MyBB Community Forums

Hi there! =3 I'm Katelynn, and I figured I'd sit down and spend some time reviewing your forum. Just to give a heads up, when I review they tend to be very large (I like to be as thorough as my free time allows) so forgive me if this seems like it may be too much to read. I used to rate forums at Proboards when I was an active user of their forum system, so hopefully you don't mind me rating your forum similar to how I did the ones over there.

Design:

• Colour scheme/Layout:
  Well, seeing I didn't see any sort of credit for the skin, I'm assuming you created this one from scratch, correct? =3 If it is a premade, you could probably just skip a lot of the design review, but yeah xD Anyways.
  
  White and blue is a safe colouration, and very easy on the eyes seeing it is easy to read dark text and the like on it, so I really have no qualms about your colour scheme. It's a bit bland seeing it's used so often, and usually I would encourage a more daring colour combination, but it looks professional, and I think that is probably what you may be going for.
  
  One thing that is sort of nagging at me, however, is how your main content area is almost as wide as the header, but not quite. Generally, in cases like that, I would either make the header and content the same width, or add a bit more of a margin and extend the footer so it takes up the entire width of the page like the header. I think it helps to balance the site layout a bit more.
  
  Concerning your ads, just as a personal thing I think four in the sidebar may be a bit much, but then, I'm not familiar with posting advertising on my websites so perhaps it's protocol I'm not familiar with. However, if it wouldn't harm your revenue in any way, I'd reduce the amount of ads to maybe just one or two in the sidebar at the very bottom. That way people don't have to scroll through all those to reach all the sidebar features (like the search box) and they'd probably be grateful for it. Also I noticed you have another advertisement box at the very bottom, but this one doesn't have anything in it (that I can see). I would recommend either just removing it, or have it replace your sidebar adverts, but I wouldn't add another advertising area seeing most people do not like websites overloaded with adverts.
  
  Also, while I'm at the bottom, I noticed you have Prostats and the recent topic plugin as well as using the recent topic box from the portal. I would get rid of at least one of them, seeing that gets really repetitive. I would suggest the recent topics plugin, seeing the sidebox area basically shows the same thing, and Prostats has more information. Really, you could get away with just Prostats (lol, and I hope I'm using the right name for that plugin or I'm going to feel like an idiot). Basically, you want to try and make your website as streamlined as possible, so getting rid of excess codes and clutter is a good step to take!
  
  
• Images:
  Images aren't bad, they match with the skin well in general, however, I would either centre the images on their own line that you have in the board descriptions (like the Register Now! one), or I would just replace them with text links. Having big breaks in the text to accommodate images like that looks a tad unprofessional, and having simply text links would be better for loading time anyway. Plus, the sponsor buttons would work just as well as text, and, really, your register board could probably be equally as effective without the image. Of course, you kind of have three choices there to improve the look of it, a) center the image on it's own line in the description, b) remove the image and use only text with some enhancements, like colour changes, or c) make the entire description a centred image. C tends to be a popular choice seeing you can really put your skills to the test and make a catchy register intro to get a guest's attention, but really, any one of them would work.
  
  
• Logo/Header:
  Now then, for your header. Overall, it's a nice, simple, clean one, so there's really not anything wrong with it. I'll admit that the darker blue bar that accommodates your Facebook links and the like is a rather shocking colour change in comparison to the other blues, but it's not bad. However, I would encourage a bit more work on the logo itself. While I support simple logos for discussion forums like this, you have a lot of white space. Centering the logo may help a bit, but I think you need a bit more going on in the logo background. Really, even a simple gradient could make a world of difference, so I encourage you to play with it a bit more.
  

Content:

• Index:
  Ah, index. From the looks of it, you don't use Mybb's portal to a full extent, but you do use the portal boxes, which is a plus. However, seeing your index itself is primarily your forum, I'll be critiquing that in the following sections xD
  
  
• Boards:
  Well, the first thing I want to mention is the @ DisqusIn you have in a few of the board/category titles. I don't think it's really all that necessary seeing, after all, whoever is posting is posting on DisqusIn.com, and, generally, you want to try and avoid using abbreviations and symbols like @ in titles or board descriptions unless you happen to be referencing an email. Also, I would suggest moving the announcements and the like to the top of the forum. Generally, those contain important topics, and you risk people missing them if they happen to be clear down at the bottom.
  
  Also, I would try to combine categories where you can. For instance, the SEO & Webmastering category could probably fit in nicely with the Coding & Webdesign category. After all, they both focus on the web, and the fact that, as is, they are actually separated by other non-related categories kind of through me off. You do definitely make use of your sub-forum usage though, which I approve whole-heartedly! They are there for a reason after all! Just be careful you are not overdoing it at the same time, especially seeing all your subforums are visible on the index. The boards with tons of subforums, to a point the subforum list is larger than the description, look a bit cluttered.
  
  
• Posting:
  You have a post in pretty much every forum on the index page from the looks of it, which is awesome! It is always a plus not to have any forums that say "Never", so no complaints there.
  

Additional:

• Domain:
  The domain is cute and catchy. Some people may have a few issues with spelling it the first time around, but it shouldn't give you too much trouble, so I approve =3
  
  
• Topic:
  Like I've said to the other people I've reviewed, when I review topics most of the time they tend to be RPG forums and the like seeing it is actually very rare for me to be present on a general discussion/topic forum (unless it happens to be a support forum for something I'm using, like Mybb). Most of the time I include plot/story/ect. reviews here as well, but yeah xD Anyways. As I mentioned before, make sure you don't overload your users. While I get that your forum is a general discussion one, try to combine topics all the same. Not only will there be less to look at, but your posts will be more contained, so it looks more active (better to have large post counts in small areas than spread out ones in huge ones).
  
  
• Loading time: (seeing you specifically asked to rate it)
  Loading time wasn't too bad. When first visiting, things loaded rather quickly, and I'm on an older computer, however, as I mentioned before, getting rid of excess stuff can help loading time dramatically. As I said, cut down on ads if you can, and remove plugins you may not really have a need for, and you should see a huge increase.

Hopefully I was of some help to you, and I didn't make this review too long xD As I said, I like to be thorough, and I believe people may benefit more from a thorough review that addresses most, if not all, main points.

Of course, if you need clarification on anything I said, feel free to ask =3