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My Opinion: Why WWIIOL is dead.
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A couple of years back squads use to do that even with AO's (they would set off ews before an AO then despawn a minute later and swap towns). If a side is perpared to be organised and do a good deception then they should be 'rewarded' by bluffing the defenders.
You say it's boring but do you really think a squad would spawn then despawn at say 3+FB's? When they did do it they would spawn at one then switch to their real one. I am not familiar with a squad setting of heavy fake ews
Another thing I would propose is pushing FB's back 500m-1km to allow more interdiction. This would also mean that if attackers wanted to set of fake ews they would have to drive say 1km before it gets set off (thus they would be wasting time they could otherwise spent setting the real attack).
In the current guise the game simply does not reward players actions enough. Wants the point of intersecting trucks when infantry can walk fru's in. Whats the point of sneaking round and blowing a fru when a new one is going to pop up in 8 minutes etc (and crs want to make it even less rewarding by introducting 'daisy chain' fru's. When one goes down a new one pops right up nearby)
The answer is yes. Most squads pre AO/HC had a air wing as well as boots on the ground 101st had constant fly overs on EWS warnings on towns. Between both ground and air oversight we many times busted major attacks before they even got close to town.
Heck we tracked the 94th as they went cross country many times with just EWS and air catching them outside of towns. The best one was when they pushed for verdun and we cuaght them with a battery of AT guns towed up to the hill above the town. Was a slaughter house before it was over. Some of the best fun I ever had in a game came from those times.
So yes it is possible very much so.
Man, I can remember the days being spotted by enemy air recon in massive armor columns.
Everyone would pull off road and grab cover.
15-20 tanks, scared shatless
Yeah, when you had 20 guys on (our standard), it's amazing how quickly you could setup guns all around. There was a reason why folks complained at the time on the forums that you couldn't easily tow 10 guns on a single truck due to lag causing... issues. If it didn't happen, we wouldn't be talking about the great gameplay from way back then. If we had the stat's, I'd love to compare ATG use per person hour in those days compared to now.
To be honest, with MSP and such in the current system, there wasn't much reason to setup ATG's. With the flood from all directions of inf, on top of all the extra and easy to navigate (run down the middle of as there's no trunk/branches) cover, ATG's got cleared out easily even with inf trying to help. Hell I've killed EI by running over them with my ATG in those bushes, impossible to keep EI away of rifle range from your ATGs. Besides, kill eight trucks and miss one and you still have a full army spawning behind you, pointless. Once I moved my inf playing to another game but stuck around for ATGs which were still mostly unique to wwiion, my ATG gaming also dropped off due to that.
Range limits to MSP points would help out greatly, so at least you can pick the non spawnable side of a city to setup.
Just to clarify, I think we have some issues here with gameplay and AO's as things are getting labled either/or when it's not really. It came up at the time on the play forums also.
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Gameplay was good. We had a huge population with some very dedicated people taking their time to run squads just because it was good. Long playing hours, mixed variety of combat and yes things like ATGs getting setup in time and great counter attacks did work.
That does NOT mean full campings didn't happen. Yes sometimes a camp could be slammed down with little chance to defend, especially depending on the town, it's type and location.
That also does NOT mean camping ALWAYS happened and situations like getting defense up in time didn't happen while using EWS only. Saying AO's are needed if defense is to be setup is assuming this is the case, incorrect.
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So we didn't need AO's to make good varied combat, or to allow defense to be up in time. Come to think of it, getting caught half way in setting up a defence is as much as part of the game as running smack into a fully setup one on attack. That's variety.
I think part of the problem was even with all the good battles, there still was a vocal group on the forums complaining about the camps that did happen (as forums tend to go lol). That's where lots of the 'if you don't like camps, don't spawn into one and defend the next city' threads popped up in playschool.
Believe me when I tell you that the company behind this game is really incompetent; they can't even run a decent youtube channel so any marketing effort like you mentioned is probably the attempt of a few players.
I mean there's negative press, and then there's really embarrassing facts like CRS doesn't have a coder, that their kickstarter didn't even garner 500 pledges, that the peak server population is 200-350 and is frequently much lower than that. Screenshots of the employees berating players for winning, referring to trial players as freeloaders, etc. Some of us have thrown out some good suggestions I guess but they are going to be ignored by the developers like they have been for years.
Like right now, sure it sounds nice that players are talking about changes to the game structure but it's all just idle chatter. The company can't code their own game and even if they could the egos of the last remaining developers are too big to allow a new system.
Then add in the fact that you have a group of players who've invested years in this high command system, who value their positions and influence within the game and will fight any changes.
So I would like it to, but nothing is going to happen. If they do get a coder they'll probably have him/her work on Rapid Assault or some other nonsense. They supposedly have 150 people paying $30 a month now and none of them there can figure out a database, or hire someone who can.
And this is why Planetside 2 is successful and why Planetside 1 was successful. Not because they limited the players ability to play, but they left the game UP TO THE PLAYERS!
So much crap, so little quality.
I'm still astonished at the massive resistance to this concept at CRS. They now have years of declining population and numerous incidents of drama yet they're still not budging.
CRS can't build a decent theme park, and the high commands can't either. So they don't have an open world experience, so-called emergent events and game play aren't really present and neither is a more regimented but reliably fun experience. Are they just going to sit in the middle(which they can't do with such a graphically outdated game with so few updates) until the lights go out or something?
Now that stats are down you don't hardly know who you are fighting and killing, so there's not as much rivalry as there was before. So if you're the type that stopped caring about the map and just log in to have fun, you can't see who you killed or look back on how well you've done.
Oh I believe you, I've been there, well not with WWIIOL but with some other games that felt great but had so much room for improvements/fixes/polish.
It's a shame that if a game is loved even if the pop. is small compared to today's MMO standard that it seems no one really listens to those playing.
Example I've been there with SWG where we the actually players wanted fixes, polish, instead they developers/gamecompany listend to the greatest winners that even stopped playing because they felt there was to much reading, to complex, no guidens and above all not enough content (while for me there hasn't been a MMORPG that offered as much content like SWG did for me.
But I keep by my point and that is when a game is suposed to be seen dead it's best to fully stop talking about it.
If people actually stopped talking about the games they dislike we might send a much larger message, cause all the talk even if it's negative is still food for developers to let them hope they once get their player base back. Would everyone stop talking about game X then developers will know they are in deep trouble.
Yeah, that seems to make sense.
Now that I've gotten in touch with a lot of former players I'm talking more with them via email or even on their squad forums than here. I think that pretty much everything has been discussed here anyway, and since the devs aren't going to change there's no point in continuing it.
I think Reklaw is a secret agent of CRS
He attempts to call people's 'bluff' by making a weak accusation that they are making negative discussions to infact promote the game through "reverse psychology". He then says the best thing to do is stop talking about the game (and thus no more negative views are expressed).
Good Spot Reklaw - probably because this game is indeed not dead. Just people who would seem to want it that way, although there has been an increase in the quality of the discussion in this thread (less BS, more discussion).
Anyway, that aside, we have just finished another campaign and 10 more to go till campaign 100 - WOOTAGE!
Fingers crossed we will get there
Don't let this thread's activity fool you. It's not 100's of different people discussing the game. It's a handful of people posting back and forth to each other. That's all. If it weren't for the subscribers posting in the interest of damage control, this thread would have been 5 pages, tops, and wouldn't have been bumped since last fall.
*edit to add*
was bored and had some time on my hands so...drum roll please...
This thread has had 75 posters.
Top Five posters by count:
Pittpete 47
Axishater 46
David06 41
Stug 35
Wrath04 29
...and you have a few more in the low twenties and then it drops off steeply after that.
So counting thread posts by individuals on a side forum drew you in more than you beloved game.
Sounds about right and as Stug would say, thank you.
That's the thing, there will always be complainers. Especially the ones who find any effort that doesn't give immediate gratification as work. It's the ones who work a little in the game you want to cater for as they are the ones sticking around. The others will leave for the next shiney new thing anyway. Now if you are going to tinker with what they are complaining about, you've got to make sure you try not to effect anything else or you risk losing everyone.
Or in CRS case, instead of giving a better indication to someone where some action might be, they shove all the action in one place and make sure the whole playerbase can't spawn anywhere else. Or for the other camping piece, make every battle a set piece one that removed all the gameplay that wasn't setpiece battles, which was a ton.
So sounds similar to SWG. You had a niche game that was complex and rich, they simplify down to cater to mass crowd, who move on anyway to a newer game, and the diehards leave because the niche was destroyed.
Damage Control is a very appropriate way of describing what some of us posted here to do. Thank you for the clarification Rendus!
The more detailed explanation here is a handful of players were hurt by the direction CRS went with their game, and pissed them off to the point they wanted to emo-post on the official ww2ol forums but found their threads/posts were deleted or in some cases even banned. So you have quite a few of these guys in here that hate CRS(for verious reasons) but loved the game that once was.
So there were alot of "opinions" that were freely passed along as "facts"such as the title of this thread, so a few of us who play the game, saw this as very unfair to say the least. Most of us saw this treatment as turning away potential players with lies/exaggeration about the state of the game, and thus trying to end the game for us who still play.
Now as for the truth that some people like to dance around to make their own arguments sound more important:
The game is still playable and is still fun. Some people here will chime in and tell you the game is not playable for them, buggy, low population ect ect...and that's fine, the pop is nothing like it was, sure. The bugs are crap, yep. The more negative posters will no doubt fill you in on the rest of the bad in this game.
But I play this game most every day or so and It is fun to play, wouldn't waste my time on it if it weren't. Yeah some TZs have low pop most of the time but even then, there's always something to do. When the fighting is good though, there is nothing like this game out there that I've ever played. Alot of us feel the same way, on both sides of the argument. Although I have found a few in here that claim this game isnt even worth trying out for free, if you can believe that lol, I think this is 100% WRONG of course. How anything can be not worth trying for free, I'll never know I guess.
So if you want to call our defence of the game we play and love"damage control", that's fine with me, but if you want to downplay our intentions as not as important as the past emo-posting of exaggerated/misinformation/opinion you seem to support, I wish you well Rendus:)
As far as this thread wouldnt have made it past 5 pages and not have been bumped since last fall...
[mod edit]
Yep just a handful of players hurt by CRS' decisions, it's you imagination that there used to be thousands of players and they all left.
If you guys didn't get the marching orders to come here and defend the game it wouldn't have been bumped, and this forum wouldn't be the messy battleground it is. Look at the first 15 or so pages, the majority of the posts are from subscribers who came here, en mass, to defend the game. Most posted a handful of times and quit, others, like Pittpete and yourself, stuck around.
Would it have been better to just allow Axishater's thread to die on it's own and slide down the page rankings? Maybe. Having a thread popping up all the time saying "Why wwiiol is dead" in the Forum Overview can't be making a good impression.
But I guess this is the battlefield you choose to fight on, so whatever happens, good luck!
lol pitt...I'd be close to tied with stug if a few of my posts were allowed to live:) I'm not saying the mods were wrong mind you, I would've deleted them too:)
@Rendus
Just calling it like I see it mate, nothing personal, but you failed to call it like it was on that one. But rather just downplay the reasons some of us are here (wrongly) as being defenders of the company or something like that. I'd call it more defending the game we play, personally. BTW... most of us are in the game fighting more than on here...just so you know what I'm doing mate. Takes the guesswork out on your part:)
Rendus says:
"Would it have been better to just allow Axishater's thread to die on it's own and slide down the page rankings? Maybe. Having a thread popping up all the time saying "Why wwiiol is dead" in the Forum Overview can't be making a good impression."
I think it makes not only a fair impression due to it's lack of truth, but a great platform to talk about the Truth about the game rather than the Fable that's been passed around....the Game is not dead now is it? there's some truth for you. Is the pop at an all time low, maybe it is, but the game IS NOT dead. You really think they would just let this thread die if not for us? I guess you really do believe that dont you lol. funny! And dont you think the "impression" would be worse off had we not showed up and told the truth about things here?
I understand Truth comes in many shapes and sizes and is often a matter of perspective. Your truth is obviously different from mine..But THE truth is, the game is NOT dead, and MY truth is, I think it's fun to play. So where do you stand on this again?
@anfiach
Never said the total players "hurt by CRS' decisions" were only a handful, but that the people who were emo-posting here were that handful I was talking about ("The more detailed explanation here is a handful of players were hurt by the direction CRS went with their game").
See sometimes it's all about context, you twisted my words to mean something totally different than intended. Thanks:)
Stug sums this up wonderfully above, you should read it.
If it is only a "few" players who are unhappy then explain how these few have caused the following effects?
Now explain to me how I and others are BS'ing when we say CRS have messed up and lost alot of players due to poor decisios. TBH i'm not into beating a dead horse but when you come out with laughable accusations and PR nonsense then i'm going to ask you to a rationale explanation for each of these points above. You take most of your evidence from fantasy land so I invite you to use some real world evidence to counter my odvious BS points above.
P.S. I know the first thing you wanted to do was avoid the points and spin it how the game still has servers up after 11 years yardy yardy... You gonna have to use something else
All I can say is that even though I have defended CRS consistently, even my position has changed to the point where I agree that a game with no players will fail, even if the mechanics are 'better' than they were. I actually thought certain changes needed to be made back in the day, but the simple fact is that nothing matters except the bottom line which is disappearing quickly.
No point in arguing because 99% of us do agree that whatever happens, CRS need to do something, anything to get the game back to being developed again. It's such a basic requirement that if CRS have to eat their words and promise to 'roll back' some of the structural gameplay issues (AO's etc) then that's what they have to do. I understand - and I think everyone else needs to - that because of the way CRS developed the code, it's not possible to roll back to v.1.25 or whatever people would like. That just isn't happening and realistically, it's no good asking them to because I can guarantee that no game of this type could simply be 'rolled back'.
BUT
Someone needs to recognise that there are clearly a bunch of dudes who enjoyed WWIIOL for what it was and may - just may - be persuaded back if they were given a proper incentive to do so. That can only come with a roadmap that allows for more libertarian gameplay (a la Eve) that was one of the big pre-launch selling points. It's clear that many people want it - not just a vocal few - and it's also clear that the current advocates (myself included) are too few to keep the game up and running financially. I actually agree I find it odd that they can't get a coder in but when you work it out, $4000 a month + whatever else they have coming in from 'regular' subs must be less than $8000 a month. Might sound like a lot but I suspect the overheads are big on a game like this and in all fairness, Doc/Gophur - whatever your personal feelings - need to be paid a living wage.
In the end the only thing preventing them being able to get a coder is that they won't commit to going back to that spirit of 01-05 where it seemed like a genuine sandbox. Even if they just said 'we'll roll back AO's in 1.36 and give all the power back to squads, but if it fails it fails' they'd actually get the coder they needed and could finish 1.35 before moving on to it. People would come back for that incentive, but it needs to be a clear roadmap with an absolute 100% categorical statement from Gophur, because he is who the players trust.
Hell, they'd probably get 50 subs just if Doc apologised to some of the butthurt guys on here
Cant believe I didnt make that list.
So much crap, so little quality.
It would certainly be interesting to see the reaction to a new roadmap touching on oversupply, attrition, FRUs, freedom - and to a reaching out towards the organised collections of ex-players that might exist on squad forums etc
SWG > Aces High > WWIIOL