail. A big thing about the ratings that may even describe it's respective thread well is that I've seen plenty of them not even make use of the possibilities granted with the rating. So it's important to let people know what they will be including in their posts that pertains to the atmosphere of the story, if a particular one is in mind upon creation. As it pertains to the Anthology, it's already been said that the rating will be undisputed since the progress and content of story/poem etc will be completely in the hands of the writer. [/FONT][/quote]

I just don't get why it needs to be "revamped." It's like taking the same problem and dressing it up differently.

I don't even know that a backroom needs to be used. I think my whole argument here (and if someone can prove me wrong, then go ahead) is that the vast majority of RPs don't need an "M" rating. The number of RPGs that genuinely require a true "M" rating are extremely rare. The number of RPGs that use the "M" rating to its fullest, are few as well. People do their best to complicate things here when it isn't really necessary by tagging a ratings system onto threads.

The forum should be set up so that damn near every thread is in accordance to the site's standards. Words like "hell, damn, etc" wouldn't even be an issue. But, if someone wants [i]graphic[/i] sex in their RPG or vividly-described, gruesome death-scenes, or really strong language, then they should have to apply for special permission from the staff; they should have to make a pitch and the staff should decide whether or not to allow the RPG. If the RPG is allowed, it should be flagged.

So, the more I think about it, the more I feel a "backroom" is unnecessary. I think the existence of such a forum will dilute the simple interface Shy and I talked about. I also think that the Underground is pretty useless and that these RPGs could easily be discussed in the recruitment threads. That forum really seems like just more of the padding OtakuBoards has that it doesn't really need at this point.

If a Backroom is instituted, I hope that barely any threads are allowed into there, otherwise it's going to get ridiculous again.