Limiting adding games by users?

[Syarmakh]

I don't mean to offend anyone (as every contributor has done an awesome job by making this site to what it is today), but maybe you should only let more experienced users add games.

If every new member is able to add games, I'm afraid that there will be a lot of inaccurate/double pages, causing a total chaos in the database. For example: I almost added "GB Aladdin", while "GB Disney's Aladdin" (same thing) is already in the database.

Also, with all the different categories, it is probably impossible to check if all games on all platforms are correct. To have moderators checking out every submission will take a lot of time and will slow down the growth, but it will give an accurate representation of the database.

[mastafafik]

Always check if the game already exist in the database before adding.

[atarileaf]

You should always do a thorough search before you submit anything. Check the different ways a game might be named. Check with and without commas, apostrophe's, etc. For example if you looked up "Disneys Aladdin" (no apostrophe) you'd come up with an empty search and based on that might create a new entry but searching just for "Aladdin" does indeed show "Disney's Aladdin" in the search results so I'm not sure why you "almost" created a new entry.

But yes, the search needs refinement but that's something only the owners/mods can do and I'm sure it's a pretty big job and they seem to have a lot on their plates right now as it is so until that time, it cannot be stressed enough that everyone submitting new entries be extremely diligent in making sure an entry doesn't already exist. Take your time, browse the category manually if you have to, check every spelling and punctuation possibility.

[matt]

Syarmakh, welcome to the site and thanks for the feedback!

As the creator, here is my take on the subject. I build VGCollect after being disappointed over and over with the other solutions out there. With every other site out there you either had to wait for approval or you could add a game that'd only appear on your list. This turned me and many other off to online solutions.  Everything just seemed so difficult to use.

My thought were - hey...why don't we use the power of the community and just remove this restriction!? Who is more anal than us collectors? Having a small number of duplicates and/or invalid data is a small price to pay for having complete freedom to list your collection. There is no waiting for anyone other than yourself. If you don't see something that is listed, just go ahead and add it. If it just happens to be a duplicate....we'll fix it eventually. No harm done.

We find that most database errors are due to users simply not knowing any better. We really don't give users much guidance so I look at that as a failure on our part. We can do better teaching people how the system works.

With all that being said, we are taking some action to help keep the database clean. We just released a new feature that allows us to "lock" a listing that is complete. This'll prevent edits to good data. We'll also be rolling this out to categories in the coming months. We also have tools in place to merge listings so even if you have a duplicate in your collection, it'll auto-update to the correct listing when we fix it.

/edit - also want to point out that a lot of reseach is being done on a new search engine. That should solve 99% of our problems.

[karyann]

If you want to make a good but simple search before adding new games, I'd suggest reading this post: http://vgcollect.com/forum/index.php/topic,22.0.html instead of laborious trial and error off the top of your head. It will make your own entries fit the style guide, and you will have an easier time finding what you want, too!

And welcome to the site

[retromangia]

A-Men to the new Search engine!!     

Looks as though I'm not the only one on this site getting aggravated by duplicate listings... however, what Matt said above is really true, and it's a small price to pay for complete freedom.

I remember trying to add games to RFgenerataion... I'm a huge collector of PC games, and I knew every time I'd want to add a new PC game to my collection on RFGen, I'd have to sit those games aside in a "pending" pile somewhere in my house..... and eventually I'd add them to my collection, when the moderators would accept my submissions... sometimes upto a week later.

I've tried them all, and VGcollect is hands down the best.  I feel this 3.0 update really made it feel "official"  .  Keep the updates comin!

[scott]

Yea, I try to merge dupes as soon as I see them. But sometimes I'm on my phone or at work and don't get the chance.

I've been looking through the categories and trying to make browsing simpler (hence the split for demos) and hopefully everything we are working on will make the whole process of adding things to your collections even easier!

Of course it all takes time, so thanks for all of your patience.

[disgaeniac]

...but maybe you should only let more experienced users add games.

If every new member is able to add games, I'm afraid that there will be a lot of inaccurate/double pages, causing a total chaos in the database.

@ MATT -

Are ya' feeling just a little bit of deja-vous as you're reading these words?