Scirra forum bandwidth

Ok I wanna discuss this from a long time. So whenever a newbie or known scirra user post something that is already found on the forum or the tutorial the moderators instantly ask politely the topic maker to please make multiple thread or to ask something that was already answered before. My question is why?

Is it the problem that scirra has a small bandwidth or they want users to be referenced to one topic?

Repeat topics are a bane to certain communities, it's a matter of taste.

To regular users, they're annoying, by discouraging the practice we get a cleaner place of discussion which promotes new, interesting topics.

The possible downside of this system is that users are referred to information that is out of date, in the near future we're going to be seeing this with regards to mobile porting and wrappers - luckily the more active members of the community are well aware of these nuances.

At the end of the day, the search function is your friend and should always be encouraged, which is the main aim of this policy - Scirra's severs can handle hundreds of thousands of user downloads, it's not a matter of bandwidth.

The primary issue with people rehashing the already answered question from a forum perspective is that is adds noise. If there is already a topic/discussion about the issue, one can find the answer as well as further elements in the discussion and several points of view of the members who participated in.

By creating a new discussion you are only spreading those informations, making it harder for those coming afterwards and that do SEARCH before asking to actually find the correct informations.

Moreover, from a user perspective, it's tiring to, over and over again, see and have to answer the same basic questions being bumped relentlessly by people who prefer to wait for someone to do work for them, especially for questions that are already answered.

It just goes to show that the person asking made no previous effort in searching by themselves. That's not what's game making is about, is it ?

C2 lowers the entry point, but you still have to "work". And that's part of what makes game making fun and rewarding, isn't it ? Like for a game, you have a problem given and you find a way to overcome it. It's OK to "cooperate", but isn't it more rewarding to find stuff by yourself ? The "ha" moment when you finally understand a concept you were struggling with, and that pieces seems to fit together to form a bigger picture.

As an old timer who knew Construct before there even was a tutorial part or a clear and awesome manual available on the website, it's bothersome.

That those questions could have been asked back in those days can be understood, but that they are still now when there's already SO MUCH information available, it's bothersome.

I can understand that one can get drown under too many informations (I wrote about it in a tutorial a long time ago).

Nevertheless game making is not a race, so take the time to search for informations, to read already existing threads and discussions.

There is already so much knowledge to be found through them. Plus by doing so, even if you're not getting immediately the current piece of information you're looking for, you can learn about stuff that will help you nonetheless and prevent you from asking those questions in the future and build/understand more elaborate concepts.

Like in an RPG, you level up as you learn and practice. Except you don't have bars or visual feedback, it's all in your mind, in your goals.

What's the point for me in taking the time to gather a list like the How do I FAQ for example if nobody takes the time to check it out and just prefers to be spoon fed by asking their question rather than learning/searching first ? (I know people do fortunately but not 100% of forum users/askers though)

It has nothing to see with technicality like bandwidth, it's only a human question of "I've already answered this question 1000 times, why/how did you miss the answer ?"

Well said, KYATRIC.

My addendum:

Users nearly always say they have searched, but clearly haven't.

Users who just don't even pretend to make an effort at reading the manual or doing any of the tutorials, and just ask for an example of "insert game here!", with the expectation that others will do it for them.

Just 2 of my personal pet hates

I hate it when some one makes a new thread in the "how do I" section, and then just make the title "How do I".

Yea, but people automaticaly use it because it's pre-set when they create a new topic within that section.

I even did it myself at the beginning, as it feels like you should use it.

I hate it when some one makes a new thread in the "how do I" section, and then just make the title "How do I".

Hells teeth, yes! Totally forgot about this one.

I ignore all such posts on principle.