Author: Aywren
Date: December 28, 2024

So, the next big Wayrift coding project has appeared on the horizon – building page-by-page archives for all existing chapters. This one is going to take some time to do, but user feedback has indicated this type of archive is desired. I appreciate everyone in the Discord who provided the feedback!

Why Did It Happen?

So why doesn’t Wayrift have page-by-page chapters to begin with? Back before the WordPress days, we did. How did they get lost?

It’s hard to explain other than to say an HTML export of Comic Easel, which I used on WordPress, wasn’t possible at the time. I was trying to move my content off of HostGator and WordPress to NeoCities and static HTML in order to save money from the subscription fee I was paying to HostGator.

Trying to code over 1000 pages without an export would have taken soooooooooo long that it made sense at the time just to code the comic in full chapter format. The one thing that got lost in this shuffle was all the original WordPress comments – which I have always been sad about.

I still have my WordPress backup, so it might be possible to restore the old comments as I build chapters. No promises, but we’ll see! (Actually, I can prove that this works - check the old Wayrift RPG page, where I've recently restored the original comments!)

I also thought at the time that the trends on the net led people to be more long-form scrollers now days. I thought it was easier for the reader to have an entire chapter on an archive page that they could binge scroll it – especially when moving through the archives.

How Will This Work?

Turns out, some folks do like the full chapter archives and use it in the way I expected. But it also turns out that some of our long-time readers prefer keeping up with the comic page-by-page.

Once I got that feedback, I began planning how I’m going to implement this. Currently, I have a sample of what this will look like on Chapter 89 – since this was only a few pages, but enough to create a sample.

Here’s the changes you can already see:

• Recoded the main page to look somewhat like how it used to with a link to the newest page. This will be the newest page in the page-by-page archive and this link will change with each update (rather than go to a “newest page” page that keeps updating). This prevents the caching issues we had when I was doing it that way.
• Each comic page will have its own Disqus comment section rather than a single Cbox. Hope to see your thoughts and feedback there!
• Each comic will have a main Archive page – see sample. I went back to old HTML backups of Wayrift and found that this was how Wayrift was structured before WordPress. Each archive page had info such as a character list, location list, summary, and links to the individual comic pages.
• When you’re on the page-by-page archive, there’s a link to the full chapter archive if you want that. When you’re on the full chapter archive, there’s a link to the page-by-page archive in turn.
• I’ve recoded the Book 3 Archives to make it more responsive for mobile devices and to provide a link to both the full chapter archive and page-by-page archive under the chapter image. You can see this on Chapter 89 since that’s the only chapter I’ve done this for.
• Bonus: I’ve coded a New Reader page that details different ways a new reader can jump into Wayrift. This includes a link to the new History/Lore section I released yesterday.

Thanks to everyone who provided the feedback that led to these changes. If you have additional feedback on how I’ve approached implementing these changes, please let me know!

Be looking for the next new Wayrift page to drop on January 1, 2025!

Wishing you the best for the New Year!

~Wren