Looking For A Honest Review And Critique would like my site reviewed

[Logan Deathbringer 0]

Well I think its time for me to bite the bullet so to speak. I would like to have The Knights of Glory Website reviewed. The main protions of the site were designed in FP so it might have problems being viewed in browsers other then IE, this will be changed soon since the site was originally hosted at angelfire, then transported to Xisto. Please be honest but kind, it is a serious work in progress and lately most of my attention has been on the new SMF that I have up and running.

Thanks

Logan

[punkpig5 0]

i think it is good but has great potential,but some things i would add is some images or video clip and put some tables in and then your set. One favor i need a good music code and i like the music you have on your site could you send me the code for the music in your site thanks if you do.

[Logan Deathbringer 0]

had a major file disfunction, had to send it to the doc to get repaired if you would look again I would appreiciate it.

[saga 0]

hi...first, overall the site is good... but anyway here is some of my ideas...i think it would be much better looking if you line up the website navigation menu verticaly than horizantaly.. the point is it keeps the balance off becuase there are 2 the same menu item missing in the 2nd row... it is more neat to line it up verticaly specialy you use big rollover effects...lastly.. about the font.... i dont know if you are using some type of font.. but what i could see in my monitor is just the time new roman font.. which is not a good looking font.. for me.. anyway, if you were using other type of font then i think you should not. The reason is that not all computer that will browse the site use the font you used.. thats the reason that most website uses arial, courier and other fonts that is common in all platform, may it be in unix or xp operating system...ohhh... i just visited the news and archive section.. i think you need to repair that too.. well... thats all.....

[Logan Deathbringer 0]

thank you will work on that

[Logan Deathbringer 0]

made some updates to the site and would like another review and some more ideas if possible.Saga...as far as vid files go due to BW and disk usage issues they would require to much space to be adaqate

[sickgrrl723 0]

i think the overall layout is good. I would suggest keeping the same font throughout the site just to be consistent. you must remember that serif and sans-serif fonts are read differently by the eyes and the mix of the two throws off focus. I also really like the music and the option to turn it off... most people dont give that option. if you could, could you send me the code for that? besides that, i think it's good and as your design skills improve, it will only get better.

[Hraefn 0]

Well, you did ask for an honest critique, so here's my short list. Note that I'll only be listing the major points of issue — at least, those that I consider major.

 

Navigation menu — I would suggest using a more compact navigation menu style, especially considering that you have a lot of links in your navmenu. Also, having most of the links in your navmenu visible when people first view your webpage would be a plus, so saga's suggestion of making your navmenu horizontal is a good one. The point here is to give your visitors as much information as possible about your webpage's content in the first glance.

 

Another suggestion I have about your navmenu is to have the links to external sites open up in a new window or tab by setting the link properties to target="_blank". The links in question are the ones to the official GW site, and those to your old and new forums. That way, even if your visitor clicks those links, they won't be leaving your webpage. I also suggest changing your "Contact Us" link on the navmenu to link to a page with your contact information or an email form. Using a direct mailto link on the navmenu can get annoying especially when we click on it by mistake and then having to wait while the email client loads.

 

Theme consistency — Keeping the theme consistent throughout all the pages on your website would make your site more aesthetically pleasing. As your site is still a work in progress, the current inconsistency is understandable, but it's something to keep in mind for future updates.

 

Speaking of themes, I would also suggest scrapping the current FrontPage theme and using something of your own design — or use a web template or have someone design the page for you). FrontPage themes are great places to begin learning about what you can do with HTML, but to be honest, they don't look all that great. You don't need to do a complete overhaul, though, if you do decide to switch themes. Keep a beta version of your website which you can work on while leaving the current one available, then make the switch when you're good and ready.

 

Embedded music — This is a big no-no! Picture this, here I am peacefully browsing the web while listening to some quiet instrumental music, when all of a sudden something loud blasts out of the speakers. My first reaction? I'd close the damn webpage that's making all that noise faster that you can say "Microsoft". Actually, I'd close the site even if it's playing Beethoven's Sonata — and so would most people. To be honest, sites that play music are just plain annoying that most people wouldn't bother standing around even to see if the site content's worth anything. Five or so years ago embedded music was all the rage and sites that played music kept popping up like daisies. Things eventually got so bad that most folks just turned their speakers off, which prevented people from listening to music that they wanted to hear.

 

Nowadays, such sites are rare, and it's generally considered among the websurfing community that putting embedded music into webpages is bad manners. Music that plays without the viewer's say-so turns most people off, and that drives away potential visitors. If you really want to put music in your webpage, I suggest turning the auto-play default to off and giving your visitors the option to play the music if they want to. That way, everyone wins.

 

Maximize screen real estate — I've noticed that, on the main page, you have quite a bit of blank space on the right side of the screen. Most probably your theme was designed for a lower resolution. That's great in theory, but for folks with higher resolution screens, it would be a waste of screen real estate. I'd suggest trying to make your webpage adaptable to whatever resolution your visitor is using. Also, you might want to consider moving the ads from the bottom left corner to the right side of the page just to use up that blank space. Whatever you method you choose to use is up to you.

 

Cross-browser portability — One thing you might want to consider would be to eventually make your website cross-browser portable. To do so, I suggest scrapping any IE-only scripts and trying to make your site as W3C compliant as possible. If you can, try to view your site using different browsers to see how the final result would be.

 

All in all, though, your website is really a pretty decent one. While there is room for improvement, it's not a bad attempt at sitebuilding by far. It definitely has promise. =^^=

[Logan Deathbringer 0]

I'd like to thank everyone for the input since my last post here. I'll look into each and everyone of them in turn and make adjustments to the site.

[Logan Deathbringer 0]

Well have done some big changes and hope that those who have helped me out and done some reviews for me will take a look and tell me what they think and give me their opinions on the new design and what not.

[computerjoe 0]

I have quite a few bones to pick with your site. It doesn't have any major errors in Firefox (1.0.6 EN-US), which I can see.

I don't like how your site is frame-based. Many browsers do not support this, and not even all your site uses the same design (the screenshot page isn't frame-based, but the menu's on the top). You don't have a consistent colour scheme either.

Also, it's not a wise idea to place music on pages, partly as it is most likely © theft. Another reason why it's not wise is for 56k viewers it will take donkeys to load.

Your Teamspeak and chatbox don't go with the colour scheme either, this could probably fixed with some basic CSS.

Frontpage isn't the best HTML editor on the web. The free and open-sourceNVU offers more flexibility and better support for CSS etc. It's worth noting it will probably make pages aimed more at Firefox users due to the simple fact it uses the Mozilla gecko, however this shouldn't cause any problems for IE users.

Your site really needs improving - no offense!

[Logan Deathbringer 0]

No offense taken, just a few points though from my point of view:The site is was origanally designed in FP due to the fact that it was origanally designed to be deployed on Angelfire, prior to my getting hosting here and I was using the FP extensions to get the most functionality possible within the limitations I was under. Now that I don't have to worry about that I'm slowly redeveloping it.I'm using the Frames due to the fact that some of the Guild members are still stuck using 56k modems and the frames seem to help them be able to view the site faster and easier since, for the most part, they don't have to reload the major graphics of the banner and the link bar.As I redevelop the site in my spare time, which is limited these last few weeks, I will slowly be losing the FP pages, and finish balancing out the sites fram/color/text/font schemes.Computerjoe thx for your input I will continue to hone the site and my skills.

[Nybb 0]

The banner looks like it was done by an amateur (the text blends in too much). A black background is a sure sign of crappiness on any site (use an image). And navigation, WTH? If you want returning visitors, keep them updated and have interesting content (no one likes guild sites). The forum design is nicer but as I have said, use a background. Your site looks like an amateur shrine, just with a domain name. Don't join the bandwagon.

[yordan 10]

I liked your site

Very nice, very impressive.

The only thing I didn't like is the music. Maybe it's due to my Internet Explorer web browser, I didn't try it with Firefox.

What I didn't like is that your site didn't appear first. The screen was freezed, until the music was able to startup. could it be possible to see the first screen, viewing the pictures and reading the text while the music is downloading ?

[Logan Deathbringer 0]

I liked your site

Very nice, very impressive.

The only thing I didn't like is the music. Maybe it's due to my Internet Explorer web browser, I didn't try it with Firefox.

What I didn't like is that your site didn't appear first. The screen was freezed, until the music was able to startup. could it be possible to see the first screen, viewing the pictures and reading the text while the music is downloading ?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Not to sure about your idea Yordan but will look into it. I've designed the site and tested to be as W3C compliant as possible, though the frame code isn't, and will see if I can come up with a way to delay the loading of the music first.

 

The banner looks like it was done by an amateur (the text blends in too much). A black background is a sure sign of crappiness on any site (use an image). And navigation, WTH? If you want returning visitors, keep them updated and have interesting content (no one likes guild sites). The forum design is nicer but as I have said, use a background. Your site looks like an amateur shrine, just with a domain name. Don't join the bandwagon.

Well I'll keep trying to keep the site as upto date as possible but I've been spending a lot of time studying SAN technology and Linux stuff recently will work on your ideas but I can't please everyone and the guild it was designed for, being the "customers" in this case, are quite pleased with it.

 

With the bandwidth, disk space, and time restraints I am working with I try to keep everything as lean as possible.

 

As always thanks to everyone for the reviews