Nine years of Vooks & the ins and outs of making it

Were nine years old today; October 16th 2000 is when the first iteration of Vooks went live. So rather than some history, lets talk about now and a little behind the scenes

Most of our readers know the history behind the site, the previous names, logos and iterations of the forums. So instead of throwing a huge party this year for our 9th, we’re going to save it up until next year. Instead, I thought would run through what it is we do here on a day to day basis, how a team of people contribute to the site, and all the fun and mayhem running the country’s oldest Nintendo fan site can bring. And maybe share some wisdom along the way.

The main thing I get asked about Vooks is, first, why do I do it, and second, do I make any money. So why do I do Vooks nine years on? Because I love Nintendo games, it’s that simple. Let me explain. While I play a wide assortment of games from all consoles, growing up a Nintendo fanboy has put the company in a place in my heart and I wouldn’t do it otherwise. I could write about other games and consoles if I got paid, but would I take time off work, stay up till 3am, fly interstate and internationally for them? No chance in hell. And to the second question, do I make any money off of this? Short answer is no. Here’s the long answer though. While we do have some adverts on the site, none of them cover the costs of the site. For some this would be a problem, I mean how could anyone pour money into something year after year? Well it goes back to the reason I do the site, and that’s out of my love for Nintendo. Also, the 2500 plus members and thousands who visits the site daily keep me going and the site going; without you guys, what would be the point?

At this point I’d like to point out that this site couldn’t be done purely by me, in past it was but for while now I’ve had an awesome team of guys helping me out. Vooks is a team effort of no less then at least 12 or more people. From the day to day news writing team, to the reviewers, to the moderators, to the guys I nag on MSN for help, nothing could be done without them—all of them.
So enough soppy rambling, how do we get things done around here?

The news is definitely the most time intensive day to day stuff we do, but in typical Nintendo fashion sometimes there is absolutely none and other times there is tons. Since we’re so out of sync with both American and Europe our news can be a little off kilter compared to the big international sites, but we do drop everything—hell I’m writing this at work as proof—to bring you the breaking news. We do also pride ourselves on getting not only timely Australian Nintendo and gaming news but also news no one else has. And that’s where the problem starts. Being the small fry in the gaming world doesn’t help our country get anything easy. We’re always waiting on news here for a myriad of things, most usually release dates: is so and so game coming out and when can I finally buy that damn Black Wii?

Reviews are a whole different kettle of fish, you probably think “those bastards getting all these free games”, and while yes they’re free we also do have to write a review and sometimes play some really terrible stuff – FarCry Vengeance anyone? I still find it quite cool to get review games, it’s an honour . We also do still review a ton of games we buy ourselves – quite often niche and quirky games or games that have no chance of coming to Australia. Also playing a game for fun and having to review it are two different things, especially if it’s a game you would never play. The other problems with review games stem from 1. Being in Australia, and 2. Not having any access to debug Wii units. As you know, releases in Australia are mostly pretty poor—we get most things weeks, months after the US and UK—so to bring you timely reviews we have to import. We’re not complaining, but we’re not going to wait for a game as much as you guys (being gamers and all). Not having a debug Wii for advance copies is a problem as well. So we get review copies at best a day, two days before release – we then have to post (another cost oy) that means we mightn’t start a review until 2 or 3 days after release. Now, we’re not ones to rush reviews either; we want them to be as good as possible so you can best make your purchasing decision – but it does suck. It’s not the case for all games, though, as we have gotten access to plenty of games very early and as gaming fans that’s very cool. I mean, who wouldn’t want to play A Boy and His Blob, Tales of Monkey Island and Super Mario Galaxy early?

I’m quite proud of our podcast which can never settle on a proper schedule, but hey, it gets done, so settle down! Thanks to the benevolent love of the previous Nintendo Australia PR manager (we won’t name him, but you know who it is), we’ve even had our podcast featured in the Herald Sun and still ‘rate’ highly on iTunes. We’ve dropped a bit since then, but that’s alright; we don’t do it be famous—just to give you guys a laugh and some insight.

I already mentioned the few issues with have with review games, it’s not the publishers fault by any means. I’m sure they are frustrated by it and would want their game reviews and previews published on release or shortly after release just as much as we do. We get on well with the majority of publishers and distributors who help us out with not only answering our inane questions, but also securing us interviews, hands on sessions and review code. Being on the west coast I personally rarely get to see them face to face, but we’re in the digital world so who has to? We love our third party friends.

So we come to Nintendo Australia, the big N—the grand daddy of all. Nintendo Australia is a mythical beast; power only outweighs its mystique. What that means is basically we don’t have any idea what really goes on there. While we’re critical of some of the things Nintendo Australia do, we only do it out of care that we want Nintendo to do well here in Australia— we just don’t want them to forget about us. I find it cool to finally see catalogues with Nintendo games even in cases like this week with Big W having an entire Nintendo one. Nintendo ads on TV? That was but a dream years ago, but now they’re seemingly every day. As we’ve been around since 2000, we’ve seen Nintendo go from on top, to the bottom of the pit, and then rise back to the top again, and we don’t want them to go back to the bottom. During the GameCube era, it was very hard to be a Nintendo fan here in Australia, the GameCube – the what Cube? Nintendo Australia does appreciate what we do here and they do read our site and read what all you guys say— this fact still amazes me. Nintendo, reading our site? Awesome.

Well, this is going to get a bit nerdy, but I know a lot of people out there might be interested in this. The latest version of Vooks that went live just this last June runs on an off-the-shelf gaming CMS- why do all the hard work on building one, when there is already something out there that you can take and make your own? The current design was designed by me, and all the graphics you see on the site are have also been created by yours truly. Except for the wonderful new default banner we usually have in place which staffer ExciteD was kind enough to create for us. Apart from the CMS, the site also runs on Invision Board for the user system and forums. The site and forums have been integrated so the comments on the news stories and reviews can be used by your forum account, no simple feat for two systems that are completely foreign. Other cool technology is the Calendar which is updated via iCal files through Sunbird and is completely RSS enabled so you can add the release dates to your favourite calendar. Lots of cool things are planned, too, with a few actually working behind the scenes, but not yet ready for implementation.

Yeah me, Daniel Vuckovic, writing this long winded article, which I hope you have read so you know just what goes on around here. I started Vooks (then Vooks Gamespage) when I was 14, and no, I didn’t think we would be where we are today, or that I would still be doing it. Vooks is a part of me, but it’s also something else—a sentient life form made up by you our readers and members. I spend upwards of 6 hours per day on this site in addition to my real (and paying) job as a web developer. Being a web developer and running this site has been great, as I’ve been able to learn things through my career to use on here and learn things about the web from running the site. Without this site, I wouldn’t have done cool things like being at the E3 in 2006 and playing the Wii before most of the world, and have contact with Nintendo and third parties. And having such an awesome group of members who, for the most part, all get along! Be awesome to each other. Finally, a big shout out to all the guys who help out with reviews, news, articles, moderating – everything. I’d be cationic and dead in a pile without you guys.

Just wanted to share some wisdom to people out there who are thinking of making their own site or blog, or wanting to become a writer (I’m not one, but hey look I wrote this). Nowadays, the web is full of places to share your opinion; it takes 2 minutes to get a WordPress blog and scratch down some thoughts, report news or write a review. Back in 2000 none of this was possible, everything was hand coded and hard to do. Just remember if you don’t like what you’re writing about, then don’t bother—unless you’re getting paid. I spend a lot of time, money and effort on Vooks and wouldn’t have it any other way. Listen and watch what other people do, but don’t copy—put your own stamp on it. No one wants another cookie cutter site or blog out there. Boy do I sound old.

That’s it—I’ll be fielding any questions in the comments below if you have anything you want to ask about me, the site, or any of the staffers.

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