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 S.ave O.ur S.hips: The Dwindling Population in The Galaxy 
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I purposefully posted this within issues and support due to the fact that we're seeing a troublesome trend here:

The amount of active players in GL is dropping at an arguably alarming rate. (Speculation on my part based on observation) -- Top legions are having issues keeping their ports full with active players and they're the cream of the crop.

----If legions that've received a great start are dying even with the aid of dedicated players. (using S W A R M as an example) - Then what should we expect of legions that aren't in the top 50? Or even the top 25?

What's the issue?

One of our members suggested that perhaps the game is being more so tailored for veteran players because they're more or less the most profitable for Dan to market to.. (in terms of GP)
It could also be that pretty much only active or veteran players are the only one suggesting innovations thus leaving "the new guys" out in terms of innovations in the game.
DISCLAIMER: The veterans are certainly a pool of players that need innovations and twists added to the game in order to maintain their interest I understand that.

-As veterans you guys deserve all of the credit for starting the game up, legions and new members alike, but we're lacking in terms of the obtaining and retaining of new players. Regardless of how many innovations are done we will have veteran players who throw in the towel.

If we aren't receiving new veteran players because new players lose interest quickly and we're losing our veteran players (slowly by steadily) We won't have any veterans to tailor the game for.

I don't know if sharing the game on Facebook and talking it up to friends would help or if the game itself needs to do something for those new comers who don't know what a GP is or what they should be saved for. I feel, in the interest of perpetuating the game, we should do something.

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Fri Apr 18, 2014 4:01 pm
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well, few thoughts:
1) the number of active player is dropping, that is x-times discussed fact
2) focusing on veteran players only aint gonna work out well, because:
A - veterans quit game not only because of the game mechanics, lack of new goals (already addressed and partially fixed) but mainly due to RL issues
B - veterans are more experienced and spend GP more wisely plus, majority of items they already have the basic GP modules for their ships unless they restart
3) we are having major drop of the new players joining GL (also multiple times discussed and countless suggestions posted on this forum)

Suma sumarum, unless GL gets back to have much more new players trying this game, we arent gonna see any change in the trend of decreasing number of total players. To be constructive, I still do not understand, why GL as game playable on mobile devices has to be linked to FB account and can not work as mobile/tablet application & PC game at the same time.
My only guess is, that Dan is satisfied with the income from GP and thus has no motivation to implement major changes making GL more attractive to new players.
Unless such change takes time and require some contracts to be signed & early notice is not part of communication strategy...

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Fri Apr 18, 2014 5:05 pm
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If Dan focuses his efforts on the smartphone market he could see an influx of at least a few extra dozen players a day.

But there still lies the matter that the game is very complex. Most new players get frustrated or confused by this level of complexity and completely quit. The game needs to be simplified for them. Locking some features was a good start but I believe more features need to be locked until a higher rank is achieved. One of the greatest mistakes (and pitfalls) in the game is the low rank requirement to start up a new legion. These guys often don't communicate well and are often isolated by themselves. Look at how many new legions are created by low ranks as opposed to higher ranks.

There also lies the matter that players in game aren't encouraged to use the forums for guidance. So they are left out of a fairly elite community of veterans and skilled players of various play styles. Without guidance they are prone to making many "newbie mistakes" and give up.

A lot of stuff at low rank is a bit of a drag and boring. At a low rank energy recharge is very slow, so after dumping out their energy tanks they are left waiting an hour before they can attempt another go at a mission or 15 minutes just to get that final kill-shot on that last NPC. There needs to be more content for low ranks aimed at keeping them busy while their waiting (something that rewards them for their time spent online). When I was a low rank I only played once a day dumping my energy on a mission (seeing as it's the only "easy" and rewarding task for low ranks.

NPCing is increadibly tough at low ranks. As you rank up it gradually gets easier but at low ranks NPCing is not worth it. Not to mention you can't see your first elite until rank 50 (which may take at least a week to achieve). I didn't really get into NPCing until I was around rank 80 or so.

What this game needs is to be temporarily geared towards keeping lower ranks interested:

1. Lock certain content (ie. Creating Legions) from being accessible until the player is a certain rank.
2. Creating content geared at keeping low ranks interested in the game long enough until other features and content becomes fairly easy (and subsequently, enjoyable) to accomplish.

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Sat Apr 19, 2014 3:30 pm
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Need more mini-games. Rewards don't have to be outrageous, would just give people something to do while waiting for energy to recharge.


Sat Apr 19, 2014 3:46 pm
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If I end up quitting, it will be because of:

1) LAG, which continues to happen off and on.
2) Lack of new and interesting content. There needs to be more than just endless clicking.
I wouldn't call myself a "veteran", but I have spent a significant amount of money on GP; been slowing down lately, but $50 every 2 weeks was my norm.

Also, something does need to be done about the availability of half-decent planets. Over the last 4 years, anything worth taking has been taken. And Dan might want to stop banning players who happen to originate (from his view) from the same IP. Maybe give each player 1 free GP per day that they log in or 1 GP per rank; something for the players who don't spend money.

Mobile, not tied to Facebook would be a HUGE boost.

And some of the NPC are just too ridiculously rare. Would give more players more hope if they actually saw some of these on their BT.

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Sat Apr 19, 2014 4:06 pm
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Not so much worried about running out of content and having GL devolve into mindless, joyless clicking as seems the case with some of the higher rankers. When there's no more content that interests me, I'll just retire. For people who have more or less "completed" the game, quitting is perfectly fine, normal, and healthy. What worries me is the lack of advertising coupled with GL's huge learning curve. Who outside of SSB resets and melter-peddling alts are replacing the people who retire?

I agree with much of what playret0195x had to say. A lot of things that are second-nature to more experienced players are confusing and/or frustrating to new players.

When first introduced to GL by a friend, I didn't care for it, and had to be reminded (nagged, really) to log in every day to stay loyal and collect my legion shipment. It was simply information overload followed by a few clicks, and then nothing to do for hours after running out of energy. Big frustrating yawn. I love it now, but it took at least a week or two before I started "getting it." Can't help but wonder how many new players start out without the benefit of supportive (pushy) friends who quit after just a day or two?


Sat Apr 19, 2014 4:24 pm
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Pongoloid wrote:
Not so much worried about running out of content and having GL devolve into mindless, joyless clicking as seems the case with some of the higher rankers. When there's no more content that interests me, I'll just retire. For people who have more or less "completed" the game, quitting is perfectly fine, normal, and healthy. What worries me is the lack of advertising coupled with GL's huge learning curve. Who outside of SSB resets and melter-peddling alts are replacing the people who retire?

I agree with much of what playret0195x had to say. A lot of things that are second-nature to more experienced players are confusing and/or frustrating to new players.

When first introduced to GL by a friend, I didn't care for it, and had to be reminded (nagged, really) to log in every day to stay loyal and collect my legion shipment. It was simply information overload followed by a few clicks, and then nothing to do for hours after running out of energy. Big frustrating yawn. I love it now, but it took at least a week or two before I started "getting it." Can't help but wonder how many new players start out without the benefit of supportive (pushy) friends who quit after just a day or two?

Same here. My early goal was trying to colonize as many planets as possible. Back then I did not have a good understanding of the game and colonized a lot of Sparse and Small planets. I'm still suffering from my newbie mistakes.

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Sat Apr 19, 2014 4:34 pm
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http://galaxylegion.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=40501

Possible solution to this problem

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Sat Apr 19, 2014 4:47 pm
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I'v thought of this for along time and this here is another issue I think should be added to the list.

My brother keith played the game for .. i'd say about a month in total, in that time all he did was get frustrated and pissed off at most everyone ... apparently it is NO *insert curse word* FUN AT *insert more cursing* ALL when your getting completely smashed by all the low rank "Players" who are sitting down there with 3000/1 KD ratio's..

I cant blame anyone for hating the game because dan has it so you can reset your ship at any time if you dont like it, in order to survive in the lower ranks you need to have people feed you planets, especially right off the hop, new players joining the game DO NOT GET THESE ADVANTAGES! Its like a MMORPG with no lvl requirement for Gear, start up and someone gives you gear that WOULD be for a lvl 100, what happens then is an extremely Unfair advantage for everyone else who is trying to even find some solace in Enjoying the game, this is starting to get ramble like.


Sun Apr 20, 2014 2:24 pm
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Yeah, low rank SSBs and freeze rankers completely ruin any fun in PvPing. The next generation of GL gamers might even avoid PvP entirely because of this. It is strategies like these that truly ruin PvP for others.

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Sun Apr 20, 2014 3:07 pm
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playret0195x wrote:
Yeah, low rank SSBs and freeze rankers completely ruin any fun in PvPing. The next generation of GL gamers might even avoid PvP entirely because of this. It is strategies like these that truly ruin PvP for others.


and I am 100% in agreement with you on that :)


Sun Apr 20, 2014 3:35 pm
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playret0195x wrote:
Yeah, low rank SSBs and freeze rankers completely ruin any fun in PvPing. The next generation of GL gamers might even avoid PvP entirely because of this. It is strategies like these that truly ruin PvP for others.

It's the whole point of the game, though. Build a tough ship.

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Sun Apr 20, 2014 9:13 pm
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It's the whole point of the game, though. Build a tough ship.
Well, one of the things people strive for, yes.

But imagine this: you're new to GL, and nobody has told you how much more important artifact production is compared to mining and research. You probably think research is the most important, and are feeling good about yourself after finishing up with Plasma cannons. Yeah, you're pretty tough.

Then you log on one morning to find yourself disabled, your hacks and raids zeroed! Oh no! You go after the ship who did this to you, but when you retaliate, the guy does about five times more damage back than you dish out. But you are not deterred! You use up all of your repair nanos and a Tri-Matrix Emblem, rank up in the middle of the attack, and still don't have enough energy to kill him. Gah. How frustrating! Then to add insult to injury, once you're on his feed, the guy comes back every 12 hours to take more actions from you.

OK, that sucked, but hey, maybe he's just some super ship or something. You are annoyed, but go about your business. Then two days later, a different ship does the same thing to you. And another ship not too long after that! And of course when you retaliate, similar results.

"What the heck is going on here?" you wonder! "Why are some ships so impossible to kill? I thought I was doing OK!" You have no idea that this player has actually been around for 3 years (you probably don't look at people's medals yet), and reset with several 22x arti planets waiting for them on the other side. You have no idea that this player scores more Rescued Prisoners in 12 hours than you do in an entire week.

If it were just 1-2 oddball ships bullying everybody in the 20-100 range, that'd be one thing, but when you run into it enough, it gets pretty disheartening. Some people are stronger than you and that's life -- deal with it -- but when you keep running into impossible odds, you start wondering if you are doing something wrong, if these other players are somehow cheating. Or maybe you should just quit, because you're getting pounded by these cocky punks and there's nothing you can do about it, short of catch them offline and spend $20 in GP refills/repairs to take them down. And who wants to do that?

Now when I reset 15 months ago (no planets waiting for me. Guess I did it wrong! :P), it was admittedly an annoyance, but as an SSB with reasonably good AP, I was left alone for the most part, but you could tell from reading people's ship comms that there was a fair amount of raging going on lol... and from my understanding, Super Annoying Slow Ranking Reset Scouts of Death are more prevalent now than they were at that time.

:eek:


Sun Apr 20, 2014 10:21 pm
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what i hate the most when people say they quit cause of lag its really just their crappy internet and i can use gl on my phone

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Sun Apr 20, 2014 10:47 pm
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Pongoloid wrote:
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It's the whole point of the game, though. Build a tough ship.
Well, one of the things people strive for, yes.

But imagine this: you're new to GL, and nobody has told you how much more important artifact production is compared to mining and research. You probably think research is the most important, and are feeling good about yourself after finishing up with Plasma cannons. Yeah, you're pretty tough.

Then you log on one morning to find yourself disabled, your hacks and raids zeroed! Oh no! You go after the ship who did this to you, but when you retaliate, the guy does about five times more damage back than you dish out. But you are not deterred! You use up all of your repair nanos and a Tri-Matrix Emblem, rank up in the middle of the attack, and still don't have enough energy to kill him. Gah. How frustrating! Then to add insult to injury, once you're on his feed, the guy comes back every 12 hours to take more actions from you.

OK, that sucked, but hey, maybe he's just some super ship or something. You are annoyed, but go about your business. Then two days later, a different ship does the same thing to you. And another ship not too long after that! And of course when you retaliate, similar results.

"What the heck is going on here?" you wonder! "Why are some ships so impossible to kill? I thought I was doing OK!" You have no idea that this player has actually been around for 3 years (you probably don't look at people's medals yet), and reset with several 22x arti planets waiting for them on the other side. You have no idea that this player scores more Rescued Prisoners in 12 hours than you do in an entire week.

If it were just 1-2 oddball ships bullying everybody in the 20-100 range, that'd be one thing, but when you run into it enough, it gets pretty disheartening. Some people are stronger than you and that's life -- deal with it -- but when you keep running into impossible odds, you start wondering if you are doing something wrong, if these other players are somehow cheating. Or maybe you should just quit, because you're getting pounded by these cocky punks and there's nothing you can do about it, short of catch them offline and spend $20 in GP refills/repairs to take them down. And who wants to do that?

Now when I reset 15 months ago (no planets waiting for me. Guess I did it wrong! :P), it was admittedly an annoyance, but as an SSB with reasonably good AP, I was left alone for the most part, but you could tell from reading people's ship comms that there was a fair amount of raging going on lol... and from my understanding, Super Annoying Slow Ranking Reset Scouts of Death are more prevalent now than they were at that time.

:eek:


Yeah, you do raise a good point here Pongo ... I feel bad for jumping at the opportunity to zero those that were in a legion that i felt i could take on or not in a legion at all :oops:

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Sun Apr 20, 2014 10:56 pm
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Pennsyltucky wrote:
Pongoloid wrote:
Quote:
It's the whole point of the game, though. Build a tough ship.
Well, one of the things people strive for, yes.

But imagine this: you're new to GL, and nobody has told you how much more important artifact production is compared to mining and research. You probably think research is the most important, and are feeling good about yourself after finishing up with Plasma cannons. Yeah, you're pretty tough.

Then you log on one morning to find yourself disabled, your hacks and raids zeroed! Oh no! You go after the ship who did this to you, but when you retaliate, the guy does about five times more damage back than you dish out. But you are not deterred! You use up all of your repair nanos and a Tri-Matrix Emblem, rank up in the middle of the attack, and still don't have enough energy to kill him. Gah. How frustrating! Then to add insult to injury, once you're on his feed, the guy comes back every 12 hours to take more actions from you.

OK, that sucked, but hey, maybe he's just some super ship or something. You are annoyed, but go about your business. Then two days later, a different ship does the same thing to you. And another ship not too long after that! And of course when you retaliate, similar results.

"What the heck is going on here?" you wonder! "Why are some ships so impossible to kill? I thought I was doing OK!" You have no idea that this player has actually been around for 3 years (you probably don't look at people's medals yet), and reset with several 22x arti planets waiting for them on the other side. You have no idea that this player scores more Rescued Prisoners in 12 hours than you do in an entire week.

If it were just 1-2 oddball ships bullying everybody in the 20-100 range, that'd be one thing, but when you run into it enough, it gets pretty disheartening. Some people are stronger than you and that's life -- deal with it -- but when you keep running into impossible odds, you start wondering if you are doing something wrong, if these other players are somehow cheating. Or maybe you should just quit, because you're getting pounded by these cocky punks and there's nothing you can do about it, short of catch them offline and spend $20 in GP refills/repairs to take them down. And who wants to do that?

Now when I reset 15 months ago (no planets waiting for me. Guess I did it wrong! :P), it was admittedly an annoyance, but as an SSB with reasonably good AP, I was left alone for the most part, but you could tell from reading people's ship comms that there was a fair amount of raging going on lol... and from my understanding, Super Annoying Slow Ranking Reset Scouts of Death are more prevalent now than they were at that time.

:eek:


Yeah, you do raise a good point here Pongo ... I feel bad for jumping at the opportunity to zero those that were in a legion that i felt i could take on or not in a legion at all :oops:


lol, don't feel bad Pennsyltucky, but also don't be surprised that there is a fair drop off in the early stages.
Like Pongo says, if you're constantly being used as a punching bag by experienced players, chances are not great that you will enjoy the game, which is of course the single most important factor in maintaining players.
Also a large part of the reason I love the idea of trainees/apprentices in established legions, so new players can benefit from guidance, planets and the generosity of older players.


Mon Apr 21, 2014 1:25 am
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Deigobene wrote:
lol, don't feel bad Pennsyltucky, but also don't be surprised that there is a fair drop off in the early stages.
Like Pongo says, if you're constantly being used as a punching bag by experienced players, chances are not great that you will enjoy the game, which is of course the single most important factor in maintaining players.
Also a large part of the reason I love the idea of trainees/apprentices in established legions, so new players can benefit from guidance, planets and the generosity of older players.


I definitely agree! The idea of trainer legions would be great; if these changes were implemented I'd definitely advertise the game via shares and such for Dan (I'm sure others would too) Same with the tutorial pop ups. Do the mods engage in discussion any? I know Dan seldom posts but there seems to be a clear consensus that we gotta help out the new fish.

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Mon Apr 21, 2014 2:11 am
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I'm going to try to stick it out as long as I can but Real life is my main reason my play time has been cut down. 12 days till 4 year medal.


Mon Apr 21, 2014 3:08 am
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Devastation wrote:
It's the whole point of the game, though. Build a tough ship.


sorry, but no. you are sadly mistaken here.

i started this game late (november i think it was) 2011, and played it for a little under 2 years, but i quit because of the [expletives] matchmaking in pvp for starters. the reason why i quit (along with my fiancee and son, who both quit long before me) is because the matchmaking in the pvp-system is a huge joke. the fact you can get hit, let alone disabled, by someone that is about 300 ranks above is beyond a joke.

this also echoes true for the base -vs- base battles. no cap, no matchmaking, nothing. a bunch of rank 1k+ can just easily disable a base with members that are a lot lower then them. there should atleast be a tier-system in place for those battles.

the fact that anyone can steal a planet of anyone is also ridiculous. i spend money on those items that improve planets, and what happens next? someone that is rank 1k+ plus along and steals it right from underneath me. who gives a ratass that i paid real money for a better planet? noone. not the admins here, and surely not the high ranked players.

and finally, a lot of the high ranked player are very... how do i put this nicely, elitists. they think that because they are a higher rank then you, they can just insult you, have a pisspoor attitude and are just self-entitled. now, i am not saying that they all are, but the ones i met (whether it was through pvp, them stealing my planets or hitting my base) were.

all the things i described above made me, along with my fiancee, son and some friends, quit this game. the game had a lot of potential and i highly enjoyed it for a while, but the general population's attitude stinks and stops people from playing it and enjoying it.


Mon Apr 21, 2014 11:48 pm
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Jeebus wrote:
Devastation wrote:
It's the whole point of the game, though. Build a tough ship.


sorry, but no. you are sadly mistaken here.

So if the whole point of the game isn't to build a strong ship, then what is it?

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Tue Apr 22, 2014 12:01 am
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