I like how the Activity Graph shows a decrease in VS players being matched by a corresponding increase in NC players! I suppose the VS realized that their attempt to fool others into believing that the VS Magrider tank was not overpowered FAILED. TR players activity rates have remained pretty constant.
Sounds like your friends are in school or just out of college. My working colleagues have no issues dropping $20 USD here and there on games that they like to play. The trick is finding them games that they like to play. I plan to do my part shortly to convince some of them to give PS2 a shot.
I guess that's the difference between us. You seem to be expecting a game that's openly in paidfor/f2p beta to be marketing itself heavily whilst people will join and swear never to come back because it's not yet finished. The fact that server pops are around the same level as they were a couple of weeks into the game is remarkable. If anything, I'd have expected a 50% drop off given how rocky the first two months was. I'm actually impressed this many people have stuck around. The fact that as many players are active as were two weeks into the game is incredible; definitely not something I expected to see. And a comfortable 15-20k new characters created a day?! It's really not doom and gloom. You'll also notice the game has had much more severe declines than this (some seasonal, some not), and continues to come back up. I'd only really start to worry about the game if active players had dropped by more than 50% since launch, and even then I'd expect most players to come back once the game has actually been finished. What I find interesting is there aren't massive pop spikes after new content comes out; suggests they need to get into the habit of emailing out GU notes so they see the same booms EVE does.
300k+/- players is healthy for this type of game, 3 months after launch. The spike and the level of population at launch was not sustainable, nobody expected the population to stay at the launch level. Pretty much any massive multiplayer online game would be considered a "success" if it has around 300k players. There are MMORPG's that wish it would have this many players. If they can keep around 250k-300k players, then this game would be like Eve Online, and Eve Online is considered a very successful game for being such a niche game that's different from other games on the market. Also another thing players have to realize is that the actual number of players is irrelevant, for the most part. To SOE, it's about how many people spend money to keep this game funded. As long as there are enough players spending money, then they'll keep the game going. To us gamers, all we should care about is whether our servers are populated enough to be considered fun, and whether the devs are doing a good enough job improving the game and enhancing the game. If your answer to the questions are yes, you are having fun, there are enough players, and the game is improving, then the game is doing well. You let SOE worry about the money part. I will say that this game only took them 1 and half years to develop, that's at least twice as fast as standard MMORPG's, and at a much smaller budget. So don't think that this game require 1million+ subscribers to be profitable. You can always know when a game is doing well or not by whether Smed talks about the game. And since he has spent quite a lot of time talking about Planetside 2, you know the game is doing fine financially. Plus they'll be running an aggressive ad campaign this month according to Smed, now knowing Smed, he will never run ad campaigns on failing games. This is why you don't see him advertise many other games in the SOE lineup. For him to spend ad campaign money, the game must be doing well, and that they foresee it doing even better in the upcoming months.
So basically you are saying that the game hasn't been slowly losing players over time since early January? I've been checking the server populations multiple time a day, every single day since this game was released. As reported by these sites: http://www.planetside-universe.com/server_status.php https://www.soe.com/status/ The amount of time servers spent at medium has been diminishing across the board. Genudine stopped reaching medium ever. Helios was only registering at medium for 2 hours at primetime. You must be some type of denial expert if you don't see what's happening.
Sorry, it's clearly you that's the denial expert. That's the actual statistics, instead of ratings purely based upon colour. The high/med/low ratings are really not as good as actual numbers; for one, you don't know if the metric used to calculate that has changed. The game clearly hasn't been losing players over time since early January; some servers have indeed seen people disappearing because they're worthless servers, but I for one am glad the game launched with enough servers to handle the initial spike and that they were so prepared to merge only three months into the game. That's not a bad thing. In fact, I will take that back; the game has lost a healthy amount of players given how badly the playerbase were treated through December, and the terrible state the game is currently in. Populations are still almost as high as at launch, and given that there has been no real marketing of the game, that's almost unheard of. More importantly though, the statistics don't match up with the Steam metrics, so it's pretty clear that my point about the Steam sample is completely valid. The game currently has an active playerbase of the same size as EVE online; widely renowned as one of the most successful MMORPGs of all time. Most importantly, it has an active playerbase more than three times the size that EVE did at the same point in its lifecycle, whilst occupying a similarly uncontested niche. The sky really isn't falling. The game's not as perfect as it could be for sure. Players leave out of boredom or frustration, sure. But new players arrive all the time too (20k per day!!!). It's really not doom and gloom, nor will it be for some time.
At some point I expect this game to be heavily advertised on STEAM, with all sorts of weapon discount packs (similar to what Tribes Ascend did). Why they haven't done this yet? They need to get this game optimized before they really try to appeal to the masses again.
Wow. Ok. So... it's not like we just had server merges a few days ago. Because you know, populations are still about as high as they were at launch. And I'm the denial expert huh? There's obviously nothing that's going to change your thinking. So enjoy your private reality, it sounds like a nice place.
READ THE DATA! Like seriously. You're posting about all this stuff you feel, or the few times a day you check the arbitrary 'high' 'med' 'low' numbers. I've given you the data sheets. Can't you read spreadsheets?? There's even charts in there for you. Merges happened because the game launched with a lot of servers, however rather than evenly spacing the populations, the game clearly played best with high populations so everyone migrated towards the big servers (often where vets, friends, or outfits had chosen to go for exactly that reason). This meant we ended up with servers like Miller having more than 50,000 players, whilst Genundine had 11,000. This in turn meant that people were arguing about metagame and gameplay elements they had no idea about, because someone coming on the forums saying 'ESFs are OP' when their server had only 10 people that weren't at the Crown on it, had no idea how all ESFs died on the larger servers because invisible AA were everywhere, etc etc. The idea was to bring the populations to a comfortable level on the 'high pop' end of the scale as clearly player retention on the highest pop server was best. Merging servers doesn't decrease your number of active players. Again, maths and facts > your inferences.
You have more chance of getting Higby's bank account info from SOE than true official player numbers. That info is vital proprietary company information. On the plus side, a quick look around your local PS2 server should give you the answer.
Waterson was so crowded last night there was a queue. I think if Sony would run a TV commercial showing contrasting scenes of the cool landscapes/lighting and big battles with "Actual game footage" at the bottom they would get tons more players. Whether the servers could handle it is another question.
I completely agree. That's the approach I'm taking to convince my professional colleagues to play PS2. PS2 literally has to be seen to be believed. Again, hosting events of CURRENT PS2 gamers being lead by "celebrity" faction leaders and emceed by a reality show "celebrity" is NOT the way to promote PS2. Frankly, if PS2 were my responsibility, I'd have fired the Marketing Director already.
I wont reiterate the same point with detail, because it's been made. Simply put, the game will get marketed more coming up once it's in a more presentable state, it's got a huge number of people, and I see little to hold it back from being something that I can expect to be around for years to come. At it's core, it is an amazing experience, that'll keep me coming back while the glitches are sorted. Would say that I wouldn't be quick to dismiss the marketing team, as they really haven't done much yet. That could be them, it could be their bosses. Working off the whole: "Don't market the game until it is more complete" it is likely a good idea that they didn't market aggressively early on. The response to some of the nerfs thusfar, have been such that with a larger player pop, it could have been ruinous. I don't think that was intentional mind you, likely they bumbled into the situation and it worked out in SOE's favor, but still.
This guy is graphing server populations by hour. It's only got a few days on it, but it's neat to watch the peak and trough of the daily swing. http://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/...ly-population-statistics.100859/#post-1340800
You're talking about taking the data and trying to interpret it looking for a reason that explains the data. The data merely points to the fact that they are leaving, regardless of why.
I like how the change in VS/NC populations started before GU2 and you think an effect can precede a cause.
After reading quote, I thought to myself why don't we look at the steam stats and post them here instead. I was inspired by these two threads 1 and 2 to make this. Picture 1: Comparison of PS2 to other Recent Top Steam Games Clearly when compared to Gamespot's top PC choices available on Steam, PS2 has actually been doing remarkably well in a market that is dominated by players of more classic games like TF2 or Elderscrolls. In fact, you can see based on the steam results themselves, Planetsides player base has leveled off at an equilibrium player based and not declined contrasting most people's anecdotal evidence. However, I don't expect you to be convinced with just two graphs. After all, that thing about bias and the need for multiple sources really hit home with me. Not everyone was convinced by Phazaar link to the Planetside Statistics Thread. So, if steam can be biased then why cannot Sony's official server stats for planetside 2? Days before the stats looked unhealthy by Katana's obsveration and now they look healthy again. Generally, I don't know the answer to completely solve this bias other than the recommendation to find more sources. Perhaps though we can give a partial solution by examining the steam data closer and then for humor looking PS2 stat data in a different light. Lets compare PS2 to just the top reviewed recent FP2 games available: Picture 2: PS2 Steam data in depth Across all the F2P games in general we see a social cultural trend. Its the same trend that we find in the beginnings of rock, hip hop, turntables, dub-step, and even memes. Weird Al Yankovic gave one of the best know presentation about it when talking about the meme autotune (http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/auto-tune ) Its the idea that games go through a peak in popularity, unstable decline (instability), then reach an equilibrium stage of loyal fans. So no Noctural7x, this is a natural trend. These decreases in population or instabilities are common to all games after launch or a major update. In fact comparatively, PS2 has been able to retain 48-50% of its peak population while COD only retain 55%-58% and Borderlands 20-25 %. Its in this equilibrium stage that MMOs thrive and make most of their money. Clearly based on the same data Planetside 2 is in its equilibrium stage right now fluctuates between 7,000 - 14,000 total people world wide on Steam. Eventually games do decline. However, from examination of the steam graphs, it rarely ever gradual but a sharp drop after the equilibrium stage followed by a gradual decline. While in this equilibrium, every so often the popularity has short odd peaks where the popularity jumps up or down called "Odd... Peaks". I am not 100% sure what causes these, but I suspect it due to the influence of the developers. The what developers do that causes it eludes me, so maybe your right MarlboroMan-E and Omega4. Perhaps they update the game, creating a new content, or advertising the game more. In fact in planetside 2 case we see that the "Odd... Peak" we see that it possibly due to the combination of a Major Patch Update and FNO occurring on the same day. FNO always seems to increase the server population each week; however, when combined with a game update its effect seems to triple or 4-ple effect on the population. From examining the PS2 to the other FP2 games, I concluded that PS2 was in the equilibrium stage. Let me repeat it is not declining currently. However, one thing that prevent gradual decline if it ever occurs, are these "Odd Peaks..." like the one we just had a few months ago. Thus, my highly speculative conclusion for all you the future is that the success or failure is really dependent on the FNO on the same day or after the next game update. Of course like Syylara said that purely speculative inference. So... yeah... long post I know, but tell me what you think _________________________ Also for the sake of humor. The meaning of the graph is funny because economy doesn't work like this. There is no such thing as an average player. The math behind it is quite real and based on simple numerical integration to make the curve more smooth. Basically, its the amount of money PS2 on average given the average player spends $127 dollars in 2012 on video game. In the graph to the right, the picture does show how most MMO make their money in Odd... peaks and equilibrium stages. Its funny because most MMO make way more than because like PS2 they are above average. Its also funny because in F2P games not everyone actually put money towards the game.
No, no, no. You're committing a horrific logical fallacy. You've used the word data. I circumvented this definition because it was clear everyone was doing the same in their assertions. Data is raw numbers; uninterpreted and purely factual. This is the collection stage for what will later become information. What the data shows is NOT that people "are leaving, regardless of why." What the data shows is that STEAM USERS are NOT USING the STEAM VERSION of the game AS OFTEN. If we then take that data and attempt to reach the assertion that people "are leaving, regardless of why," we are attempting to conclude information from that data. To do that, we are indeed interpreting, and as such we have to look at what biases are present and thus whether any information concluded is an actual conclusion. In this case, it is not. Myself, I am a Steam user, I have the Steam version, but I do not use it. We have no way to collect data to see whether I represent a minority or a majority, but the simple fact that I exist shows that drawing such a conclusion is merely hypothesising about what another metric might show. I might represent 95% of Steam gamers, in which case the game is actually in a large boom phase, or I might be the only one, in which case the game has declined about as much as would be typical of other Steam games (as mlane16's post above). Equally, the game could now have twice as many users, paying twice as much money each, thus making it four times as profitable, but everyone might only play for one day in four (I can't remember the exact collection information for the Steam stats, but you get my point). Anyway, I'm now back to rehashing my original post. The point is simple. You've already inferred information from the data, and misunderstood what the data actually shows. Further, I have not looked for a reason to explain the data. I have looked for biases in the data collected to see whether it actually in any provable way relates to the conclusion people are attempting to draw from it; it does not, and thus my point remains. If we were to get onto looking for reasons to explain the information, we'd now be looking at the next step in the statistical model; knowledge. Love it. Apply for a job at SOE, and begin working on the statistics behind the balancing passes please
LOL - Actually what I think is that SOE already made enough ads on the internet, TV and other media sources to attract new players. Actually what SOE failed to sdeliver is a mature and stable product with challanging content, longterm incentives to stay with the product and innovative features. SOE did not even introduce the innovative features of planetside 1 which they now try to sell as the groundbreaking holy grail of the gaming industry while everything which they have on the roadmap is just a cheap copy of what planetside 1 had already in the game on launch day with stable client and balnce performance. Every cent which goes into marketing ads and is not spent on game development is just another wave of players - lured into a F2P game with increasingly unmature game mechanics / performance, which does not hold its ground to the marketing scam promises. So SOE would spend money on ads which is actually needed in game development. If SOE wanted to be taken serious to make a a revolutionary and enjoyable longterm product out of PS2 instead of what they currently do with the title, they would put in all resources they have to fix client stability issues - bugs which are already reported since early beta. Currently SOE is ripping people of their money with horrendous pay to win cash shop prices, while delivering increasingly bad client stability, miserable faction and gear balance, complete lack of longterm incentive or a minimum of strategic depth. An excellent game automatically makes advertisement for itself in the times of WEB 2/3.0 through social media, blogs, etc. while a miserable rip off pay to win cash shop game - well does also in a negative sense - so guess which of the two options is currently fact.
Dare I get back into this thread. But we do now have access to the "full" population numbers as reported by the game's API here: http://sirisian.com/planetside2/population.php (peaked today at 16,000 players) And we've always had the stats information for the Steam portion of the playerbase here: http://store.steampowered.com/stats/ (peaked today at 7,300) These numbers are for players on all servers combined, of course. And it shows that the Steam users are a significat percent of the user base, 45% (for today). I'd say that's more than a good enough sample size.
