What a testament to Elite Dangerous, to have that much playtime!
FDev should use such taglines in marketing videos
"d8veh - over 9000 hrs"
Player Retention
- Thread starter Red Rocket
- Start date
FDev should use such taglines in marketing videos
"d8veh - over 9000 hrs"
Yes, but all that's pretty irrelevant. This thread is about player retention, not about who should've done what with the Gnosis and what went right/wrong. Only the effect of that event is important in this respect. Some players loved it. Most didn't. The result of the lead-up to and aftermath of the gnosis event can be seen on the Steam charts. About 10% of Steam players stopped playing after the event. There's no reason not to assume that Steam players are not typical of all players.
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Indeed.
Though, actually, there's also a fair bit of involvement of players and player groups - just again, on Frontier's terms and without advance (or often even retrospective) hype:
- the whole Alliance/Aegis arc is fairly strongly tied to what happened in Witch Head after the media had gone home
- at least a few details of who now runs the Marlinist Colonies (and especially that it's not a mish-mash of nearby PMFs) is entirely down to the players who formed a group to adopt them
- the Paresa CG would have at the very least been much closer without Hadrian Duval having been adopted by a sizable group since his first unsuccessful appearance
- conversely the Federal defections have in part run out of steam because the newly independent factions have on average fared no better outside and no-one's shown much interest in supporting them in the background
- handing out naming rights during the Colonia Bridge CGs has let a lot of players and groups get a permanent marker of their efforts
- creative unofficial opposition to Salvation's superweapon was acknowledged
- "Fednecks" (and a few other examples)
Deleted member 182079
D
That's one way to interpret it.
Another way is, people engaged because the Gnosis event was something special, after it concluded things settled down and people may have gone back to play something else instead.
Whenever NMS release new content I log on and play it a bit - after that, I move back to whatever else I'm playing at the time - doesn't mean I rage-uninstalled it because I hated the content that was added.
Your post on retention made me look through my friends list. Most haven’t played for 20 months or longer. Nobody has played in the last five months.
I also looked through the comments on the forum and saw nobody I recognize from before about 2017.
-- ah, spotted a comment by Stealthie.
I also looked through the comments on the forum and saw nobody I recognize from before about 2017.
-- ah, spotted a comment by Stealthie.
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About that, NMS' features have no depth. Every derelict freighter is identical and living ships work the same as regular ships, but worse. If living ships could be like Thargoids and pull targets out of hyperspace and have their own unique health system, and if Derelict Freighters ended up in completely different states (burning next to star, cut in half across the bridge), then maybe we wouldn't get bored as quickly. As it seems, Sean is just going to push out more shallow content monthly riding on the 'wow' factor that you get from a (seemingly) big new feature. Now Elite has 0 passion behind it as of 2015 but at least there's enough depth to its features (especially combat) (save for planets and their surfaces) to keep us here for long.
So I have been playing this game since launch and here are my two cents for what its worth...
PG and SOLO: not gonna be popular here but this ruins the game for longevity. player interaction that drives content is what keeps people playing. Its fine for when your just getting your space legs and all but at some point you really should begin engineering your ship to survive in open. You don't have to want to PvP or anything but a properly engineered ship and simple tactics almost guarantees survival. Playing alone or with the same couple of people doing the same thing every day like exploring, bounty hunting, CZs gets old, believe me I tried this when i first started out. Eventually getting invested in the game is gonna mean stepping out into open.
Join a Group: Join a power play or BGS group. This will give you tons of content, including RP politics, BGS and PP objectives which in turn leads to conflict. Again this should be done in open to fully experience the thrill of conflict. Once you have engineered your ship up, just killing NPCs gets boring after while because its easy mode. No one sticks with game long just doing easy mode. It gets old and repetitive. Open play allows for a actual player group vs player group war! So you may eat a rebuy, who cares, you can grind money easy enough in this game. Get a wing together and experience a war the way it was meant to be fought!.
Other groups are great for exploring together (puked in my mouth a little there) Personally I can't stand exploring, but i do understand some people love it. I would think standing shoulder to shoulder with other explorers in a group would have more appeal than being alone. Some groups organize events. For example, my group once organized a SRV soccer match that was a blast! We used an orb for the ball and "kicked" that thing all over the place, all while running our SRVs head long into each other. It was a blast. The point is, being in an active group will help keep you coming back for more.
Long story short in summary... get yourself engineered properly, join a group, do a little RP or whatever and try new stuff from time to time. Don't be afraid of open play. Ignore toxic players, don't block, but DO turn off system chat (super toxic sometimes) and carry on. Many people who may try to blow you up will actually help you get better if you want. Anyways... Hope to see more of you in the black CMDRs.
Rambo the 13th
PG and SOLO: not gonna be popular here but this ruins the game for longevity. player interaction that drives content is what keeps people playing. Its fine for when your just getting your space legs and all but at some point you really should begin engineering your ship to survive in open. You don't have to want to PvP or anything but a properly engineered ship and simple tactics almost guarantees survival. Playing alone or with the same couple of people doing the same thing every day like exploring, bounty hunting, CZs gets old, believe me I tried this when i first started out. Eventually getting invested in the game is gonna mean stepping out into open.
Join a Group: Join a power play or BGS group. This will give you tons of content, including RP politics, BGS and PP objectives which in turn leads to conflict. Again this should be done in open to fully experience the thrill of conflict. Once you have engineered your ship up, just killing NPCs gets boring after while because its easy mode. No one sticks with game long just doing easy mode. It gets old and repetitive. Open play allows for a actual player group vs player group war! So you may eat a rebuy, who cares, you can grind money easy enough in this game. Get a wing together and experience a war the way it was meant to be fought!.
Other groups are great for exploring together (puked in my mouth a little there) Personally I can't stand exploring, but i do understand some people love it. I would think standing shoulder to shoulder with other explorers in a group would have more appeal than being alone. Some groups organize events. For example, my group once organized a SRV soccer match that was a blast! We used an orb for the ball and "kicked" that thing all over the place, all while running our SRVs head long into each other. It was a blast. The point is, being in an active group will help keep you coming back for more.
Long story short in summary... get yourself engineered properly, join a group, do a little RP or whatever and try new stuff from time to time. Don't be afraid of open play. Ignore toxic players, don't block, but DO turn off system chat (super toxic sometimes) and carry on. Many people who may try to blow you up will actually help you get better if you want. Anyways... Hope to see more of you in the black CMDRs.
Rambo the 13th
If it was that easy...
It is just common sense. If you fly a T9 with no shields in open you probably deserve to get blow up. Get yourself a Cutter if you want to trade in open. Engineering those shields properly and knowing to submit to the interdiction and highwake is gonna save you rebuys. Get in a group that has experience in Open and likely someone can give you engineering advice for most ships to survive a gank.
I think you need to realise that what you look for in a game isn't what others look for.
In fact I'd suggest that it's the explorers and the players who appreciate a solo game for itself rather than needing other people to be involved, who are more likely to stay with a game long term and be easier to retain. In other contexts I get told that "the PvPers have already left this game".
We are talking about playing a game for a protracted period of time, if your a casual player and new to the game then, yes, PG may be an option. But we are talking about playing the game long term, in which engineering should be a priority so you can get on to the next level
There isn't any "next level".
I am simply trying to offer options that I have found are useful over the last 7 years. As for the next level, its simply an expression. Fully engineering a ship will feel like next level compared to a vanilla ship. I guess you can chose to be negative all time or you can constructively talk about options for the OPs question
I like engineering and I bring all my ships up to G5 where possible. However there are players who never bother with it and they enjoy the game too.
Some players focus on PvP; they obviously engineer. Others do mainly PvE, either in squadrons or solo.
I don't see any trend for more cooperative or PvP players to stay in the game longer than solo players. In fact from my observation the opposite is true. Some explorers are the longest-playing people I know. I therefore think your idea that people would be more likely to play long-term if they focus on engineering, Open play and conflict is incorrect.
The game is full of bugs, the DLC was a rip off of money, boring and not connected with the rest of the game, the optimization is rubbish, the VR doesn't exists any more. do u want to continue to play a game like this? seems most of the player don't. More than half of the daily player left. In my opinion they have to to create a link between foot and ship life, add event to play in group, fun event not just grind and make the VR playable again to get were they were. (and please leave out the boring interior of the ship)
I am playing since the Gamma, with a little break of few years due to health issues. I am now playing more casually and not everyday as before.
My ships are engineered mostly to G5 since i got back, however i don't have time to or want to have any encounters with people when i am in The Bubble, so i play in PG almost exclusively.
The other thing is that i play with VR and to get a good screenshot in VR it needs to be the high-quality one, and you cannot do that in Open.
I am having a lot of fun all these years, so what's your point?
And yeah, i am an explorer.
To each their own. If it works for you, you do you.
![BigBANGtheory [VR]](https://forums-cdn.zaonce.net/data/avatars/m/71/71385.jpg?1644873788){kind=avatar}
its a good rebut therefore it deserves a good answer.
Frontiers Way is... To recycle gameplay over a universe without real progress.
Glass Walls is... To try and progress story, lore, discovery without results i.e. you try to learn and progress but the reality is its so hard to do so or its RNG or worse its fed as clues to select groups...