I love you/I hate you (site feedback)

EDIT: No longer an issue. Thank you bomb devs, great job with the redesign!

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I love Giant Bomb. I started following in the Arrow Pointing Down phase, and have kept to it ever since. I made everyone at my work watch the Postal episode of TANG. I listen to the bombcast any time I'm doing chores like doing dishes, which means I've probably been through the ENTIRE SUCCESSION of YEARS of episodes 5 or 6 times. I hope I've established that what I'm about to say comes from a place of genuine caring, respect, and deep affection. That said...

THE NAVIGATION FOR THE VIDEO ARCHIVE IS FUCKING GARBAGE.

(I love you so much, GB, why do you make me hurt you?)

Seriously, if I want to watch something that's like a series from a while ago, something that contains more than one episode or installment, its such a headache to go through. The relevant example today is the 09 PAX panel, something I never saw, but thought I'd like to brush up on before some of the PAX East content comes out. First off, my "tour legit tour quit" search came up empty, a serious bummer. But whatevs, maybe it wasn't tagged that way. So I search for PAX (I'm using the video search, btw, not the global search), and PAX 09 does come up at the bottom of the list. Super!

So, I watch, liking it, actually really thought Vinny's talking about their approach to video was insightful (I'm a video dude myself). Part 1 ends. Related videos come up at the end... but no sight of the other episodes, just the recent vids, Mortal Kombat and stuff. Well, okay, I'll just hit back. Oh, shit, right, I didn't hit any kind of search landing page when I searched for PAX, so I'm just on the main video page. Dag, well, I'll just repeat my search. "PAX", okay, there's Part 1, the last of the ten results. Maybe if I hit "Enter" it'll bring me to a landing page and list everything my search brought up? Nope, it instead takes me to the first result listed... or wait, no, it's not actually the first result, its the sixth result. Weird, well, whatever, I know what to do. I'll search "PAX" again, and hit "see next 10 results". Since Part 01 was was the last thing listed, surely Part 02 will be the next...

But it isn't. It's not even in those next ten. It's in the next next ten, and not even next to Part 03. Grrr..

So yeah, that's not great. I see two ways to maybe address this. Either create a way to tag multiple episodes in a series, which would allow you to navigate between directly connected videos (good idea! i like it). Or, minimize some of the problems of search by allowing for a search results page, and not just a dropdown menu showing 10 items. I mean, we all like long pages right? How about long pages of search results? Those are page-types too...

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erm, since I'm bitching anyway, here's another related problem with video navigation. If you're watching older stuff (and I mean old enough to be past the front video page, here), and want to watch a couple of episodes of, say, How to Build a Bomb, or TANG, it really, really sucks to find the video you're looking for on like Page 10 of Features, watch it, and then to see the next one have to click through all those "Next Page" links to get back to the period in time you were to see the next video (or a related one, or something around the same timeframe again). You can't just hit "Back" after you've finished the video to return to the page in the archive that you were at to find the video to begin with.

This might be addressed by my suggestion above, like if there was an on-page click-through for the next episode of TANG, then great, I'm watching the next one. And also, I realize that most of the traffic for the site isn't people coming to check out the QOTW for August 09. But I have to imagine that many people come across this at some point, and I've been driven up the wall by it.

Thanks for taking this into consideration.

Sincerely, your friend, Rob,

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and dracula is totally still a threat

" 
 
THE NAVIGATION FOR THE VIDEO ARCHIVE IS FUCKING GARBAGE.  
 
 "

I have to agree with the OP, trying to watch a series of videos is real chore because once you're done watching the video you have to browse all the way back in many sub-menus if you are watching something that isn't recent.  Please fix Top Men!

" @uvschism said:

" 
 
THE NAVIGATION FOR THE VIDEO ARCHIVE IS FUCKING GARBAGE.  
 
 "

It is pretty bad... "

There's a simple reason for this, GB is farming hits. It artificially inflates their stats. Which may be cheesy, but we're all here as their guests so I don't begrudge them a little stat pumping. 
 
It may also be a result of  security concerns. They seem to run a pretty tight ship, which is a good thing because it keeps them up and running so that you and I can enjoy what they offer. Again, I don't begrudge them a little inconvenience if it helps protect their hardware. Malicious hackers are assholes.

First, lemme remind subscribers you've got Theater mode, which lets you skip page loads altogether and lets you queue up a playlist. As you guessed, legacy content (especially content not linked to an actual game) is viewed extremely minimally. 
 
Not saying their aren't things to improve here, but this post is a little alarmist. Just search "pax part" and all of um show up. Queue them  in theater mode and sit back for an hour.

@snide: 
 
Thanks for the response, Dave.  I didn't realize Theater had the queue up functionality.  That mostly resolves my issue, or at least gives me a way to sidestep both of the problems I had with the search and nav.  Guess I'll just have to tag anything broken up into multiple vids with "part" in the search... I can do that, if I remember.  
 
I'm guessing these problems still exist for non-subscribers who don't get theater mode?  That's a bummer.  Sorry guys. 
 
I feel I raised a level of alarm appropriate to the problem.  Legitimate dismay that built up into open hostility towards the problem, that's about where I'm at (or was).  But always couched in love.
 
@RudeJohn 
 
I really, really don't think its about farming hits.  I think its a design decision that was made before there was any kind of archive for video to speak of.  Now that archive exists, but since the traffic is such a small part of the user experience, it hasn't made sense to go in and fix it.  Except that its a BIG part of this user's experience, a paid user, and maybe that's what the Theater mode is trying to address.  That kind of access functionality for legacy content would probably skew towards serving a financially committed user a bit more, because they have proven to be willing to pay to support the content this site produces.  Seems like they'd end up watching more of it, even long after the fact.  Or something, but it makes sense to me. 
 
I'm not sure if security factors into this, unless I need to be kept out of the Endurance Run for security reasons.
 
Still, it sucks that for the general population things work in this wholly-maddening state.  Which is why I spoke up at all, to try and get some eyes on this super frustrating corner of the site.

" First, lemme remind subscribers you've got Theater mode...

the worst thing about the site is the fucking  video player its so bad

" the worst thing about the site is the fucking  video player its so bad "

I just don't like how it doesn't work properly on the PS3 browser...
 
Luckily for me I can watch the recent videos. And that's just about it without a MAJOR headache.

" @RudeJohn: I thought it was a piece of their design philosophy to not hit farm.  "

I wouldn't call it "hit farming" so much as making sure people can find what they're looking for.
 
@CornBREDX said:

" @snide said:

" First, lemme remind subscribers you've got Theater mode...

My only problem with theater mode is it only works in chrome (and safari I believe). "

" First, lemme remind subscribers you've got Theater mode, which lets you skip page loads altogether and lets you queue up a playlist. As you guessed, legacy content (especially content not linked to an actual game) is viewed extremely minimally.  Not saying their aren't things to improve here, but this post is a little alarmist. Just search "pax part" and all of um show up. Queue them  in theater mode and sit back for an hour. "

"THE NAVIGATION FOR THE VIDEO ARCHIVE IS FUCKING GARBAGE."

" the worst thing about the site is the fucking  video player its so bad "

Yeah, no complaints with the video player itself from my end.  It works how I'd want it to.

Just an update, the new redesign has pretty much fixed everything I was talking about. I really appreciate that video navigation was given a good hard look, because it's my most-used part of the site. And I like the way it works now, you guys seem to have nailed it.

Thanks.

I don't like the auto-play thing they have on the videos

@DillonWerner said:

I don't like the auto-play thing they have on the videos

Click the "auto" button next to the video, and it won't start playing another video on its own. It will remember this setting from then on. Was so pleased when I finally noticed that.

I do have one question... I seem to have lost the ability to truly fullscreen, not just fullscreen within a browser window, to the size of the browser window. Am I overlooking something?

EDIT: Ah, I was in HTML5. Didn't realize. Disregard.