I agree that the heavy-handed moderation is a significant factor.
And I don't get why people complain so much about the forum games. Without them the place would be even deader than it already is. You can't tell me that there suddenly would be lots of interesting discussions here, if it weren't for forum games.

[Forum Game] Start a new interesting discussion thread!

Back before all the rules, it was more "wild" in some ways, but also the forums were much more populated & perused.

Yeah, the forums needed a bit of structure/reigning in, but imo they(GOG itself) went a bit too far....and now the most used board is GD, and even it isn't used too much.

Some dislike such topics & they're too unmotivated to install a browser extension to hide the threads they dislike. And some likely just like to complain and find new things to complain about.

(also I feel some don't want said topics moved/removed to help the forums, but rather more so to make the board how they want them to be....as if this is their own personal living space and they're decorating it the way they want it & trying to remove/etc what they don't want around)

The subforums don't have forum games, and aren't too hard to get to, and are even dedder than GD....so yeah, I don't think forum games are likely dissuading many from posting.

Definitely creative solution. Tells us though the forum software is old/very hard to modify. I honestly given up they will give the forum a makeover. Imagine its too hard or impossible to move everything over to something bright shiny (oh yeah probably way down there to do list)

From what i've heard, it was made by the lowest bidder...who has long since left the company.

The first objection to this idea will be from marketing, since they will wish to prevent any potential customer from being shielded to their efforts. And that is after considering that the technical expertise, company resources and executive volition actually identify such a convenience will be a nett improvement in customer activity, which might elicit the response: nonpossumus.

edit: incorrect negation

I check the forums every once in a while: one week, two weeks. Sometimes less than once a month.
I see a wall of "forum games" and I think: the forums are dead.

The games are nice, for who find them interesting but, as someone else said, clustered always at the top, really gives the impression of a dead community and uninteresting forum.

That is actually the case, from my point of view.

I don't have a solution but surely they can provide a negative impression.

Oh!

And what about the giveway/gifts threads along some other list something threads?
Please tag them as well.

You can easily fill the first page with these.... and whatever.
Any interest in the forums gone.

I think this is a tad hyperbolic.

That said: one can easily hide threads they dislike with the GOG forum extensions, or mark the threads they want to read as favorites. The forums are maybe not perfectly tailored to everyone's tastes, but they can be that way if users actually put some effort in.

Yep. I think that's a pretty safe assumption. Haven't seen the forum change in the 5 years I've been here and from what I've heard, it's still the same as it's been since the start. And they seem allergic to any change, most likely because od fear of changing anything. Or they don't have anyone who knows their way around in the forum code. Either way, new features or even fixing bugs (search, purple dot etc.) are obviously a no-go.

I frequently read the complaints about the cluttered first page, but I never see the forums like in your picture. Currently out of the first 30 topics, there are only 5 forum games. I wonder if it has something to do with time zones.

Just checked: 3 forum games out of 15 topics while not logged in. 15/50 after log in.
From my observations, they tend to be more popular in the evenings or during the night.

Well what I was proposing was individually hiding threads in the same way they are favourited. Thus every new thread will have to be seen at least once before it can be hidden. The real reason this won't happen is because the forum is held together with duct tape and string.

They are not games, but still they are so many and long standing that could be tagged [giveaway] & [list something]

They are the same from the beginning, yeah. A (possibly last?) remnant of the old GOG code, written by people who have since left and the current team doesn't know how to deal with the codebase (which says a lot about the coders GOG hired in more recent years...). Or at least that was the excuse given for removing mixes, or partially also the downloader. So if they'd get to wanting to change something, based on all past experiences, it'd mean either complete removal or, as in the case of the rest of the site on the 10th anniversary, a complete replacement with something rushed and awfully designed, mainly unnecessarily flashy and resource-heavy and missing a good chunk of the previous functionality. Why I keep saying better not give them ideas about changing the forum, even if it's buggy and outdated...