It’s time for a change. It’s time to do something different.
TheSixthAxis has always strived for quality and we’ve always worked very hard and made difficult choices to maintain our integrity. We haven’t always got it right but when we have erred we hold our hands up and we resolve to do better.
Last week’s hot topic in games media gave us cause to think about how we engage in our coverage and it reaffirmed our ideas and made us even more certain of the plans we had already put in motion to change our approach to covering videogames. At some point in the last few years, we’ve started to lose our way. We engaged in trying to make TheSixthAxis work like other games websites do. That’s not how we started out and it’s not really what we enjoy. So we’re going to make a change.
We’ve decided that we’re going to stop regurgitating the same little press-release news items that pepper hundreds of games websites around the internet. We’ll only publish a news story if we think it’s going to cause some discussion among our community, if we’ve uncovered something new or if we have something we want to say about it ourselves.
We’ll stop publishing things that PR teams and other websites tell us are news and we’ll start to publish things based on how interesting we think it is and whether we think that you, our audience, will be interested by it. That’s how TheSixthAxis worked when I first arrived here and that’s how we’re going to work again.
Let’s be clear: this is not a declaration that anybody else is doing anything necessarily wrong. We’re not condemning the sites that publish every press release they get sent. There’s a seemingly insatiable appetite for that kind of coverage and several websites do it exceptionally well. They draw large audiences and they make plenty of money. TheSixthAxis might draw a respectably sized audience but we don’t make very much money at all. So why should we spend all day every day grinding out the work we don’t enjoy – work which is almost identical to a hundred other sources and mostly to the greater benefit of PR departments – when we’re not getting paid to do so?
We want TheSixthAxis to be a hub for discussion amongst people who love playing games, a place for opinions to be shared. We’re going to focus on sharing our opinions with you and we hope you’ll continue to share your opinions with us in the comments sections.
Those opinions you’ve shared have led to the second reason for this message: we’re changing our homepage design again.
Back in September, we moved from a standard blog list with sidebars to a more modern tiled layout. While the feedback we received was generally positive, we think we can do better. We’ve spent the time since the end of September redesigning how the homepage looks and works and we think the new layout, which you should all be able to see now, allows for clear promotion of our features while presenting the stream of time-sensitive stories in a way which is clear to view and clear to use.
This redesign gives more space and more significance to some of the community aspects of TheSixthAxis, too. We want to encourage you to enjoy the unmatched community of smart, funny, considerate gamers that have gathered here. We want to encourage you to join in the discussion as much as possible and we’re looking into ways, in the future, to assist you in getting your ideas out to the wider TSA community. For now, you can always use the Forums as a platform to share your ideas. If you’re interested in getting words down in a more structured way, don’t forget that we’re always keen to take your Guest Writer submissions and we’ll work with you to help them meet the high standards we want to maintain for articles published on the front page.
The new homepage design also signifies another return to earlier principles for us. TheSixthAxis began life as a PlayStation 3 blog and although we now cover every platform and medium for playing games, PlayStation has always been our strongest area of expertise. We’re going to emphasise that fact a little more.
Of course, that doesn’t mean we’re going to stop covering other platforms. We’ll still discuss, preview and review the big games on Microsoft, Nintendo, PC and mobile platforms when we can. But we’ve always been strongest with PlayStation, both in terms of how much coverage we can give (most of our staff are PlayStation users) and in terms of how much feedback you give us. So we want it to be clear that, although we enjoy games of all shapes and sizes and on all platforms, we really know PlayStation.
Finally, the discussions surrounding these changes led us to the conclusion that we want to do more to help spread the word about other great videogames coverage. We want to be involved with other independently spirited outlets who share our passion for the medium and our frustrations at the stranglehold that large organisations have on the wider games media. Plans are at extremely early stages just now but we’re going to try to set up partnerships with some of the websites we trust and respect so that we can all share the unparalleled work that some of the smaller, independent sites manage to put out. It’s hard work being independent and maintaining high standards. Our reasoning is that it might be easier for us all if we help each other a little bit more.
We also want to emphasise the great respect we have for independent developers. We’ll be putting a little more effort into presenting the work we do around that particular scene in a way which is more enticing for casual visitors. We understand that it’s difficult to get the word out and we think that a lot of you, our audience, are missing out on some of the great games you could be experiencing simply because it’s hard for these smaller teams to be heard amidst the cacophony of wealthy publishers’ marketing campaigns and PR teams.
Many changes are already in place but there are still more to come in the longer term. Hopefully you’re excited by the direction we’re taking and hopefully you’ll stick around and help us find a fun, engaging platform for sharing our ideas and opinions about this interactive medium that we all love so much.
Game on.
freezebug2
Snazzy, nice new look!
So where’s the Singstar icon?
hol
Whilst I’ve always found your news articles to be interesting & honest, lets be fair, it’s not why most of us ended up looking at these pages every day? It’s the discussion here &, more importantly, the respect you show your readers & each other. Even beyond the walls of TSA, you all act in the same way on twitter which is nice to see.
Keep up the great work guys, there’s still a long road ahead :)
Nate
Liking the new look a lot more than the semi-old one, although the forums seem even more hidden now. I can’t see any reference to them on the front page anymore apart from the little forum button, although I may have missed a sidebar in my quick gloss.
I’m looking forward to a more focused TSA, although personally I liked the little regurgitated news tidbits as I don’t read any other gaming sites. If you could just create a little Ignorance Corner where you tell me what’s going on in the rest of the internets to save me venturing into the wilderness that would be great, thanks.
Peter Chapman
there’s been some discussion around getting Tuffcub to do his News Snatch again – like a round up every day or so with all the little bits of news and him taking the piss out of the silly stuff.
Nate
The more Tuffcub the better really. He is like wordy crack.
billsmugs
That would be excellent. I also don’t frequent other news sites, so it would be good to still get all the info in some format, and if that format is Tuffcub mocking it all then that’s even better!
One other thing, which I might as well include here: will the “/vertical” page continue to exist for the forseeable future? The new homepage is better than the previous one, but I still much prefer the good old fashioned vertical view, sorry!
billsmugs
Sorry, ignore the /vertical stuff, I just read Alex’s comment three posts down. That will teach me to not read everything before replying.
Tuffcub
Which will be happening as soon, just need to get all this Vita stuff out of the door.
Kitch
Yay. I loved some of the old topics and discussions. Can we also now stop with the +1 thing? I’ve backed off reading since it became more PR release orientated. Godd luck and THANKYOU.
gazzagb
Love the new design over the previous one, I always had to chose the vertical one as I couldn’t easily see what were the newest articles, so this is much better!
Also like the sound of the re-focus, but may I suggest that you still report on gaming news, just do it in a way similar to how Tuffcub used to do his ‘news snatches’ in the forums years ago, in small bite-sized write ups with multiple stories in a single article. I think that would fit this re-focus very well.
Alex C
Just a note that the old (old) layout still works just fine, if you don’t like this one – http://www.thesixthaxis.com/vertical/
There’s no overhead to us keeping it, so it’s staying for those that just want the list. =)
gazzagb
The annoying thing was that there was no way of me setting it to remember my preference of using the vertical theme, but that doesn’t matter anymore as I like this new one :)
minerwilly
Great news been around a while now . Good luck , I’ll still be around .
YOURMUMANDME
Can I make a suggestion or two?
Well actually I don’t know why I asked, I’m not waiting for a reply!
Can we have more short term, competition based meets? Maybe a nice scoreboard or a regular update for it that sits on the homepage tucked away neatly at the right or left side? Not even for prizes or anything, just for gloating purposes ; )
(I’d need PSN first anyway so no rush :D)
Is there a way to show how many people are viewing an article like there is in the forum? That would good too, could encourage people to comment or reply more.
gideon1451
This is great :)
Alex C
Also, before I forget, massive thanks to a certain TSA member (not sure if he’d want me to mention him directly) who helped at the end of the home page development with some great ideas and motivation.
ico
Less PR fluff? Fabulous news which I can enjoy with my Mountain Dew and Doritos. Seriously though this is pretty much the only gaming blog / site I come to daily and comment on (mainly due to the almost complete lack of trolling and flame wars). Good luck with the reboot and I’ll still be a regular of this great bastion of British game journalism greatness. Long live TSA!