Need some eyes on my custom WP-to-ServUO web portal (Project Onyx)

[Kronos]

Hey folks,

Following up on my intro post from the other day, I wanted to share the actual infrastructure I've been working on in my lab, and hopefully get some brutal feedback from the community here.

I've spent the last few weeks completely buried in PHP and CSS trying to build a unified web ecosystem for "Project Onyx". Since the project is a 5-realm cluster running concurrently (Classic OSI, Dark Fantasy, a 1-life Permadeath, a Siege ruleset, and a PTR), I needed a way to link everything together without forcing players to register multiple times.

I ended up building a custom Single Sign-On setup (Onyx ID) that hooks a WordPress front-end straight into MariaDB and ServUO. One account routes to all 5 ports, and I'm currently trying to tie the whole thing into the ClassicUO WebAssembly client for browser access.

Before I even think about going live with the actual shards, I really need some fresh eyes on the website. When you stare at the same dark-theme templates for days, you completely lose perspective on what works and what doesn't.

If anyone has a couple of minutes to spare, I'd love it if you could drop by the site:

Project Onyx | The Ultimate UO Nexus.

Welcome to Project Onyx. One account, 5 unique UO realms. Join the Nexus, choose your playstyle, master your destiny, and forge your legend.

www.projectonyx.gg

Click around the realm pages, check the UI, and tell me what you think. What looks cool? What is completely confusing? What should I just scrap and redo from scratch?

Don't hold back on the critiques, especially regarding the UX/UI. Thanks in advance!

 

[Voxpire]

Honestly, everything looks great.

The first thing I noticed was the [Explore Realms] button scrolls one unit too far when clicked.

I would probably just scrap the forums, the embedded page is clipped and looks out of place; since you have Discord, it will make forums redundant - you can always create forum-type channels in Discord for familiarity.
(Based on my experience with shards that run forums, they end up becoming more like outdated archives over time)

 

[Kronos]

Hey, thanks a ton for the express check on the site!
Good catch on the "Explore Realm" button. The CSS padding is definitely out of whack there, I'll get it realigned.

You also hit the nail on the head regarding the forum vs. Discord. You are absolutely right. I'm going to completely scrap the web forum idea next week and look into doing a full Discord integration instead. It might sound surreal coming from a dev, but my experience with Discord is mostly just as a regular user, so setting up the advanced forum channels and webhooks will be a bit of a learning curve for me. But honestly, this is exactly the kind of blunt, time-saving feedback I was looking for before I went too deep down the rabbit hole!

Just a heads-up, the site is still very much a work in progress and I'm missing a couple of core sections. I'm pushing as hard as I can to wrap up this whole web ecosystem so I can finally get back to the fun part: finalizing the actual realms in C#.

Thanks again for taking the time to check it out!