P2pBG

Introduction

With so many different torrent sites out there nowadays, it can be really difficult to find one that truly stands out in some way. It seems like, for the most part, so many torrent trackers, torrent index sites, and torrent search engines are all the same. The majority of them offer roughly the same torrents, site design, experience, user features, etc. I don’t know about you, but I am ready to find a new kind of torrent indexer. There are so many possibilities and potentials that have not yet been explored, in my opinion.

Could torrent sites become more innovative? – One thing that I think that torrent indexers should really start embracing more is social media. And, no, I don’t mean that your favorite torrent tracker or torrent search engine should simply start engaging on Twitter more. I mean that I wish that these websites would offer their own forms of social networking. I think this is a frequently missed opportunity – to offer a truly exquisite and comprehensive social component of some sort.

Lots of sites do come close, to their credit, to provide a decent social platform in addition to providing thousands of torrents. But I always feel as if there is something missing from them. Sure, they may have a decent forum, a chat room or shoutbox, maybe even a means to add friends, but they all seem to stop there.

Why not go all the way with it? Why not add a newsfeed that notifies you every time that someone you follow uploads a file, leaves a comment, etc.? Why not make a torrent site that is a true social network as well? Obviously, this is not a requirement. You can still find an amazing torrent tracker with no social features whatsoever … I just think that it would be cool to see some new, innovative sites pop up here and there.

P2P BG offers a new type of torrenting experience – There is at least one site that I have discovered recently, though, that has something new to offer the world of torrent trackers. It is not quite the social network torrent site that I envisioned, but it is a new take on the social nature of P2P file sharing, nonetheless. Instead of merging the worlds of social networking and torrenting, P2P BG, a Bulgarian torrent tracker, has brought together torrents and online gaming. Offering a truly novel idea, P2P BG is definitely a game-changer.

P2P BG offers free indie games for its community of peers to play, such as blackjack and a weekly lottery. But instead of winning cash, P2P BG awards its users with upload data. This is precisely the kind of new and exciting thing that I was looking for in a torrent site. I wish that more torrent indexers would take some notes from sites like P2P BG and realize that torrent sites can be more than just indexes of torrents. They can be fun and exciting places to kill some time and interact with others, too!

Could this become a problem? – This does make me wonder, though, whether P2P BG is able to hold its own as a torrent community as well. It would be a shame if this site were to become too caught up in the supplementary features that it didn’t function as a great torrent indexer as well. Obviously, this is going to be the most important element of a site like this, at the end of the day. So, hopefully, P2P BG hasn’t put too much effort and attention into the gaming side of things and neglected to cultivate plenty of healthy torrents.

Something tells me, though, that this won’t be the case. I would be much more concerned if this site had its users competing for real money. But since the currency in question on P2P BG is, in fact, upload data, this reassures me that users are likely to be attentive and responsible with their torrent downloading. Otherwise, why play free indie games to improve their torrent ratios in the first place, right?

Well, there is no real point in speculating when we can just delve on in and check out the inner workings of P2P BG for ourselves, right? Let’s take a closer look at everything that this interesting torrent indexer has to offer and whether P2P BG has the potential to be your new go-to source for torrents.

Design

I am going to be completely honest with you … P2P BG almost lost me immediately when I first arrived on the site. I am not a huge fan of the way that this site is designed, at all. It looks dated and, frankly, a bit incomplete. Different sections of the same page tend to be various sizes, which gives the whole of the site an unprofessional and somewhat sloppy appearance. There is nothing experiential or responsive about the site. It is just data with very little to dress it up, really. Admittedly, I have seen worse websites in my day, but I would still like to see P2P BG get with the times and update their site design.

Home page – The site asserts itself in 3 main sections: a site menu bar at the top of the page, a Latest News section down the middle, and a more detailed site navigation menu sprawling the left-hand side of the page. The menu at the top allows you to access various sections of the site, including Home, Leaderboard, Torrents, Advertising, Upload, Blackjack, Help, Rules, News, and Forum. So, you are immediately given some idea of everything that the site has to offer. If you want to browse torrents in a more in-depth way, though, you’ll have to scroll down to the side menu.

Here, you can start to actually access torrents in a meaningful way. There are several main categories to choose from, many of which also have subcategories, making for a fairly easy and user-friendly browsing experience. The news section in the middle pertains to, it seems, only announcements of the site’s lottery winners and when to draw new tickets for next weeks contest.

Inner pages – Unfortunately, the site doesn’t become any more responsive or appealing the further in you travel. Browsing torrents is tedious and straining due to the fact that files are depicted in a very bland table, with a text that is, in my opinion, too small for the rest of the page. You also won’t find any thumbnails associated with torrent files (aside from very generic avatars indicating the media type), no covers or indie movie posters, etc. to add a bit of an imagistic element to the site. Again, nothing but raw information.

However, the torrent info pages themselves are decent. Here, you will find plenty of associated media, including posters, covers, screenshots, trailers, and all relevant credit and torrent info. This is probably the one aspect of the site design that I enjoy.

Content and Features

So, P2P BG is a multiple category torrent indexer. As such, you can find just about every kind of file here. This site contains thousands upon thousands of torrents, and you can download free indie movies (DVDR, Xvid, HD), free indie TV series, free indie Music, free indie Games (PC and console), open-source Software, free indie Books, and homemade XXX content. As far as torrent features are concerned, though, there are a few missing.

For instance, there is no system of torrent verification on P2P BG. This is troubling because verified torrents let you know that a file is safe to download, that it has been checked and scanned already. A torrent site with verified torrents is always preferred to one that does not have verified torrents. At least P2P BG offers comments to make up for this – if something is critically wrong with a file, hopefully a peer will alert others to the fact there.

In addition to torrents, as discussed, P2P BG offers blackjack. The game is played against a dealer (AI, I’m sure) and each game played wagers 200 MB of your upload capacity. If you earn blackjack, you win 500 MB. If you beat the dealer: 400. A push, naturally, earns you nothing. And, as is the case in all games, if you lose, you lose.

The site also has a forum in which users can discuss torrents, as well as their favorite free indie movies, free indie series, free indie music, etc.

Conclusion

Although P2P BG is a fun and novel way to gamify torrenting, the site desperately needs a makeover and I think a little more effort needs to be put into the torrenting features of the site.