Is it because of frustration over forever-unresolved core balance issues?
Is it because ultimately sins is an indi game and rebellion will join the other sins titles in abandonment?
discuss
I sincerely doubt that games on StarCraft or Zero Hour take on average 1 hour. 30 minute top and even that between 2 equally skilled players. Just look on youtube, there is crapload of SC2 vods, i am pretty sure majority of them is about 20 minutes long. Its made that way by design, nobody is ever going to watch like you play the game for an hour, matches on Call of Duty or Fifa do not take so long either...its not coincidence.
Anyway, even if i kind of undervalued that number, my point still stands. Sins is never going to be deep enough for harcore 4x fans, nor fast-paced enough for StarCraft maniacs. There is however a group of people, who actually like this combination and would not want it to be neither more like Master of Orion, nor like StarCraft. It just happens that majority of these people clearly prefer compstomps or play over LAN with their closest buddies.
Mysterious Game ????
I play SINS because I love the game and because I can turn off. Get lost if you know what I mean.
My substitution is not a game but coding and I really enjoy it at the moment and while I'm coding I really don't feel the pull I felt before when first thing I did when I came home was load SINS to see if there is good game set to go on.
I'd say the biggest thing that hurt the Sins online MP community is how unfriendly it is towards setting up a game. Just having a simple option to auto-assign player teams based on their win to loss ratio would have done a lot. You can easily spend 20-30 minutes messing around picking teams or waiting for people, just to have someone ditch and force you to start the whole process over again, or have veterans kick the noobs who have been waiting patiently because someone's buddy just got out of a game. There is a lot of talk about "paying one's dues" but lets face it, it makes for a hostile community and most gamers these days are not going to have the patience to deal with it when so many games remove these kinds of barriers that prevent you from just jumping in and having fun. Other features like having new maps downloadable through the launch room would have been nice too.The games can in fact go pretty long. They often don't, but they can, and this is probably the main reason I don't play anymore and never really got into playing Rebellion online. I've had MANY games go for 3-4 hours and a couple go as long as 6 hours between evenly matched teams where the last couple opponents did not want to give up. If you don't have at least a 2 hour block of time to play, you probably shouldn't start a game of Sins online.
Because Sins requires so much dedication to play and enjoy online, it makes the online community smaller, which just makes it increasingly unfriendly for new people to try and get into. Thus you have a small dedicated "hardcore" community, and some people who just like to play with their friends via ICO or LAN.
Do any of you guys ever play vanilla SINS anymore, or even Diplomacy and Entrenchment? I haven't ben on those in a while, but I am thinking on re-visiting. Because those games are balanced, I was just wondering if there are many people playing those online anymore.
I like what you said here because the wait could put off alot of people who want to instantly join a game:
So how do we solve this?
My advice: Ranking system (elo chess ranking system) and auto-matching is always the obvious answer but lets not take this route without buffing it. What really needs to happen to have an edge in joining games ? My idea goes to building a community portal and ladder, achievements for multiplayer alone and leagues but then again thats just copying sc2 so it needs a twist..
I feel like slapping you, OP writer. Nothing personal. But it's a bit early to declare this game dead. Slap slap slap slap slap slap
But on the whole,
-Lord Brony
Saturday night, only ~80 people online....
Its more like 80% of the 80 people are all waiting to join a game and 80% who join a game have an 80% chance of being kicked for being low skilled or are suspected smurfs. Which means that 80% of people who join a game have a 20% chance of beating any of the pro's in 80% of all games played each day.
Which could also mean that those 20% who join a game could be smurfs with 80% more skill than 80% of the hosts who want to kick them out of games. This paradox only concludes that the probability that rebellions multiplayer survives 80% of its expected life time before the next installment is 20% which has resulted in its online player count dropping by more than 80%.
this sounds like Chewbacca defense
Considering that 90% of Sins players play SP only i think Sins in general is far from "dead". Sins has a strong fan base. A strong modding community, and the Dev's are still supporting the game.
You shouldn't judge a game solely on its MP potential. Which i will admit is Sins one, and only weakness. However like i said Sins core player group is SP only. TBH if Sins dropped MP support i (and the other 90%) wouldn't lose any sleep at all over it, because like the X series of games, and most 4X games. Sins doesn't really need MP to be enjoyable.
If anyone is "Killing" Sins, It is the 10% that is the MP crowd. with their relentless bitching, whining, and trolling of these boards. Which is kinda funny, because it is the 10% that is posting on these boards. Turning off any potential new Sins players. Who may not give a damn about MP. Maybe its time for the silent 90% to step up, and say something.
I have 32 Steam friends that play or have played Sins Rebellion...
Of those, I'd say 9 are true "MP people"...8 of those 9 still play on a fairly regular basis...
For the other 23 "SP people", only 4 have played within the last 2 weeks...additionally, 14 have less than 60 hours of game time...
Hardly proof, but as far as I'm concerned, SP people are putting Sins away as well...
I have a feeling any attempts to remind you of the contributions made by the MP community would be futile...
If 90% of Sins players play SP only, which is an invented statistic but I'll agree it's still the majority, how many still play the game? There's really no way to know is there. Most of that invented 90% also contribute absolutely nothing to game community. They simply play it and probably never visit or post on the forum. The "MP crowd" are the main drivers and contributors to the game's life past release with balance and strategy feedback, replays, helping beginners with questions about the game, etc. Modders also extend the lifespan of the game with their creations as well. Purely SP players do not contribute much at all if they aren't involved in mods. I'm curious what this "silent 90%" would actually have to say if they "stepped up". They definitely help the bulk of sales, but really they do nothing for extending the life the game and the community of the game past release.
You are correct the 90% is an exaggeration. We don't know what the true percentage is. However we do know it is a majority of players. Seleucia I am not saying that there weren't good contributions from the MP crowd. However you guys are trying to make it sound like Sins is a MP ONLY game. Which it is not, and Sins will SUCK if there is no multiplayer. Which it does not, and you can only enjoy Sins if you play MP. Which is not true. It is very obvious that Sins was designed primarily for SP first. Then MP as a fringe benefit. A good majority of the MP post i see are "Sins sucks, because the dev's didn't balance Rebellion "my way", and "my way" pretty much depends on who ever the poster is. OR outright TROLLS, and harasses the dev's, players, or who ever has the misfortune of reading that post. Deny that any possible good suggestions are being buried by all of the trolling. Which the dev's have admitted that they don't have the time to read through all of the walls of text to see if there are any good suggestions out there. There is a problem here. It is just a pity that nobody does anything about it.
I am a SP only person, and i made TSOP. One of the biggest contributions to the Sins community ever made. Without TSOP there more than likely would have been no Rebellion. There are other SP only people that made equally important contributions over the years. So do not tell me that SP only people do not contribute. That is FALSE. There are many that do contribute, and have already done so.
Perhaps the reason you don't see many new contributions from SP is because there isn't much more that can be done with Rebellion. All of the primary issues that plagued sins have been fixed. There are just balance, and a few minor issues left. Which i will not deny still exist. How many developers do you know still give a damn about their game four years after initial release?
The whole point is that Sins is far from Dead. Especially if i have anything to do with it.
Minidumps and desyncs still occur on a regular basis....wouldn't call that fixed...there was also just recently a report of the AI still getting into a loop of inactivity...and of course, still a whole host of problems associated with the autocast AI, diplomacy, ship pathfinding...the list continues....
Rebellion has made some major improvements, but the big issues (most of which affect both SP and MP) are still issues...
This is correct IMHO.
Its no coincidence that the major trolls on these boards are also the biggest MP cheerleaders.
Anyone tired of the little boys on these boards would not want to ruin their Sins experience by then playing a game with you guys.
Have been playing Sins SP only since 2008.
Its a good thing I suck cause the AI still gives me a good , slow steady challenge on anything above hard.
And as I have stated before, my feeling is single players play for the role playing experience as opposed to MPers who play to win and only win.
Wait, people play this game just so they can get their ass handed to them?
That explains everything!
Stress makes a good case and then the SP forum trolls jump in and ruin it
The game is not dying and it's never had a strong MP community. What it has had is a consistent but small MP community. When I started playing in the summer after the Entrenchment release high simultaneous MP counts were in the low 200's. Rebellion's summer release was around the same towards the end of August. The current #'s of around a 100+/- during peak times is pretty consistent with normal sins MP.
And the people that typically write how poor the MP experience is usually say in the next sentence they don't play MP, only doing LAN or SP. Not sure what their motivation is, but if you don't have any MP experience, why make any comments at all on it?
A ladder, ranking, ELO, w/e system would appeal to the e-pean nature of online gamers. Also adding non-ranked games or coop game stat options would attract the less hard core gamer that still like to play with other people.
From their a change to ICO from hosting games to I want to join a 5v5 ranked or a 2v2 coop vs AI, etc would appeal to both groups of players and help increase online.
From there I would release a demo version of Rebellion that is online only and able to select the TEC faction only but able to play against all players. Sorta a F2P option.
I think they like baby S & M. You know similar to S & M for adults but it is happening in game not RL.
Seriously Greg, you have an avatar with a brain and "Use it" typed next to it and you gotta post that? Put that brain back in your head before posting.
Game is excellent for modding.
Dirty Sanchez is probably the biggest MP cheerleader there is, and he is by no means a troll...he's helped new players online and even made an excellent map pack available to all players...
Greg (DieHard) and Sareth (Carpetbomb) are some of the best players online, and both have been giving excellent advice to new players over the years....both have also posted replays or videos for the community so that newer players have something to watch in order to get better...Greg is about as far from a troll as one can get, and while Sareth has stepped on some toes, that was mostly with devs or with other MP players....barring the last week, Sareth has been one of the nicer and more helpful MP people this community has ever seen...
HowThe? is one of the best players online as well...he made the goldlist of MP guys back in the day and has reported several bugs on these forums...hardly a troll...
Ekko_Tek started an entire thread dedicated to setting up mentoring between skilled players and new players...it failed, in no small part because some of the "mentees" were actually SP people who just wanted to troll us through steam chat....Ekko has also posted lots of advice and tips for new players...
Red Rubby has been keeping a thread alive with replays of skilled players so that new players have excellent recordings to watch and improve their gameplay...
Some of the best MP cheerleaders ever are no longer with us...gentlemen like Raging Amish and Darvin were extremely helpful to the community...those guys made multiple threads giving in depth analysis of large team games, game mechanics, balance, etc...one of Raging Amish's threads is still referenced even to this day...
Myself and other MP guys have made efforts to clear up the worse trolling on ICO...some of the long time trolls like kbroke and KoK are no longer dragging games out...other players like HuyMac have toned down after multiple hosts refused to allow them to play unless they behaved....
MP players like Zombie and Pbhead did/do a lot of behind the scenes work with the devs (hence why they are in the special thanks category)...and if you want to question whether zombie falls in the MP crowd, I'll remind you that he is just as skilled and experienced on ICO as many of the clearcut MP guys....
Many other MP guys (PlayerSlayer, Auqia, Slackah, WarNeverChanges, ARISEV, the list goes on) have participated in balance discussions, ICO etiquette discussions, and the like...none of the people I have mentioned up to this point are hardcore trolls...only 2 of the people I've mentioned thus far really troll to any degree...
So which MP people are actually true trolls? Nightraid3r? At least he posts replays, which is more than what a lot of people do to contribute to this community. Who else...Mecha_Lenin? Cpt. Siddy? Those guys hardly ever post...there's a few others that troll, but their either harmless (Teun-a-Roonius) or hardly ever post as well (Fallen_One)...
Maybe you're thinking of me when you say troll...sure, I troll...I also make oodles of posts giving advice in regards to strategy and etiqutte...I've heavily participated in balance discussions since diplomacy...I initiated and hosted a balance mod that was heavily influenced by community input (btw many of those changes got implemented in the v1.2x diplomacy updates, most likely due to the MP advocates in the "Special Thanks" category)...I've tested several mods and given feedback...I've helped new players on ICO, even played games with them specifically to help them get better...I've even PMed the devs on specific bugs and text file issues....
The vast majority of your MP people on these forums are hardly trolls...there's maybe a handful that troll on a regular basis, and of those, many still make valuable contributions to this community aside from their trolling...
Then I think of some of the true trolls...I mean, the guys who troll or act like asshats with virtually every post....like OddskiBoddski, who (though rather harmless) doesn't even play MP...then there's RiddleKing who never plays online...I think of the silly food porn wars between me and Boshimi (who btw hardly plays online)...I think of Semaz and SwissKnight (who are modders, have virtually nothing to do with MP)...
Then I think of some of the SP only guys who love to blame the MP community and conveniently forget all that it does...I mean seriously, you guys are just as good at pointing fingers and making blanket statements as the worst MP trolls are...
I made that line above for a reason...take every person I mentioned above that line (other than zombie) as well as all your other MP players I didn't mention...you know, all those asshat trollish MP guys you hate...take them away and what would you have left? Seriously, what would you have left? Mods for sure, and lots of mod support, but not much else...
The bug reports would be rare and far between...you'd have virtually no quality balance discussions...a lot of your mod testers would be gone...pretty much certain you wouldn't see any replays or casts...the advice that new players would get would be mostly crap, and just frustrate them even more...many of the changes in regards to gameplay would never have been fixed, and I'm not just talking about balance issues (broken features, frequency of MDs/desyncs/disconnects, etc.)...
Zombie, Goa...maybe Bilun, Bama, and 1 or 2 others (I assume they aren't MP but I could be wrong)...those would be the only people left in this community that actually understand this game and could give good advice or have solid, well-founded balance discussions...
I'm not by any means going to try and take away the contributions from modders, and I do acknowledge that SP guys do bring attention to some gameplay issues...but y'all are kidding yourselves if you think this would be a better place without the MP community...
Just wanted to point out too that the OP was talking about Sins ICO playerbase being dead or seeing a steady drop in numbers since release - not the game as a whole. There was really absolutely no reason for it to become SP vs. MP discussion. Nonetheless, I totally agree with Sel's overview of the forum and community.
The OP asked why the online scene was dead.
I gave my opinion that trolls might be ruining the online experience.
Seleuceia, Didn't you post a whole thread about that very issue?
So we are in agreement there, I didn't name names, you did.
Even if everything was spot on balance wise, the game will naturally have it's player base drop off..it's just the way things go once someone gets a taste and then moves on.
Sin doesn't taste as good as people think but its good enough for some to go back for seconds and thirds. There going to have to make a delicious improvement in the next big thing but they seems to be only like 14 or 20 devs working on rebellion at anyone time so you can imagine just how small the team and execution time is.
Lol....
I think it also stems from the fact that the game doesn't even run as smoothly as it can be in SP, to add lag and people who can't play MP, people just don't play it.
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