It's time for a steamcharts thread!

[RexKraemer]

thx for info, I'll have to add my voice to steamcharts = unreliable numbers.

Reliable in which sense?
Say explicit and clear what you read from the numbers and I can tell you, if it is reliable or not.

Example:
Steam charts are currently (time frame X) higher than before X. Fact.
=> More players play E: D now

Reliable? Yes, to 100%!

It doesn't matter that some players currently (during time frame X) just have the launcher running and are not playing.
Why is that?
- every game at any time will have some players just idle, not playing
- the percentage of idle players will be more or less the same in every game and at any time

It does not change the reliability of your claim derived from the numbers.

Except if you derive wrong claims. Example: steam charts says "13425" so I claim there are exactly 13425 players playing E: D now.
But this claim is just ridiculous and even if someone says something like this it is not ment in this stringent sense.

Actually arguing about steam numbers and rejecting them in general is stupid like flat earth arguers.

 

[Kaocraft]

Yes, but a tipping point for who? There are others with more interest in the game where the tipping point might've been €20. And before that €25. And so on... Why should we assume that the amount of people who don't care about Elite but buy it for €15 would be higher than the amount of people who do care about it and buy it for €20?

Look I will 100% cop to the fact that what I am saying is pure spitballing speculation. But I don’t get why you think it’s reasonable to assume that the price/interest level would be a linear distribution. I don’t see why it is at all weird or counterintuitive to suggest that there might be a lot more people interested in giving Elite a try at $15 vs $25, never mind the $50 it normally costs.

The lowest either Elite or Horizons, individually, has been is around $12. So the lowest you could get the full game for, until the very recent sale, is around $24. The recent sale at $15 is an unprecedented drop in price. Even if we assume that there are multiple tiers of people waiting for a deal at $25, $20, $15, etc; the recent sale is such a deep discount that it’s going to cover multiple groups.

 

[Bob Lighthouse]

Reliable in which sense?
Say explicit and clear what you read from the numbers and I can tell you, if it is reliable or not.

Example:
Steam charts are currently (time frame X) higher than before X. Fact.
=> More players play E: D now

Reliable? Yes, to 100%!

It doesn't matter that some players currently (during time frame X) just have the launcher running and are not playing.
Why is that?
- every game at any time will have some players just idle, not playing
- the percentage of idle players will be more or less the same in every game and at any time

It does not change the reliability of your claim derived from the numbers.

Except if you derive wrong claims. Example: steam charts says "13425" so I claim there are exactly 13425 players playing E: D now.
But this claim is just ridiculous and even if someone says something like this it is not ment in this stringent sense.

Actually arguing about steam numbers and rejecting them in general is stupid like flat earth arguers.

That would be true if the data was collected in the same way with the same level of reliability at the two timepoints.
We know for a fact it is not, but they may have a passable workaround.

 

[StuartGT]

That would be true if the data was collected in the same way with the same level of reliability at the two timepoints.
We know for a fact it is not, but they may have a passable workaround.

False.

Concurrent players Steam data is collected in the same way now as it was years ago: directly from Steam's public pages.

 

[RexKraemer]

That would be true if the data was collected in the same way with the same level of reliability at the two timepoints.
We know for a fact it is not, but they may have a passable workaround.

This is just a special case for some special statistics.

I am talking in general with general examples against the "steam charts are in general false, wrong, unreliable, what ever" people.

And to your special argument that steam numbers now are not comparable to numbers before: Can you give me a link where to read about the changes in detail?

I would say there is no real change, because steam numbers are most simple as possible: How many clients have game X currently running from steam client.

This is so simple that I can't see how this could be changed in any way.

 

[Bob Lighthouse]

False.

Concurrent players Steam data is collected in the same way now as it was years ago: directly from Steam's public pages.

I don't use Steam so I may be mistaken with some nuance, am I missing something here?

Steam's New Privacy Settings Effectively Render SteamSpy, SteamCharts Useless

Valve's blog post explains that all users' game libraries will now be set to private by default, meaning all those floundering game libraries out there in cyberspace will be unreachable to SteamSpy. This is exactly what SteamSpy, and incidentally, other services like SteamCharts, used for gathering the very data that formed the backbone of both services.

https://www.shacknews.com/article/1...fectively-render-steamspy-steamcharts-useless

 

[lysan]

well just checked my friends list, many of them have not been active for many month, now i'm not saying the game is dying because it's not, juts that some of the old players have take a very long break from the game.
The new updates really make a difference but then again the game need something more to keep it alive.

 

[RexKraemer]

I don't use Steam so I may be mistaken with some nuance, am I missing something here?

https://www.shacknews.com/article/1...fectively-render-steamspy-steamcharts-useless

Ok, here is the missunderstanding:
When I talk about steam charts I typically mean the raw numbers you can see in the steam client under "Stats" menu.

Your link is about charts produced by external pages which get numbers through steam api.

To adress the issue:

Currently it is about that current numbers of players are on "all-time" high => game is healthy, no doom anywhere, ...

As the changes in the steam privacy setting will affect the raw numbers only to decrease the above conclusion is not falsified by this change.

In general you are right. These changes have to be considered depending on the claim you try to make. But it is in no way an always valid argument against any steam charts or derived works.

 

[StuartGT]

I don't use Steam so I may be mistaken with some nuance, am I missing something here?





https://www.shacknews.com/article/1...fectively-render-steamspy-steamcharts-useless

Yep, that the article writer didn't understand the situation.

Both SteamSpy and SteamCharts collect "concurrent players now" stats direct from Steam's public pages. You can do it yourself this very moment: go to a game's community page, and at the top is "w,xyz playing now".

What Steam's privacy changes did was stop SteamSpy from gathering "owners of this game" from each users' personal pages. SteamCharts has never recorded owners so was unaffected.

The concurrent players stat is as accurate now as it has ever been.

 

[EUS]

Reliable in which sense?

The fact I idle in the menu, but am playing a different game, or watching TV, or making dinner, or otherwise not playing ED makes the numbers unreliable.
At best it's a licence counter, but not indicative of the qty of people playing the game.

 

[RexKraemer]

The fact I idle in the menu, but am playing a different game, or watching TV, or making dinner, or otherwise not playing ED makes the numbers unreliable.
At best it's a licence counter, but not indicative of the qty of people playing the game.

As I said: it counts the numbers of clients currently running game X from steam client.

Nobody ever said anything else, so why is this not reliable? It is clearly a reliable number in the sense it is the true number. This is trivial.

What you mean or imply is:

It is not reliable, that Elite Dangerous is doing well, just because the steam numbers are currently on a high. Because this is how this thread started (more or less).

Now I would like to have this elaborated:

Why is this not reliable?
Can steam numbers tell us if enough people are actually playing and still buying the game to ensure future development?

 

[babelfisch]

So does idling in the main menu count for active users in the steam charts?
I did that most of all day, yesterday.

That's completely irrelevant to the topic because idling in the main menu was possible before.

 

[babelfisch]

Yeah, its interesting how Steam numbers only matter when they go up. But when they're down - like, for 3 years on end - its completely irrelevant.

The steam numbers aren't going down since 3 years, they are pretty stable.

 

[Bob Lighthouse]

Ok, here is the missunderstanding:
When I talk about steam charts I typically mean the raw numbers you can see in the steam client under "Stats" menu.

Your link is about charts produced by external pages which get numbers through steam api.

To adress the issue:

Currently it is about that current numbers of players are on "all-time" high => game is healthy, no doom anywhere, ...

As the changes in the steam privacy setting will affect the raw numbers only to decrease the above conclusion is not falsified by this change.

In general you are right. These changes have to be considered depending on the claim you try to make. But it is in no way an always valid argument against any steam charts or derived works.

So Steam Charts /= Steam charts?
Because Valve is referring specifically to Steam Charts data in that article, (edit) from what I gather.
And that data is tainted according to them.

It's a single direction confound/problem so increased numbers would not be shown to their full extent, and a decrease might not be true at all, or be overstated.

 

[babelfisch]

thx for info, I'll have to add my voice to steamcharts = unreliable numbers.

That depends on what you are doing whith the data. If you are in the launcher is irrelevant to the point being made.

 

[babelfisch]

People having time to play videogamez in december. Must be a christmas miracle. Oh wait.

It's not the first December in the history of Elite, try again.

 

[Bob Lighthouse]

Yep, that the article writer didn't understand the situation.

Both SteamSpy and SteamCharts collect "concurrent players now" stats direct from Steam's public pages. You can do it yourself this very moment: go to a game's community page, and at the top is "w,xyz playing now".

What Steam's privacy changes did was stop SteamSpy from gathering "owners of this game" from each users' personal pages. SteamCharts has never recorded owners so was unaffected.

The concurrent players stat is as accurate now as it has ever been.

Do you have anything to support that claim?

It seems that privacy settings should affect that too.

To wit:

This is exactly what SteamSpy, and incidentally, other services like SteamCharts, used for gathering the very data that formed the backbone of both services.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

I wonder, have any of those who were comparing NMS players vs Elite players, just after the Next update, based on steam charts already posted?

Look how 1 guy and his dog put the 100s of developers from Frontier to shame!

You know .... those guys?

 

[babelfisch]

Look I will 100% cop to the fact that what I am saying is pure spitballing speculation. But I don’t get why you think it’s reasonable to assume that the price/interest level would be a linear distribution. I don’t see why it is at all weird or counterintuitive to suggest that there might be a lot more people interested in giving Elite a try at $15 vs $25, never mind the $50 it normally costs.

The lowest either Elite or Horizons, individually, has been is around $12. So the lowest you could get the full game for, until the very recent sale, is around $24. The recent sale at $15 is an unprecedented drop in price. Even if we assume that there are multiple tiers of people waiting for a deal at $25, $20, $15, etc; the recent sale is such a deep discount that it’s going to cover multiple groups.

Because it's what statistical data suggests. Do you know when the most sales for any given game happen? At release, when the price is highest. From there on sales become less and less, which is the reason we have discounts in the first place.

 

[EUS]

That depends on what you are doing whith the data. If you are in the launcher is irrelevant to the point being made.

I was discussing semantics. Steam lists everyone as active players. I disagree. That's it.
But I struck some nerves here, so I better stop before some heads explode.