playerbase down 25% in 4 months?

[Renshi]

Hello, I'm the OP of the article posted on Allakhazam (the link on the first page). Actually the numbers are even a bit more misleading - something I tried to explain to Hugus on Allakhazam as well. Let me explain.

Numbers until October 2010 were collected with the /sea all command during a specific time each day (a "one-moment-snapshot"). Numbers after February, however, were accumulated over 24-h-intervals. So it's save to assume that 24-h-interval numbers in October were actually much higher than 2600.

The drop October->February thus was not 2600->2000, but (2600*x)->2000, with x being (24/average number of hours a player stayed logged in in October). If we assume x to be a very exagerated 6, for example, actual 24-h-interval player numbers would have been 10.400 in October. The drop 10.400->2600 is 75%, that's why I said that the additional drop 2600->2000 since February is "positive".


P.S.: The player numbers showed a almost identical drop across servers until October (second link on the Allakhazam page). What makes you think Cornelia, the original No.3, became a "special exception" since then?

Yeah gotcha, but don't say that 25% of the ENTIRE playerbase is down. It leads to miscommunication =)

[zaviermhigo]

On selbina i really don't see any lack of people on. We may of lost most of our CE people (not me though), but I see tons of new people everyday and I have for the last 3 or so months. And these aren't bots or multiboxers i'm talking about, their real people who make really stupid sounding newbie shouts like "where's the AH" and you have to break their heart.

[Sav]

Not surprisingly, a lot of the numbers dropped after the post-tsunami outage.

[Rinsui]

Not surprisingly, a lot of the numbers dropped after the post-tsunami outage.

Well, actually the number was smaller than could have been expected. If you look at the table in the link, you'll realize some "-"s. That's the tsunami outage. Player numbers climbed back up for a short duration after that.

[Rinsui]

They sure a fighting an uphill battle. Whenever they release a new patch, they get a lot of positive feedback from the community; for about 2 weeks, when that there's nothing else to do becomes evident once again. There simply isn't enough "base goodness" in this game to grow on. It still is in beta a year after its release.

I wonder how newcomers would react to the game world, though. For them, the content we were fed bit by bit may sum up to look like an impresive amount...?

[Arcell]

They sure a fighting an uphill battle. Whenever they release a new patch, they get a lot of positive feedback from the community; for about 2 weeks, when that there's nothing else to do becomes evident once again. There simply isn't enough "base goodness" in this game to grow on. It still is in beta a year after its release.

I wonder how newcomers would react to the game world, though. For them, the content we were fed bit by bit may sum up to look like an impresive amount...?

That's just it, there's no way to reasonably put out enough content to keep people who have been playing since launch busy for longer than a few weeks at a time. This is because they've done everything else and the new content is the ONLY thing to do. Every bit of content added is important for new players though as it is even more to aspire and look forward to.

[Jinrya-Geki]

Depends how fast they blast through the ranks. Honestly, if they raised their ranks to the appropriate mark to do missions and quests, by the time they do them all, more content should be out. That's for new players though.

[whoopeeragon]

Hmm...was it really necessary to revive this thread, Rinsui? Move from one thread to another, and spark a different argument...

And 2 weeks after the major patch....comes patch 1.18a. Now, it may not be rivetting new content to keep us all engaged, but the fact they release something to the game 2 weeks after the patch says something. Besides, did you honestly expect a patch to really provide enough content to last you months and months and months? That's what expansions are there for, I think.

Newcomers....well, for one, there's at least twice as much content as there was at launch. Not to mention that, if the newcomer decides to participate in quests and missions, they'll have enough harder to view the same amount of content as worthwhile.

[Rinsui]

Hmm...was it really necessary to revive this thread, Rinsui?

I guess: no. Some dogs should be left asleep. Mea culpa.

I also believe that newcomers joining now will already have a much better ride than we; there is quite a bit of content in the game already. In a way, the "loyal" players who never stopped playing are sort of an old mortage SE tries to pay off bit by bit - they will never be satisfied, because for them every patch will bring just a pittance of new stuff. Which would suggest that simply shutting the game down for a few month would have been an interesting solution... but that's also an old, and fruitless discussion.

I, for my part, consider myself a Beta Tester. Nothing more, and nothing less. I belong to an absolute minority of players who, when and if the game has it's re-launch in a few months, will be around to tell a tale of very humble beginnings. I don't really expect to be satisfied with the scheduled updates. Guys like me are way to few in number to actually matter from a business standpoint.

I am just a guinea pig that helps to shape a game. And I'm o.k. with that. I pay nothing, and if I want to, I am free to quit and come back whenever I want. For my "services" as a guinea pig, I just reserve myself the right to suggest, complain and rage whenever I fell like it. Simple.

[MattyWS]

The way I see it, we are getting a head start before this game is really released. :P We aren't paying because SE have a bigger income than they have a loss from this game. They aren't losing money really, so it's not big deal to them. Enjoy the free ride and when the game is released on ps3, there will be a ton of new players starting from scratch and we will have completed the game lol.