And then I recall that name of his.
Hypothetically, that sounds like a good idea. But, in practice, I think the activity here wouldn't change much.
I could be wrong, but I assume people go to bigger gaming/anime forums or sites for their discussion needs since there's more people they can discuss with and share their tastes.
Of course, the advantage here is that people are usually nicer, so I feel more open to say what my tastes in games/anime are.
Time and again I see lurkers not often post anything, yet who could blame them? There's little to talk of here, especially when the userbase is divided as a result of Mobage titles. This is again compounded by these lulls iM@S has between major releases -- iM@S 2, OfA and now PS. At this rate I doubt we'll change for the merrier; it's always the same damn thing.
To at least make headway, we'd use more growth in-between. You're right to say people default to other, larger communities, so we'll have to provide an incentive to discuss their interests here -- hence the new sub-forums. Since our userbase is generally comfortable with one another, things
would be more open; a bloom would come by, gradually speaking.
But then, this all depends if the staff have the same drive for change.