The /newstuff Chronicles

The /newstuff Chronicles is a periodic roundup of recent uploads to the /idgames archive that are reviewed by users from the Doomworld forums. When a sufficient number of quality reviews have been approved, they are compiled in a new issue published on a Doomworld thread. Community users can post comments on a /newstuff Chronicles issue within the forums.

The name /newstuff Chronicles is taken from the /newstuff directory, where the latest submissions to the archive can be found.

History
The original idea took root after Doomworld staff member Flood started taking in-depth looks at a single new PWAD release every week. Andrew Bassett later took over and decided to post a weekly review of every new WAD uploaded to the /newstuff directory, publishing issue #1 to Doomworld on July 23, 2000. Subsequently, new reviewers joined the efforts, including Liam Mason, Tom White (Hyena), Stephen Clark (The Ultimate DooMer), Graham Burgess (Grazza), DD_133 and duncan. The last featured regulars were Dean Joseph (deathz0r), Alex Mayfield (AlexMax), and myk with Graham Burgess. Guest reviewers were also invited to fill gaps in the regular rotation whenever a member was unable to review for the time next issue, most of the time due to issues with time schedules and punctuality.

After a several months long hiatus because of lack of reviewers, The /newstuff Chronicles returned in May 17, 2008 with a new system which allowed any Doomworld forums member to choose any of the available WADs and to submit reviews for them. This proved to be far more effective than a closed group of reviewers. Bill Koch (Bloodshedder) became the new publisher of the /newstuff Chronicles since issue #312. New reviewers such as Not Jabba and gaspe did a number of honest and successful reviews, becoming active contributors during the final issues. It was not uncommon to see other new members make one-time contributions too.

Discontinuation
On June 2016, the /newstuff Chronicles published issue #500. But the number of WADs not reviewed yet, still remained at approximately 100, and increasing every few weeks.

This was due to the way the community system was designed, which required a certain number of WADs to be previously reviewed to allow new WADs to be opened and claimed by reviewers. The original goal of the publication was to be able to publish a review for every new WAD uploaded to the /idgames archive, but this quickly became an unrealistic goal due to the exponential increase in WADs uploaded and the reduction of available reviewers. By the last few editions, the backlog of unreviewed WADs was over 150, and without enough contributors willing to write reviews, the number kept growing and releases ended up falling behind schedule. Another cause for this lack of reviewer activity was due to the fact that the system only allowed one reviewer per WAD, and certain WADs were locked until older WADs were reviewed first, forcing contributors to play old mapsets or choose unwanted ones that did not attract the necessary motivation.

Other issues include the forum software change and the removal of the homepage.

As of December 20, 2018, the last issue of /newstuff Chronicles is issue #546. There have been no recent publications since then. There was no offical statement or conclusion provided on part of the main host, and the review program is now considered to be discontinued.

Regular contributors
An estimated of 300 users contributed to the program during its active phase. In the following list below are some of the most frequent contributors:


 * Andrew Bassett (AndrewB)
 * Liam Mason
 * Stephen Clark (The Ultimate DooMer)
 * Tom White (Hyena)
 * Dean Joseph (deathz0r)
 * Mike Watson (Cyb)
 * Xenaero
 * duncan
 * Bill Koch (Bloodshedder)
 * gaspe
 * Not Jabba
 * Philnemba
 * Walter Confalonieri (daimon)
 * Magicsofa
 * Christopher Emirzian (Udderdude)
 * kmxexii
 * Memfis
 * James Cresswell (Phobus)
 * Decay
 * Csonicgo
 * Voros
 * Chezza
 * Jaws In Space