Hello, everybody. I started writing this during GameSpot's total functionality failure that is commonly referred to as E3. Several of these, though, are issues that have bothered me for some time, so I decided to finally write them down while simultaneously (playfully) mocking GameSpot's great journalistic blunder, The Tipping Point.

Sitting there in front of the "Everything is down for maintenance. Please come back later" screen, I ran out of vitriol pretty quickly (hence only 7 items), but I do find the idea of renewing my Total Access membership in doubt. It's not that I don't like GameSpot, its that I don't like paying for something and then not getting it. If I'm supposed to get HD-quality streams and downloads of E3, I don't think its too much to ask that they actually WORK. I shouldn't have to go to other sites to get the info I pay GameSpot for, just because GameSpot's site is incapable of handling higher than expected volume. Not to mention that while I was unable to watch E3 coverage I was also unable to browse forums or journals, because the inability to handle E3 coverage spilled over into inability to keep other portions of the site up.

Right when I was most counting on GameSpot as an information channel, it completely failed me. If something is only there when you don't need it, it just doesn't seem worth paying for. If I knew my money would go into making the site more reliable, it would be another thing, but I've been subscibing for a couple years now, and its not getting any better. I just don't expect this degree of instability from a professionally run site--much less one that I subsidize.

So here we go:

1) Have pages reliably load in under one minute on a broadband connection. Right now, when you click a link, you never know what you're going to get. It could be 2 seconds for the page to load. It could be 25 minutes. It would be nice if you knew what kind of time commitment you were entering into before clicking.

2) If the site is barely able to handle regular traffic, don't try to add live streaming of E3 press conferences. When you do, the forums go down, journals go down, and the streams don't work anyway.

3) Consider fixing some of the massive, massive problems with the site before deciding to do cosmetic redesigns.

4) Avoid ill-conceived features. Comparing the visuals of games designed for the 360 with PS3 ports of games designed for the 360 is just silly. I know that the argument goes that comparing games designed for the 360 to games designed for the PS3 is like comparing apples to oranges, but is that really any worse than comparing apples to other apples that have been frozen, dehydrated, shipped, stored, rehydrated, and plastinated?

5) Take pity on those suffering epilipsy. One of those cosmetic changes made instead of making the site actually... you know, WORK was making the avatars absolutely massive. If a change like that is made, I expect to see an option in my preferences to disable avatars completely. I come to GameSpot for news and discussion regarding video games, not to see the same blinking, flashing, animated pictures stacked on top of each other. I shouldn't have to turn all images off just to prevent seizures from annoying avatars.

6) Figure out a way to allow the words "c|ass" and "sty|e" without danger to users. Its simply ridiculous that these words are STILL not working on the site. Stop working on nonessential updates and FIX IT!

7)Join us in the new millenium, where people vaguely remember 800x600 like they remember 640x480. If you feel you just can't do that to the four people still using 800x600, at least offer an OPTION for a higher resolution. Or better yet, ditch the fixed-width format altogether.