I was interested to find out how many online Freelancer servers of any description that still existed.
At the time of writing this, there are only 49 players are actually active worldwide.Of the 32 "most active" only 3 had 5 players or more. DiscoveryGS only had 27, the next 10, and one had 5 players.
This is an observable fact. DiscoveryGC is really one of the last servers standing, and the trend is down.
Discovery may etch out a couple of more years, maybe three with the die-hards. No-one is driving new players to this site to offset the losses of players.
"In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human mind, am able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views." Einstein
Keep in mind it's morning hours in central europe. Check out those stats again in like 10-12 hours. Also, we really don't need another guy here to draw the devil at the wall.
What anyone of us can do is simply, in a non-intrusive way, spread the word. I do it on YouTube and on Imgur, uploading videos weekly and whenever I have some nice video material of bigger events, I post it as album with gifs in the user-sub.
(05-10-2018, 07:39 AM)Sombra Hookier Wrote: ... to draw the devil at the wall.
Not sure what that means... interesting to know.
A misunderstanding here. I wasn't trying to be the negative killjoy, but highlighting the trend.
DiscoveryGC has one big advantage over the rest. It is a truly stand-alone entity. From a marketing point of view, even though the engine is old, there is great potential so long as it is properly marketed. Word of mouth is good, but it is "hard-to-find" on the internet unless one is looking and that is still problematic.
New players must be driven to the game. There needs to be a marketing strategy put in place, not to attract piecemeal, but to herd them to it in bulk. Attrition naturally occurs and out of every 100 fewer than 5 would commit to the game for more than 6 months. Longevity is the key not only to keeping DiscoveryGC alive, but to building the active membership.
Anyone know how many can play at one time on DiscoveryGC without causing issues?
"In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human mind, am able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views." Einstein
Again, you're not the first person to point out this entire topic about advertising. However, you're lacking the background information. There are many threads about advertisment, people complaining about the lack of players because the times of 200/200 server loadout were so much better than the current times.
Discovery is aging. It is a roleplay-server of a mod of a game of 2004. We have a nieche game here, limited to people who are to roleplay on this server, who also need to have this mod installed. Matter of factly, however, we're currently having an increase of people joining the server. We had worse times, definitely. Yes, we also had better times. But at some point, Freelancer can't keep up with the current zeitgeist of gaming. The graphics are nice to us, but not to people who play stuff on consoles. The gameplay is tedious, especially at the beginning when you grind millions and billions for months. You are required to roleplay on this server, which is nice for us but significantly reduces the amount of people interested in this. Note that none of this should be changed, or could be changed. Discovery will live on for years. We always have some volunteers who do the dirty work of maintenance and player control. We also have volunteers who have the knowledge to contribute to the mod itself. We even have people who are willing to spend 100 moneys per month to ensure Discovery stays alive, to prevent the server from being turned offline. We have a good server and rarely experience server-sided lags. Crashes are mostly caused by Skorak fiddling around with PoBs and NPCs.
The only way you can help Discovery is by spreading the word yourself. Nobody here can fund an extensive campaign to shed more light on Discovery. We have people on YouTube, Imgur, Twitch, ModDB and other pages. You are welcomed to do the same.
(05-10-2018, 08:40 AM)Sombra Hookier Wrote: The only way you can help Discovery is by spreading the word yourself. Nobody here can fund an extensive campaign to shed more light on Discovery.
Some very good insights here.
As to the section I am quoting you on (above). I don't quite agree. Spread the word individually, yes. And there are no funds to put towards marketing, granted. Never-the-less it can be attractive to a broad range of people with unique demographics.
It is a free game and the graphics are the lower end of the scale. This would appeal to people with little money, and a free game is worth lowered graphics. There are many games that have worse graphics and they still attract a big following. Such as Rimworld.
What is attractive about DiscoveryGC is the great variety of activities a player can enjoy doing.
I suppose it is all about how players are bedded into the game. They need both a sense of belonging and a sense of purpose. They need to fit in and maybe a tight niche is not marketable.
"In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human mind, am able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views." Einstein
(05-10-2018, 09:28 AM)Sombra Hookier Wrote: Freelancer is not a free game.
Freelancer the game? Or DiscoveryGC?
Freelancer the game is abandoned by Microsoft support. It is arguable that one can give copies away, but not sell copied versions.
DiscoveryGC is supported by donations and the goodwill of the players. It cannot charge people due to Microsoft owning the copywrite on Freelancer coding - I may be in error. Anyone joining plays for free.
"In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human mind, am able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views." Einstein
It's more of an art asset copyright problem than particularly a code one.
Graphical enhancements are something I have worked on but getting them QA'd and passed is a process that hasn't started quite yet because of concerns that people playing on 2004 grade computers may have issues.