Great Game :)

[Stochastic]

Great Potential
I really love this game, and I have had a lot of fun with my friends playing coop and mixed battles, it has countless of repaly-ability. However I think this game lack some marketing/advertising to gather more players, I surely believe that there is a great market for it out there.
I discovered this game through a friend a month ago, and I had never heard about it, and since I do play some computer games, I tend to be up to date on what games are released each month, and I was unaware that this great game even existed.

More players, would prolly open up for more content, the game could use more different ships and weapons. (and yes I have bought the DLC packs) Many players in here seem to request a new campaign, which could be solved by making an editor for maps and campaign-settings to us players. –and maybe consider merging some servers. :happy:

I think it is sad, if you just slowly give up on this game and leave it as it is, it has great potential, and there is a large group of latent customers out there, who are not aware of this great game. Give it a chance!

I believe many of the users/players in here will agree with me on this.
Anyway, thanks for a great game!

-Stoch

 

[unmerged(735025)]

Wanted to add to your thread a bit . You know if you take the mobile support away and add a few factions and maps to the game , as well as a few balance issues taken care of , perhaps a persistent war scenario , this game has Xbox live arcade written all over it . Far superior to most of them already . BtW , what times do you play ? Add me as a friend , elarma , and we can do a 24 hour MP game , if you want .

 

[BjornB]

I'm glad to hear you like the game

We haven't given up on it just yet. Stay tuned for the future!

 

[unmerged(735025)]

Well that is a glimmer of hope !

 

[Dakk]

@Stochastic: what's your in-game name? I play this game a lot. Sadly because of work and studies I (now) mainly tend to gravitate to 1-day games. Sadly because it even furthers diffuse the available games for new players (as 1-day tend to be invite only). I also absolutely love the game, I think it's wonderfully crafted and owns it's niche.

My opinion has been for quite some time that a move to free-to-play (base game) with some headline visibility in Steam and then live off of DLC would probably be wise. If there's anything I wish this game, it's more players.

"Glimmer of hope" indeed!!

EDIT: The game does need a lobby system however...

 

[Stochastic]

I am called "Stoch" ingame, feel free to add me. (server: Leviathan 1)

I am not that often on these days - due to a few exams, and I tend to play a little Battlefield 4 as well, or X-wing miniatures (boardgame).

 

[Ethanol]

I'm glad to hear you like the game

We haven't given up on it just yet. Stay tuned for the future!

Nice to hear that, i also feared you would have given up on this one when it just needs a little "rebirth" (oh but please don't let go of the tablet version, this is the kind of game for which tablets were made )

 

[BjornB]

I'm afraid I might be getting people too excited. I can't promise you anything for the future. I just know that the ones in the decision seat really like the games concept and want to go further with it. There are however other factors at play deciding how realistic it is to actually do something with it.

 

[unmerged(735025)]

Point taken . I did watch a Paradox video that had a section about how and why Paradox would consider a sequel to a game , not this game in particular , but any game . Can't remember where it was .

 

[Dakk]

I'm afraid I might be getting people too excited. I can't promise you anything for the future. I just know that the ones in the decision seat really like the games concept and want to go further with it. There are however other factors at play deciding how realistic it is to actually do something with it.

Haha no worries. I for one didn't get too excited, just borderline excited. I'm not expecting Leviathan II or a major patch, or even a minor patch, but I believe this game can survive and even evolve by actions taken solely on the publisher side. Which, of course, is much cheaper.

To reiterate a bit what I said above. This game HAS great (and, IMHO, largely untapped) potential. Make it Free-2-Play combined with a marketing drive that makes people notice it, and then use DLC sales to run the servers and maybe even thrive a bit. Normally this format is used in conjunction with the DLC being "Pay-2-Win", but the DLC for Lev is not of that kind. In closing, double down on your publishing responsibility and and dito skills Paradox

 

[Ethanol]

Haha no worries. I for one didn't get too excited, just borderline excited. I'm not expecting Leviathan II or a major patch, or even a minor patch, but I believe this game can survive and even evolve by actions taken solely on the publisher side. Which, of course, is much cheaper.

To reiterate a bit what I said above. This game HAS great (and, IMHO, largely untapped) potential. Make it Free-2-Play combined with a marketing drive that makes people notice it, and then use DLC sales to run the servers and maybe even thrive a bit. Normally this format is used in conjunction with the DLC being "Pay-2-Win", but the DLC for Lev is not of that kind. In closing, double down on your publishing responsibility and and dito skills Paradox

I agree, a minor consolidation/balance patch could do wonders and coupled with a marketing drive make it really popular....

 

[Dakk]

One thing that I feel is really holding the game back, is the lobby system. Or lack thereof.

• It's impossible to see how any, if any, or who is online. I played X-wing vs. TIE-fighter on MSN Zone in the mid 90's, and the lobby system was excellent. You chatted in a main lobby, and you fired up a room when you wanted to play. The system MSN Zone used 20 years ago would be perfect for this game, and widely superior to how it works now. Currently you just sit in a weird limbo with a little animated circle showing you are probably searching for players.
• The way you search for a game (matchmaking) is totally obsolete. Possibly, maybe, useful for a game with hundreds of open matches. Now it's just a hindrance. There can be 20 people online and they will barely find each other through this function. Someone pretty much HAS to first create a game that another part can join. Again, no lobby just makes this whole process totally opaque. Which brings me to..
• "Display public matches". This is realistically how you can find a match. Too bad you must tick a discrete and non-obvious checkbox to do it. Very confusing.
• Old matches need to go. Seriously. While I understand that the concept of 1-day games dictate that the host must be able to leave his room (hosted match) without it folding, the consequences are absurd. I have matches in my list that was hosted more than 6 months ago (most of them 1- or 5-minute games), and the host is never ever coming back. Just so the game list won't be cluttered with ridiculous amounts of stupid perma-AFK games I tend to snatch these up, choose a fleet and ready up (just in case the host does come back). I have maybe 20-30 games in my list right now that's totally dead. I know of more veterans that do this. Nothing discourages new players - and old players too, for that matter - as much as games with matchmaking on and the host afk for good. Sometimes the host has actually left the room, but the room lives because someone joined before the host left. A band-aid solution could be to just have non-launched games older than a week automatically disband. Probably better for your database and server too.
• Coupled with the above, the whole "leave" <-> "disband" is not very clear. Or, well, it's clear to me. But new players just don't get it.
• E-mail notifications should be default on...
• LET ME TALK TO PEOPLE ONLINE. I have a room called "CHATROOM, NOT A GAME" with matchmaking on so people can come in and use it as a way of communicating with each other. Having had this room open for a few months here's a couple of observations:

• It fills up every day with new players I've never seen before (and most often never do again). Every time I go online - which is several times a day - I empty the room of offline player. When I come back later, it's often filled again. This tells me there's actually a non-trivial amount of influx of new players.
• All the players in the room are offline, and judging by the chat window they are/were confused and wonder(ed) when the game will start.
• The few players that have played a match really really likes the gameplay. However it's a chore finding new opponents.

All this leads to frustration with the matchmaking process, and make finding opponents tedious. Many players also get scared away by what they believe is a dead game.. and there's the making of a downward spiral. Coupled with this is that I, and many other veterans, to a great extent play 1-day games, and those are almost always invite only. This, in turn, leads to even more of a dearth of (to the casual games visible) games.

In summary? Help us help you make this game popular - let players connect, communicate and captain. Right now we can only do the last thing.

Nota bene. I should note that I love this game, I've played over 600 games (I also claim I have the best win/lost ratio in the world, try me :happy, and I play pretty much every day. The gameplay is great fun, it's the matchmaking that let's the game down.

Dear Paradox Interactive, please work some publishing magic :blush:

 

[unmerged(737493)]

BjornB is getting hopes up on purpose to keep dragging $ out of players and DLC with no improvements - we need to be letting other gamers know so they don't get away with this in the future.

 

[BjornB]

BjornB is getting hopes up on purpose to keep dragging $ out of players and DLC with no improvements - we need to be letting other gamers know so they don't get away with this in the future.

Could you please elaborate?