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Wow Tom Vasel used to be a part of the BGDF.com community!

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Mon, 05/31/2021 - 19:45
questccg
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I guess prior to "The Dice Tower" and his very well known Videos, Tom Vasel used to have a Section dedicated to "Game Reviews"! And he would post up a thread about a game he played and summed up his experiences HERE over at BGDF.com!

Wow... That's ages ago. But still it shows how many more people were involved with BGDF.com in the past.

Very cool to figure that out... Just looking at the "Archived" content that is Locked but available to READ...

Anyhow, just figured that I'd share that! Cheers everyone.

Note #1: His account dates to way back to 2004! Ages ago.

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Mon, 05/31/2021 - 20:30
#1
questccg
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In case you may want to check-out some of Tom's Reviews...

Here is the Link/URL to that section:

https://www.bgdf.com/forums/archive/archive-commercial-games/game-reviews

I went all the way back and Tom had become a REGULAR ... But he wasn't the original person who started the reviews way back in 2002!!! So ages ago... But only 2 years EARLIER before Tom took over (mostly full time from what I saw in the archive)!

Cheers... It's fun to go back in time and see what people thought of games and where they are TODAY!!!

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Tue, 06/01/2021 - 07:56
#2
pelle
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The links to the very oldest

The links to the very oldest posts are clearly broken with texts that ends mid-sentence, as if something bad happened to the database and clipped all text in a column. Very sad.

I had no idea (or memory) that this forum went that far back. I do not remember seeing anyone with a Joined date that was much before mine. It seems like already by 2008 when I joined very few from the early days were still around?

But great find anyway. There might be some really good reviews in that list, that might be worth saving to check out later whenever I consider buying a game from that era. :)

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Tue, 06/01/2021 - 10:24
#3
pelle
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This made me realized that

This made me realized that bgdf is almost as old as bgg? And... older than the bgg design forums? So I checked and the oldest bgg game design forum post is this one (well, what remains of it; the fist post was deleted):
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/37169/link-board-game-designers-forum

That says... "Geek has forums now, but I think BGDF is a vastly better site to really discuss this particular topic."

Feb 28, 2005

!

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Wed, 06/02/2021 - 08:45
#4
let-off studios
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Server Updates

pelle wrote:
The links to the very oldest posts are clearly broken with texts that ends mid-sentence, as if something bad happened to the database and clipped all text in a column. Very sad.
Maybe something happened to archival backups when there was the major server upgrade some time ago. Maybe certain types of backup files had a character limit? Unfortunately, it's not uncommon for files to be corrupted or erased when major changes occur - not just at BGDF of course, but in many discussion forum-based websites and archives.

It's a bummer for sure, but sometimes that's how it goes. We'll always have the memories, though... :)

And yeah, it's definitely impressive to learn that BGDF was likely the start of game-design discussion on the Internet, rivaling or even predating BoardGameGeek. Wow!

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Wed, 06/02/2021 - 20:54
#5
The Professor
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Outstanding, Kris

This warms my heart...as they say "it takes 10 years to become an overnight success!"

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Thu, 06/03/2021 - 03:10
#6
pelle
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let-off studios wrote: And

let-off studios wrote:

And yeah, it's definitely impressive to learn that BGDF was likely the start of game-design discussion on the Internet, rivaling or even predating BoardGameGeek. Wow!

Yes, but... there were USENET and Compuserve etc online communities for (board) game design years before www existed. And since there were other game forums on www since around 1996 or so I would be surprised if there were no active (sub)forums for game design as well before 2002. Would be interesting to find out more about. But that BGDF was that early and as big as it was was fun to see.

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Fri, 06/04/2021 - 14:47
#7
larienna
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I think I joined around 2006,

I think I joined around 2006, we will see after I made this post ... the answer was 2008.

Never heard Tom Vasel was here. Or maybe, at that time, I did not know who Tom Vasel was.

I am surprised to learn that BGDF would have preceded BGG, if that is really true. Since there are much more gamers than designers.

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Mon, 06/07/2021 - 05:23
#8
pelle
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larienna wrote:I think I

larienna wrote:
I think I joined around 2006, we will see after I made this post ... the answer was 2008.

Never heard Tom Vasel was here. Or maybe, at that time, I did not know who Tom Vasel was.

I am surprised to learn that BGDF would have preceded BGG, if that is really true. Since there are much more gamers than designers.

I saw posts by you from before 2008, and also by others that the forum says joined in 2008. My guess is displaying when someone joined was added at some point (in 2008?), and the date that is displayed is the first time someone logged in after that date. There was no attempt to set an earlier date by for instance searching for someone's old posts. I guess.

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Mon, 06/07/2021 - 10:16
#9
questccg
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Well if you go into the Archived Reviewer Forum...

And click on LAST, you'll see the oldest entry is: 13 November 2002 (By Anonymous). I didn't look around if this is the EARLIEST date in ALL of the Forums... But so far that's the earliest that I've found. There must have been a User "rebuild" because Tom Vasel's User Account dates back to 2011. And so my guess is that the accounts were "refreshed" in 2011 due to some maintenance or such activity.

As per that Forum, the oldest entry from Tom is 9 March 2004... and the Review of "Magic Hill". But if I go into the review and see Tom's joined date it say: 23 March 2011. Just some FYI...

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