marly cortez
Mercurialis Inc.
The Bastion
158
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Posted - 2016.06.23 19:51:36 -
[1] - Quote
Interesting analysis on your project, We put it in to see if it got players to log in again in significant numbers, obviously everything that has been sent your way over the past few years on the subject of falling game numbers has either been utterly ignored or skilfully intercepted before it could be absorbed but here is one take on the situation, Bribery will not cut it guys.
It has been mentioned here that Phobe was the tipping point for turning the slowly falling numbers into a torrent but I suggest you look a little further back to the inception of a train of changes to the game each of which while on the face of it appeared to be the 'Next Best Thing', in actual fact only ramped up the pressure on players to look harder at the game they spent there hard earned dollars on, Was it in fact providing the content they thought they had paid for, the numbers speak for themselves and need no further polish or spin, obviously it does not for many so they simply drift away, stop logging in and eventually unsub there accounts.
It is the content that is the problem here guys, the lack of provision for an individuals self generated content has been lost in favour of the current thread of thought that everyone that plays Eve simply wants to destroy everything they meet, in short you homogenised the playing field, turning it into one gigantic Jita 4-4 undock scenario leaving players little option but to engage in that activity or leave, and who really wants to log into a game were the only style of play is to undock, blow stuff up, get blown up and then log off again.
Those of us that have a vested interest in numbers, those being actual bums on seats, have watched this trend with ever increasing unease as Corporation active numbers have dwindled with each update, Yes fatigue was a major issue, but not on the face of it, there it looked like the perfect answer to force projection but beneath that there were other issues players had to contend with as a consequence of it's introduction, those issues far outweighed the surface penalties and for a lot it was a step to far, especially for those owning capital ships or Jump Freighters.
Mining nerfs spun off as ELUA infractions or attempts to oblige players to interact more met with similar resistance as the players natural risk aversion cut in and the Ice thing, well that was so poorly thought through it was laughable, but in the end it too had only a net negative effect, Not going to touch on ISBOXER as it simply seems to draw out the trolls in larger numbers but that too had a major effect on player numbers for many Corps as yet again they saw players self generated content evaporate followed by the involved Alts and more than some might admit the mains also leaving the game.
Recent changes to Sov mechanics again on the surface appeared to some to be a really good idea but beneath that the real effect to player content was never addressed by CCP, it was just expected that everyone would engage with this new style of play, One were there was little balance in the mechanics and even less content for the players involved having to grind indexes daily simply to maintain the situation before they could even consider doing anything for themselves in the game, like that was going to fly for very long.
Some may disagree but in the opinion of many and an even larger number no longer playing Eve, CCP lost it's way with the game, it forgot that balance extends across all aspects of the game, it forgot that players play the game for the content and that includes not just that served up by CCP, far more important is that which they can generate for themselves, remove that as it has been for many and there is little reason to play Eve at all.
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