Server Population is GROWING!

[Andryah]

The Swiftsure 2-3 weeks ago used to have a que of an hour on weekends.

 

You are picking a corner case with obvious explanation.

 

Swiftsure is heavy with AU players, many who are over playing on their new local servers until they get character transfers.

[Barracudastr]

I wasn't very clear.

 

I wasn't referring to you directly as a doomsayer, I was referring to doomsayers in general.

 

Sorry for the misunderstanding.

 

Ah well in that case it makes sense .

 

No worries then.

 

I would love it if the servers were growing though >.<

[Pardraig]

Usually I don't weigh in on topics like this on MMO forums because it's usually just two camps of people flinging weightless arguments at each other.

What I will say is that Bioware and EA have released official subscriber numbers as well as a ton of metrics on game time played. I have only ever seen one other release official subscriber numbers and that is WoW. AoC released initial sales and so did WAR, but they lost so many subs so quickly that they never releases subscriber numbers. Unless the game is doing well, developers are careful to keep subscriber numbers ambiguous. Also, EA officially said there is 1.7 million active subs, and while some of those may be inactive players and whatnot, they can't lie about that number, so they're at least raking in the money,

Furthermore, they opened up servers in Asia, a move that usually isn't done so quickly after release, implying that there is at least some demand for this game.

I'm not saying they haven't lost players since release; they obviously have, there are no longer server queues. However, they must at least still have a decent playerbase over 2 months in to be doing what they're doing, and in my experience if an MMO can survive the first month without hemorrhaging subscriptions it's doing well.

As for the poster who said 'Players who quit tell their friends how bad the game are spreading bad word of mouth', have you considered that the gaming outlets and players who love this game might be singing it's praises? Not everyone hates this game y'know?

[Brickabrack]

Apparently the game population is no different than the stock exchange. They get spooked easily.

 

The only mistake BioWare made was letting you see the amount of people who are playing on a given world at a given time in the upper left hand corner of your screen as a constant reminder. WoW didn't make that mistake. You had to look for that information if you wanted to find it, not have it permanently stamped on your screen while you play.

 

I remember a few years ago when I played WoW, there were dozens of times when I would be the ONLY person in the zone I was in. Heck even in the Barrens I remember plenty of times when only 5 people were playing, sometimes on rare occasions, even less. I never once thought it was because the game was failing.

 

So it's weird to me that people here are so hyper alert to every population flux as though they think the game will drop out from under them if they have anything less than a "healthy" amount of people in the zone with them.

 

The mind boggles.

[Andryah]

doesn't change the validity of my statement.

 

I could have posted the same thing at 7pm or 8pm and you would have said its a weekday.

 

I could have posted the same thing on saturday night and you probably would have some other reason why theres no one on lol.

 

Because this thread constantly gets trolled by negative game posts, I check each night at 7:00 Pacific time. Last night, save for the usual 20 light servers (always been light btw) all servers were Standard or higher, there were 4 heavy, and 2 very heavy. About the same as a week ago.

Edited March 1, 2012 by Andryah

[Cerion]

 

That is a drop in the number of hours people are playing not increase.

 

 

There. Fixed that for you. I know you didn't mean confuse population with number of hours people are logged in.

[MuzzaFuzza]

The ability to move characters from servers would be a nice thing.

 

My guild i dead, Imperial Fleet is like 70 people, and everyone is just standing near the Combat Area.

[AJediKnight]

What I will say is that Bioware and EA have released official subscriber numbers as well as a ton of metrics on game time played.

 

Actually, I'm about ninety percent certain that Bioware has never released active subscription numbers, just the total of boxes sold.

[Azzras]

Actually, I'm about ninety percent certain that Bioware has never released active subscription numbers, just the total of boxes sold.

 

1.7 million active subs as stated on their last earning call.

 

Not here to get into the debate about those numbers people. Just reiterating what was stated.

[Andryah]

The ability to move characters from servers would be a nice thing.

 

They have already said this feature is coming, after they do their free NA/EU --> AP one time region transfers. They are doing that in April, so if you want something before late April, you are out of luck.

 

Legacy names gives them another layer of detail they have to work out compared to other MMOs for server transfers.

 

Personally, I would not want to see them rush into server transfers before they have fully debugged it. It would bork things up really badly.

Edited March 1, 2012 by Andryah

[Barracudastr]

You are picking a corner case with obvious explanation.

 

Swiftsure is heavy with AU players, many who are over playing on their new local servers until they get character transfers.

 

I was talking about the server BEFORE the new servers went up.

 

It has been at a steady decline for a month now.

 

And like you say it is losing even more now due to new servers for them.

[Darque]

I have been around a few MMO's and I have seen a few fail.

 

I started to get that 'this MMO is failing' feeling a week or so ago. MMO populations are fickle and if you don't get them excited and keep them excited, they go back to World of Tanks, LOL, etc. and wait for the next MMO...like Mechwarrior Online, etc.

 

So I came to the forums today to see if it was 'just me', or if others were sensing the same thing.

 

I am sad to say, it appears it is not just me.

[Andryah]

I was talking about the server BEFORE the new servers went up.

 

It has been at a steady decline for a month now.

 

Yeah, it went from Full/Very Heavy to Heavy/Very Heavy. The world is coming to an end.

 

Coincidentally this coincided almost exactly with the announcement of AP servers opening up.

Edited March 1, 2012 by Andryah

[Barracudastr]

They have already said this feature is coming, after they do their free NA/EU --> AP one time region transfers. They are doing that in April, so if you want something before late April, you are out of luck.

 

Legacy names gives them another layer of detail they have to work out compared to other MMOs for server transfers.

 

Personally, I would not want to see them rush into server transfers before they have fully debugged it. It would bork things up really badly.

 

The problem I see with transfers is people leaving okay servers and creating dead servers in the process.

 

A flip flop effect. Servers that were okay and healthy in comparison to others would then be suffering forcing people to move to another server.

 

How do you know what server is getting filled up? which ones are draining out.

 

Etc etc.

 

And after transfers come will bioware shut down servers that have such a minimal population its not worth keeping it open but rather move them to other servers?

 

Alot of issues can arise out of transfers after the dust settles.

[Ansultares]

I remember a few years ago when I played WoW, there were dozens of times when I would be the ONLY person in the zone I was in. Heck even in the Barrens I remember plenty of times when only 5 people were playing, sometimes on rare occasions, even less. I never once thought it was because the game was failing.

Mature MMO versus release MMO.

 

Bad sign when a MMO releases and within two months drops to mature activity levels.

[Andryah]

The problem I see with transfers is people leaving okay servers and creating dead servers in the process.

 

A flip flop effect. Servers that were okay and healthy in comparison to others would then be suffering forcing people to move to another server.

 

How do you know what server is getting filled up? which ones are draining out.

 

Etc etc.

 

And after transfers come will bioware shut down servers that have such a minimal population its not worth keeping it open but rather move them to other servers?

 

Alot of issues can arise out of transfers after the dust settles.

 

You know absolutely nothing about how or what process or rules they are going to apply for server transfers (none of us do yet), so everything you just said is pure speculative doomsdaying.

 

I get that you are sour on the game and on Bioware. No need to keep reinforcing it in every post.

Edited March 1, 2012 by Andryah

[Ansultares]

1.7 million active subs as stated on their last earning call.

1.7 million activated accounts, which includes free month players at the time (given that the numbers are at best from mid-late January). This number is basically as good as box sales, because from their end 2M units sold (including 40% online sales via Origin), could just mean that 300k units remained on store shelves (sold to distributors is still sold on their end).

 

Also, I edited the earlier post; Protus-AoC is the troll you remind me of.

Edited March 1, 2012 by Ansultares

[Barracudastr]

Yeah, it went from Full/Very Heavy to Heavy/Very Heavy. The world is coming to an end.

 

Coincidentally this coincided almost exactly with the announcement of AP servers opening up.

 

Well yes and no.

 

It went from 900 person que to no que to very heavy to heavy...

 

It only hits heavy maybe one hour on the weekends now.

 

And is light during the day. 3 weeks ago this was a server that was heavy during the day and ramped up from there.

 

That is a pretty big drop in population if you ask me. then throw on top of that the aussie players that left this week. our fleet has gone from having 240 people at prime time to maybe 150.

 

Sitting at 66 right now. At primetime it will probably ramp up to around 120ish but thats a 50% drop in population over the month of feb.

 

Sorry but that concerns me as a player when over half the people that normally play dont play. Of course some probably moved to aussie servers. But I know alot of them stayed for the simple fact their guilds are international and the overall ping for everyone is better then if they all moved to an aussie server.

[Ansultares]

Sitting at 66 right now. At primetime it will probably ramp up to around 120ish but thats a 50% drop in population over the month of feb.

Sounds like a similar drop to what I've seen on Jekk'Jekk Tarr, another one of those unofficial Oceanic servers.

 

Guess I can move to the Fatman; it'll be like the new Dark Crag.

[Azzras]

1.7 million activated accounts, which includes free month players at the time (given that the numbers are at best from mid-late January). This number is basically as good as box sales, because from their end 2M units sold (including 40% online sales via Origin), could just mean that 300k units remained on store shelves (sold to distributors is still sold on their end).

 

Also, I edited the earlier post; Protus-AoC is the troll you remind me of.

 

This is a doomsayer. For your reference.

 

[Cerion]

So it's weird to me that people here are so hyper alert to every population flux as though they think the game will drop out from under them if they have anything less than a "healthy" amount of people in the zone with them.

 

The mind boggles.

 

Yeah. I don't get this either. I've been playing MMOs for a dozen years now, and I've never seen such obsession over the numbers. There's a vast echo chamber of negativity that's been built up around this game, much of it unwarrented. I mean daily, even hourly, we see the ludicrous extent to which people will find fault with the game with their silly posts.

[Brickabrack]

Mature MMO versus release MMO.

 

Bad sign when a MMO releases and within two months drops to mature activity levels.

 

How do you figure? 1.7 million subs versus 10 million subs (at the time). At the time I experienced this, WoW had millions more active players, AND it was still gaining subs, since this was just before WOTLK. A lot of times playing through, you wouldn't know it, is my point.

 

By all means though, freak out. It's fun to watch.

[Cerion]

1.7 million activated accounts, which includes free month players at the time (given that the numbers are at best from mid-late January). This number is basically as good as box sales, because from their end 2M units sold (including 40% online sales via Origin), could just mean that 300k units remained on store shelves (sold to distributors is still sold on their end).

 

Also, I edited the earlier post; Protus-AoC is the troll you remind me of.

 

No. That was thru-sales...meaning in the hands of the consumer. The 300k difference was in fact a loss of subscribers, box sales from December that didn't convert to subs.

[Andryah]

Sorry but that concerns me as a player when over half the people that normally play dont play.

 

All you know from this is less people are playing at the same time. It tells you nothing else.

 

They could be trying other servers, they could be playing less, and yes we know some people quit (but no reason this server would be disproportionatey dropping due to cancels).

 

It's all speculation on your part, and mine for that matter.

[lordredace]

Ok just for general laughs how many of the people complaining about standard to heavy server loads and crying dooooooooooooooom were crying about que times and demanding more servers be created immediately?

 

Ive seen the same thing in WOW, for about 5 years now the general discussion is "OMG the game is dying everybody run"