New site design feedback

[FreaKill]

Loading the Library page takes over half a minute for me, which makes creating multiple giveaways or going through Showcase freebies quite annoying, since that involves reloading the page. I think Gameplay Giveaway section is the culprit since it used to take a long time to load in the old design, but now it opens almost immediately, so it must be loading with the page.
I'm not sure why a list of dates and links takes so long, but if it can't be made faster, can devs make it load only when needed?

 

[GoBerserk]

Loading the library should not be taking that long. Definitely email IG support about that.

 

[Zoliv]

How about 2 sections in the gameplay giveaways : one for the unopened keys, loaded with the page, one with the opened keys, loaded on click of the tab ?

 

[GoBerserk]

I use bookmarks for a few different levels when I check out giveaways. It's much quicker than going to the main/all levels giveaways page--then sorting by a specific level--every time I want to check out giveaways.

But using bookmarks of the giveaways pages has suddenly become utterly broken.

You can still go to the giveaways page for all levels, then sort to a specific level. But for some reason, trying to load a giveaways page for any specific level from a bookmark no longer works.

For example, a bookmarked page for level 2: https://www.indiegala.com/giveaways/1/expiry/asc/level/2

What happens now:


There's no way to bookmark by level anymore, because the address stays as something like this:
https://www.indiegala.com/giveaways/2/expiry/asc/level/all
even when sorting by a specific level. I don't know why the address stays as level all even when sorting by a specific level.

In fact, clicking that link I just gave fails too. Give it a try.

Besides that, even duplicating tabs for giveaways pages fails. Go to the giveaways page, then sort by a level (doesn't matter which level). Now, right click on the tab on your browser and choose duplicate. It fails just the same:


Could this please get fixed?

I'm on Chrome, if it makes a difference.

Edit: even this fails:
https://www.indiegala.com/giveaways/

It's so strange.

 

[TrueSeeker]

I second everything Oh The Folly said. But it's even worse than that.

https://www.indiegala.com/giveaways/ URL doesn't work
https://www.indiegala.com/giveaways is the new URL we're supposed to use

The thing is, on almost every attempt it herrases me with this:



And soon enough it blocks me completely.
Making the entire site unusable. Literally, unusable.

 

[GoBerserk]

Giveaways are also taking a LOT longer to load since the change today. First they can take half a minute to show up when first loading the giveaways page. Then, when you sort by level, there can be another delay of about another half a minute.

There weren't such long load times yesterday before whatever change was made today.

I've seen the captcha a couple times too just browsing giveaways like I normally do. Fortunately I haven't gotten blocked, but when the captcha is going to show up, it seems to take a minute to a minute and a half of just sitting there with a mostly blank gray page before the captcha finally shows itself.

Which makes it an incredible nuisance even if it only shows up infrequently, because that is a massive delay. Was IndieGala using imperva before this? Because if this is a new captcha being used, it clearly seems to be a trash captcha service if it's causing such terrible slowdowns.

 

[RedSparr0w]

I remember last time they added the captcha, just made the site completely unusable, wasn't the same company though IIRC.
But would always pop up between every 2-3 pages.
such a hassle

And these new load times are crazy long 5+ seconds to load the main page, then 2+ seconds per extra page after that.

Edit: It's the same captcha service they used last time "incapsula" they've just re branded..

 

[LightReasoningIllusions]

I'm facing the same problems. Links for the giveaways that use level filters or some order don't work, they become that text version thing that user Oh The Folly posted. Also, opening a new tab in the page links at the bottom generates the same text version.
Not being able to use those links generates extra workload on the website, and requires extra time for the user. Not being able to use extra tabs does the same, when users have to move forwards and backwards.
Not being able to hide owned Steam games (this was an option in the old design) is also adding time and workload, and it's making these problems worse.

I'm also being hit with the Incapsula security checks often. Yes, I am a human. This is annoying, and it could be a big problem with the quiz: users could get hit mid-quiz and fail it because of these robotic suspicions.

 

[RedSparr0w]

It seems the links with filters just fallback to the main giveaways page now, but don't apply the filter.

I'm also being hit with the Incapsula security checks often. Yes, I am a human. This is annoying, and it could be a big problem with the quiz: users could get hit mid-quiz and fail it because of these robotic suspicions.

It's just constant.

And no word from IG staff about anything going on yet.

 

[GoBerserk]

Besides the captcha, something else that happens when browsing giveaways sometimes is "Sorry, due to high traffic on this page, we are having some issues handling your request. Retry later. "

When then happens, you have to start over. If you were on page 10 out of 15, for example, you cannot just refresh the page and be back on page 10.

No, you have to start over from page 1 and click nine more times to get back to page 10. All the while hoping that you don't get the "Retry later" message again, and have to start all over again.

It's already gotten to the point that when I get the message "Sorry, due to high traffic on this page, we are having some issues handling your request. Retry later. " I just give up. Right now it's like the site actively wants to fight against you simply using it. It's not worth fighting against the site like you have to now when it doesn't want to work right.

There needs to be the ability to bookmark and reload pages directly from whatever place you're currently at, exactly because of things like this. Being able to use bookmarks to get back to where you were is essential site design, for any site, ever.

Please don't ever put in any kind of site design which doesn't let you use something as basic as bookmarks, ever again.

 

[GoBerserk]

I keep getting randomly logged out of the forum, and can't log back in.

Logging out of the IG store and logging back in to the IG store is the only way to get logged into the forum again.

Support is aware of this issue (they're the ones that first told me to log out of the store to get logged back into the forum) but it keeps happening despite it being a known issue. I'm hoping if I post here something will be done to fix it.

It's annoying in the first place to keep getting randomly logged out of the forum sometimes, but it's so incredibly dumb to actually have to log out of the store every single time that happens, or else you can't log back into the forum again.

Please fix this.

 

[Kyoshiro]

Besides the captcha, something else that happens when browsing giveaways sometimes is "Sorry, due to high traffic on this page, we are having some issues handling your request. Retry later. "

When then happens, you have to start over. If you were on page 10 out of 15, for example, you cannot just refresh the page and be back on page 10.

No, you have to start over from page 1 and click nine more times to get back to page 10. All the while hoping that you don't get the "Retry later" message again, and have to start all over again.

It's already gotten to the point that when I get the message "Sorry, due to high traffic on this page, we are having some issues handling your request. Retry later. " I just give up. Right now it's like the site actively wants to fight against you simply using it. It's not worth fighting against the site like you have to now when it doesn't want to work right.

There needs to be the ability to bookmark and reload pages directly from whatever place you're currently at, exactly because of things like this. Being able to use bookmarks to get back to where you were is essential site design, for any site, ever.

Please don't ever put in any kind of site design which doesn't let you use something as basic as bookmarks, ever again.

Just to get some more focus on this, I think I will try to preemptively refute the reason I see this design choice often advocated for. Some developers in favor of infinite scrolling non-bookmarkable pages argue major sites like Twitter, Facebook, and some other social media use them, and therefore then, it must be peak design.

There are a couple reasons why sites like Indiegala shouldn't use them though.

1. Just because something is flavor of the month, doesn't make it good UX design.
2. Social media is focused on the immediate moment. Users of social media sites rarely need to load more than a few extra pages at most, so proper pagination is devalued. It should go without saying, that users at Indiegala aren't interested in just the first page of giveaways or even the first few pages, they are interested in all of the giveaways they can access.
3. Because users are interested in all pages, it requires a stable connection from both the server and the user to get through them all, clearly something Indiegala is having problems with.
4. Since the design is focused on spending less time engaged with a service, it encourages people to spend less time at Indiegala in general. I'm sure I don't need to detail why that is bad for business.

Thankfully, redsparr0wcom's chrome-extension, make the number of entries manageable. Were it not for his hard work, I don't think I could even use the giveaway section of the site.

 

[GoBerserk]

Could we please get some confirmation that the giveaway section is going to be redesigned so that bookmarking works again? If you're working on that or planning to change it, please say something so people know.

Getting "Server error, retry in few minutes" when you're a large number of pages into the giveaways section, and then having to start over from page 1 because bookmarking/refreshing doesn't work, is so broken and so unnecessarily frustrating.

I'm also certain that it is giving a very bad impression to people who are new to IG. It can be solved by making it so bookmarking/refreshing the page works again, and I would strongly suggest making that change that asap.

 

[Bitzero]

Has this site reskin actually accomplished anything or added any new functionality? As far as the giveaway section goes, nothing of value was added. What's worse is that functionality has regressed by removing the ability to filter owned games. And of course, with every change done to this site, there's a month of glitches to put up with before things stabilize. Test your site before publishing. This is amateurish nonsense that really does not shine a very positive light on your devs.


What was the point of this reskin, and when, if ever, are we going to get the functionality we once had, back?

 

[GoBerserk]

Another bug: Extra Odds giveaways only let you enter once.

When the Join button comes back after entering, it will not let you enter again. When you click Join nothing happens.

You can only enter again by refreshing the page. You literally have to refresh the giveaway page for every singe entry.

Please just allow people to type in the number of entries they want for extra odds giveaways already, or get rid of extra odds entirely. It is not functioning properly.

I don't want to get down on the people working on the site, but seriously, without exaggeration, there has not been another change to the site that I can think of which has been so bugged as the current one, nor so functionally taken backwards (bookmarks no longer working for example, is a huge step backwards). People have been telling what's not working right, and what to improve to make the site more comfortable to use.

Some things were improved shortly after the change was first put in place, and that was good. But there are also major issues that aren't fixed, and it's been a while since anything has apparently been done to fix remaining issues. Are any of these other things people have mentioned ever going to be fixed?

EDIT: I'm talking about extra odds on the individual giveaway page.

Extra Odds does appear to be working correctly on the main/all giveaways page. The problem is, with bookmarks not working, if you want to see what's past an Extra Odds giveaway, you have to continue on to the next page. In this case, to keep the Extra Odds giveaway visible you have to open the individual giveaway page for that giveaway. And that's where Extra Odds doesn't work. You have to refresh the page every time you enter there.

It's yet another reason why being able to load bookmarks and be at the page you were when you bookmarked is so crucially important. If bookmarking was possible again, you would be able to get back to the main giveaways page where there was an Extra Odds giveaway with ease. The way it is now you would have to click through sometimes upwards of 15-20 pages or more, just to get back to the Extra Odds giveaway page on the main giveaways page.

You see how this is broken without bookmarks, right?

 

[Zoliv]

Hello, i'd like to talk about something that drives me crazy on the site : the drop down menus (where you see the bundles, etc...). They're are too big, but most of all, they take too much time to disappear !!! They should disappear as soon as the mouse pointer is not on them anymore, or they'll stay some long seconds, and you can't do anything else. It's horrible.

Other people have that too ?

 

[GoBerserk]

Yes, it's not just happening for you. The menus that pop up don't like to go away and won't let you do anything until they finally do go away.

 

[FreaKill]

Interesting, currently the Showcase, Community and Profile tabs disappear immediately after you move the mouse away. But Bundles and Store tabs stay for half a second.
Still that's better than before, even though I personally prefer drop down menus to only open when I click them - that way there's never an issue of a "helpful" design element actually interfering more than being useful.

 

[Zoliv]

Maybe they've started correcting it, good !

 

[GoBerserk]

I think the biggest problem with the pop-up menus is that they show up too easy - the mouse cursor crossing the menu at the top for even a split-second while you are moving the cursor to somewhere else is enough to make the pop-up menus show up. That causes the pop up menus to often show up when you did not want them to. They should not be so sensitive that just crossing the menu at the top while moving the mouse cursor to somewhere else is enough to make the pop ups show up.

The other problem is that they take to long to disappear once the mouse is no longer over the trigger point that makes the menu pop up. Sometimes they even get stuck and you have to move the mouse over the trigger points a bunch in hopes that you can get the pop up menu to despawn. I've had a few times where the pop up menus were so persistent that it was easier to refresh the page than to try messing around with the mouse to get them to go away.

Sometimes it's no issue but still today I almost had to refresh a page just to get the stupid pop up menu to go away so I could do what I actually wanted to do. In all honesty those pop ups have annoyed me so much since they were put in place that I would rather they were just gotten rid of entirely.