overflow into the Message body.

But if the forum software did it automatically then the goodness would just happen. I wouldn't need to touch the subject field.

How I imagine it would work is...

user clicks Post reply

reply page loads with original subject in subject field

user does his stuff and clicks OK - Submit

back on the server the PHP code checks the contents of the subject field.

if it has changed from what was sent to the reply page then it uses that as the subject

if not then it tries to get the first non-comment sentence

if found then it is trimmed to size and used as the subject

I image that the first non-comment sentence is the first non-empty line that doesn't start with the angle character

This sounds complicated, with tons of room for comical (and maybe not so comical) mistakes, and huge potential for annoyance from people looking to be clever. :)

It also changes the behavior of the forum for EVERYONE, not just the people who think this style would be cool - with no way to override it.

Overall, I think it's a cool idea, but implementation brings with it too many issues to make it feasible. :(

But if the forum software did it automatically then the goodness would just happen. I wouldn't need to touch the subject field.

How I imagine it would work is...

user clicks Post reply

reply page loads with original subject in subject field

user does his stuff and clicks OK - Submit

back on the server the PHP code checks the contents of the subject field.

if it has changed from what was sent to the reply page then it uses that as the subject

if not then it tries to get the first non-comment sentence

if found then it is trimmed to size and used as the subject

I image that the first non-comment sentence is the first non-empty line that doesn't start with the angle character

I used to use an offline reader called: Pow wow, wigwam, teepee, Virtual Access (yes, the name changed a lot).

It let you quickly go online, download msgs from: CIX Compuserve, Newsgroups and unheard of, strange, Israeli text based conversation thingies wot I never used or subscribed to.

It quickly went through all the services that you were subscribed to. Sucked all the messages into a database, uploaded all your replies, and then hung up.

You would view your messages in a threaded format and read and reply offline.

This was back in pre-broadband days. You know, modems going chhhhhhhhh urrrrrr !"£$%^& and shit.

anyway...

It had a feature.

In the threaded message list, you could opt for it to display the first, non-comment, sentence of the message as the message title in the thread list. It would be chopped to fit if needed. Actually, I think this was the default behaviour because it was so good.

It worked really well because you see the ebb and flow of the conversation just from reading the msg titles. The threads often got very large (hundreds of messages) but, in a sense, you could read the entire thread just by looking at msg titles. It was easy to keep your place in the thread, you were less likely to get lost in the sea of posts.

I like to change my reply titles so that people can see where the conversation is going and can decide if they want to dip in before they load the message body.

It might help moderators skim the forum looking for aggravation.

Have you seen something like this elsewhere? Does it exist everywhere and I just haven't noticed?

Is there an option already in this forum that I just need to turn on?

Is this an Xbox One thing? I've never seen anything like this on the 360. (How can you connect a console to multiple screens?)

Weren't you saying you had your One on one screen and your PC on the other with the keyboard close by?

Nope. I've never played Halo 4 on a One. Just 360.

This whole room. Environmental storytelling is the best form of visual storytelling.

Environmental storytelling is great and really helps out the ... environment, feel, setting. But, it's quite difficult to fully communicate a story just through the environment. You can relay a very basic story, but there certainly aren't going to be any plot twists, it's basic & straightforward.

I disagree. A great example is in Skyrim. You find a cave in one point, and a journal that talks about how two guys bought it hoping for riches. When you go in and explore, you see a campsite in a room with a waterfall, and evidence that they dug multiple long tunnels before giving up on one. The table has a journal about how they found nothing, and the writer felt ripped off. The last page tells about how he went to town for a few days to buy some supplies, and when he came back, his friend had disappeared. Feeling betrayed and broke, he cursed his friend and left the cave.

And that's pretty much it. Evidence of their stay is all around... But if you explore, you'll see that beyond the pool and behind the waterfall, there's a hidden cave. If you go into it, you'll find some mining equipment, and a skeleton half crushed under some fallen rocks... Revealing a large vein of gold...

But if this room were present without any of the journals to read you would think, "oh, someone was mining for gold, found it and was then crushed by a cave in." Not much of a story at all. You wouldn't think about the friend potentially hiding his find, or the tragedy of the partnership & lost friend. It wouldn't really have any impact without some other form of storytelling.

Sure the journal helped remove all ambiguity, but the environment did a great job of telling a story, AND including a twist for you to discover.

Yeah, but the twist was only possible because the journals set it up.

Another example is "Der Reise" in the first Black Ops. The map's environment tells a story that can be explained by the audio records that you find, explaining the zombie dogs, the reason there are so many zombies, and the fate of Samantha (who controls the zombies). It's not spelled out for you, but there was enough in the environment to see the twist (one dog was teleported, but multiple dog tracks are seen leaving the teleporters).

Again, the environment is supplemental to the audio (or vice versa). It doesn't truly tell a compelling story on its own. I don't disagree that environmental storytelling is a fantastic addition to a game, and creating environments with a story behind them really adds a lot, but it needs to be paired with something else, otherwise it's just that, environment and atmosphere. It's just a stage for a performance. Maybe, at the absolute most, a very simple story like what I see in that picture...

When I look at that picture all I see is "Oh, some human fought for its life with a gun and lost." I don't get any real story, just atmosphere and setting. I have no emotional connection, no reason to care about that headless skeleton sitting there. Now if that room were accompanied by something else (audio, text, cutscene) that gave me a reason to care by telling or setting up a story, then it could be moving.

Maybe we're debating semantics. Environment can tell a story, even part of a really great story, but it needs help.

Well that's the thing about it. You're not going to get a beginning, middle, and end neatly explained in environmental storytelling, but it helps supplement any story, any game, and any other form of storytelling. Left 4 Dead did a great job of this, with every area telling its own story of lost friends, safe houses, overrun barricades...

*Last of Us Minor Spoilers*
Another great example is The Last of Us, where you find a boat, and a nearby sewer system where you see that a community was thriving underground... Until it fell. Sure the notes that you can find explain exactly what happened at different points in time, but even without them, you can tell what happened everywhere (one room has an adult with children in a corner, and blankets over their heads). You can deduce what took place all around, even without the notes. In the end, you find out that the other side of the sewers lead to a suburban region, which is where all the people came from. The game is a tale of survival, and the sewers are a unique interpretation of that concept, indirectly supporting your story, and building the world around you.
*end spoils*

How boring would it be if the environments were lifeless, bland, and said nothing? That's an issue that I have with Destiny. If there aren't enemies, there's nothing interesting anywhere outside of the human bases on the moon, and even those don't really tell you anything about what might have happened...

I agree that environmental storytelling is, for the most part, not going to elicit as much of a response as another form of storytelling, but combined with ANY other form of storytelling, even in written form, it elevates that storytelling to a much more impactful thing than it would be otherwise.

In Bioshock, the tale of the family who's daughter was turned into a Little Sister is sad, but combine that with the fact that you find the couple in their bed, with pills and a picture of their daughter, and it hits you... Would you really need an audio log explaining the scene to understand that this couple lost their daughter, and decided to die than live without her? No. It's a small story told in a small room, among countless other small stories told all around that help the city that you're in tell its own story...

The room in the Lighthouse does this for me a bit. The two corpses and dead vex explain why the dropship sits there abandoned and unpacked. It explains the books and research materials. It reminds me of the fact that Mercury was turned into a machine in days, without letting people escape. Or maybe they hid down below, trying to figure out what was going on before the Vex finally found them.
Who knows? The possibilities are endless.

This whole room. Environmental storytelling is the best form of visual storytelling.

Environmental storytelling is great and really helps out the ... environment, feel, setting. But, it's quite difficult to fully communicate a story just through the environment. You can relay a very basic story, but there certainly aren't going to be any plot twists, it's basic & straightforward.

I disagree. A great example is in Skyrim. You find a cave in one point, and a journal that talks about how two guys bought it hoping for riches. When you go in and explore, you see a campsite in a room with a waterfall, and evidence that they dug multiple long tunnels before giving up on one. The table has a journal about how they found nothing, and the writer felt ripped off. The last page tells about how he went to town for a few days to buy some supplies, and when he came back, his friend had disappeared. Feeling betrayed and broke, he cursed his friend and left the cave.

And that's pretty much it. Evidence of their stay is all around... But if you explore, you'll see that beyond the pool and behind the waterfall, there's a hidden cave. If you go into it, you'll find some mining equipment, and a skeleton half crushed under some fallen rocks... Revealing a large vein of gold...

But if this room were present without any of the journals to read you would think, "oh, someone was mining for gold, found it and was then crushed by a cave in." Not much of a story at all. You wouldn't think about the friend potentially hiding his find, or the tragedy of the partnership & lost friend. It wouldn't really have any impact without some other form of storytelling.

Sure the journal helped remove all ambiguity, but the environment did a great job of telling a story, AND including a twist for you to discover.

Yeah, but the twist was only possible because the journals set it up.

Another example is "Der Reise" in the first Black Ops. The map's environment tells a story that can be explained by the audio records that you find, explaining the zombie dogs, the reason there are so many zombies, and the fate of Samantha (who controls the zombies). It's not spelled out for you, but there was enough in the environment to see the twist (one dog was teleported, but multiple dog tracks are seen leaving the teleporters).

Again, the environment is supplemental to the audio (or vice versa). It doesn't truly tell a compelling story on its own. I don't disagree that environmental storytelling is a fantastic addition to a game, and creating environments with a story behind them really adds a lot, but it needs to be paired with something else, otherwise it's just that, environment and atmosphere. It's just a stage for a performance. Maybe, at the absolute most, a very simple story like what I see in that picture...

When I look at that picture all I see is "Oh, some human fought for its life with a gun and lost." I don't get any real story, just atmosphere and setting. I have no emotional connection, no reason to care about that headless skeleton sitting there. Now if that room were accompanied by something else (audio, text, cutscene) that gave me a reason to care by telling or setting up a story, then it could be moving.

Maybe we're debating semantics. Environment can tell a story, even part of a really great story, but it needs help.

This whole room. Environmental storytelling is the best form of visual storytelling.

Environmental storytelling is great and really helps out the ... environment, feel, setting. But, it's quite difficult to fully communicate a story just through the environment. You can relay a very basic story, but there certainly aren't going to be any plot twists, it's basic & straightforward.

I disagree. A great example is in Skyrim. You find a cave in one point, and a journal that talks about how two guys bought it hoping for riches. When you go in and explore, you see a campsite in a room with a waterfall, and evidence that they dug multiple long tunnels before giving up on one. The table has a journal about how they found nothing, and the writer felt ripped off. The last page tells about how he went to town for a few days to buy some supplies, and when he came back, his friend had disappeared. Feeling betrayed and broke, he cursed his friend and left the cave.

And that's pretty much it. Evidence of their stay is all around... But if you explore, you'll see that beyond the pool and behind the waterfall, there's a hidden cave. If you go into it, you'll find some mining equipment, and a skeleton half crushed under some fallen rocks... Revealing a large vein of gold...

Sure the journal helped remove all ambiguity, but the environment did a great job of telling a story, AND including a twist for you to discover.

Another example is "Der Reise" in the first Black Ops. The map's environment tells a story that can be explained by the audio records that you find, explaining the zombie dogs, the reason there are so many zombies, and the fate of Samantha (who controls the zombies). It's not spelled out for you, but there was enough in the environment to see the twist (one dog was teleported, but multiple dog tracks are seen leaving the teleporters).

Yeah, we can add something like that. I’ll pow-wow with Claude since he seems to have an idea already.

People who are worried about spoils can highlight the text to read it and other people don't have to do work to read stuff.

I just ran out of things to spoil.

I think I and someotherguy have showed many examples of how time has nothing to do with spoilers as people find and engage in new stories at all different times and places. And what about new generations of audiences? They don't get a chance at experiencing something new for the first time, surprises intact, like the author intended?

I just started reading Wheel of Time, for example. Does that automatically mean I'm not as cool as the people who read the novels when they first came out and thus random spoilers is what I deserve? Obviously I should put in some work to prevent them - I'm not going to go to any Wheel of Time websites or read Tumblr pages about it. If I see an article on Facebook titled "Comparing Wheel of Time to Game of Thrones", I can just keep scrolling.

But isn't it just slightly reasonable to think someone might be careful to not ruin the books for those like me, out of the blue, and on a Destiny site or something?

Putting an expiration date on a spoiler seems like putting the responsibility on everyone else to me. That's inconsiderate of others, especially when I can come halfway and prevent ruining something for someone with just a little forewarning.

If we're discussing story and the Vex and how they go about using time, and I find relevance in something from The Time Machine, which was written in the 1800s, and start comparing to something involving the Morlocks, it truly is not my problem if you or anyone else here has never read the book or seen the movies. If anything, whatever I reference may just make absolutely zero sense to you due to complete and total lack of context. I mean, what the hell is a Morlock if you haven't read about one or seen one in a movie? For all I know, even mentioning a Morlock just now threw you for a loop, and still would even if I provide whatever comparative example I'm potentially talking about. To think that I should have to pause and wonder if I should hide it or censor it is absurd. And I absolutely wouldn't think twice.

And I don't see what being online has anything to do with it. Ruining shit for people is the same whether it's analog or digital to me.

Online, I don't know who is and isn't around. I have no idea if you just climbed out from under a rock and have never read a single book or seen a single movie in your entire life. Things get referenced and dropped all the time in context and out. Sure, the way Cody did it was absolutely ridiculous, but in general? I don't find your expectations reasonable. In person, if I'm for some reason around a group of school children out on a field trip at a movie theater who are about to see Big Trouble In Little China for the first time in its little anniversary showing on the silver screen (don't ask me why the school children are seeing that particular movie), even though I might be there for nostalgia, I'm not going to open my mouth and be like, "OH MAN YOU ARE GONNA LOVE THIS ONE SCENE WHERE THIS THING HAPPENS! IT'S SO AWESOME!" Online, that scene where the thing happens may hold relevancy to whatever the conversation is, and I'm absolutely going to mention it without wondering if you've seen that movie or not. It's just not happening. It's been out way too long, and I'm not going to go around assuming that a group of school children who haven't experienced things could be lurking anywhere at any given time online.

Obviously if you're on a Halo or Destiny forum, you're announcing you're going to be talking about that subject. Someone can enter if they dare or avoid it like the plague since they know what to expect. I always avoid the B.Org forums on launches until I've completed the new release. But if you're on a B.Org forum and somebody starts talking about how So and So did something in a completely different game or medium, without warning, you're just shit out of luck.

And if it's relevant to the topic at hand, and assuming that thing has been around for 1,000 years, why would they think to censor it? The expectations are too rigid. If medieval literature somehow applies in comparison, but you were just a month away from reading that particular piece of writing because you're this hardcore medieval literature buff but didn't get to it yet, how dare that person reference that thing that goes back to the Crusades? No. If we're in a thread about writing, and someone wants to make some sort of comparison to Destiny's writing, depending upon how old that work is, it's not unreasonable to make the assumption that a majority of people are aware of it. It's also not necessarily unreasonable to expect that outside examples unrelated to Destiny might be referenced as part of the overall conversation.

The kind thing to do, I think, is to give some warning that you're going to delve into the details of a different subject. And Cody did give a warning and I appreciate that. The way he formatted it just wasn't very effective.

Cody's was beyond ineffective. I'm not even going to pretend to try and defend that. But this whole censor all the potential spoiler things regardless of how long they've been around? That's unreal to me.

What you constantly refer to as absurdity I think of as consideration. I guess we just have very different views on this so I'll skip over your posts from now on to make sure you don't ruin something for me randomly with no warning.

I think I and someotherguy have showed many examples of how time has nothing to do with spoilers as people find and engage in new stories at all different times and places. And what about new generations of audiences? They don't get a chance at experiencing something new for the first time, surprises intact, like the author intended?

I just started reading Wheel of Time, for example. Does that automatically mean I'm not as cool as the people who read the novels when they first came out and thus random spoilers is what I deserve? Obviously I should put in some work to prevent them - I'm not going to go to any Wheel of Time websites or read Tumblr pages about it. If I see an article on Facebook titled "Comparing Wheel of Time to Game of Thrones", I can just keep scrolling.

But isn't it just slightly reasonable to think someone might be careful to not ruin the books for those like me, out of the blue, and on a Destiny site or something?

Putting an expiration date on a spoiler seems like putting the responsibility on everyone else to me. That's inconsiderate of others, especially when I can come halfway and prevent ruining something for someone with just a little forewarning.

If we're discussing story and the Vex and how they go about using time, and I find relevance in something from The Time Machine, which was written in the 1800s, and start comparing to something involving the Morlocks, it truly is not my problem if you or anyone else here has never read the book or seen the movies. If anything, whatever I reference may just make absolutely zero sense to you due to complete and total lack of context. I mean, what the hell is a Morlock if you haven't read about one or seen one in a movie? For all I know, even mentioning a Morlock just now threw you for a loop, and still would even if I provide whatever comparative example I'm potentially talking about. To think that I should have to pause and wonder if I should hide it or censor it is absurd. And I absolutely wouldn't think twice.

And I don't see what being online has anything to do with it. Ruining shit for people is the same whether it's analog or digital to me.

Online, I don't know who is and isn't around. I have no idea if you just climbed out from under a rock and have never read a single book or seen a single movie in your entire life. Things get referenced and dropped all the time in context and out. Sure, the way Cody did it was absolutely ridiculous, but in general? I don't find your expectations reasonable. In person, if I'm for some reason around a group of school children out on a field trip at a movie theater who are about to see Big Trouble In Little China for the first time in its little anniversary showing on the silver screen (don't ask me why the school children are seeing that particular movie), even though I might be there for nostalgia, I'm not going to open my mouth and be like, "OH MAN YOU ARE GONNA LOVE THIS ONE SCENE WHERE THIS THING HAPPENS! IT'S SO AWESOME!" Online, that scene where the thing happens may hold relevancy to whatever the conversation is, and I'm absolutely going to mention it without wondering if you've seen that movie or not. It's just not happening. It's been out way too long, and I'm not going to go around assuming that a group of school children who haven't experienced things could be lurking anywhere at any given time online.

Obviously if you're on a Halo or Destiny forum, you're announcing you're going to be talking about that subject. Someone can enter if they dare or avoid it like the plague since they know what to expect. I always avoid the B.Org forums on launches until I've completed the new release. But if you're on a B.Org forum and somebody starts talking about how So and So did something in a completely different game or medium, without warning, you're just shit out of luck.

And if it's relevant to the topic at hand, and assuming that thing has been around for 1,000 years, why would they think to censor it? The expectations are too rigid. If medieval literature somehow applies in comparison, but you were just a month away from reading that particular piece of writing because you're this hardcore medieval literature buff but didn't get to it yet, how dare that person reference that thing that goes back to the Crusades? No. If we're in a thread about writing, and someone wants to make some sort of comparison to Destiny's writing, depending upon how old that work is, it's not unreasonable to make the assumption that a majority of people are aware of it. It's also not necessarily unreasonable to expect that outside examples unrelated to Destiny might be referenced as part of the overall conversation.

The kind thing to do, I think, is to give some warning that you're going to delve into the details of a different subject. And Cody did give a warning and I appreciate that. The way he formatted it just wasn't very effective.

Cody's was beyond ineffective. I'm not even going to pretend to try and defend that. But this whole censor all the potential spoiler things regardless of how long they've been around? That's unreal to me.

I think your expectations are absolutely unreasonable online when discussing content that is years (or decades) old.

Why?

I think I and someotherguy have showed many examples of how time has nothing to do with spoilers as people find and engage in new stories at all different times and places. And what about new generations of audiences? They don't get a chance at experiencing something new for the first time, surprises intact, like the author intended?

I just started reading Wheel of Time, for example. Does that automatically mean I'm not as cool as the people who read the novels when they first came out and thus random spoilers is what I deserve? Obviously I should put in some work to prevent them - I'm not going to go to any Wheel of Time websites or read Tumblr pages about it. If I see an article on Facebook titled "Comparing Wheel of Time to Game of Thrones", I can just keep scrolling.

But isn't it just slightly reasonable to think someone might be careful to not ruin the books for those like me, out of the blue, and on a Destiny site or something?

Putting an expiration date on a spoiler seems like putting the responsibility on everyone else to me. That's inconsiderate of others, especially when I can come halfway and prevent ruining something for someone with just a little forewarning.

And I don't see what being online has anything to do with it. Ruining shit for people is the same whether it's analog or digital to me.

Obviously if you're on a Halo or Destiny forum, you're announcing you're going to be talking about that subject. Someone can enter if they dare or avoid it like the plague since they know what to expect. I always avoid the B.Org forums on launches until I've completed the new release. But if you're on a B.Org forum and somebody starts talking about how So and So did something in a completely different game or medium, without warning, you're just shit out of luck.

The kind thing to do, I think, is to give some warning that you're going to delve into the details of a different subject. And Cody did give a warning and I appreciate that. The way he formatted it just wasn't very effective.

Is this an Xbox One thing? I've never seen anything like this on the 360. (How can you connect a console to multiple screens?)

Weren't you saying you had your One on one screen and your PC on the other with the keyboard close by?

(Unless that's what you meant. I was comparing Cruel's suggestion to today's reality, not the best option for Halo 4 against the best option for Destiny.)

Yeah, you can actually watch the videos online on one screen while playing the game on another. Just like you do with the Grimoire. So, in a way (discounting attention span and conflicting audio cues), the H4 terminals were as accessible to you as the Grimoire currently is.

Is this an Xbox One thing? I've never seen anything like this on the 360. (How can you connect a console to multiple screens?)

(Unless that's what you meant. I was comparing Cruel's suggestion to today's reality, not the best option for Halo 4 against the best option for Destiny.)

Yeah, you can actually watch the videos online on one screen while playing the game on another. Just like you do with the Grimoire. So, in a way (discounting attention span and conflicting audio cues), the H4 terminals were as accessible to you as the Grimoire currently is.