Why is Planetside 2 losing so many players?

1. Planetside 2 has a very high PC Requirement. A lot of players simply can't play PS2 yet.

2) Planetside 2 hasn't been released on consoles yet.

When PS2 gets over those two barriers, look for a storm of newbies washing in.

let me also add that the cert system is a huge detriment to new player retention

*WARNING* LONG POST!
I made a thread on what I though were some points as to why this game would fail. Here is the thread:https://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/index.php?threads/making-a-better-game.49902/page-2#post-653321

-The real reason this game is dying as alliterated by many of the PS1 vets is because the game is absolute garbage and does not hold a candle to the outdated PS1.

-I as many other players said during beta and at launch what the core fundamental problems this game had, but no one listened except those who were to blind with fanboyism.

-This game lacks substance, meta game is laughable and the there is no real goal to the game other than a cert grind and KDR.

-Although it has been toned down, vehicles dominate everything. Vehicles should be plentiful, but not spammed by almost every single player. 80% of players should be infantry.

-Some people may disagree but it should take more time to get into battles. Also there should not be so many ways to get back into a fight so quickly. If you kill someone they should not be returning to the battle so quickly.

-Less compacted zerg fights and instead soldiers spread over the front lines more. Buildings should give better rewards, have better defenses, have unique features such as: A Lazer guided strike by a commander, anywhere on the map if the perquisite IE:10 buildings are captured and held for at least an hour 1 hour.

Buildings should also feel more like outposts with infirmaries, commander battle rooms ( for 50+ BR), sleeping quarters, fun mini games like playing cards ect, for those defending a vital base and incentive for those players to defend.

Everyone can be every class with every unlock. The game should have a cert cap and vehicles included. Being able to operate a vehicle should fall under that category for all except the Flash. Someone without proper certs should not be able to operate a vehicle whether in your squad/outfit or not, but manning the guns would be acceptable.
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There is alot more I stated on my thread, https://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/index.php?threads/making-a-better-game.49902/page-2#post-653321 but the game still feels like a shallow fragfest semi-fps(because the fps mechanics are bad) with stale gameplay and meaningless progression. I doubt the game will ever get better either because it is made to cater to the casuals who will buy the next overpowered gun.

One reason I can think of is that they keep introducing new content that some what steps on the toes of pre-existing content which causes a lot of problems, such as confusion amongst new players, frustration from people who just bought the old content and frustration from people who have had the old options fully certed and have to cert something else.

Example: Locust A2A

We now have 2 A2A Secondaries that go in the same slot. The new one is far more usable in a dog fight. People who invested in the old A2A missles who wanted to use them in dogfights had to spend 2100+ certs on lock-on timer reduction to get that functionality out of them and now these show up.

Same could be said for the new vulcan. It's better at AI than the rocket pods used to be but has 100 round magazines and can kill esfs in 15 shots and libs in 33 shots while traveling much faster.

Then leaving

Here is my take on what could be improved upon the game. Please tell me what you think and how you believe the game can change for the better.

-Cert caps.
1) Limit the amount of certs a character can achieve(Amount debatable by SOE) thus making teamwork prevalent and the game more of a group effort.
2) Make it so you need certs just to unlock and operate stock vehicles(Except for the flash) and more certs use them to their full potential, IE: different enhancements.
3) Make it so you can have as many characters of the same faction you want per server.
4) Make it so you can only reset cert points at a warp gate and only every 6 hours.
5) Make some better items locked until the appropriate BR rank.
6) A true commander skill tree at BR 40+ that will allow battle altering opportunities Ie: Satellite bombardment if all prerequisites are met, amongst other things such as a BR40+ commander chat.
This is a huge requirement for myself. I believe every player should not be a super soldier of every class and capable of doing everything and instead rely on more specialized players for tasks.
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-Rewards and meaning for base capturing.
1) Make bases more than placeholders to initiate conflict.
2) Make the bases actually defensible with doors and walls.
3) Have different things to do in the base. Even if it is fluff things IE: Playing cards or showcasing battle trophies in a base with fellow faction members.
4) Have benefits for each different base and make them worthwhile. For Example:
A} Base XXX will give you slightly longer radar ping for all vehicles with radar on them as long as the base is captured.
B} Base YYY will make the faction player's radar ping the sighted enemy a bit longer as long as base is held.
C} Base ZZZ will make the faction enemy's radar pings last last slightly shorter until base is lost.
D} Bases XXX, YYY, and ZZZ together allows a satellite ping of all enemies in your vicinity for 5 minutes(Of course balance will be needed, such as a cool down of 1 per day per person, only after BR40 and on the Commander Cert tree).
5) Make it so outfits can claim a base they put effort into capturing. If multiple outfits helped take a base, have a vote for BR 10+ that helped take the base to decide.
A} The outfit that controls said base can fortify the base using resources by making destructible doors stronger, cannons better, and generators stronger.
B} They can customize where they place banners and outfit emblems and add decor to make their base look unique. All of this will cost resources and/or can be bought for Station cash.
C} Any player can help the base by spending their own Resources/Station cash and pooling together.
D} All upgrades and decor will last until the base is captured by another faction.6) Make it so players can take over warp gates, however make it a very difficult event to orchestrate.
A} It would require the conquesting faction to take control of every territory the opposing faction(one about to lose warp gate) has before they can attack and occupy that faction's warp gate.
B} Balancing such as a 1-2 hour invulnerability window before it becomes capture enabled. This will give time for the defending faction retaliate.
C} Warp gate defending faction must take over 5 territories to save their warp gate and retain continent invulnerability thus resetting their warp gate and saving their place on that continent. Conquesting faction must repeat the process, taking all bases and waiting for the 1-2 hour invulnerability window to end to attack the warpgate again.
D) If a faction only has one Warp gate left on one continent that warp gate is permanently invulnerable as to never completely lock a faction out of the game/server.
7)Make it so there is a battle line but promote back hacking of bases so non zerg players/outfits can achieve and accomplish more. Since bases will be defended more often this should not pose such a problem.
Things like this will influence players and outfits to stay and defend a particular base giving the players reason to conquer and stay in an area. It will promote unity and give bases an actual purpose in the game while giving a bigger picture to global conquest.
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-Vehicles
1) Vehicles will require cert trees to drive, but gunners can still operate without certs.(There is a cert cap)
2) Add more vehicles to the game.
3) Add it so you can put your own decor and outfit emblems on your vehicles.
4) Stock Vehicles should be fairly weak to Anti vehicle weaponry, but attachments bought with certs should improve their defenses.
5) Vehicles should handle better and not feel as clunky.
I believe this will help vehicle combat feel more unique, vehicles not as common, infantry combat more of a staple and overall improve the game play.
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-Spawning
1) Make it so spawning in a vicinity is much harder to do.
2) Limit the AMS sunderer to squad or platoon only and require the appropriate vehicle cert unlock to deploy Sunderer respawning.
3) Instant action will be limited unless prerequisite bases are captured and respawning times will be increased a bit.
4) Make it so you have less options of a base to spawn at(Around your vicinity) unless your faction has the appropriate base(s) captured. For example:
A} Base NNN would lower respawn times at all base's spawn tube by 1 second.
B} Base GGG would allow respawing to another base further away.
C} Base JJJ would lower squad deploy by 1 minute(The squad deploy would have to be like every 15 minutes or so for balance)
D} Bases NNN, GGG, JJJ together allow instant action spots further away from warpgate.
In my opinion this will allow for more of a tactical, strategic and more rewarding game experience. As opposed to following the zerg around. You will be justly penalized more if you fail to win a skirmish and allow more unique battles to take place.
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-Player Characters
1) Only one faction per server, but as many characters as you would like on a server.
2) More character customization in both the cert trees and character creation screen.
A} Clan emblems and decor in the form of tattoos and other items. Could cost station points to create in an ABP customization screen fashion.
B) More certs than we do for every class.
3) Allow swapping to any class, however there will be a cool down of 10-20 minutes to stop abuse of this mechanic.
A}Cert cap that only allows X amount of certs per character.
4) Battle Rank to actually mean something, by giving unlocks to better equipment and commander cert skill tree BR 40+.
A} A chat for certain Battle ranks(lets say 40+) to organize server wide attacks and defenses.
B} Perhaps a special emblem/clothes for someone 40+ to signify their prowess and battle sense.
Character creation is a bit limiting in the game even with the cash shop. Allowing outfit emblems and decor will both help SoE and the players.
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-Gunplay
1) Gun mechanics seem a bit off to me due to server latency, the weapon reactions themselves, hit detection and/or another related issue.
2) Guns need to have different skins and actually have noteworthy differences in statistics along with more variation of weaponry.
3) Perhaps some more balanced between each faction's weapon specialties.
The guns elements just feel off for me and not quite as rewarding as playing BF3/CoD. Despite not wanting Planetside 2 to become those games, their gun play elements are refined, elegant, and to a degree realistic. Where as Planetside 2's feels floaty, unresponsive, and cumbersome.

I aggre with alot Isilith Tehroth said, one change would be to
5) Make it so outfits can claim a base they put effort into capturing. If multiple outfits helped take a base, have a vote for BR 10+ that helped take the base to decide.

Just set it so which ever outfit obtained the most points in the area to get it so larger outfits cant win it at the last minute by voting even though they didnt put in the work.

Alot of poeple including myself want the game to do well it just isnt, and with youtube celebs pushing for the game to be more like Battlefield/COD and thier fans doing the same we are not going to get anything that they dont want.

probably the low fps, who knows

I don't know about others but I quit playing because there really is no point to the game...you go capture a base...abandon the base to move to the next one just so you can go recapture the one you just captured a couple hours later...for me that gets rather boring after a while...there really is no reason what-so-ever that I have found to try to defend a base...it is in most cases so much easier to just return and recapture it later. This is the first game of this type I have ever played...I prefer games like EQ and so on...and even though I did enjoy this for a month or so I need a little more than just run here and kill someone to hold my interest...some strategy would be great...not who has the biggest zerg at the moment.

I agree with this... As a newbie, it's impossible to feel satisfied for unlocking new weapons, simply because it takes too long to achieve that much certs. I think this is exactly why new players aren't liking it that much or for long. Would be nice if newbies had like 1-2 week/month newbie-booster (50% or some, so it doesn't feel that bad when it ends ;D [also, not sure, but doesn't it have that now? didn't have back then..]). Also being able to unlock stuff faster would keep players satisfied (and they wouldn't feel so crushed for unlocking something they afterwards don't want [not everyone "has the time" to go test before unlocking, you know]), so lowering the prices on weapons and other unlocks wouldn't be that bad. Or setting weekly/daily sales for CERTs too!

Not everyone will agree with me, because some people just think more about getting money than keeping good player database...

Planetside 2 is after two years in a sort of open beta status. That is why the game seems to be dying. Full of bugs and glitches and often, not sometimes, often unplayable. I am from europe/germany and i am having a much better gaming experience if i am logging to Emerald instead of Miller. More to say?

If SOE is capable to end the obviously open beta status PS2 could get a chance. To wait for PS4 user is a false hope. They would not be compared to PC user. Splitted leagues, servers or whatever. Only issue could be that PS2 would change completly from PC to console players. Buy a PS4 to play PS2

This sums it up.
I'm from The Netherlands and switched from Ceres (which is 200 km. away from me!) to Emerald because Ceres ran (runs?) like crap.

Also this game IS still in beta. I don't care if it officially released 1.5 year ago.

I don't see how the PS4 release would help the PC version except maybe shine a spot light on the game. But I doubt it will gather much hype and I doubt it will be popular on PS4.

Yeah, a neverending story. Not the players story but..

me lazy. does anybody have updated stats on this? the original stats were from almost a year ago.

My (10+ years) experiences with SoE is that they tend to do things that frustrate people. More so than other companies.
Thats my theory on why people leave. They get fed up with how they run things and go somewhere else.
Below is mostly a rant, but its some of the reasons why i think PS2 is loosing so many players.

Balancing:
They usually make something OP, or nerf it into the ground. And when they "break" something by overnerfing/buffing they are usually slow to fix it.
What i think they need is someone telling them "Lets just tweak this a little, and see how it performs for a few weeks"
If anyone remembers the release of BFRs in PS1 and if you stuck with the game, you will remember how long it took them to finally look at BFRs.
And when they nerfed them they were so useless that they were free kills for anyone with a Decimator and Jammer grenades.

Confusing and frustrating to try and find official news/information:
They have always boasted "great communication with the playerbase". That is, if you dont use the official planetside forum.
Apperently the "Official News and Annoucements" section of the forums isnt the best way to find official news and annoucements.
No, you have to follow all the devs of twitter, facebook and reddit if you want to know whats going on.
And sift through sometimes conflicting information to find what you want.

Moneygrabs:
Most companies do this (EA with their DLCs on everything for example), but SoE does it so obviously. Release something OP, then wait for people to buy it then make it useless.
Release the SWG: Trials of Obi-Wan expansion, cash in, then 2 days later without warning revamp the entire game into something else.
Force through changes that gets them quick $$, even if its not even that popular of an idea, like Implants.
Secretly removing things that doesent "pay off" from the roadmap without telling anyone why, hoping nobody will notice even though its one of the top voted things, like the re-cert item.
And once something is milked, cut all support for the game (but not before releasing $$ value packs in a last ditch effort), and move on to make a new cash-fountain game.

Advertising:
Most people i know havent even heard of Planetside 2. SoE dont seem to be able to properly advertise their games.
(Hate to bring this up, but) Anyone remember how much advertising was for WoW years before it was released.
When it finally came, lots of people already knew about it and look where that got them.

Lack of communication/professionalism:
Not even a week ago they "forgot" to turn off double xp. Sure, i like double xp as much as the next guy, but there was no official word about it. It just happened.
I remember the time Higby posted on twitter somethign like "We changed it so you can spawn to every depoyed AMS on the continent today as an experiment", but without any word on it in the launcher or ingame, or even on the forum.
The recruit rewards page as been in "scheduled maintenance" for like a year now. Did someone forget to update ts status to "not available"?
On the players page the "certifications" tab has said "coming soon" for as long as i can remember.
The Early Access store ingame has not been updated for a very long time now. Cant remember the last time items in therer changed. No word on that ofcourse.
Player studio items used to be released every week. They stopped doing that for some reason without a word.
Its little things like that, that makes me think things at the SoE office is a little bit too relaxed.

There is so much more that they do that is so frustrating. Good thing they make unique and exciting games.
Too bad they ruin them after release with wierd and random changes, plus the things listed above.
I dont know why they do things the way they do, all i know that i keep hearing the name Higby alot.

If we use the BTN stats, even tho devs came on record to say the numbers were marginally wrong, the evolution can be mesured quite accurately. The pops seems to be stable or even very slightly going up since last may.

The red line is a very poorly drawn and not well calculated average of those values but it can give a better feel of the overall pop.

Thanks!

That's pretty stable, maybe a very sleight downward trend (expected considering most games aren't expected to last forever.).

People gotta stop necroing this thread, it's bad PR.

With the recent merges, I'm perfectly fine with the server pop right now honestly. But the thing is that we need enough player and enough paying players to keep this game running.

The game will love a LONG time... I assure you that. Long enough for a Planetside 3 to come out, that's how long!

In all the player count stats I've seen, PS2 has ~50% of the playerbase it had at launch. That's fine with me. There are still more than enough players on each server to maintain large battles. Honestly, this game's architecture is not able to deal with truly huge battles without introducing unplayable lag anyway.