Steel division development progress

[Harold Alexander]

Are dev team on vacations? Because I don't see any activity on forum/blog/youtube and twitch channels. In the same time game slowly dying without any help from dev team.

 

[Captains]

You'll have to wait until they finish their holidays before you'll get a response

 

[Rojan]

You'll have to wait until they finish their holidays before you'll get a response

Are you being sarcastic or are they actually away? I don't know when the frogs have holidays.

 

[Captains]

Are you being sarcastic or are they actually away? I don't know when the frogs have holidays.

Yes

 

[DuroSVK]

They are French.
Their vacation is all-year long.

 

[Gustave]

The playerbase is pretty much stable now.

 

[I WUB PUGS]

The playerbase is pretty much stable now.

No it isn't. The bleeding has just slowed.

For reference, the last time Steel Division had more players online than Red Dragon was a week ago. Both games had nice little upticks over the long holiday weekend in the US but with about an hour to go before peak time (noon Pacific), Steel Division is struggling.

I'm using Red Dragon as an illustration of what a dead Eugen game with a hardcore following that has "stabilized" looks like. The last few days in this week will be telling for Steel Division. Entirely possible that we see a new "stabilization" with a couple hundred fewer players.

Steam Charts saying it's at sub 650 players with about an hour to go before the daily peak. That is like -30% from a week ago. Maybe it's not 2000 players dropping, but it sure as shit isn't indicative of a bottom being found.

 

[Claremont Waltz]

Yeah I'm not part of team "lol dead game", but at this point it really does look like the game is dying.

Eugen is 2 for 2 on flops with new titles. At this point they need to seriously consider shaking up their design team and leadership because whatever they are doing is clearly not working. People love the overall ideas they pitch, but once players (especially new players) experience the actual gameplay they nope the f out and never come back. And a new Wargame title isn't the answer given that each new title sold worse than the one before.

I hope Eugen turns things around and fast because I actually like their products and want them to succeed, but I'm not exactly holding out much hope after this experience.

 

[I WUB PUGS]

And a new Wargame title isn't the answer given that each new title sold worse than the one before.

I don't believe that is true. European Escalation was a very niche game that only has such high sales numbers due to being packaged with Red Dragon and Airland Battle for several years. Red Dragon had a lot of success at launch and during discounts. For being such a niche title, and having many of the same lobby/matchmaker problems that Steel Division has, Red Dragon did extremely well.

It is after all the reason why the Wargame Titles combined broke over a million copies sold.

I don't remember how Airland Battle did sales wise but the lobbies were never dead and they quickly released Red Dragon after Airland Battle so it had kind of a shortened run.

Act of Aggression was a serious flop and Steel Division is rapidly approaching that level, however.

 

[roirraw]

Here are some suggestions to keeping this game growing and interesting for those who love the game type.

1) Allow for ranked 10v10 play. I know this will get a lot of people frustrated and angry, but this game mode is the closest thing to a simulated combat environment in any RTS. Combat was never 1v1 or tactical during this time period, during the dates given. The scope and size of the offensive needs to be emphasized and this game has done it. I can understand the frustration from those who call it a spam fest or whatever, but to deny this is a viable game option that serves at least half the population at any given time is kind of elitist.

2) Allow for maps to be created and hosted on custom servers, take the best fan maps and allow them to be hosted on EUGEN servers 1 through 39. Company of Heroes 2 does the same thing, user created maps are put into rotation for a few months and new ones replace them later on. Map creation and thematic scenarios will keep the player base interested, having us fight over the same hedge rows or cities, even when turned 90* gets stale.

3) Show stats for groups who play together all the time as part of the ranked tracking, just like Company of Heroes 2 has leader boards for individuals and teams. Showing who plays well together, what battle-groups they play, can help counter what people consider team stacking.

I am a huge fan of this game and want to support it as much as I can. Never got into RUSE because Close Combat, Company of Heroes, World War 2 Online and the Men of War series kept my attention; Steel Division has bridged the gap for all of these games. You have an amazing title series in the making with : Market Garden, : Citadel, : Battle of the Bulge - just to guess ahead some.

 

[Claremont Waltz]

I mean let's be brutally honest here: no one wants to play new RTS games. No RTS released after CoH2 has succeeded in getting above a sustained 1k players. Most have collapsed to about 100-150 online at peak times. So I can't really blame Eugen for failing.

I don't have access to Starcraft 2's player count and it doesn't seem like anyone else does either. If there are RTS games I missed let me know but these are all I can think of. I included HoI4 both as a point of reference and to disabuse people of the notion that the issue is complexity in a real time experience. It really isn't. People are perfectly willing to put up with a complex real time experience so long as they can have either a colorful builder with a forgiving combat model (Age of Empires) or a deep and engaging single player mode with a pause option.

Asking them to sign up to be smashed over and over again in multi player without providing one of those two isn't going to work out.

The other alternative is a radical departure from the traditional business model of pay a buttload of money up front for an experience where the content is other players who sign on to fight you and the game mode is a complex operation of wrangle dozens of cats across a map in a precise fashion against an opponent trying to do the same. In an era of free to play multiplayer behemoths like Rocket League and Team Fortress and World of This and Heroes of That, only the dumb and the faithful will sign up for that ride.

Anyway, here's the list in order of player count.

http://steamcharts.com/app/394360
Hearts of Iron 4 : 15k peak, 10k average, growing

http://steamcharts.com/app/221380
Age of Empires 2 :13k players peak, 7k average, steady player count growth

http://steamcharts.com/app/231430
Company of Heroes 2 : 6k peak, 5k average, steady for the last two years

http://steamcharts.com/app/105450
Age of Empires 3: 3.3k peak, 1.5k average, stable but growing

http://steamcharts.com/app/228200
Company of Heroes : 2.5k peak, 2k average, stable

http://steamcharts.com/app/9450
Dawn of War 1 : 1k peak, 500 average, stable

http://steamcharts.com/app/285190
Dawn of War 3 : 1k peak, 900 average, collapsing from 25k all time peak

http://steamcharts.com/app/251060
Wargame Red Dragon: 1k peak, 600 average, falling slowly

http://steamcharts.com/app/572410
Steel Division : 800 peak, 600 average, falling

http://steamcharts.com/app/386070
Planetary Annihilation Titans : 800 peak, 330 average, stableish

http://steamcharts.com/app/281610
Supreme Commander : 652 peak, 450 average, stable

http://steamcharts.com/app/56400
Dawn of War 2: 600 peak, 300 average, stableish

http://steamcharts.com/app/281610
Supreme Commander 2 : 550 peak, 330 average, stable

http://steamcharts.com/app/244160
Homeworld Remastered : 300 peak, 200 average, stable

http://steamcharts.com/app/318020
Act of Aggression : 150 peak, 60 average, dead

http://steamcharts.com/app/290790
Grey Goo : 150 peak, 60 average, dead

http://steamcharts.com/app/281610
Deserts of Kharak : 150 peak, 60 average, dead

edit : writing this has reminded me that actually I really like CoH2, so that might become my primary RTS fix for a while. I've been obsessed with this genre since Warcraft 1, so....

edit2 : I'm actually sold on the idea of redesigning the game to be almost World in Conflict 2, WW2 Edition with 10v10 as the sole mode and a deep discount on the price. That'd be a heck of a lot easier to sell as an entry level to harder stuff like Red Dragon (which should be choked down to 1v1-3v3, all in automatch) than the current fiasco.

 

[LegioX]

Here are some suggestions to keeping this game growing and interesting for those who love the game type.

1) Allow for ranked 10v10 play. I know this will get a lot of people frustrated and angry, but this game mode is the closest thing to a simulated combat environment in any RTS. Combat was never 1v1 or tactical during this time period, during the dates given. The scope and size of the offensive needs to be emphasized and this game has done it. I can understand the frustration from those who call it a spam fest or whatever, but to deny this is a viable game option that serves at least half the population at any given time is kind of elitist.

2) Allow for maps to be created and hosted on custom servers, take the best fan maps and allow them to be hosted on EUGEN servers 1 through 39. Company of Heroes 2 does the same thing, user created maps are put into rotation for a few months and new ones replace them later on. Map creation and thematic scenarios will keep the player base interested, having us fight over the same hedge rows or cities, even when turned 90* gets stale.

3) Show stats for groups who play together all the time as part of the ranked tracking, just like Company of Heroes 2 has leader boards for individuals and teams. Showing who plays well together, what battle-groups they play, can help counter what people consider team stacking.

I am a huge fan of this game and want to support it as much as I can. Never got into RUSE because Close Combat, Company of Heroes, World War 2 Online and the Men of War series kept my attention; Steel Division has bridged the gap for all of these games. You have an amazing title series in the making with : Market Garden, : Citadel, : Battle of the Bulge - just to guess ahead some.

WW2OL? Damn dude that is some old school stuff right there. I remember downloading that mega patch on dial up the first week the game came out, just to get it to run.

 

[roirraw]

WW2Online is about to become a game on Steam, check it out. They might even make it a bit more modern.

 

[LegioX]

WW2Online is about to become a game on Steam, check it out. They might even make it a bit more modern.

WW2OL is a great game if you have the playerbase to support it. They have a "strong" loyal playerbase, but the days of player pop during the early 2000's I believe is over. Now If it comes back to that I would gladly join back up. Still Is the only game to this day that I enjoyed immensely. Ahhhhh good ol days.

 

[roirraw]

Cornered Rat Software had a hard time with the crash of 2007 and 2008. The grapevine says, they lost funding and team members due to money issues and those who loved the game stayed on for the last 10 years. They had special builder packs where you could be immortalized in game for your donations and support, I had my subscription active even when I didn't play it just to keep it alive. I'm actually happy they're making it to steam and have some F2P account options to get the population up. My guess is, they have a good plan to modernize the game and just need the time and resources to do so, if anything, we already know they are committed at this point after working basically for free the last decade. Anyways, that was one of the best games ever made and still will be in my opinion.

 

[LegioX]

Cornered Rat Software had a hard time with the crash of 2007 and 2008. The grapevine says, they lost funding and team members due to money issues and those who loved the game stayed on for the last 10 years. They had special builder packs where you could be immortalized in game for your donations and support, I had my subscription active even when I didn't play it just to keep it alive. I'm actually happy they're making it to steam and have some F2P account options to get the population up. My guess is, they have a good plan to modernize the game and just need the time and resources to do so, if anything, we already know they are committed at this point after working basically for free the last decade. Anyways, that was one of the best games ever made and still will be in my opinion.

Yep. Nothing (even today) compares to leading a flight of 10+ HE111's or Blen/Havoc bombers to bomb a factory way in the rear while having escorts protect you...(all real players by the way). Man the thrill of seeing that red box way in the rear and your side scrambling fighters to intercept, all the while searching like crazy for them.
I remember one time I spotted a flight of 10+ enemy bombers at very high altitude and yelled out over factions comms where their location was. I felt like a U-boat captain spotting a convoy and relaying all the info for other U-boats. MAN THAT WAS FUN!! sorry got off topic!!!!

 

[iamthatiam]

Thi

Yeah I'm not part of team "lol dead game", but at this point it really does look like the game is dying.

Eugen is 2 for 2 on flops with new titles. At this point they need to seriously consider shaking up their design team and leadership because whatever they are doing is clearly not working. People love the overall ideas they pitch, but once players (especially new players) experience the actual gameplay they nope the f out and never come back. And a new Wargame title isn't the answer given that each new title sold worse than the one before.

I hope Eugen turns things around and fast because I actually like their products and want them to succeed, but I'm not exactly holding out much hope after this experience.

This will be the last Eugen game that I purchase unless they do something drastic to save this game soon. Act of Aggression was a flop and now this; I'd be worried if I was them.

 

[RoyalColor]

This will be the last Eugen game that I purchase unless they do something drastic to save this game soon. Act of Aggression was a flop and now this; I'd be worried if I was them.

Highly doubt there will be any drastic changes. I think we'll see a normal game cycle for SD: we'll get a few balancing/small feature patches, perhaps a DLC or two, with couple of new divisions, maps, maybe a new setting (still western front related, to maximize upon what's already done).

I believe that a core game design is fine, but all the "around" components (archaic multiplayer/social management tools, that lead to stacks and pub stomps and turn new players away) need a major rework and I don't think it's worth investing from Eugen's business perspective. I guess we'll have to wait for SD2 to see those things brought in line with the XXIst century (hopefully).

 

[iamthatiam]

Highly doubt there will be any drastic changes. I think we'll see a normal game cycle for SD: we'll get a few balancing/small feature patches, perhaps a DLC or two, with couple of new divisions, maps, maybe a new setting (still western front related, to maximize upon what's already done).

I believe that a core game design is fine, but all the "around" components need a major rework and I don't think it's worth investing from Eugen's business perspective. I guess we'll have to wait for SD2 to see those things brought in line with the XXIst century (hopefully).

They might as well not bother with SD2. No one will buy it. What's the point in buying a mainly online multiplayer game if the online multiplayer dies within a couple months.

 

[Stoffen]

Im back to Red Dragon.
I am thoroughly enjoying it and most games I have are pretty close, even if I am trying a more gimmicky deck (UK armored, USSR moto).

Steel divisions mechanics are flawed and it would have been clear for EVERYONE if any of the airborne divisions where present at beta.
The (attempted) rock paper scissors gameplay is plain boring.

In wargame, the only silly part is super heavies / ATGM-plane gameplay. Sure some decks are better than others, but most coalitions can hold out against eachother.

If you are playing the 3rd armored in steel division in 1v1 - you lost in the lobby.

Both games lack proper matchmaking -> map vetos -> quickmatch / no splitting the playerbase.

But where red dragon can be forgiven for this, SD cannot.