The game has the same playerbase it has always had. The last world(2) were an anomaly because they just launched to steam and suckered a few people in..
No new players persist, and only the same losers exist - perpetually. This games about stagnation, and not growth. It's the same losers across 10+ years doing the same things whilst disparaging the game itself only to celebrate their shallow victories after the fact. Nobody gives a fuck how good you think you are in this game, they want a PvE experience and the only comments from this peanut gallery are "git good and learn to play the game" as they engage in botting and exploit abuse, actively not playing the game as it was meant to be played.
Degenerates - and they've been this way so long they no longer realize or comprehend they are this way, unless they venture outside of this space only to quickly recoil back into it where they can legally bot and not actively play aside from PVP.
Current PVPers get all the benefit from botting and not playing the game, whilst enjoying the rich PVP content you'd only be able to enjoy with effort playing the game they bot away.