Late 1990s Web Design

It isn't a Nineties website without a web ring!!

Oh, and a picture of an American-style mailbox for the e-mail button... often found at the bottom of the page. Because who needs the contact button in a prominent place?

 

This is going to be the best website ever!
I just need to find the time to code it all into the Notepad / BBEdit!

 

Some examples for your perusal:

http://oneterabyteofkilobyteage.tumblr.com/

 

Don't forget the classy dev sites that were like this!!

http://web.archive.org/web/19970530204700/http://www.codemasters.com/

http://web.archive.org/web/19961029111031/http://www.atari.com/

http://web.archive.org/web/19971017111419/http://www.infogrames.com/

http://web.archive.org/web/19961219233159/http://www.sega.com/

http://web.archive.org/web/19961222145127/http://www.nintendo.com/

The Nineties very much had different feels for different countries, too. Japanese sites were a pain to use, often.

 

Sometimes 90s web design is still found in the wild: http://www2.warnerbros.com/spacejam/movie/jam.htm

Dunno what that font on the actual pages is called, but I swear it was on every 90s website. And don't forget the frames! Also, a hit counter.

 

So...much nostalgia!

 

...implemented as a Java applet.

Maybe some MIDI background music? Without controls to turn it off, of course.

Landing/intro pages were quite popular, too.

And make sure you mention the user is on your "Internet Home Page" or sth. like that, because he might not have noticed.



Looking forward to this, since it'll be a chance to use my browser's "back" button - another thing all that newfangled dynamically-altering-page scripting crud broke.

 

Make it with Microsoft Publisher '97 or Frontpage.

That's how my first website was made.

 

How could I forget? Page transitions!

 

Don't forget to make sure it's compatible with WebTV! LOL At least that's what I did in the 90's. Coding in tables never really bothered me that much, but trying to do things that way after years of using CSS feels awkward.

 

Used to talk to the guy who runs (or ran? dont know if its the same guy) this site on AOLIM a long time ago... back before it had a forum I think. This site had a really functional 90s type design back then, was pretty cool as I remember. If there is any way you can check it out (maybe its archived?), do so. Was cool.

 

1.) Plaster ads and links for AOL Hometown and GeoCities everywhere. Also ICQ.
2.) Have it endlessly loop a MIDI rendition of Emerald Hill Zone
3.) Make an announcement that a new part of the website is coming soon, make a link and page for it, add under construction gifs, leave alone for next 5 years or until domain expires.

You could also try to incorporate that ugly 90s coffeehouse art style that a lot of companies used for all their products during the Windows 9x era:

http://images.cqout.com/SB/Adobe_Acrobat3.jpg

^ If there's one thing I've never seen anyone who talks about the 90s get nostalgic about, it's this art style...

 

For links and other things with bright colours, don't bother optimizing the colours (say by having white then become off-white by a few shades and/or tones) so that they're eye-burningly bright.

And contrasting colours for text on banners and the like, for button images used - for ones you want more focus on, make sure ALL of the buttons don't match up in terms of style.

Or flashing wordart gifs. Bonus points for having sparkles/stars. Oh and pop-up characters and/or custom pointers saying why you should use their site that cover the majority of the page.

An entry page for the site offering frames, non-frames (and one of them totally not working) as well as different optimized options, webring link, e-mail address and links out to other sites that are mostly dead would also do the trick so you can shove all the other crap onto that section.

As well as a shitload of little add banners and website vote banners at the bottom of the page.

 

He said late 90's web design, not let's make the worst website ever.

http://animetheme.com/ good example of a site obviously stuck in the 90's but without being horrible.

 

Hahaha, thank you all for the input, while a lot of you did stray and look for the worst possible examples ever... it's refreshing to see such terrible websites. That tumblr one with the screen caps I've been going through for a while and it is just amazing what constituted a webpage back in the day.

Anyway, I've done some preliminary work and found some of my old "under construction" images. Sirens and whatnot will follow.
Anyone got any suggestions for good counters?

 

only thing I would add to that to give it that 90's feel is frames. MAYBE link to a sega webring

 

The colors are not garish enough and the background needs to be a tiled image. Also, use a font that doesn't have anti-aliasing. The photo is also too large, and too high quality, what is it? A JPEG?

 

Haha, yes true I am using some modern technologies! :wink-new:
Oh man, I managed to get the Google going since Altavista has disappeared... when did that happen! Hahaha!
I've added some buttons at the bottom, can anyone think of any others I have missed?

 

Creative Commons was founded in 2001, I think that's too new for such a website

 

Being from the future, I get to pick and choose the best of both eras! :wink-new: