|
Content
|
| Quality : |
13.0 / 20 |
| Quantity : |
11.5 / 15 |
| Entertain : |
12.5 / 15 |
| Updates : |
4.5 / 10 |
| Exclusive : |
5.0 / 05 |
| Download : |
3.0 / 05 |
| sub-total : |
49.5 / 70 |
| Navigation |
| Easy : |
7.0 / 10 |
| Features : |
2.0 / 05 |
| Design : |
3.5 / 05 |
| sub-total : |
12.5 / 20 |
| Other |
| Originality : |
3.5 / 05 |
| Hard Facts : |
3.5 / 05 |
| sub-total : |
7.0 / 10 |
Scoring Criteria New
New Update!
As of Aug 15th, 07, price of a site is no longer factored into the overall score/rank. |
|
| Editor: Spencer |
Initial Review: 11-17-05 |
|
1. Exclusive content.
2. Not too expensive.
1. Pictures are small.
2. Video quality isn't great.
3. Navigation is a bit plain, and slightly difficult.
4. Not sure when/if they update.
"On the surface things look okay here, but small/poor content really hurt them." |
|
|
Okay I know the dude next door, and the last place you'd want to see him is on a website. Still, this company decided to make a whole site called Next Door Male, but thankfully I don't think it's about my neighbor at all. Based on their tagline, the site doesn't seem to be catered to a gay audience necessarily: "100% straight guys. 100% amateurs. 100% studs." Well we can find out for just $20 a month for the first few months (it drops down a bit if you stay longer).
Once inside, these guys don't fuck around with any BS. They get straight to the point (content) and start listing off the guys that are available inside. They break things down by model, and list anywhere from 10-20 guys on a page (14 is the norm) with six pages total. They don't let you jump around very easily, and they don't tell you how many pages there are which is a pain as well. There's also no way to sort the guys in any different fashion (chronological, alphabetical, etc.). In summary, the site is pretty simple so far without many extra ways to browse around.
Once you do pick a guy, he has his own page that gives a brief bio and links to his content. Each guy seems to have a gallery and a video, without more than the one gallery each per person.
The photos can be viewed in a standard gallery layout, as well as in a slideshow. They appear to be exclusive from what I can tell (the Next Door Male t-shirt always helps). Beyond that, I wasn't too impressed here unfortunately because the pictures are so small. A few sets looked to be just vidcaps, but even the actual photos only came in at 510x385 or so which is just awful. I tend to use 800x600 as my "standard" or "okay" reference point, and to fall so far below that really isn't good. Many sites today offer pictures at 1200x800 or larger because of today's large monitors and broadband connections. The newer sets come in slightly larger and look okay (640x480 to 700x500), but they are still too small by today's standards no matter how you look at it. No extras were found here either for browsing, or for download features.
Videos come in both Windows Media Video and Quicktime formats, and have two quality options each (all of them are full-scene videos only). The standard here seems to be 320x240, with 500kbps for newer videos and 350kbps for older ones. They have some quality issues all around, even on the newer ones. Like the photos, I just look for more than this in today's paysites unfortunately.
Don't hit the "home" link while browsing as it takes you back to the tour where you'll have to find your way back into the member's area. What I was looking for when I hit it was an update schedule which I couldn't find. I'm not sure how often or when updates are, so we'll have to wait till next time to see if the site has grown.
As you can expect, it's not going to be a huge recommendation here. The idea is good with exclusive content of solo guys, but that's where the fun ends. The quality here is lower than expected, and the site itself is a bit plain. If they could upgrade the content, that'd be their best hope for a better score. If you don't mind small pics and semi-jagged videos, it's not a bad option really. Hopefully we can see some improvements next time around though.
|
