Do you or Don't you care?

[Rigwyn]

As for rebuilding I'm not suggesting getting out there and role playing, rather I'm suggesting something much more passive.
Rebuild the playground.

I don't thing the playground I'd that hard to fix. Fix and people might be attracted.
Set it up so that it encourages rp and perhaps new players will be affected by it and become roleplayers.


I might be oversimplifying things.

If I want mold, I can try night and day to make it, but I will fail.
If I create a warm moist environment and wait, the mold will appear.

( Analogy blissfully ignores that fact that mold spores need to be present in the air )

[Nivm]

 If you want to attract role-players, it wont be taverns, playgrounds, or graphics. Those are what you need to keep a community you already have. To bring people into the game, you need to work with the first things seen and heard; what they hear from other people, and what the see when they fist visit the site.
 Have you had any moments on this game where you could say something really great happened? Something you will remember years from now and laugh about it with a friend who knows nothing of? A game needs to generate stories*, not of the novel kind, nor of the scripted kind, but of the living kind; the sort where you not only want to tell it to someone, but they want to listen.
 When people first come to the site and read about it, it seems like a documentary or history book. I enjoy that kind of thing, but it gives most people the feeling that the game really is dead; borked links and uncertain information support this. If you wish the community to be active, design the site so it appears active; it becomes its own self-fulfilling prophecy.

*Examples: Boatmurdered is a succession game/fortress commonly used to advertise Dwarf Fortress, and the Fire Ignorance bugs and such. The game also has the motto "Losing is Fun", and the players often dub glitches as features because they're fun. Nist Akath is a story fort/game that is referenced over the entire DF community.

 I know I'm still a "newbie" here, but I feel my words apply to any game community.

[Dracaeon]

If I want mold, I can try night and day to make it, but I will fail.
If I create a warm moist environment and wait, the mold will appear.

( Analogy blissfully ignores that fact that mold spores need to be present in the air )

If I create a fridge and a sandwich, the mold will appear >.<

Happens far too often...

[kaerli2]

If you want to attract role-players, it wont be taverns, playgrounds, or graphics. Those are what you need to keep a community you already have. To bring people into the game, you need to work with the first things seen and heard; what they hear from other people, and what the see when they fist visit the site.
 Have you had any moments on this game where you could say something really great happened? Something you will remember years from now and laugh about it with a friend who knows nothing of? A game needs to generate stories*, not of the novel kind, nor of the scripted kind, but of the living kind; the sort where you not only want to tell it to someone, but they want to listen.
 When people first come to the site and read about it, it seems like a documentary or history book. I enjoy that kind of thing, but it gives most people the feeling that the game really is dead; borked links and uncertain information support this. If you wish the community to be active, design the site so it appears active; it becomes its own self-fulfilling prophecy.

*Examples: Boatmurdered is a succession game/fortress commonly used to advertise Dwarf Fortress, and the Fire Ignorance bugs and such. The game also has the motto "Losing is Fun", and the players often dub glitches as features because they're fun. Nist Akath is a story fort/game that is referenced over the entire DF community.

 I know I'm still a "newbie" here, but I feel my words apply to any game community.

Yes...PS.it definitely needs to be improved drastically.  Much of the history/Settings information there is semi-obsolete, and the news releases are too sporadic for anyone to follow.  Perhaps a new site is in order...?

[Nivm]

 Only a new site if the majority wants a change in style. It looks like this has been on the figurative back-burner too long; just start with the bare-minimum text edits so at least something gets done. The news says it has been two weeks since the update; wouldn't the changes have been marked down by then? Or if things are updated on day-to-day basis, shouldn't the developer involved keep track and update the corresponding articles?
 I managed to start playing the game, and I'm creating a list of things to check off against the bug tracker.

[...]
We are working on all the items above, fun factor included. A number of quite important changes are coming to address the items above. Obviously I don't like to see players number decreasing, but I'm sure more players will come when we release new features, and PS is getting better every day. Let's say that players are just more demanding seeing the games present on the market I'm very confident in what PS can become, and I suggest you to continue to have fun, invite your friends to play, and support us as you are doing. We will work on making PS better and in getting more players as well.

I really should have read the entire thread before, but only just did. This part made me shiver, and I'm not sure why everyone just took it in stride.

[Zweitholou]

I care.  I've just been busy lately.  I'll see what I can do here and there this summer.

[PhoenixRizin]

If you look at other areas of the net, you'll see exactly why the player base has dwindled so much.

Most people here have a MySpace account I would assume. A huge part of that number probably just stops by now once in a blue to check it. So what happened? They put ads all over the place, cluttered the interface, tried to be a Facebook clone with all the apps, and generally became unusable. And they did this over a very short period of time.

Planeshift is very much the same. I'll admit, people wanted new features, myself included. They begged and pleaded for them. As a response, Planeshift tried to take a HUGE leap over a very short period of time. This caused many people to be unable to operate the game, whether it was from low specs on their comps to the game just not loading at all. I think this rush to grow up overnight was a result of mounting tensions within the community, and a rush to satisfy the masses.

As Rigwyn said, the playground needs to be fixed first. Problem one has always been that to even get the game going requires more hacking than any casual gamer should have to go through. Goal one should be to have something that works out of the box, without tweaking settings files and going through system folders. Problem two is that once players are in the game, it lags more than games with tons more concurrent users, much larger environments, and much higher variety of in game items/clothes/player models. And the current third problem as stated before is that many can't even launch the game in the first place.

Though PlaneShift is a role-playing game, right now its future, both of getting older players to return as well as new players to stay, rests solely on the probably overworked shoulders of the coders. Perhaps its the 3D engine. Perhaps its the code for the game settings. Whatever it is, something on the technical end needs to be optimized to allow players to spend less time trying to get it to work and more time focusing on roleplay. This may mean rolling a whole new client altogether and starting from the ground up. But buildings can't stand on weak foundation, so perhaps this is the best time to start rebuilding, taking what has been learned and making it even better. Starting over is not a step back unless you don't learn from mistakes.

Once everything gets rolling, people will play and hopefully heal and rebuild the fractured community. I've certainly had fun times playing when I could get on, and wouldn't mind popping in once in a while to have a little fun (or mischief) again.

And Illysia...I understand it isn't very fun to have such an establishment without customers, but these days, there just aren't enough to go around. Don't give up on it, but don't be afraid to go out on some adventures elsewhere either. If they rebuild it, they will come.

[Candy]

[...]
We are working on all the items above, fun factor included. A number of quite important changes are coming to address the items above. Obviously I don't like to see players number decreasing, but I'm sure more players will come when we release new features, and PS is getting better every day. Let's say that players are just more demanding seeing the games present on the market I'm very confident in what PS can become, and I suggest you to continue to have fun, invite your friends to play, and support us as you are doing. We will work on making PS better and in getting more players as well.

I really should have read the entire thread before, but only just did. This part made me shiver, and I'm not sure why everyone just took it in stride.

Because those of us that stick with the game just understand that to be the way things work around here. You make your own fun in PS. People that don't find it fun don't typically hang around, check out the forums without getting scared off by all the flaming and drama, and then decide it'd be a good idea to help make it more fun, be that contributing, joining the team or helping/running a player-run area and/or just plain roleplaying more.

I go do something else when I want to be guaranteed fun instead of walking around, /greeting everyone, and hoping it'll lead to roleplay - or sit around just staying in touch through tells, treating PS like an unnecessarily bulky IM client that I can rarely even play a podcast alongside of without crashing. But I still try every once in a while, because I'm clinging desperately to the hope that someday there will be some fun in PS again, even if a lot of the people I used to enjoy roleplaying have given up and moved on. That something else often being play a game that does have roleplayers, most of whom can actually run the client relatively smoothly, have fun helping each other level when we have some goal in mind (mind-blowing concept, isn't it?) and do care about keeping the RP alive. Either that or I just write my own darn stories, even if it would be more fun if I didn't know how my antagonist/annoying sidekick/etc was gonna react to my character's actions. Questing isn't fun, mining isn't fun, cracking rat skulls so I can eventually progress to ulbernaut skulls isn't fun (and no, I am not going to contribute donate my work to try to make it more fun - but that's another can of worms altogether).  It kills some time, but I'd rather be roleplaying. If that means finding some BS reason for my character to stray from their regular activities so I can go to the "hotspots", fine. Better to allow for some change of heart in your characters even if it doesn't make sense, or even roll new characters, than sit around an empty town.

Also, I'm totally with Jonoth on the above post - either a redo or just making the game playable without having to hold the hands of us non-techie people that want to run PS would be awesome.

[Illysia]

Ok, let's work back here...

But I still try every once in a while, because I'm clinging desperately to the hope that someday there will be some fun in PS again, even if a lot of the people I used to enjoy roleplaying have given up and moved on.

  Ok, this is it! This is the whole reason I ever struggle with PS summed up in one statement. It's a sentiment I share and know that several former PS players have buzzing around in the back of their minds. Thank you Candy.

@PhoenixRizin: Yes, the playerbase took a major hit when most of the people couldn't log in and you should see the current state of the cooking process and the cookbook. Coders are desperately needed. I think stabilizing the current client and shoring up the server would go a long way. People might be more tolerant of other coding set backs if they can at least get and stay in game.

@Zweitholou: Hiya Zwei.


In general, I think new is the wrong way to go.... New got us into this mess. I think fixing what is there should be a higher priority as it is already more than enough.

[bloodedIrishman]

I care.

[Xoel]

I wouldn't say "new" got us into this "mess", merely, PS had a fair amount of catching up to do. Now the code supports a fair amount of that catchup, there's some ripples to iron out. Everyone egged on "we want mounts" "we want detail maps" "we want cloaks/hoods/softcloth outfits"....

You can't say adding new features gets us into this mess or say we should stop adding new features to PS simple so there's less bugs.

Those who code new features usually don't bugfix. And vice-versa. Not to mention FINDING bugs in code, let alone figuring a way to recode to fix them, and not cause more issues, is VERY HARD. To stop adding new features and try focussing those on assets would mean no wishlist additions for years. Decades perhaps. Just as focussing on new stuff and not bugfixing at all would lead to code that doesn't work, period, in a matter of weeks/months. It's a fine balance, remember everyone is a volunteer, and can only work to whatever skills they have. We're not pros, heck, I've only known how to use Blender to a level of competency for about a year.

[Illysia]

Trust me, I know a thing or two about contributing. I Also know how quickly people go from "Oh cool! We got X." to "Man... I can't even stay in the game for 5 minutes without lagging out or crashing." I've talk to too many people who would like to play the game but can't for bugs keeping them out. Wishlist stuff is nice, but a lot of people can just appreciate the game as it is as long as the RP is sound. If you really like a game, you don't need constant bells and whistles added. Don't get me wrong, they are nice, but PS could be enjoyed even at it's previous states *cough* crystal hunting with Hydlaa as the only city *cough* If the client issues with logging in could be ironed out some more, I think we'd see a rise in player numbers. I know there are a lot of people out there lurking that would come back to PS if their clients weren't giving them trouble.. You know who you are. 

[Xoel]

So you obviously don't remember that the decline started before 0.5 was even released, because people were bored of not having new things added. Sure, it accelerated afterward, but they were already leaving because the game just wasn't keeping up or keeping people interested.

[Roled]

Please allow me to offer my anecdotal experience/

I have now played PS for two full years. My first two months were challenging due to what I now know as 'mechanics'. But the initial role playing was was lured me in, and frankly the challenging nature of the quests kept me in. Some were easy enough, some I felt so proud when I figured them out myself, some I couldn't figure out and role players helped me IC, which taught me alot.

Then i was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time with a certain skill and got a prize from Jayose, which enabled me to quickly max my stats (by then I knew what that meant AND what it did for my ability to play the game). Without that prize I think my little elf would still be struggling along.

My point is the role playing and the cleverness of the quests kept me in game. For me it was cool to get new stuff but that was much less appealing than earning glyphs. The day I finally made it into the Winch was ridiculously fun.

My guess is there is a natural cycle within the generations of players within the game. You start. Everything is new and hard. You get help, you learn, you remember, you learn the lore, it helps with the quests, things get easier, so you start working on the harder stuff. Your character gets deeper, you develop history in your ig relationships. The rps get more involved cause you know more characters.

Then comes the time when, no matter what stuff is in or not, you feel like you've been there done that. You spend more time in the forums talking about the game, which is less time ig. Like me right now.... You grow out of it.

Now BIG new stuff might change that, in my ingame time the big new stuff has been rivnaks and drifters and mobs that are impossible to kill. But if what , a new race appeared, a crystal eclipse happened, a new city or map opened, a new set of quests came in, then my guess is even oldbies would come to check it out and play again until the newness is exhausted.

There are declines. There are increases. The newbies become the oldbies ~then perhaps become the jaded and leave either without fanfare or in a burst of flames.

[Nivm]

 I failed to do this twice now, hard, but I think I got the clarification down.

 What I was worried about in response to Talad's post (and many others now) is that they are treating it like a job. He speaks of working to make the game fun, when such a thing is impossible. Games are an art piece that turns out best only when the artist is having fun. They shouldn't be doing it to appease their player base, they shouldn't be doing to compare to some other game out there; they should be doing it because it's the one thing they really enjoy.


 Oh, and I would love for there to be some massive catastrophy that even Talad and Laanx together have trouble coping with. Like the stalagtite falling into that massive lake. Or that one thing I would like to RP some day.