McLeodGaming Forums

350px|thumb|Logo of the McLeodGaming Forums.
The McLeodGaming Forums was a discussion forum website hosted by , which allowed users to register and post comments on any open dedicated thread. The forums were first opened by Gregory McLeod on December 4, 2005, as the McLeodGaming website grew bigger, and later revamped on August 10, 2008. One of its main functions was for discussing development, news, and trivia of Super Smash Flash 2, which is described by Deep Though 42 (an inactive forum admin) as "what most of you came here for".McLeodGaming - View topic - [READ ME New User's Guide to MG] Accessed on May 20, 2020.
The McLeodGaming Forums was formerly one of the most prominent websites for the McLeodGaming community, accruing a total of 849,662 posts, 18,334 topics, and 25,940 members. The website continued operating until its permanent closure on April 30, 2020, which was announced on March 16, 2020 due to the software being poorly maintained and an overall lack of user activity.MG Forums Closing Permanently - McLeodGaming Accessed on July 19, 2022. A static archive of the website was later released on May 20, 2020.
== Forums ==
Forums were separated into various categories, most of which allowed any user to create topics or post replies in. The only exception to this was the "Forum Rules & Guidelines" category, which simply detailed rules and information for using the website.
The "McLeodGaming" category included a forum pertaining to McLeodGaming news, much of which was also posted on the main McLeodGaming website, and other forums for specific games. These include the original Super Smash Flash, its successor Super Smash Flash 2, and the series.
The "Entertainment" category included forums to discuss various unrelated media, including movies, TV shows, anime, video games, literature, music, and art. The art forum also allowed users to showcase artwork of their own, which was separated into subforms for traditional or digital artwork and pixel artwork. Notably, various SSF2 developers became artists for the game after posting artwork to this forum, such as Joshua Wattus, Likiji123, and Mass.
Other forums were stored in the "Miscellaneous" category, including for general discussion, forum suggestions and problems, role-playing, forum games, and "The Lounge". The general discussion forum also had a subforum named "MG's Golden Threads", which archived certain topics deemed "some of McLeodGaming's most memorable threads".
=== Super Smash Flash 2 forum ===
The most notable forum on the website was the forum for Super Smash Flash 2 discussion. Originally, a forum named "Super Smash Flash 2" (formerly "SSF2 Discussion") was in place, but it was later removed and replaced with a new forum called "Super Smash Flash 2 Beta" alongside the release of Beta 1.0.
The forum allowed users to discuss various aspects the game, with dedicated threads set up for topics such as guides, bug reports, and in-game records. The "Tournaments" subforum allowed users to announce and participate in upcoming tournaments. The "Character Communities" subforum featured one topic for each character in the public demo for the game for users to discuss the gameplay of. The "Competitive Play" subforum allowed users to discuss various topics relating to competitive and tournament gameplay, such as the announcements and discussions of tier lists provided by the Smash Flash Back Room. "The Waiting Room" subforum allowed users to discuss potential future content for the game.
=== SSF2 Developer's Section ===
The "SSF2 Developer's Section" was a private forum accessible only to Super Smash Flash 2 developers. It was first created in March 2007 after being suggested by James Hadden as a private section where aspects of the game's development would be hidden from normal players. With this, the original development team for the game was created as a set of users who could access this forum to contribute to the game.
In this forum, developers would discuss the current status of the production of SSF2 and offer suggestions for the game. They would also have access to the developer demo and certain private tools, as well as a now-removed private archive of the game's sprites. The highest rank for this forum was "SSF2 Developer", which denoted users with the most contributions made to the game. Other ranks were later added to distinguish between types of developers, such as for sprite artists, playtesters, musicians, and video editors. Applicants would be given a "trial" ranking to prove themselves before being promoted to full developers.
During the game's early development, the McLeodGaming Forums was used as the primary site for developers to join the team and have discussions between each other, with developers who left the forums being removed from the team. However, this later changed as other messaging platforms emerged, such as Slack and Discord, which effectively replaced the original forum.
== Early website ==
The original McLeodGaming Forums website was available to be posted until 2008, when the website was updated with a new design and several new features due to problems stated by several users. With the creation of the updated website, a static read-only archive of the original website named the McLeodGaming Archives was made available until later being removed in 2014.
The original website was structured very similarly to the updated website but was more limited in terms of content and characteristics, lacking features such as friends and foes lists, birthdays, topic bookmarks, and post attachments. However, there were also several features that did not return to the updated website, such as a full list of users and a point system called "Gold".
== Trivia ==
*Various forums and subforums were removed over time. For instance, there was originally a forum to discuss about the games which was removed after it had problems with moderation and unnecessary topics from part of the users.McLeodGaming - View topic - Delete the SSB section. Accessed on May 20, 2020.
== See also ==
*Super Smash Flash 2 Expansion Forums
== References ==
== External links ==
*The archive of the McLeodGaming Forums website.
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