Non-sensitive statics release, maybe, please?

[Spidee]

Would be possible to release the general information on how people play?

I know, that absolute numbers are sensitive, as they would show player base and I can see why would want to keep that secret. However things like MC/ME/FP games started as percentages. Difficulties people play on, size of galaxies, what voice overs are most popular, most common traits etc.
All as percentages. Just...kind of it would be nice to see, how the community plays.
Thanks for considering this.

 

[Stars_and_Bars]

Would be possible to release the general information on how people play?

I know, that absolute numbers are sensitive, as they would show player base and I can see why would want to keep that secret. However things like MC/ME/FP games started as percentages. Difficulties people play on, size of galaxies, what voice overs are most popular, most common traits etc.
All as percentages. Just...kind of it would be nice to see, how the community plays.
Thanks for considering this.

How would you even do that? That doesn't even make sense. How would that even be possible?

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

How would you even do that? That doesn't even make sense. How would that even be possible?

Paradox has that info. The game sends it to them.

 

[maxp779]

How would you even do that? That doesn't even make sense. How would that even be possible?

Either as others have already said, the game sending that info to paradox. Or trawling through all the cloud saves they have.

I agree OP, it would be very interesting information to see.

I have wondered what others do in their game, anecdotal accounts are everywhere but hard statistics are only in Paradox's hands. I personally have never played as a megacorp and have never destroyed a planet or built one of the planet destroying things (travesty I know lol, its on my todo list). And have never completed a ringworld.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

I am pretty sure that PDX has no info whatsoever about my games (which I did not freely provide by posting here). As I only play with a deactivated network, so the game somehow never has any connection to the internet.

Good for you? But for most users, the game sends statistics back to Paradox.

 

[Stars_and_Bars]

Paradox has that info. The game sends it to them.

Even if paradox has that info, how would you search through all that noise? Would every empire you created count, or only every empire you created and played a game?
and would a game where i played for five years count the same as a game where I played for 200 years? Would people that play more games count more? You haven't given any thought to what exactly paradox would be measuring. It's not about not having the data, It's about there being too much noise.

 

[Spidee]

How would you even do that? That doesn't even make sense. How would that even be possible?

They repeatedly commented on some telemetry....like only 1 or was it 4% of people play HOI IV starting in 1939 and that they could have saved a bucketload of work not making that scenario. I am pretty sure, that the vast majority of players just agreed the terms and conditions and that those state, that non personalized play data will be collected to improve the content they design for us or something.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

Even if paradox has that info, how would you search through all that noise? Would every empire you created count, or only every empire you created and played a game?
and would a game where i played for five years count the same as a game where I played for 200 years? Would people that play more games count more? You haven't given any thought to what exactly paradox would be measuring. It's not about not having the data, It's about there being too much noise.

They have some way of parsing the metrics because they've mentioned specifics before (such as democracies being the most popular government type to be played).

 

[Spidee]

Even if paradox has that info, how would you search through all that noise? Would every empire you created count, or only every empire you created and played a game?
and would a game where i played for five years count the same as a game where I played for 200 years? Would people that play more games count more? You haven't given any thought to what exactly paradox would be measuring. It's not about not having the data, It's about there being too much noise.

Empires created, played years, played hours. Either of them would work.
If played less than 4 hours, designate that as a failed play through, or any game <30 years. For voices of advisors, minutes played with it (I would really like how many people can stand the "BAM!!!" voice). I can't state how I would like to sort the data, as I do not have a sample. quantification can be easy. Yes it is, I do it for a living.

 

[Spidee]

They have some way of parsing the metrics because they've mentioned specifics before (such as democracies being the most popular government type to be played).

I think they stated pacifist and xenophiles in the meme thread (something like, even though this thread is all about purge and killing off the xeno, actually you enjoy playing philes more). But you are bang on the buck.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

I think they stated pacifist and xenophiles in the meme thread (something like, even though this thread is all about purge and killing off the xeno, actually you enjoy playing philes more). But you are bang on the buck.

That might've been it, yeah. Either way, "searching through the noise" is clearly a nonissue because they make use of those metrics themselves and have some way of identifying trends for internal usage. That's the whole point of collecting player metric data in the first place- they wouldn't if they couldn't make use of it.

 

[Spidee]

That might've been it, yeah. Either way, "searching through the noise" is clearly a nonissue because they make use of those metrics themselves and have some way of identifying trends for internal usage. That's the whole point of collecting player metric data in the first place- they wouldn't if they couldn't make use of it.

Come to think about it, it would be a nice....substitute of a dev diary. Would give people tons of things to talk about, try combinations, it wouldn't cut into the time of developers, only marketing people...

 

[ZomgK3tchup]

This is literally why they give us incentives to play while logged into our Paradox accounts.

 

[Spidee]

Do they get the info when playing via steam?

 

[Defiler99]

I can't believe how many responses here amount to "lol this is impossible".
These are basic things to handle when dealing with any real-world dataset.

Whether it's worth PDX's time to do those things or not, separate question.

 

[Spidee]

I can't believe how many responses here amount to "lol this is impossible".
These are basic things to handle when dealing with any real-world dataset.

Whether it's worth PDX's time to do those things or not, separate question.

2 people responded that way....I believe that number

 

[DreadLindwyrm]

Do they get the info when playing via steam?

I believe so. It was something that people complained about when they pushed CKII to Steam only.

 

[AlanC9]

I am pretty sure that PDX has no info whatsoever about my games (which I did not freely provide by posting here). As I only play with a deactivated network, so the game somehow never has any connection to the internet.

Why do that?

Edit: Really? Someone disagreed with asking a question?

 

[AlanC9]

They repeatedly commented on some telemetry....like only 1 or was it 4% of people play HOI IV starting in 1939 and that they could have saved a bucketload of work not making that scenario. I am pretty sure, that the vast majority of players just agreed the terms and conditions and that those state, that non personalized play data will be collected to improve the content they design for us or something.

Yeah, that was the case. I remember that because I can't stand the 36 scenario -- I find Germany dull, but non-Axis powers don't have much of interest to do in a 36 scenario. But when you're in that small a minority, you have to suck it up.

 

[Stars_and_Bars]

Alright, well even supposing that they can parse the data into useful meaningful criteria. Why would they share that info on anything but irregular intervals?