Comments on The Free RPG Blog: Why your free RPG website must be great and how to...

Really good tips, Some i hadn't thought about,...

2011-11-17T17:27:38.538Z

Really good tips, Some i hadn't thought about, Thankyou so much!! :D

Carpe - OSH review is about to be let out! I still...

2011-06-07T11:32:46.403+01:00

Carpe - OSH review is about to be let out! I still have mixed feelings about its layout.

Nathan - thank you for the pro-tips as always - very helpful!

Another nice post, Rob. It's worth letting pe...

2011-06-03T12:23:03.925+01:00

Another nice post, Rob.
It's worth letting people know that they can have a free blog with their own domain name for a fairly minimal cost (about $20, from memory). You get you blog sorted out, purchase your domain and pay a small cost for linking the two (this is my experience with Wordpress, anyway).
Also, Dropbox let's let's you share files with the public, if you want.

Nice! I've always thought that Old School Hack...

2011-06-02T17:05:22.948+01:00

Nice! I've always thought that Old School Hack was one of the best-designed sites I've seen. The game is equally well-designed, visually. I think the guy is a professional designer, but don't quote me on that.

CA - I would have a link straight to the download ...

2011-06-01T11:58:04.083+01:00

CA - I would have a link straight to the download of the PDF in the top right. I'd simplify the description text to something like: "Dead and Back is a post apocalyptic-horror RPG set in 2050 America. You can download the rules, the default setting or read supporting fiction...". Don't menion your intended publish date! I'd also add a header graphic if you can.

Kirin - thanks for the technicals, I think pointing out how easy it is the first step for any reader to make best use of the advice!

Thanks for the feedback everyone!

Great tips. Very useful to know and those are som...

2011-06-01T01:46:34.652+01:00

Great tips. Very useful to know and those are some pretty sweet games you point out. I really like Old School Hack, but Lady Blackbird looks pretty cool.

Kirin from oldschoolhack.net here, thanks for the ...

2011-05-31T23:20:04.156+01:00

Kirin from oldschoolhack.net here, thanks for the kudos on the site design. If anyone has any specific questions, I'd be happy to answer 'em.

Here's some technical details:

Main web page uses Wordpress, a very solid and design-friendly CMS, with a handful of cool plugins. It also has a nice traffic-monitoring plug-in for seeing how much your stuff is being downloaded, as well as showing who's linking to you.

Forums use Vanilla 2, which is a super nice package for "smaller size" forums.

Social networking stuff is tricky, not so much plugging it into your site (that's easy), but knowing how much to use.

I've actually gotten crap for "over-advertising" the game. But so what, I like making websites. :)

Thank you for the shout-outs. I'm glad i could...

2011-05-31T19:33:40.874+01:00

Thank you for the shout-outs. I'm glad i could help.

I'll try to incorporate some more of the best practices mentioned. Any specific suggestions for my blog to make it a better example to others?

On the matter of hosting the game's PDFs, I should mention box.net. Visitors can both preview files, and download them without the wait Megaupload forces.

Chaps, thanks for the feedback. I think a website ...

2011-05-31T16:42:33.737+01:00

Chaps, thanks for the feedback. I think a website is both easy to do and easy to get quite wrong. What's more there, are some simple things we can all do that can help a user a lot!

Those are some good tips with some things I hadn&#...

2011-05-31T14:39:37.841+01:00

Those are some good tips with some things I hadn't really thought of myself. I have to learn to be less verbose about describing my games (and to promise less!). Good post!

Thanks for adding Disgenesia to the list. I must a...

2011-05-31T14:32:14.477+01:00

Thanks for adding Disgenesia to the list. I must add a contact and feedback button.

Note to self: add link to PDF of my game to front ...

2011-05-31T14:06:16.325+01:00

Note to self: add link to PDF of my game to front page of site.

I'd definitely agree on getting rid of a forum if it's not being used. A dead empty forum is worse then not having one.