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Recent SotA Steam #'s - It ain't pretty.
MightyUnclean
Member EpicPosts: 3,531
Well, if SotA's developers were expecting a huge influx of new players with the official release, they must be shitting themselves by this point. Of course, Steam Charts doesn't tell the whole story, but things aren't looking good. Looks like this game is DOSA (Dead On Second Arrival), as so many previous players predicted.
http://steamcharts.com/app/326160#7d
http://steamcharts.com/app/326160#7d
Comments
Besides, its Easter.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Given the fact that it looks and plays like something three people made in a year - I think it's safe to say it's not going to be a major hit
That said, the game does have a few things going for it.
An objective mindset about it from the developers, however, is definitely not a part of that.
Tried it a while back, was very dissapointed. Never really taken another look, especially since any feedback from actual players has more or less been negative.
A good combat system (not a card system) like the one UO had and allowing a Felucca gameplay as an option with the promised slider system would have moved this game from niche.
There is a huge market for hardcore PvP if done as well as old UO (Renaissance era)
Hardly enough to make a conclusion about the health of the game.
I keep and likely always will keep looking back at the way FFXI was made.5-7 years with NO profits,only debt.
Now a days lamers like Chris Roberts wants instant profits,huge bankrolls before starting a game and wants us to TRUST him..lol yeah right.You see my feeling is that if you don't TRUST yourself to be able to deliver and sell it AFTER you make it,then why would i trust you?
This problem also haunts most every game except using the same example FFXI ,at least for many years.The problem i refer to is keeping ALL zones active so that you don't NEED a huge influx of new players to revitalize old zones.Blizzard does not know how to do it,Zeni/Bethesda doesn't know it,Trion doesn't know it,so many bad develoeprs out there.
How would new players take part in an economy if a low level one does not exist,but guess what ,devs don't care about old stuff they already sold to the masses.They simply work on level 110,make new gear /loot for 110 a few new zones and don't are about the rest of the game anymore so then neither will the vet players and that is sad for the games and the players.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Moving toward's a card combat system that is very slow compared to UO system made SotA combat a easy mode one far from what UO was.
You can lock your card's but loose focus (as far as i know, remind me if i am wrong).
Op is correct that steam chart hit the mark correctly.
Shrouders may be putting on a brave face, but it has to have shaken even their biggest fans.
My guess is they will pull the plug after going through the motions of an official release.
Plus it's not like he said steam charts doesn't tell the whole story... oh wait...
Maybe you have some official numbers from SOTA? No?
The steam numbers and reviews speak volumes and it isn't good.
Trion has a stand alone launcher for it's games and yet Trove had 58,709 peek players on steam...
http://steamcharts.com/app/304050
Better lock this thread for trolling can't have links to actual numbers! KEK
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/Your desperation is showing.
Kyleran, I really do enjoy your posts. Onto the topic at hand....
I don't seem to be too excited about any of the new batch of games coming out. I love MMO's, but the new crop seems just....boring, to me. UGH!
Reason for this is developers, moderators and whales together removed the majority of their community. Developers decided to listen to the vast minority of hi money pledgers instead of the majority that wanted a different game then the one we see today.
Only listening to the real life rich people turned out to be a very bad move.
This is something to consider for future MMO developers and definetly not something we ever want to see repeated.
I read a interesting reply over at Steam from poros1ty where he calculated the numbers that dont log in through Steam -
"way more outside of steam" .... this generalization is pure speculation, which definitely varies from game to game, and very likely does not apply in this particular case with SOTA regarding steam vs non-steam users.
For one, Steam is the most popular digital game platform/client in the world, so most people who play PC games will be using the steam platform in some manner especially if they have friends who play or are in a guild, etc. So as long as your game has been available for sale on steam for a considerably long period of time, the largest percent would have either purchased it there and/or had activated their key there to potentially play the game using the steam client. If you were a kickstarter backer or bought the game directly from Portalarium, you had the option to activate your copy onto steam and this could not be reversed. A large number of people who bought the game outside of steam now own the game on steam because they activated their game key on steam and linked their accounts. The only benefit of not linking the accounts is for people who wanted to potentially resell their accounts in the future, which is likely a minority of people. You also could not review the game on steam unless you linked your accounts, which the devs openly begged users to do.
https://steamdb.info/app/326160/graphs/
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/?page_id=35155
Total Backers: 68,606 (total number of people who can log in and play)
~44,000 owners on steam (combination of steam purchases or steam key activations)
22,322 kickstarter backers, but some percentage of these users are included as steam owners if they linked their accounts.
SotA Only Backers: 46,284
unknown number of steam purchases who can only use steam client
unknown number of purchases outside of steam, can use both game client or steam
unknown number of free trial users using game client
Of the 1410 users who reviewed SotA on steam, 47% are from people who purchased the game on steam and 53% are those who did not. This implies that approximately half of the steam owners come from users who linked their accounts to steam and can both use the steam and official game clients. There are also a considerable amount of people who bought the game only through steam and do not have the option to use the official client.
For fun, as a reasonable assumption, of the 40,000 players (from steamdb, not owners) who have at least launched SotA on steam once, lets assume a 50/50 split of steam purchases vs users who activated on steam and can use both clients (out of steam purchases). Next lets assume that 20,000 of the kickstarter backers have played the game which isn't unreasonable, and there is a 50/50 split of those who chose to activate the game onto steam for whatever purpose (steam review, use steam client to track hours, achievements, talk to friends, etc), and those who did not (resale purposes mostly).
So of the 40,000 players on steam, the make up of users is estimated to be
*remember there are some margins of error associated with these numbers from steamdb, and we're talking about people who played the game and not just own it*
20,000 steam players only
10,000 kickstarter backers who activated on steam
and 10,000 non-kickstarter game purchases outside of steam who activated onto steam
Users playing on game client
10,000 kickstarter backers not steam linked/activated
10,000 non-kickstarter game purchases not steam linked/activated
This corresponds to a total of ~60,000 players which is reasonable considering total backer total of ~69k.
Now if you happened to activate your SOTA key on steam and linked your accounts, you can play the game both through steam and also the game client at your choosing so there is more uncertainty on which clients people prefer. While its unlikely that the official game client is more popular than steam, to make it easier lets assume that its a 50/50 split.
From these calculations, a reasonable assumption is 30,000 who regularly play or have at least played on the steam client (20k + 5k + 5k), composed of both steam purchases and users who activated their game on steam and prefer that client. And a reasonable assumption for users who bought the game outside of steam and either only use the official game client and/or activated their game on steam but prefer game client instead is 20,000 players (10k + 10k).
Now if you want to be super generous, erring on the side of caution that there is a lot of uncertainty in these assumptions/estimates and slight errors in player numbers themselves, then lets also add in about 10,000 free trial players which is likely a gross exaggeration.
This means that mathematically/theoretically, at most, the number of players not using Steam at any given time can only be double the official numbers you can see through Steam. So mathematically/theoretically, basically there are only approximately 1000 players on at most if the game is capping at 400-500 max steam users during peak hours.
http://steamcommunity.com/app/326160/discussions/0/1698294337792766905/?ctp=2
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
LOL, did you actually take the time to read through every post I've ever made, just because you don't agree with me about SotA?
Looking good, right? So they didn't manage to get more peak Steam players at the official release than they did at the soft release. And supporters aren't worried about that? SotA has zero momentum, is attracting a pitiful number of new players, and the whales will jump ship once they finally realize that a huge influx of new players is never going to happen. Worst money I ever spent on a game, and that's saying something.
Didn't Starr Long say they need 50K users a month to be profitable? Come on guys, even the diehard fans, how long do you think it will be before they close up shop?
I think the game has the potential to draw more players over time, but also expect it will be more trickle than flood. The make or break of the game may well depend on whether they have the resources to withstand long enough for that interest to take hold.