I have a number of grievances that range from major frustrations to minor annoyances. (Feel free to add your own to this list. Maybe FFG will do something, though I wouldn't cross my fingers.)
1. Any AGOT news/information/etc. is difficult to find. Whereas I previously often visited www.agameofthrones.com, the AGOT-related news is constantly burried by news of other FFG products. The discussion threads are similarly difficult to navigate--one must go through a series of pages just to get to the "A Game of Thrones Discussion Boards." AGOT is NOT EVEN ON THE FFG HOMEPAGE!!! (At least not at the moment I'm writing this.) Nothing about this new site is intuitive, and many things are counter-intuitive. (For example: If I had heard of AGOT but not the "LCG," I would look for it under the "Collectible Card Games" category and probably never realize it exists under an alternative "Living Card Games" category.
2. The "news" page has a sophomoric, unpolished feel to it. Though I appreciate news about AGOT, there is rarely any and it often appears insignificant amongst the various other posts. Moreover, the blog-feel makes the news appear unthought-out and unofficial. This is certainly not the way to get new players involved.
3. The discussion threads are terrible. Typing, the most basic aspect of a thread, reveals technical problems. For whatever reason, every time I hit the new paragraph ("Enter") key, there is an additional space in my text so that I have to skip lines when all I really want to do is insert a paragraph break. Other similar annoyances have also come up, though I'm drawing a blank at the moment. (It's possible the problem is with my web-browser though, as I prefer to use Firefox over IE.) Also, I still haven't figured out how to send personal messages to people. If there is no messaging system, I would be both perplexed (this is one of the most basic features and an important one--I am definitely not going to post my mobile phone number on a public discussion board) and disappointed.
4. I have a sneaking suspician that many of the frustrations I have with the discussion board are intentional. Did FFG choose this structure because it in some way allows them to track us "customers" more easily? Even if unintended, the current FFG site forces visitors to navigate through a series of pages to get to their final destination. This feels a bit like being hearded past other FFG products in a way that is vaguely reminiscent of being shepharded around a tourist visitor's center full of unwanted solicitations. (For future reference FFG, none of this is going to make me buy non-AGOT products. In fact, it is having the opposite affect in that I am frustrated everytime I visit FFG's site and would only ever buy another FFG product if a friend that I trust recommends it to me. My friends that play other games are less likely to recommend things on the discussion boards or elsewhere if they are similarly frustrated by the new FFG site.)
5. Last but not least, this site is f-ugly. Even if "cool" at first glance, the dark colors ensures a dreary feeling and makes spending long amounts of time on the site depressing. (Remember, in website design, "simple" and "bright" are usually preferable to "complicated" and "dark.") Also, the uniformity of the discussion threads across FFG's site reduces the personalization and community aspects of the old threads. Whereas the threads used to feel like they were created for AGOT players (even if, in fact, this was only because a few AGOT pictures had been well-placed), it now feels as if our threads were annexed into some larger, impersonal and almost immoral regime. (If the old threads were the Apple Computer, the news are the disappointing Microsoft variety; if the old AGOT site were a handcooked hamburger, the new ones are the McDonald's $.99 version.)
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