[Noble]

Limelight Aurora was the project name for a website redesign that I had been working for off and on during the past year or so. There are no plans for it to ever launch on LL so I'm fine with sharing the progress that was made on it before I retired from the team.

This was the concept that kicked it off a few years ago. Note that for all of these images you can right-click and open in a new tab to view full resolution:




The basic premise was to take MyBB and completely overhaul the front-end design to the point that it doesn't look like shit or resemble the usual forums that you see everywhere on the web. For reference I used Bungie's forum design so that I didn't also have to spend time coming up with a totally new design. My total time on this was somewhere around 100 hours and that doesn't include the time @Doctor Internet, @PaulB, and @Burnett spent helping me with things I couldn't do. This new design was never fully complete but almost all of the major functions and front-end was finished. I apologize in advance for the crappy gifs.


Creating threads/topics was handled all on one page instead of redirecting you. Same goes for Quick Reply that became the default Reply and was restyled entirely.




Post view was also overhauled quite extensively and removed a lot of unnecessary information from each post (ie: user's total posts). Rank display was also modified.



A 'controversial' change on this was removing signatures entirely. But by doing so page loading time was drastically reduced, less scrolling to view posts, and new customization options were given to profiles as a replacement.


'Likes' were also removed and instead replaced with a reaction system similar to that of Facepunch and Discord.




Bottom right icon was named 'Hype Yacht'. There were plans to be able to add more based on community feedback and was 'controversial' as well due to negative ratings existing. The ability to blacklist members from using it was added to prevent abuse.


The UCP panel was entirely overhauled and removed all the options that weren't necessary or ever used much. Members had the option to add custom background URLs and GIFs were restricted to current staff.




My personal favorite part was the fly-out menu and overhauled profiles (also to make up for the removal of signatures).




You can view the full UHD images of my profile below:






The new profiles displayed a lot more useful information about a player than what we've ever had on the forums. As mentioned before members could add a custom background (slight parallax when scrolling which is why the GIF above messed up) that would automatically be restyled slightly as to not clash with elements on the page. Players also had the ability to add a moto to their page and Discord ID. Steam profile links were also added once a player linked their Steam account.

I also wanted to make sure there was more information about the player on their profile so they displayed the years someone had been on LL, the top post rating that they had received from other players, and a 'Player Rating' score. The score was auto calculated based on bans, blacklists, and forum warnings and would increase the longer a player went without receiving an infraction. I don't remember all of the math behind it but it was a pretty impressive system.

In addition your clan would be displayed with the clan name, clan motto, and number of members. Below that would be the usual forum activity with recent posts that the player made.


Unfortunately this will never be released due to concerns about it being based on another site (some restyled extensively and others not), having negative post reactions, no signatures, etc. etc. but with all the time that I and others put into it I figured I'd at least show it off. It wasn't perfect and certainly had a lot more work that would needed to be put into it but it was massive undertaking to do on MyBB. Enjoy!

[VIVZZ]

Looks pretty cool

[Quest]

Fuckkkk thats so nice I wish we could have this

[Pat]

WHY ISNT THIS A THING

[Insert]

<3

[Cole]

Yeah I loved this theme, I don't understand the issue with it but I'll still continue to use it as long as it's around on the website for.

[John Jong]

How does one obtain this theme???? I am sorry bambo but this is alot nicer x

[Jen]

How does one obtain this theme???? I am sorry bambo but this is alot nicer x

Become part of the team

[Soviethooves]

No signatures and GIFs only for staff. no thx



Sad to see it never got released because of a similarity to another website. Still looks better than the current one

[John Jong]

No signatures and GIFs only for staff. no thx



Sad to see it never got released because of a similarity to another website. Still looks better than the current one

is the other website FL's? if so I dont see the similarity lmao

[ForceGhost]

No signatures and GIFs only for staff. no thx



Sad to see it never got released because of a similarity to another website. Still looks better than the current one

is the other website FL's? if so I dont see the similarity lmao

[John Jong]

No signatures and GIFs only for staff. no thx



Sad to see it never got released because of a similarity to another website. Still looks better than the current one

is the other website FL's? if so I dont see the similarity lmao

ahh ye thats pretty similar

[Noble]

For reference I used Bungie's forum design so that I didn't also have to spend time coming up with a totally new design.

[kian]

All this is making me wanna do is go play the old Halos.

[Doctor Internet]

@"ForceGhost" @John Jong, concerns were raised, so the design was completely changed. You can see the newer design in @Noble's OP. The one ForceGhost posted was about 3 months out-of-date when Noble left.