Please Review an arcade for me....

[Richieboy67]

Hi all,

I purchased this some time ago and only recently started doing some updates and seo....

www.arcadecookie.com


It is actually making a small income right now but I expect it to do better after my work kicks in...

Any tips on layout, colors etc? I have not worked on too many arcades but I would like this one too look a little unique. I know these arcades are a dime a dozen so I feel that making it stand out is the only way to make it halfway decent...

Please be descriptive with your posts. Don't say "Add Graphics".... Tell me what kind and where... It would really help me much more this way...

Thanks much

Rich

 

[Koopa]

Some layout advice:
The top Adsense clashes with the Amazon Associates
A list of categories would be useful where the "Sponsors Links" currently are
The amount of ads may put some visitors off, as they're quite close to one another
Pac-Man and Mario look a tad sketchy on the logo, and there may be copyright issues?

Good luck with the site :tu:

 

[Richieboy67]

Oh yeah, thasnks for pointing out the ad.. I have been meaning to fix that... That is a layer I added because I wanted to put a graphic there.. It has to be moved over though...

Yeah, I thought the same things about the ads but a site like this relies on ads for income. if i take them out it makes nothing... I do plan on changing the layout though for better placement....

I was thinking of moving the first gaming block up to the top and then I want the banner,navbar,welcome message all into one table which will be under the main box...

For the backround I was thinking about some kind of gradient instead of the red... If I ever have time I would like to do something with the tables too, the borders and corners could use some pizazz..... I wish I could find some prebuilt templaes all done for me...lol

thanks...

By the way, the only reason I have the welcome table in there was to get a keyword or 2 in the right area.. Otherwise I could just do without it..

 

[-LB-]

Hey there.

Looking at your website I think that the ads would more than likely put somebody off of the website as a first impression. However, if you maybe limited the ad's on your site then it would look that much better. (Simple things generally make the world a difference).

Also, you see the category header colours? I think they would look better as the same background colour as the logo. (So that it doesn't look like there's too much going on) and the red background could be possibly changed from red to a dark blue?

And, not to be picky, but you have a spelling error on the Sponsored Links category.

Sponsors Links

I hope this helps.

 

[Mike]

needs a bit more action in the design. i'm missing a decent backdrop, something that excites me as a user.

the Top Rated Games should be above the google ads and should be represented by their icons not just a text link.

top 10 gamers overall and per game would fire up the competition a bit and hopefully drive more momentum to the site.

Center the nav bar and clean up the logo, it's a bit fuzzy even in it's small appearance.

I'm not sure about your traffic, but just for the case that you have steady and decent traffic, i'd build a box with: Currently there are XXX players on ArcadeCookie, it should add to your site being a good site with credible games.

The teal color with the red border is not my personal choice but should work overall.

:tu:+1/2 out of 3

 

[Tippy]

It looks too plain Jane to me just like every other arcade/game site using a basic turnkey script layout, make it original/personal.

 

[Fka200]

it's really wide

 

[Richieboy67]

wide????

 

[Tippy]

I believe fka200 is referring to : width="100%"

Making it less wide might clean up some of the white spaces and improve the look some, try some different widths.

 

[Richieboy67]

LOL


I know that...lol

It is just that I asked for details and "wide" does not seem to descriptive too me. Plus I totally disagree. I have never used narrow formats for most of my sites. I just feel that they waste too much space.....

Tippy, Too plain jane? in what ways? What would you rather see??

Thanks for the replies...

i am more of a developer than a designer even though I have built my share of sites.. One thing that nobody mentioned is that the real purpose of this site is to get people to play games.... One question to try and answer would be how can I focus people on playing games here??

I have another arcade, www.bulletarcade.com -- I am still in the process of totally redoing this one too but the goog thing about this one is that people play games. There is not much else to distract them

That being said I don't really think the site needs to be too drastic looking. People are coming to play games.. Maybe a few animations on the site and some imaging but nothing too drastic...

I do plan on taking much of the advice into consideration...

Thank you all so much.. I liked this so much that soon I will post another site for review..

Anyone know where I can get a template for this site??? lol

 

[Fka200]

Was in a bit of a hurry and just had to put in some input,

yes, I was talking about the width being 100%, and I agree, I believe some sites are best made simple... but there is a lot of white empty space here that can be avoided by just making the width either 70% or so, make it where maybe the adsense leaderboard fit the width of the game boxes perfectly.

 

[zachary0611]

i would change the font to something more modern

 

[Richieboy67]

Thanks all..

My plan is this..

I have just contacted the person I bought this script from for the licence info. When he gets it for me I am going to get the latest script and totally redo the whole thing..

I have a few clients sites to finish up first but right after that....

I am going to redo this from the ground up in my spare time and this will be one of my sites that will get finished hopefully.

I am going to go for a unique look and I have been jotting down some ideas lately. I will take into consideration everyones advice....

Thanks again.... These are the most worthwhile posts for me and I love to have a response like this to my posts...

Rich