77 replies to this topic

[QuantumButler]

MrPenguin, on 10 December 2012 - 09:43 AM, said:

Do you seriously think it's a coincidence the counter vanished just around open beta time?

[DaZur]

Mancu, on 10 December 2012 - 08:06 AM, said:

The player base may not be declining. (We have no way to know.) But the fact that they did remove the players online counter speaks volumes about their issues attracting new players right now.

Or... PGI grew tired of of folks not extrapolating the "online" numbers over a 48 hour period and thus making the false assumption that there only are / were only "X" number of players playing...

It's kind'a like driving down the road on your way to the store and only counting 25 mini vans and forming the hypothesis that mini vans are in decline because you saw 32 the day before... Never mind the fact that there are millions of them on the road.

[QuantumButler]

Windies, on 10 December 2012 - 09:49 AM, said:

If I'm a gamer unnassociated with the Mechwarrior IP, why would I choose this game over WoT or Planetside 2 or Tribes Ascend or Hawken.

This is a question everyone should seriously ask themselves.

Would you play MWO if not for the battletech/mechwarrior thing?

My answer is a resounding 'no', if this game wasn't mechwarrior I'd have left months ago.

[Tennex]

well this game isnt exactly noob friendly lpo

QuantumButler, on 10 December 2012 - 09:49 AM, said:

Do you seriously think it's a coincidence the counter vanished just around open beta time?

its not a coincidence. but how many people are on has never been disclosed in real time in any "professional" games: world of warcraft, league of legends, etc.

it was just there for testing reasons kind of like console or fps and never makes it to the final game

[Windies]

DaZur, on 10 December 2012 - 09:49 AM, said:

Or... PGI grew tired of of folks not extrapolating the "online" numbers over a 48 hour period and thus making the false assumption that there only are / were only "X" number of players playing...

It's kind'a like driving down the road on your way to the store and only counting 25 mini vans and forming the hypothesis that mini vans are in decline because you saw 32 the day before... Never mind the fact that there are millions of them on the road.

Actually, a better analogy would be having a counter that shows all the mini vans on any road at any time in realtime. Then extrapolating that data for a 24 hour period and coming up with your own graph over the course of say a month and determining that mini van usage is in a decline.

[Broceratops]

QuantumButler, on 10 December 2012 - 09:50 AM, said:

This is a question everyone should seriously ask themselves.

Would you play MWO if not for the battletech/mechwarrior thing?

My answer is a resounding 'no', if this game wasn't mechwarrior I'd have left months ago.

the same can be said for SWTOR or WH Online, but I also supported both of them with my $$ for a while.

the difference is that for MWO, I can come back in 8 months and try it again for free. okay you can do that in SWTOR now but no one has any inclination to go back because its the same basic game. in MWO they have the possibility that if they ever do CW and make this an ACTUAL MMO then people will return in droves because it'll be like the first time again.

[Mancu]

Tennex, on 10 December 2012 - 09:54 AM, said:

well this game isnt exactly noob friendly lpo



its not a coincidence. but how many people are on has never been disclosed in real time in any "professional" games: world of warcraft, league of legends, etc.

it was just there for testing reasons kind of like console or fps and never makes it to the final game

False, World of Tanks makes 10s of millions a month and displays the total number of active users on. Right now the North American server has about 25 to 30 thousand players on any given evening.

[Vassago Rain]

Windies, on 10 December 2012 - 09:49 AM, said:

He raises a good point in a way. I mean this game as it is right now is pretty much a World of Tanks clone with some Mechwarrior bits thrown on top of it. With Third Person View they are trying to leech off some of the WoT playerbase as well. How can they do that though when their content is nowhere close to finished and nowhere close to competing with most of the F2P titles out there?

If I'm a gamer unnassociated with the Mechwarrior IP, why would I choose this game over WoT or Planetside 2 or Tribes Ascend or Hawken. Why would I even choose it over paying 50-60 for BF3 or Far Cry 3 or Borderlands 2 or any other main stream title? Sure I can play this for free for a while, Problem is that from the onset of starting out the game is so painful to play for free you just get turned off. You don't even reach the point of becoming invested before you're ready to say F this game. Maybe the Dec 18th patch will change that for the better, I'm definitely skeptical. First impressions though are hard to reverse, it's going to take a lot of stability and a lot of changes to reach a point where people might give it another shot and actually stay and pay.



Somebody already disproved that by creating a new account and watching it show up on the counter.

I would pick this game because giant robots fighting. If it was gundams or evangelions, I'd still be playing it. It has some differences to WoT, but if you're familiar with both, you know they're not that different.

Right now, it feels more like keeping it safe, using the same, old, tried 'steal the CoD/WoW audience', than making something new. When the game was pitched, there was lots of talk of it 'not being your dad's mechwarrior,' and the totally over the top founder ads with LOOK! LRM20! LOOK! 20 LRMS! and the awesome dadrock..I think they should take themselves less seriously, and go more with that.

Maybe the money's tight, or they've sold their souls to the devil's publishing house.

I've never made an F2P game, but it doesn't look that difficult to coordinate. Most of their mistakes are more like toothing pains, or one apartment doing such an incredible job, it outshines the others. Yes, I'm extremely tough on them, but that's because I want my giant robots fighting, and a certain degree of quality is expected, even from an F2P giant robots fighting game.

[Windies]

Broceratops, on 10 December 2012 - 09:56 AM, said:

the same can be said for SWTOR or WH Online, but I also supported both of them with my $$ for a while.

the difference is that for MWO, I can come back in 8 months and try it again for free. okay you can do that in SWTOR now but no one has any inclination to go back because its the same basic game. in MWO they have the possibility that if they ever do CW and make this an ACTUAL MMO then people will return in droves because it'll be like the first time again.

CW is going to change the reason we are fighting on our cramped map, but it's not going to change the feel of the game or the fact that other core mechanics are out of balance or just plain unfinished. If nothing changed insofar as the core mechanics right now, and they added CW, what would be so amazing about having a map that tells you where and why you are fighting, and then playing capwarrior online once you actually get in game. I do get the economic side of it and adding more depth to that, but how does it really add any depth to the actual combat or main portion of the game?

I'm also operating under the assumption that CW will be very very basic, pretty much a .01 implementation, when it's first introduced. It may not even have the economic aspects coded in until a much later stage, and will most likely take on a close resemblance of the WoT Clan Wars mechanic.

The only thing that will make people come back to this game in droves is to fix the bugs that cause such a painful playing experience that have been known issue's for months, Add in fresh content and new larger maps, Real objective based game modes with some actual depth to them, A new user experience that is rewarding rather than unrewarding, weapon balance that makes sense both on paper and in practice.

[Cargo Bane]

WoT will also show you how many are in que for a match with you and what tier tank they have.

Call MWO a clone of WoT is an insult to WoT.

If it wasn't for the Mech thing, I would have never Foundered. And I wouldn't still be barely hanging on. Other then patch release, I don't even bother playing anymore.

[flackee]

stjobe, on 10 December 2012 - 09:45 AM, said:

All right, so I took note of that number a few times over the last few weeks, and it seems it goes up with roughly 500 members per day.

Thats right as a very rough average since open beta.



Since open beta, forum user registrations have been declining. I'm pretty sure this is expected, as new user spikes come with big announcements, and there haven't really been any since. It is currently around 300-400 per day, whereas it was around 800-1000 right after open beta started.

That being said, the server population feels healthy from the games I played this last weekend.

[Broceratops]

Windies, on 10 December 2012 - 10:06 AM, said:

CW is going to change the reason we are fighting on our cramped map, but it's not going to change the feel of the game or the fact that other core mechanics are out of balance or just plain unfinished. If nothing changed insofar as the core mechanics right now, and they added CW, what would be so amazing about having a map that tells you where and why you are fighting, and then playing capwarrior online once you actually get in game. I do get the economic side of it and adding more depth to that, but how does it really add any depth to the actual combat or main portion of the game?

fair enough but my thinking is that at its base, the gameplay is solid. okay, the maps should be bigger and more, and there needs to be matchmaking, and there's lots of bugs, and there's only this base cap gametype, and the new player experience is terrible, and a bunch of other issues. but at it's base, customizing stompy robots and then shooting other people's robots is a fun thing and if they can just fix the horde of peripheral problems then it's a pretty fun game for free.

CW i'm looking at as more of a community boost thing. with factions comes things like rivalries, which spice up the game outside of the actual drops. its just another one of those things which add flavor to the base package. if you're not interested in the base game then it won't change your mind, but if you are then it might give you a reason to keep playing.

and frankly, as minimal a system which you describe would be, it would be the largest feature they've ever implemented since closed beta. so relative to MWO standards it's a big thing. really its the *only* thing. if after that things are still bland then many of us will be able to say okay, they got nothing left after this

Edited by Broceratops, 10 December 2012 - 10:20 AM.

[DaZur]

Windies, on 10 December 2012 - 09:56 AM, said:

Actually, a better analogy would be having a counter that shows all the mini vans on any road at any time in realtime. Then extrapolating that data for a 24 hour period and coming up with your own graph over the course of say a month and determining that mini van usage is in a decline.

Fair point... That said, one would need to know the average time "spend playing" to draw conclusion to the mean average increase or decline.

[Vassago Rain]

Broceratops, on 10 December 2012 - 10:17 AM, said:

fair enough but my thinking is that at its base, the gameplay is solid. okay, the maps should be bigger and more, and there needs to be matchmaking, and there's lots of bugs, and there's only this base cap gametype, and the new player experience is terrible, and a bunch of other issues. but at it's base, customizing stompy robots and then shooting other people's robots is a fun thing and if they can just fix the horde of peripheral problems then it's a pretty fun game for free.

CW i'm looking at as more of a community boost thing. with factions comes things like rivalries, which spice up the game outside of the actual drops. its just another one of those things which add flavor to the base package. if you're not interested in the base game then it won't change your mind, but if you are then it might give you a reason to keep playing.

MWO has a very good feel to it. Beefy sounds, beefy guns, bright, lovely lasers, very cool, highly detailed mechs. The terrain itself fails a lot, but I can't complain on the feel.

They should be focusing on the terrible trialmechs and goldvision bugs. I don't really care whose girlfriend suggested trials were the best thing ever. It just needs to go, so we can grow the playerbase. Right now, I have to tell my friends '...and you gotta grind out 50 games in a mech that overheats from three shots!' It's not good.

[Windies]

Broceratops, on 10 December 2012 - 10:17 AM, said:

fair enough but my thinking is that at its base, the gameplay is solid. okay, the maps should be bigger and more, and there needs to be matchmaking, and there's lots of bugs, and there's only this base cap gametype, and the new player experience is terrible, and a bunch of other issues. but at it's base, customizing stompy robots and then shooting other people's robots is a fun thing and if they can just fix the horde of peripheral problems then it's a pretty fun game for free.

CW i'm looking at as more of a community boost thing. with factions comes things like rivalries, which spice up the game outside of the actual drops. its just another one of those things which add flavor to the base package. if you're not interested in the base game then it won't change your mind, but if you are then it might give you a reason to keep playing.

and frankly, as minimal a system which you describe would be, it would be the largest feature they've ever implemented since closed beta. so relative to MWO standards it's a big thing. really its the *only* thing. if after that things are still bland then many of us will be able to say okay, they got nothing left after this

It's fun for awhile yes, then it gets old because it's very repetitious. I think that is where CW could come in and add more of a variety or flavor to what we are playing right now, IF it's done right. If it's just, ok I'm fighting House Liao, time to cap their red square on the ground!, it's nothing more to me than what we have right now. IF I actually get an objective to fight over that is mildly interesting and isn't the exact same thing EVERY time, that would be amazing. I think a lot is hinging on what the conquest game mode entails and how it will play into CW.

It would be the largest thing they have implemented, which is what scares/worries me. The amount of bugs and imbalances that we have now could be tripled or quadrupled when CW is introduced. Because of the track record so far, that is why I am so pessimistic.

[Harmatia]

The few people I suggested play the game, that left, all did so because they just did not enjoy the big heavy mech experience. Nothing can be done about that, it is what MWO is. If you look at what kind of FPS game typically sells, the faster and less team-based the product the better chance of mass usage. Even Battlefield pushed in that direction with BF3, shedding more weighty mechanics and teamwork in an attempt to compete for the the huge crowd attracting games like Call of Duty.

I think PGI should experiment with 4 vs 4, or 8 vs 8 PUG only matches. Give team players the option to have 8 vs 8, 4 vs 4, or 4+4 vs 4+4 (4 premade, 4 PUG) options. Despite the constant content deployment, MWO badly needs more game variations. I know conquest is coming, and I'm sure it'll do wonders, but I think simply variations on things that already exist would go along way to attracting new players. I for one would really enjoy running 4 vs 4 premade games.

[Eviscerator]

For me, it's gotten to the point where I only play a few days post patch to see what changed. I've already got some builds I'm happy with, and they weathered the ECM change well, so without capturing planets for my house or renting out my services as a merc...I've no real incentive to play.

[Taizan]

flackee, on 10 December 2012 - 10:10 AM, said:

Since open beta, forum user registrations have been declining. I'm pretty sure this is expected, as new user spikes come with big announcements, and there haven't really been any since. It is currently around 300-400 per day, whereas it was around 800-1000 right after open beta started.

That being said, the server population feels healthy from the games I played this last weekend.

As an indicator from a comparable F2P game namely BF heroes, in this slideshow some rough estimates can be made (32m mark).

In BF Heroes forum users make out about 1/5th of the whole player base, active forum users about 1/38th of the actual player base. Of course this does not necessarily have to be the same for MWO, but imo its enough basis to have a rough idea of the actual amount of users. Most interesting fact stated there is that their forum users spent 10 X more than the average user.

The slideshow is pretty interesting as well for everyone who is into game postmortems and the P2W factor in F2P games.

[Vassago Rain]

Taizan, on 10 December 2012 - 11:02 AM, said:

As an indicator from a comparable F2P game namely BF heroes, in this slideshow some rough estimates can be made (32m mark).

In BF Heroes forum users make out about 1/5th of the whole player base, active forum users about 1/38th of the actual player base. Of course this does not necessarily have to be the same for MWO, but imo its enough basis to have a rough idea of the actual amount of users. Most interesting fact stated there is that their forum users spent 10 X more than the average user.

The slideshow is pretty interesting as well for everyone who is into game postmortems and the P2W factor in F2P games.

Yeah, this is what I keep trying to convince people. Players want to buy advantages, even when they pretend otherwise.

[Pygar]

Eh... this is a weird discussion given that the game is still in beta- It's too early to really be asking questions like this and far too early to declare that the "sky is falling" somehow.

This last year has been a huge year for "AAA" game titles, and MWO is just getting started...while it already has a good base of hardcore players, there are many players that are waiting for the full game before they join, or have maybe come and played but with only a handful of maps and mechs and only one game mode, they quickly decided that maybe they should wait too.

The community for MWO seems to be pretty lively despite being a beta, so I am much more "concerned" about how long it's going take to get from where we are now to the full release version of the game- which should have far more content than we have now. (My biggest gripe for the last couple weeks- I was not very thrilled to see last weeks patch was loaded with x-mas trinkets and light on other content... game needs solid content like new maps and different play modes bad, I wouldn't care to use any of the x-mas crap if it was given to me for free.)