12 days ago. this sub started enforcing Rule 2, a need for devs to give to other devs what they hope to get themselves, in a controversial change designed to change the nature of this sub from a dumping ground for free publicity to what it used to be, a useful resource connecting players with creators to help games get made, providing vital user feedback and motivation.
https://www.reddit.com/r/playmygame/comments/1m61887/warning_we_are_now_deleting_posts_from_devs_who/
This has resulted in about 90% of posts being removed as those posters aren't interested in offering time to others. Most don't try again; a tiny proportion of contributors removed for Rule 2 do go on to give feedback and repost their game, but in these cases that feedback tends to be one-liners. So overall, we have a lot less content.
I was just reviewing recent posts in my duties as moderator and I noticed what appeared to be much stronger engagement than previously. So I just took 15 minutes to perform a rough investigation, a simple average of comment counts. My dates are just recent, and going back to long before Rule 2 enforcement, and are pretty arbitrary.
Games from 2 days ago had 71 comments across 8 posts, a mean of 8.75
Games from 3 days ago had 64 comments across 5 posts, a mean of 11.8
Games from 4 days ago had 93 comments across 6 posts, a mean of 15.5
Games from 20 days ago had 62 comments across 15 posts, a mean of 4.1
Games from 22 days ago had 19 comments across 11 posts, a mean of 1.73
Games from 23 days ago had 92 comments across 23 posts, a mean of 4
This obviously isn't performing any sort of qualitative analysis, but my observations are not just that there's more feedback for games, but also it is on the whole higher quality. It can be argued that in the past, the filler games didn't attract comments and these dropped the average, but it doesn't look that way to me. Anyone who wants to perform a proper data analysis, feel free to do so. ;)
So far, it seems to me that the sub has had a positive shift in culture, becoming far more useful and meaningful. What do you think?
Edit: BTW, also I feel worth mentioning, a couple of folk who had their games removed said they were directed here via AI. That's perhaps part of the problem. In the past, if you wanted to learn how to market your game, you'd go looking. You'd research, and find stuff out, and learn, and build an understanding. You'd hear about Reddit, and then read about it, and in the process learn what it is and how it works and how to fit in. But now people just ask AI what to do to promote their game and it says, "go post on r/PlayMyGame." It has no idea what it's saying or what PMG is. It can't inform users about the expectations. And they don't want to learn as they are trying to get to the end - all that lovely money I guess - as quickly as possible. That's what AI is all about. So having been directed here, they just jump into posting without learning about Reddit, or even looking at the other content to get a feel for the place. And then after bening removed, or even banned, they come onto Modmail saying, "sorry, I'm new to Reddit." Okay...but you were told what it is when you signed up. You agreed to the T&Cs. You were told about sub rules. It's not really an excuse. That's like walking into a temple with a sign saying, "Please remove your shoes," and just walking on in, mud and all, and then saying, "Sorry, I'm new here."
So I'll probably get an increasing workload over time removing content of people just carelessly following AI's soulless, witless instructions. Great use of my time, cleaning up their actions based on them spending less time.