63 replies to this topic

[Bishop Steiner]

How depressing is that?

About 1/3 of my contact list is on European time (probably another 1/4 to 1/3 active ForumWarriors), so usually we play in the morning when I am available. Of late? Ghost town.

During NA peak hours? I see maybe a dozen in green on a good day now?


Outside of the Big Comp Unit guys....has anyone else seen their Friendlist become a Graveyard?

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 15 July 2016 - 07:33 AM.

[martian]

MWO offers nothing but endless grind and meaningless repetetive deathmatch.

Are you surprised that people have lost interest and migrated to other games?

[MechPorn]

I have over 400 on my friends list and generally I see about 10 to 25 people online at a given time.

[Bishop Steiner]

martian, on 15 July 2016 - 07:31 AM, said:

MWO offers nothing but endless grind and meaningless repetetive deathmatch.

Are you surprised that people have lost interest and migrated to other games?

Surprised, no. Well, a little, since for most of the last 4 years, somehow people "stayed interested" probably through delusional hope (like me). It's the quantity and the timing. I'm thinking FW Phase 3, and Russ's TH Tirades coincided to push a lot of "On the Fencers" like myself.... over.

But since I know a goodly part of my Friendlist was the one of the Whale Pods keeping MWO afloat? *shrugs*

Go chase the Esports, PGI. Go chase. A good chunk of them do spend money to stay "competitive", though when you are talking at best...2% of the population..... pretty sure they won't remotely replace the number of casual whales swimming to friendlier seas.

On the bright side, at this rate, the Comp Kids will maybe someday soon make up a majority of the population, so then you know, they can keep pushing for their agenda as the majority. It'll be a majority of like...2-300 total players logging on at that point, but it'll be the RIGHT 2-300 players for Russ's Esport dream!

[Flyingleanpocket]

Counter Strike is still the #2 game on steam, and #3 is miles behind. So you can't say that meaningless deathmatch doesn't have some kind of appeal.

[Bishop Steiner]

Flyingleanpocket, on 15 July 2016 - 07:38 AM, said:

Counter Strike is still the #2 game on steam, and #3 is miles behind. So you can't say that meaningless deathmatch doesn't have some kind of appeal.

Well, does that mean that MWO is an even LESS than meaningless TDM game now?

I mean, the Long Tom has finished killing off an already pointless outside of Comp Play Faction Warfare.

Quickplay is seeming to cater to a level of idiocy I haven't seen since Unreal Tournament......

*shrugs*

IDK anymore.

[xWiredx]

I have about 100 people on my list and usually see between 10 and 30 people online. Most of those are people from EMP, LORD, KCOM, and JFP. I still see the remnants of my former Atlas Hunters unit on from time to time, too.

Our unit usually has 3-10 online out of 30 people during the week, and sometimes we form a full 12 man and additional full 4 man scouting team during the weekend.

I only have 1 PGI member on my list - Alex - and I haven't seen him on very much lately. With my former unit, he would drop with us maybe once or twice per week before he was headed home for the night. I never bothered to friend Russ or the other PGI guys I've played with in random matches, though one time I did defend Russ in his Summoner and he still owes me for that because he was definitely the enemy team's focus point.

[dervishx5]

And this is when friends are properly showing up instead of being online but you still can't see them.

[Bishop Steiner]

xWiredx, on 15 July 2016 - 07:41 AM, said:

I have about 100 people on my list and usually see between 10 and 30 people online. Most of those are people from EMP, LORD, KCOM, and JFP. I still see the remnants of my former Atlas Hunters unit on from time to time, too.

Our unit usually has 3-10 online out of 30 people during the week, and sometimes we form a full 12 man and additional full 4 man scouting team during the weekend.

I only have 1 PGI member on my list - Alex - and I haven't seen him on very much lately. With my former unit, he would drop with us maybe once or twice per week before he was headed home for the night. I never bothered to friend Russ or the other PGI guys I've played with in random matches, though one time I did defend Russ in his Summoner and he still owes me for that because he was definitely the enemy team's focus point.

so outside of your Comp Team pals, not much, eh?

dervishx5, on 15 July 2016 - 07:43 AM, said:

And this is when friends are properly showing up instead of being online but you still can't see them.

oh we got a bug for that now, too? Splendid.

[Barantor]

I've been playing this game since the first few steps of beta and was on IRC way back in the day when we had that set up to talk about the game in live chat. I was there and recruited many people for DHB, went through the ups and downs of the clan waves, tried to hype the Free Worlds League and even was a supporter of the Stock Mech Mondays.

I have hundreds and hundreds of people on my friends list, yet even on a prime time during a weekend night US... about 20-30 people.

Most of the ones I still talk to quit because there is about as much movement with this game as there is with Star Citizen. They wanted something besides TDM, since there are other games that do that a lot better with interesting systems (Overwatch, CS:GO). They wanted something that was more simulation of battletech but other games do simulation better (Arma, Elite Dangerous, etc).

I've got pretty much zero interest in logging in, but I come looking around here every couple of days with some slight hope that something will be new.

You aren't the only one Bishop.

[cazidin]

/Insert shameless offer to add Bishop to friends list.

[Bishop Steiner]

Barantor, on 15 July 2016 - 07:45 AM, said:

I've been playing this game since the first few steps of beta and was on IRC way back in the day when we had that set up to talk about the game in live chat. I was there and recruited many people for DHB, went through the ups and downs of the clan waves, tried to hype the Free Worlds League and even was a supporter of the Stock Mech Mondays.

I have hundreds and hundreds of people on my friends list, yet even on a prime time during a weekend night US... about 20-30 people.

Most of the ones I still talk to quit because there is about as much movement with this game as there is with Star Citizen. They wanted something besides TDM, since there are other games that do that a lot better with interesting systems (Overwatch, CS:GO). They wanted something that was more simulation of battletech but other games do simulation better (Arma, Elite Dangerous, etc).

I've got pretty much zero interest in logging in, but I come looking around here every couple of days with some slight hope that something will be new.

You aren't the only one Bishop.

Is DHB even a thing anymore? I remember a few offers of recruitment, even after HARDCorp split, but seemed like the Colonel was almost never on the TS server anymore, so never really got to feel the rest of the unit out aside from the guys I knew from the Forums.

Just seemed like a lot of the good but less Comp Obsessed groups have...withered away.

[Barantor]

Bishop Steiner, on 15 July 2016 - 07:50 AM, said:

Is DHB even a thing anymore? I remember a few offers of recruitment, even after HARDCorp split, but seemed like the Colonel was almost never on the TS server anymore, so never really got to feel the rest of the unit out aside from the guys I knew from the Forums.

Just seemed like a lot of the good but less Comp Obsessed groups have...withered away.

Evidently it is, I left years ago now.

[Bud Crue]

As far as I can tell the hard core competitive folks are becoming the population base.
I play with various members of a cadre of about ~20 so folks (typically 3-4 regulars and a few others of the group comprise an 8-10 man drop), for an hour and a half or so nightly. Yet despite us ranging from bad players (raises hand) to decent casuals (many are t2 a few t1), we are regularly seeing the same opponents match after match, and often they are of much higher skill than us (recognizable comp teams like EMP, AS, ISEN, etc.). I think this is going to have the affect of driving even more new comers (if there is such a thing) away.

As far as the friends list goes...I have hundreds of folks on my friends list, usually see about 40 or so online when I am on (central time 8-11pm)

Edited by Bud Crue, 15 July 2016 - 07:59 AM.

[WarHippy]

Bishop Steiner, on 15 July 2016 - 07:23 AM, said:

How depressing is that?

About 1/3 of my contact list is on European time (probably another 1/4 to 1/3 active ForumWarriors), so usually we play in the morning when I am available. Of late? Ghost town.

During NA peak hours? I see maybe a dozen in green on a good day now?


Outside of the Big Comp Unit guys....has anyone else seen their Friendlist become a Graveyard?

I have only a handful of people on my friends list and it is rare to see even one online at any given time. Of course nobody wants to be my friend so it isn't all that surprising that my list is so small and inactive.

[Bishop Steiner]

WarHippy, on 15 July 2016 - 07:58 AM, said:

I have only a handful of people on my friends list and it is rare to see even one online at any given time. Of course nobody wants to be my friend so it isn't all that surprising that my list is so small and inactive.

what ya get fer being a ding dang hippy!

[meteorol]

The activity on my friendslist didn't change.

[WarHippy]

Bishop Steiner, on 15 July 2016 - 08:02 AM, said:

what ya get fer being a ding dang hippy!

Yeah, but I am an oxymoron hippy so that should count for something.

[Bishop Steiner]

meteorol, on 15 July 2016 - 08:02 AM, said:

The activity on my friendslist didn't change.

Still empty?



(I kid, I kid,...... but c'mon, someone had to say it!)

[Alistair Winter]

It's just how it goes. MWO is an aging FPS PVP arena shooter. It's a great game, but it doesn't have the things a game needs to keep players interested indefinitely.

Ironically, trying to please the arcade arena shooter crowd turned out to be a double-edged sword. Because when you turn the Mechwarrior franchise into an arcade shooter on tiny arena deathmatch maps (as opposed to a proper combat sim on huge maps, etc), you're just temporarily tempting all the players who aren't necessarily hardcore Battletech / Mechwarrior fans, but who just want to play new and interesting FPS games.

And then a game like Overwatch shows up, is a massive success, and you lose all the casual players who just enjoy arena shooters. Whereas if PGI had tried to make MWO more like MW2:Mercs online, then... what other games out there could possibly challenge their position on the market?

If you look at games with incredible longevity, they usually offer something completely different from any other game (e.g. the Transport Tycoon open source community), or they are incredibly well balanced esport games with great maps and/or game modes (old CounterStrike, Unreal Tournament, Starcraft 1, etc) or they are MMORPGs with a continous stream of new content (and grinding + farming to keep people playing), or they're a combination of the above (like EVE Online).

MWO is different from other games, but it's still essentially a PVP arena shooter with very few combat sim elements. We're still running through water like it's air, still no collisions, still no knockdowns, still no repairs, still no realistic military scenarios, the list goes on. Without these elements, we're just playing Battletech Hawken. Which is fun. But doesn't keep everyone playing forever.