I think this will help a lot, for all members of the forum. Moderators now enjoy more freedom of movement within the progressive moderation system, users have a clearly defined outlet for site and moderation criticism, and, in general, the rules are less opaque and more comprehensive.

All the senior mods did a great job putting this together.

VGC taking steps to improve? I don't believe it.

Lol, good work :)

This pls

A tip for improving user experience: You might want to consider summarizing the changes somewhere, for example in the first post. That's a lot of rules, and common sense is much more attractive than that wall of text - especially considering much of the new ruleset is still common sense.

Exactly. Summarizing what has changed in relation to the standard old rules would be quite useful.

Moderators will look at overt discrimination very harshly. Blatant forms of racism, sexism, homophobia, or any other sort of hatred towards a group of people(s) will not be tolerated, and will be met with firm moderation.

Good to see. As opposed to certain political doctrines and constructions, where the system encourages hatred and discrimination these days.
Glad to see the younger generation meeting such obvious detriments with a steel glove.

Yall should run for precidency.

Ok, a few things:

Loving this one
"Should not be used to pose simple questions."

For checking possible dupe threads, "hot topics" is probably one of the worst places to look. Older or less popular threads are easily buried in that mess. So my suggestion is using "latest threads" and go through at least the last 50 entries. That way almost all dupe threads would be eliminated. This shouldn't be hurdle. After all threads shouldn't be made lightly and it's not too much to ask to really check before posting.

Also the phrase "lock if duplicate" should be banned. This sentence only means 2 things: Either the OP was too lazy to look properly or that he has looked properly. In the latter case such note wouldn't be necessary because OP can claim with confidence that it's probably not a dupe.

This I don't like.
"Posts that are clearly a reply or a response to a thread should be just that, a post. Threads should not be a reply, a response, or a retaliation to another thread. Keep related discussion in the appropriate thread."
Response threads are always so much fun. That's where most of the VGC memes come from:)

Necro-bumping will be treated as a form of spamming. Posts made 30 days after the last post in any non-official/mod approved thread will be treated as an act of spamming. If you still feel the need to discuss a topic that is past the 30 day mark due to whatever reason, create a new thread about what you want to discuss (you can always include the link to the original thread if you want to have a reference to the original topic).

But what in the case of predictions or such? There are some cases where necrobumping are ok right?

If two threads on a topic are created around the same time, the one with the clearest title and most constructive content will remain open, the other will be locked. Even if the latter was created first.

Sweet!

You cannot create threads, posts, signatures, etc. just to bait people of a specific fan group. Bait threads will be locked and you will be moderated for them. If you spend a lot of time making hit-and-run negative threads or posts about a specific platform, you will also be moderated at the discretion of the moderators

Also sweet.

Website criticism. Do not attack the website. Reasonable debate based on facts is acceptable, but repeated attacks and negative comments about the website and its staff will not be tolerated. People are here to discuss games and sales, and doing nothing but attacking the site is disruptive to those who are trying to participate in a discussion.

Can we also stop under/overtracked unless backed up with a (valid) argument?

Similarly, avoid discussing the user who created the thread in a negative, insulting, or accusational fashion, rather than discussing the thread topic itself. If you feel a topic is baiting, trolling or rule-breaking, report it.

I look forward to this being enforced and apologise in advance to mods for all the work :P

interesting, so no more requested permabans eh? People will just have to stop coming to the site on their own free will from now on!!!

Edit:  Also, what is the deal with necro bumping?  I never thought of it as a bad thing, and can often lead to more discussion... why create another thread to talk about another thread?  Seems like a silly rule.  If you are worried about necrobumping being a form of flaming/mocking, then make a rule along those lines.  Don't necrobump a thread to mock it.  However, there are more reasons for necrobumping than that and I don't think it should be against the rules...

I don't know about always. But they make me laugh more often than not, and the site would be poorer without them.