A New Website

It’s been weeks. Months even. But the new website is finally live.

It’s been quite a transformation. My old host had circuit breakers on my site that turned off a bunch of pages when the site got too busy. As the search for a new host started it turned turned into an even bigger pipe dream of updating the site from an old, old WordPress theme to something quite modern. And here we are, fully up to date, the fat trimmed, and all the games and content live and well.

When I first created my website I intended for it to be a portfolio. Slowly this site turned into a video game site, loading up with ads and completely geared towards displaying games and earning your pageviews. I realized after a couple years that I was not happy about that and that I would want my work displayed somewhere nice without ads or a ton of branding. I decided to start slimming things down, and I ended up with the site seen here:

I was pretty happy with this design for quite a while, it was the longest lasting design out of the many I made. But it was buggy at times and even worse there were a ton of missing features. The WordPress template the site was built on didn’t upgrade well with new versions of WordPress and within a couple years it started to age. With the final breaking of the website from the traffic I decided to try my hand again at web design, work off of a new template, and get the site design to where I wanted it. I managed to find a template that really fit my vision for the site and after a lot of overhaul the site was ready, and here it is!

A few features have been added to the site. For one, I can upload content quickly now instead of editing static pages like a madman. The clutter is gone and the strange thick-framed panes are sexy and slim. The new designs loads much quicker and should be mobile-compatible on most browsers. There’s finally there’s a proper place for my photography, and with that, the semi-soft launch of my photography portfolio, helloaphant.com! And even neater, the website is all one giant page! It’s all pretty crazy.

That said there is still plenty to be done. For starters the animation section has not been put up. For another I miss that top banner game, so I’ll have to figure out something to do about that. And finally there’s a few final touches to be done, but honestly I’ve been far too impatient to get it live and I have an entire backlog of updates (and game uploads) to make! And now that I look at it the game icons are all different sizes, weird.

Input is appreciated on the new site, I hope you enjoy it! And for those who show up all the time, welcome back. Its very nice to have you back.

Tags: website

http://jmtb02.com John Cooney

This is a test comment!
ElPenguino

You really like elephants, don’t you?
The site is looking very slick, by the way. I love the super-clean design.
- http://jmtb02.com John Cooney
  
  I love elephants.
  - http://www.facebook.com/people/Joshua-Payne/100000112293889 Joshua Payne
    
    I forgot what got you to switch from penguins to elephants.
Skafsgaard

Yes!

It’s so good to have you and the site back, John!
jaxcheese

Congrats! It was worth it, the site looks great.
http://ezlospiritstories.blogspot.com SightSpirit / EzloSpirit

It’s back! Now I can start repeatedly navigating back to this place unconsciously to play some awesome games! I look forward to there being a more organized, complete game section again, however. Pretty site, overall!
- http://jmtb02.com John Cooney
  
  Yes, and all the games are available without an additional page click, I love it even for my own means, lol… and bigger icons! It took forever, there are nearly 80-90 games on this site and its a lot of screenshots.
jaxcheese

The only thing missing? The minigame at the top of the page.
- thaboss
  
  Yes. I loved that. Elephant Rave HD was better than regular..
  - jaxcheese
    
    Adding a mini version of Run Elephant Run in the elephant logo would be cool.
- http://jmtb02.com John Cooney
  
  Top nav minigame IS missing! I am not sure if I can fit it into the design up top but hopefully I can fit another minigame in somewhere…
thaboss

I like it! But… There’s no more Easter Egg at the top to play Elephant Rave HD!!
kaito1412

FINALLY!
Rachel

OMG I love that it’s one page, it’s interesting and different. I also miss the game at the top and think you should put it back in some way, but I think that at the end it should connect you to “Acheivement Unlocked”, or “This is the only level” instead of Elephant Rave or whatever it used to connect you to. Also, I like your photos!!
- SQ
  
  Oh, it was connected to Elephant Rave HD because it was supposed to be an easter egg at that time.
Essiw

I like it, the only thing I would like to see, is a different page where are you games are listed, by date if possible. Not like we have now that there are somewhere on the same page. Or at least give us a quick link I really love your games.
- Essiw
  
  no quick link to games?
shadowbrawler9000

Amazing job with the new website! Do you plan on setting up a new forum for your fans? It would be great to have it back.
- http://jmtb02.com John Cooney
  
  Forums are difficult. They take a lot of maintenance that I don’t have the tech or time to maintain. Since setting up these threaded comments I feel they aren’t as necessary.
  - http://www.facebook.com/people/Joshua-Payne/100000112293889 Joshua Payne
    
    Not to be a @($&, but what more is there than simply putting up the forums and “employing” mods and admins to keep order?
    
    Just don’t employ Jeppo this time; he sucks.
  - http://jmtb02.com John Cooney
    
    It’s more the maintaining of the disk space, running the board and making sure its not eating up resources so that elsewhere on the site its not running slow. Last two forums fell on their faces and eventually ran slow and sad… no amount of filtering mods managed to keep the bots out (there’s a ton of bots).
  - http://www.facebook.com/people/Joshua-Payne/100000112293889 Joshua Payne
    
    The only thing I have a response for is the bot bit…
    Xplodes devised an automated spam pruning system powered by curl and my account at one point .
    –DAPERSON
    
    The other stuff, though… not sure of whether or not Xplodes’ anti-spam would allow the mods and admins to handle the post contents so they don’t consist of lagtastic streaming. I’m guessing not.
Onjit

Woot!
YAY

How about CTS2, EQ2 or CH2
Frida_loves_cookies

Hmm, did any of the regulars come back? Fluffies, anyone?

A New Website

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