Forum Name:
Philly Sports Forum

Forum URL:
Philly Sports Forum

Comments:
Talk Philly Sports is a fairly new site I started recently for all Philly Sports Fans. I am still getting everything tweaked an settled in now before I really start promoting everything. What do you guys think so far? The default skin is a paid skin i then customized myself and then each teams section has a custom one-off made for it I did all myself.... Have at it, honest opinions please.... Main Skin/Forum Home Flyers Forum Eagles Forum Phillies Forum Sixers Forum

Categories for Review
Design
Features and Modifications
Guest Friendliness
Organization and Navigation

__________________
PA Forums
Philly Sports
Delaware Online
boomshockalacka

its sorta dark for me. but i like lighter things. Why do you have the welcome message as an image? I think it should def be text so that it is easier to read and so that search engines can get your initial text. it has the logos of the teams behind it and that makes it sorta hard to read and makes the whole area look cluttered. to me that is sorta strange.

i really like the forum icons, they are really smooth. http://www.talkphillysports.com/imag.../forum_old.gif

i think that the top nave bar is overly large. all you have is text in the nav bar, but the bar is gigantic. you could probably shrink that down and have room to move up the body of your site.

on the header you have a really nice gradient on the red background. i think you should have it on the red side bar as well.

on the top left in the red bar, i think you could probably utilize that for a register or sign up button or text.

i think your showthread page looks good. it is very well organized and looks very clean. Welcome to the Philly Sports Forum - Philly Sports Forum

are you going to use vbseo or something along those lines?

Philly Sports Forum
i really like your portal home page. What's sorta wierd about it to me is the grey bar around some of the boxes. on the top one, it looks good, but on the others it looks like the border is way to big.

you are def on the right track. Keep up the good work on this, i am excited to see where it goes

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FTA Files -- Free to Air Satellite Helper Forum

Bush Says Drill, Drill, Drill — and Oil Drops $9...

I will be very honest with my review and give my personal opinion on what I see, please do not take any offense or carry out any changes you deem unnecessary.

Design
The overall skin itself isn't that bad. I think colours mainly go together. However, I find quite a few problems or strange things going on. First thing, the menu bar seems very strange. I think it is a bit too big in height and then the image at the end changes the effect of the other colours. I am not sure if this is what you intended, but it is worth a look. I have a few niggles with colours. For example, maybe you could get the search button (in header) and the new post (orange) image to match completely with your default theme. Both the blue and orange seem quite out of place. Another thing - you have made such nice images for the board icons, and the user scrolls down and hits the online list and BAM, the default vBulletin images are there. To me, they just seemed slightly out of place - maybe you can make some or find some on the internet?

It is nice how you have different themes for each area, however there are a few problems with images looking odd and also colours not matching. I suggest you have a quick look through.

Features and Modifications

Which ones do you mean in particular?

Guest Friendliness

Was quite friendly, I must say. Quite a friendly message for me to register, which I quite like. Although it was hard to read in places due to the background. At the moment, to me it seems you don't have many posts. The problem you have is that you are amplifying this by having too many forums. I would bunch the forums up and so there will be more posts in each area, would be much better. There is a convenient search box, which is very useful and nicely placed.

Organization and Navigation

The navigation is easy to access and important links are there. I would maybe add a more detailed navigation in the sidebar. As I mentioned, you have too many forums, you should look to cut down so that it looks like you have more activity. As an administrator, try to move the topics and activity from the off topic areas to the areas that are valuable to your forum.

Hope this helps

great reviews guys, thank you!!

the welcome image i will be making bigger. i prefer for seo for it to be a image so it gets skipped and the actual post content gets picked up.

the skin colors fiasco...lol...well i worked a bunch to get the skins close, but they aren't quite finished yet...ill post back when they are..

i ahve lots of forums on the guys that are helping me's suggestion, they are huge into sports and we are trying to fill them up asap, i understand what you are saying though

and i actually experimented with squeezing down the navbar, probably be done tomorrow.

thanks to you both!

__________________
PA Forums
Philly Sports
Delaware Online
boomshockalacka

navbar and shrunk and misc buttons are fixed up, working on welcome image now...

__________________
PA Forums
Philly Sports
Delaware Online
boomshockalacka

navbar and shrunk and misc buttons are fixed up, working on welcome image now...

__________________
PA Forums
Philly Sports
Delaware Online
boomshockalacka

Design -
It does look a little dark, maybe be able to allow people a choice between 4 color schemes (perhaps the 4 color schemes of the philly teams?)
The stats on the right look squished.. maybe bring in the left module with the forums (looks like there is alot of space there) and bring those out a bit.
I really like that you stuck with your corners, I can't stand it when a page mixes rounded and straight edge corners.
Features and Modifications
I really like the home page, doesn't feel like a forum and provides pretty much all the information I need to start navigating the site with precision.
Guest Friendliness
Didn't really talk with anyone but I've herd you guys have some of the meanest fans in all of sport, luckly everyone seemed to be cordial on the forums.
Organization and Navigation
Seems really good for the beginning of the site. Just make sure you keep it that way and don't let it get all disorganized and messy.

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It's not my fault...

not quite following you there, can you explain a little?`

do you mean on the homepage put the stats module between the article and tabbed content on the left?

__________________
PA Forums
Philly Sports
Delaware Online
boomshockalacka

bro, the way you have the other forums set up to be skinned for the team is very awesome, that could really be a cool marketing venue. Like selling a section of your forum and the buyer would be able to skin it with his logo or product

__________________
FTA Files -- Free to Air Satellite Helper Forum

Bush Says Drill, Drill, Drill — and Oil Drops $9...

Looking better already. Is that the MSN icon though?