Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

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Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

Postby donatas081294 » Sun Nov 21, 2021 10:52 pm

Since now days everyone be looking at game statistics and the first thing would most likely come up is the player numbers and try to determine whether the game is doing well or not.
And seeing the game being bellow 1k is seen as a bad thing (considering how many people around the world have internet access and computer access),ending up ignoring the devs wishes, but on a side not some do it for money (cough AAA games studios cough), others as a passion product like indie devs.
So devs got to ask are you happy, okay and/or satisfied with the current player number at this time?
If yes why? and if not, what are you doing to improve them? (as twitter and facebook is a great starting progress).
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Re: Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

Postby jorb » Sun Nov 21, 2021 11:53 pm

I think the current user numbers are a pretty damning indictment of our development and/or management, or perhaps of the game itself, tbqh, but -- while I can certainly speculate -- I don't know with any perfect certainty what the big problem(tm) is. I am concerned that recurring resets is an addiction that we're feeding which prevents any longer term commitments to the game.

Continued development is the best I've got.
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Re: Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

Postby pawnchito » Sun Nov 21, 2021 11:56 pm

I'm sure you guys see the effect of patches that disable popular clients on population. That client tho. Squeeky wheel gets the oil.
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Re: Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

Postby shubla » Mon Nov 22, 2021 12:07 am

Reasons are obvious.
Game is too grindy, when reset comes people play for 10 hrs every day after 2 months they realize they've fucked up their life and quit for 10 months so that they can waste those 2 months again when a reset comes.
Also most people realize that they cannot keep up with the highest of qualities even if they played 14 hours a day and then feel dissatisfied and quit.
Some people also simply get raided/killed/KO'd of their belongings and snap because of that.
And when your villagers and neighbors slowly quit, soon you will easily quit as well.

I think tediousnes/grindiness is the biggest part, just running the "normal" tasks to have somewhat decent chars/qualities is so much work that you will burn out / not have time to do it all. Most people want it all or then nothing.

1 reason for sure is lack of long term goals. After you've rushed 4 credos, dug q200 metal and killed few mammoths, there is not much to do other than increase qualities, which is meaningless as I said earlier because you won't have top ql ever. (Except if you have large'ish group of no life players and/or bot a lot)

I think there should be some long term progression/goals, and possibly more timegates, so that you could play for few hours every day for year instead of playing 14 hours a day for those 2 months.
Powergamers play the game out really really quick so its no wonder they get bored. If there is no metal within first 2 days its already experienced as unsuccessful reset by most!
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Re: Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

Postby WowGain » Mon Nov 22, 2021 12:34 am

shubla wrote:Powergamers play the game out really really quick so its no wonder they get bored. If there is no metal within first 2 days its already experienced as unsuccessful reset by most!


id gotta say at least part of this comes from how a lot of the people who do go at light speed through content is bc the core gameplay loops that they rush through are ones that have basically been hyperautistically minmaxed to the ultimate efficiency after literal years of going through those same steps without really having much impetus to ever deviate from the most optimized way of accomplishing it

this world did mix up the initial grind of setting up industry slightly with the stack furnace bc it made several things which usually have certain hard timegates on them much faster to get done
my group realized very quickly that the stack furnace meant that you could have super early access to quicksilver and felt which let us get to a snek extremely early compared to what you'd usually do with just hoping you get flax/hemp from a WWW faster than anyone else does
it was something that was genuinely pretty fun to both realize was possible and then start actively working toward it so we'd have a snek up basically as soon as we got past the leather timegate, might be a good idea to look at other ways to mix up that initial time of early world/early game prep and ways to circumvent the "standard" timeline of progression if you're clever enough about utilizing your resources
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Re: Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

Postby pawnchito » Mon Nov 22, 2021 12:51 am

You can get a pretty quick snekky with some leather fabric if you really want to gun for it. There's going to be crowd that plays the game as above, quick burn but they go hard AF for that time. I think a bunch of the patches recently addressed some of the longer term issues with the quality grind, not having a stupid low regional cap on crops is something that will retain players. Even other random stuff like the change to cheese racks has given some value to retention I'd wager. I think those along with some of the proposed mining and trellis changes will reduce the tedium that doesn't add value. I think a lot of players enjoy the grind because it's a dopamine trap but there's stuff that make it a chore.
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Re: Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

Postby Nightdawg » Mon Nov 22, 2021 1:24 am

WowGain wrote:which let us get to a snek extremely early compared to what you'd usually do with just hoping you get flax/hemp from a WWW faster than anyone else does


g...g...go....goats
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Re: Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

Postby WowGain » Mon Nov 22, 2021 1:30 am

Nightdawg wrote:
WowGain wrote:which let us get to a snek extremely early compared to what you'd usually do with just hoping you get flax/hemp from a WWW faster than anyone else does


g...g...go....goats


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Re: Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

Postby MightySheep » Mon Nov 22, 2021 4:12 am

pawnchito wrote:I'm sure you guys see the effect of patches that disable popular clients on population. That client tho. Squeeky wheel gets the oil.

This is the biggest reason. Mediocre patches is probably 2nd. Perhaps the map is also a factor, its so big with oceans I bet players never run into each other right now. The kingdom mechanic changes were added then never touched again even though it was obviously not going to be perfect on its first implementation. So kingdom PvP died before it even started because the realms took so long to border each other.

Even now I dont actually know how to log in. My usual client doesnt work any more and I hate the other ones. Forced to go back to the dark ages.
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Re: Are devs happy/okay/satisfied with the player numbers?

Postby MagicManICT » Mon Nov 22, 2021 5:24 am

jorb wrote:I think the current user numbers are a pretty damning indictment of our development and/or management, or perhaps of the game itself, tbqh, but -- while I can certainly speculate -- I don't know with any perfect certainty what the big problem(tm) is. I am concerned that recurring resets is an addiction that we're feeding which prevents any longer term commitments to the game.

I don't think the drop-off rate is that much higher than other games. The big difference is people aren't coming back until a new world, and there isn't a steady influx of new mea... err players during an already running world. The game is pretty unforgiving when it comes to being competitive.
Opinions expressed in this statement are the authors alone and in no way reflect on the game development values of the actual developers.
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