So yesterday I received an email from some dude named Clayton. Within that email I learned a couple quick facts.
1. This Clayton dude created a website called http://www.dpadd.com
2. This Clayton dude is from Vancouver, BC. Which is where we are!!! w00t! Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Honestly, the fact that he was from Vancouver was the thing that got my immediate attention. I’m just being honest, okay? Anyways, reading on, this Clayton dude (henceforth called “Clayton dude”) claims that his website is “an online journal and social network for gamers … it’s just like Goodreads, but for video games.” Due the fact I live under a rock, I had to Google Goodreads. Afterwards, I checked out dpadd and I understood what he meant.
Clik here to view.
The “To Play List”.
I registered an account and peeked around a bit. Part of the site is similar in a way to backloggery – although not nearly as in depth. You can list games that you’re playing, have played (and, I assume, completed), and want to play. For your “To Play List”, you can categorize games into four categories: Uncategorized, Unreleased, In Stores Now, and On my Shelf. I think it’d be nice to add more organization to this feature, such as being able to sort by consoles, but I do like lists… so this is a feature I quite like.
In addition, you make comments on games (and any kind of activity by users on the site), and even give your games ratings on a scale of 5 stars.
You can also click “Browse Games” at the top of the website which brings you to a page telling you what the most played, most wanted, and most rated games of the week are. A little bit below this is the “All Game Activity” feed which is a little bit creepy when you first discover it. Any activity on the site is listed here, so if you add a game or whatever it pops up under this heading. So now everyone on this website can visit this page and see that I’ve played Ogre Battle 64 and commented “<3 Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view. ” about it. Oh dear. Now I just feel weird. On the bright side, as more people show up and start using the site your addition of the latest My Little Pony game will be buried pretty quickly so you can still add your games without feeling the need to be too embarrassed.
Also, you can click on “People” and a list of “Gamers on dpadd” will appear. This will give you a list of all the gamers on the website as well as some suggestions as to who you should follow (although I have no idea how these suggestions are determined). From here you can follow other gamers (presumably your friends if you have any) and the things that they do will show up in your Activity Feed.
Clik here to view.
The activity feed. Clayton dude is L3monade!
Although the site feels basically complete, there are still a couple weird little things that bug me. Firstly, whenever you do something (follow another gamer, add a game to one of your lists, etc.) a green bar appears at the top of the screen confirming what you did. Problem is, this green bar materializes on top of the menu so you have to wait for it to disappear before moving on. Another (very) minor problem I encountered occurred when I tried to add Ogre Battle 64: Person of Lordly Caliber to my “I Played” list. When I typed in “Ogre Battle 64″ or “Ogre Battle”, the game didn’t pop up. Neither did March of the Black Queen. But when I typed in “Person of Lordly Caliber” or “Ogre Battle 64: Person”, it did. I thought this was a bit weird, but hey. It’s a new site and that’s a bit of a picky thing. Also, when I went to my “Collection” page (telling me the list of games I’ve played or rated), apparently Ogre Battle 64: Person of Lordly Caliber is a bit of a long name, as there was a big star in the middle of the word “Caliber”. Again, pretty minor! Finally, when I just typed in “dpadd.com” in the address bar and hit enter in my browser, the website loaded and a red bar (not green!) popped up and told me I was already logged in. Oooookay. I wasn’t trying to log in again, I was just trying to view the website! I was using Google Chrome to view the website, which is the browser I used to take the screenshots below, but all of these things also occur on Firefox (I was mainly curious about the red bar popping up when I navigated to the website).
Image may be NSFW.Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.Clik here to view.
As you might expect, you can also list your “gaming identities”, such as your steam profile, Xbox live, and PSN. However, there’s also a fourth option! You can add in your Twitch.TV username, and a little Twitch.TV player linked to your stream will appear on your profile page! I thought that was pretty great. Also, when you add a new game that you are playing, you can link it to your live stream. Being a fan of Twitch I have to admit I quite like this!
Clik here to view.
My profile page. Note especially our Twitch stream embedded on the left side! I LIKE THAT.
So on the whole, what do I think? Aside from a few really minor little things that bugged me (which I talked about), I think this is a pretty cool little website. I like the fact that it incorporates the concepts of sites like Backloggery (although I would like a bit more organization available because I’m weird like that), allows me to show off my steam profile and especially my Twitch stream (and promote it too when I announce that I’m playing a game!), and comment on the activity of others. It’s simple, it’s organized, it’s easy to navigate. Once they fix a few small things I think it has, at least on paper, the means to compete with other gamer-driven social networks out there. And especially since this guy is from around here (yay Vancouver!), I wish Clayton dude the best of luck! Want to check it out? Too lazy? Yeah I hear you. The keyboard is so far away sometimes. Here. I’ll give you some links…
- Register on dpadd (you still gotta click “Sign up for free now”).
- Follow dpadd on Twitter
- Clayton dude on Twitter
- Picture of baby chickens <3
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.