Edit to add something relevant:
From my point of view, which is that of fleet activity and amount of people on my friend's list, activity is higher than I've ever seen it. I think they did something to the PvP queue because now there will be like 25 people queued and it won't start, whereas before it started almost immediately when it had 10 people.
No, STO is not dying... And it won't die anytime soon unless Cryptic/PWE institutes an STO version of the NGE from SWG. God I still miss the old SWG.
Stagnating? Maybe lower levels of player activity at certain locations from my observations. That could just be a time zone thing. Everyone has to sleep sometime, but I am a night-owl, and tend to stay up longer than some Central Time Zoners do. What I see population-wise, will definitely be different from many of you other players for that reason.
-AoP- Warrior's Blood (KDF Armada) / -AoP- Qu' raD qulbo'Degh / -AoP- ProjectPhoenix Join Date: Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Yes unfortunately the game is very slowly dieing. I can't begin to believe with PWE basically ripping people off with a joke of incentive of GOLD subs, and basically charging for every new thing, in the game.
It's a slow death, but yes there are people leaving and getting sick of some things. The only ones that will be left, are the extreme hard core fans. The game is just not stream lined enough to keep new people or non Star Trek fans.
Unfortunately this is the only non-cookie cutter MMO left out there IMHO. (I believe PWE knows that and is capitalizing on it, STO is unique in it's own right.)
I am torn, I don't want the game to fail, but if that's what it starts to take to get Cryptic and PWE with a fire in the loins then so be it.
Pushing out content constantly and just not fixing things and not responding to peoples issues or tickets, does not make a game better.
I have been playing MMO's since I was 14. When a company starts to do what Cryptic is doing, it WILL fail.
i totaly agree with this post there will always be players that live in denial thinking if they close there eyes to the truth then every thing will be fine just look what happend to world of kung fu it ran for several years but the last 3 years of it's life they neglected the players didn't answer tickets untill finaly they shut down if things continue the way they are im'e afraid the same thing will happen to sto dont get me wrong the game it's saelf is good could be better and cryptic is a good company but unfortunatly they got in bed with the wrong invester namely pwe cryptic could have done far better with EA or some other company in my opinion
i totaly agree with this post there will always be players that live in denial thinking if they close there eyes to the truth then every thing will be fine just look what happend to world of kung fu it ran for several years but the last 3 years of it's life they neglected the players didn't answer tickets untill finaly they shut down if things continue the way they are im'e afraid the same thing will happen to sto dont get me wrong the game it's saelf is good could be better and cryptic is a good company but unfortunatly they got in bed with the wrong invester namely pwe cryptic could have done far better with EA or some other company in my opinion
I started STO around 2011Q1. I played one month and after that I was bored.
I came back 2 month ago because I was fed up with SWTOR. And I was pleasantly surprised with the state of the game right now. I subscribed to the game, I bought a Romulan legacy pack and an Odyssey cruiser too within a few weeks. One of my teammates bought a lifetime subscription after a few weeks of playing.
STO has clearly have some issues but it is much better shape now than 2011. And I am amazed with some Foundry content too - there are some players here who could create clearly entertaining and creative missions too. I hope STO is not dying - I want to fly my ship for a looong time
they got in bed with the wrong invester namely pwe cryptic could have done far better with EA or some other company in my opinion
LOL, I suppose it is a joke.
Anyone who plays SWTOR has a first hand experience about EA - and believe me this is not a good experience. The main developement path now is to sell the same armor with different colors via Cartel Market. Support is non-existent, lacks of new content, etc. STO is in far more better state now than SWTOR.
And think about it: for EA even a Star Wars MMO is a secondary project - their main flagships are Sims, Need for Speed, sportsgames, etc. Do you really think a Star Trek licence would be receive the same resources like now from PWE?
"Neverwinter Online" which just launched officially is plagued with bugs and exploits...and over there they are having the same issues if not worse. Beginning to wonder if Cryptic is now powerless since they partnered with PWE. I mean in Neverwinter there is new stuff on the Zen store daily yet serious exploits that are granting people Astral Diamonds and free gear are so abundant that the economy is already totally hosed and if you refuse to exploit you dont run end game dungeons.
It is very sad that a game with so much potential like STO and Neverwinter have fallen to these types of issues. BUT I will continue to play them until I get bored or until the bugs get so bad that I simply cannot.
I hope people understand that the stuff that goes on the C-store, especially cosmetic stuff, is created by different people than who would be bug fixing. Different staff with different skills, in most cases unable to be put on system projects even IF adding more bodies resulted in quicker fixes (which it usually doesn't).
My point is that items being put into the store has no bearing on the state of bugs etc...
I have long-time friends, who never touched STO once before, playing it for the first time and having quite a bit of fun with PVP, the borg, and the storyline. New people are joining all of the time and let's face it, playable Romulans/Remans are awesome. The only way Cryptic could best itself would be to release playable sulibans and Suliban ships.
Too lazy to quote all the comments I would like to respond to; instead I shall just post some comments on the previous 12 pages.
You can't compare this game to SWG until they loose your credit card info to hackers and shut the game down with no news for a month. As a pay to play, making players afraid to give them their credit info was a deathblow. Really comparing this game to ANY other game is like comparing cats to dogs, sure both are pets like STO and SWG are both games, but too many variables make the comparison meaningless.
Game is dying/not dying? Everything is dying, some of us will die in a few years some will last for decades.. predicting when is hard for doctors. Predicting when a game will die? amusing but pointless. A good game can kill itself with a bad update and a bad game can save itself with a decent update.. so what?
Game can't be played for (free/casual/long or whatever) sorry folks, its a game, if you enjoy it, its not a grind; and if you don't enjoy it, why play? (I earned dil to buy char slots, slow but free - now I have 10 level 50 chars, just logging onto each for a few minutes daily and starting a bunch of doff missions earns me a small pile of dil daily... easy, quick and allows me enough dil to play with any character currently amuses me) Seriously though; why do so many players whine about "end game content" like its the only aspect of any game. Sure you need some end game content for max level characters, but I, personally, actually ENJOY the leveling process. Try a new character, try a new variant of the storyline quests, level a character WITHOUT bothering w/ the storyline (slow but possible) etc.. The point is, there is enough variety to do different things with your playtime. If anything your doing you consider a 'grind,' then try something different.
IF you really WANT the 'end game shiny' then do the mission/stf/daily or whatever; that 'end game shiny' wouldn't be all that special if anyone/everyone could get it easy now would it? Point is, you don't NEED any of it to play the game. I have played toons with all free stuff to level 50 and played with all zen stuff to level 50... easier with the zen? SURE. But not a huge or game breaking difference.
Complain about having to 'grind' for 'end game content' to get it next month, or pay now? That is NOT pay 2 win. Many MMOs don't have any method of earning the 'pay to win gear' THAT'S true pay 2 win. If you don't know the difference, try some other 'free' games before you complain.
Casual vs. hardcore gamer? Um... both take the same number of hours of playtime to earn the same thing. I know players that can level to 50 in a few days, others take a few weeks. Sure the casual gamer might miss out on some of the events, but that's about the only difference. Even the 'end game gear' can be earned by the 'casual' gamer, might take a year... but its possible.
Also noted there seems to be a few commentators in the above pages (from both sides) whose mind is made up, no facts from the opposite viewpoint will be tolerated. Business as usual on any forums I know. Amusing to read perhaps and quite evident to everyone except the most self-righteous poster. So let me just close with one of my favorite quotes which seems to be rather relevant to this thread in particular:
Arguing with an idiot is like teaching a pig to sing, wastes your time and annoys the pig.
Arguing with an idiot is like teaching a pig to sing, wastes your time and annoys the pig.
This reminds me of a variation on an old fable.
Short version: King catches thief and wants to kill him, thief says, "wait, give me a year, and I will teach your horse to sing, and if I dont you can kill me then."
King has nothing to lose so agrees.
The guard escorts the thief to the stables and asks why the thief just said that, if he really thought he could teach a horse to sing.
The thief said, "alot can happen in a year: the king may die, the horse may die, I may even die... or maybe the horse will learn to sing."
_________________________________________________
::WARNING:: This game is not intended for use as a source of self-esteem.
I definitely don't think the game is dying, but I do believe it's transitioning into something it never was--a grindy, menu-clicking festival of gambling boxes and fantasy wish fulfillment. Basically, the game's narrative and immersive setting have been set aside in favor of delivering expensive bite-sized doses of flavor-of-the-day references to the series. At some point (read: PWE takeover), the decision was made to turn STO into a DLC delivery vehicle as opposed to a game. Why? Because they know we Trekkies are ravenous and loyal fans ready to sink lots of money into things that make us feel even partly involved in this IP.
In addition, the ongoing list of unfixed bugs and issues has made navigating STO akin to running through a field made of discarded pushpins; they may be small and nagging, but in total, they make for an unpleasant experience. There are bugs still crawling over this game years after being reported, but the longevity of a bug doesn't seem to be of concern to Cryptic, but rather if it makes the DLC delivery machine get bogged down. Can't stop people from spending their money.
I set down the $20 for a starter pack for LoR. I did this because I wanted to reward Cryptic for delivering us playable Romulans and the new UI (which I still think is the single greatest achievement for the team). Looking at the relative blackout of communication since LoR's launch and the mentions of reputation system expansions (for PvP, etc.), I honestly regret spending the money now; while I may have intended to reward them for LoR, I'm also inevitably encouraging their incredibly meh-worthy direction for the future.
I dont know ho much I've spent on it. LOR was just the biggest single purchase ive made, but there were others.. I should probably be ashamed as I'm supposed to be supporting myself and one other on a measly veterans pension and social security disability, but i'm not. I figure a smile and a good time are as important to living as a meal and a blanket. And here i am, waiting for the first to buy my nice shiny scimitar.. Joy oh joy..
No, the game is far from dieing on one hand, but on the other, its already dead..
The Game is metamorphosing. Cryptic has chosen the direction it wants to move towards, and all those games everyone thought this one was supposed to be, are dead. I dont know what the direction is that the game is moving in. It certainly is aquiring aspects that i personally like less and less, and in many ways it could be argued that the game is becoming just one more generic offering in the great sea of forgettable entertainment.
But it isnt dieing. Its still on course for a future glue factory..
"Critics who say that the optimistic utopia Star Trek depicted is now outmoded forget the cultural context that gave birth to it: Star Trek was not a manifestation of optimism when optimism was easy. Star Trek declared a hope for a future that nobody stuck in the present could believe in. For all our struggles today, we haven’t outgrown the need for stories like Star Trek. We need tales of optimism, of heroes, of courage and goodness now as much as we’ve ever needed them." -Thomas Marrone
from what ive seen i dont think so , as long as resources are getting put into the game development then its not dying .
i think STO is doing very well , thought the player base does have a revolving door . players come and go , then come back.
cryptic made it easy to do that . which is cool in my book
I have long-time friends, who never touched STO once before, playing it for the first time and having quite a bit of fun with PVP, the borg, and the storyline. New people are joining all of the time and let's face it, playable Romulans/Remans are awesome. The only way Cryptic could best itself would be to release playable sulibans and Suliban ships.
I am glad to see there are a lot of people who get it. The game might not be dying but it did turn into a grind forever or cough up lots of money for stuff. That does not make for a fun game at all. This holiday event is the biggest proof of that. Its a seasonal event, its suppose to be fun meanwhile everything is a huge grind, even just to get a damned flower necklace, but they have a way out by letting you skip all that by coughing up money for Lobi crystals so you can buy boxes of Favors and Pearls.
Its really like the Ferengi are running STO now and they could care less if the game is fun or not, so long as they can blatantly rip off people with overpriced content.
If it werent for the fact Cryptic put in a lot of missions prior to the PWE buyout, it wouldnt still be so enjoyable still.
what do you think do you think people are starting to get board with the game and that it might go the way of star wars galaxies online
The only way it could go the way of SWG is if CBS decided to have another company remake Star trek Online from scratch; and then be so paranoid they might not get all current STO players to switch to the new version that they shut down Cryptic's STO a few days prior to launch.
So, no, I doubt this version of the game will go the route of SWG anytime soon.
Formerly known as Armsman from June 2008 to June 20, 2012 PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
im just saying not as m any people seem to be playing as they use to it takes forever to get a pvp teain the past people would line up to be on a pvp team together when
LOL - the PVP setup of this game has never attracted or maintained a large following. That said (and I do PVP myself, but it's a cold hard fact) -- PvE themepark MMOs rarely attract a large contingent of PVPers; (those that they do attract are usually VERY vocal though); and also, if you know anything about Cryptic's days with City of Heroes; and the other two MMOs they've made (Champions Online and NeverWinter)-- They have (unfortunately) never really done a PVP setup that attracts PVPer's -- and PVP is not a major aspect or focus of any of the MMOs they've created to date.
Thus, basing the assumption a Cryptic MMO is 'dying' because you can't launch a PVP queue is a false assumption. This game survives on PvE players.
Formerly known as Armsman from June 2008 to June 20, 2012 PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
not at all games very active i see people daily asking questions playing doffing stfs pve queues doing story missions new players asking for help tips locations of things info items if you think the game has turned silence recently try risa new things events thats where most people will be daily i see 150+ instances of the summer event lor just launched new ships event more on the way new missions will come in the future its a very bright future for sto atm imho.
besides a few bugs taking the level 10 ship token then still being told to do so as remen kdf no skip and cant move on to another mission till you do that claim its pretty good inside sto. and yes i did indeed say that single issue incase any dev reads :P
I think it balanced out some since the LOR launch. And that brought back older players and added new. I still see a lot out in sector space at times. And the main hubs are still full. Like DS9, New Romulas, etc. To me I hadn't really saw a decline in numbers.
I'm not leaving yet. Even there is a few bugs now and then. I'm sure they will sort them out in time. I got 4 characters going, and still having fun.
Reason you don't see PVP getting filled much. Could be they are like me and others. I hate doing PVP events. I had my fill with PVP stuff til I'm sick of it. So don't try to get me into PVP.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
Is STO Dying? My overall impressions is NO. Because the game is going strong with new content, and if the game was in serious decline, the Dev team would be regressing.
However, that said, there has been lots of people disappearing from the once active channels and even Hardcore players have gone (not permanently).
IMHO, Cryptic needs to focus on some serious bug squashing, and turning "the job" into back what it supposed to be - fun.
those ppl and me will probably NOT renew their subscription and stop spending money on the game... and a game can NOT be run without financial support!
I hope customer support will kick in soon and solve our problems
Comments
Correct but it wasn't relevant to his post.
We could go on about the whole Commonwealth if you like...
And the FISH are DROWNING!!!!!!
Edit to add something relevant:
From my point of view, which is that of fleet activity and amount of people on my friend's list, activity is higher than I've ever seen it. I think they did something to the PvP queue because now there will be like 25 people queued and it won't start, whereas before it started almost immediately when it had 10 people.
@DevolvedOne
Stagnating? Maybe lower levels of player activity at certain locations from my observations. That could just be a time zone thing. Everyone has to sleep sometime, but I am a night-owl, and tend to stay up longer than some Central Time Zoners do. What I see population-wise, will definitely be different from many of you other players for that reason.
Join Date: Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Would love the profit margins these guys make just from STO let alone the other PWE games.
i totaly agree with this post there will always be players that live in denial thinking if they close there eyes to the truth then every thing will be fine just look what happend to world of kung fu it ran for several years but the last 3 years of it's life they neglected the players didn't answer tickets untill finaly they shut down if things continue the way they are im'e afraid the same thing will happen to sto dont get me wrong the game it's saelf is good could be better and cryptic is a good company but unfortunatly they got in bed with the wrong invester namely pwe cryptic could have done far better with EA or some other company in my opinion
I don't think you know how Companies work, and as for your EA comment http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lm_GPkOfVKI
I came back 2 month ago because I was fed up with SWTOR. And I was pleasantly surprised with the state of the game right now. I subscribed to the game, I bought a Romulan legacy pack and an Odyssey cruiser too within a few weeks. One of my teammates bought a lifetime subscription after a few weeks of playing.
STO has clearly have some issues but it is much better shape now than 2011. And I am amazed with some Foundry content too - there are some players here who could create clearly entertaining and creative missions too. I hope STO is not dying - I want to fly my ship for a looong time
LOL, I suppose it is a joke.
Anyone who plays SWTOR has a first hand experience about EA - and believe me this is not a good experience. The main developement path now is to sell the same armor with different colors via Cartel Market. Support is non-existent, lacks of new content, etc. STO is in far more better state now than SWTOR.
And think about it: for EA even a Star Wars MMO is a secondary project - their main flagships are Sims, Need for Speed, sportsgames, etc. Do you really think a Star Trek licence would be receive the same resources like now from PWE?
It is very sad that a game with so much potential like STO and Neverwinter have fallen to these types of issues. BUT I will continue to play them until I get bored or until the bugs get so bad that I simply cannot.
My point is that items being put into the store has no bearing on the state of bugs etc...
You can't compare this game to SWG until they loose your credit card info to hackers and shut the game down with no news for a month. As a pay to play, making players afraid to give them their credit info was a deathblow. Really comparing this game to ANY other game is like comparing cats to dogs, sure both are pets like STO and SWG are both games, but too many variables make the comparison meaningless.
Game is dying/not dying? Everything is dying, some of us will die in a few years some will last for decades.. predicting when is hard for doctors. Predicting when a game will die? amusing but pointless. A good game can kill itself with a bad update and a bad game can save itself with a decent update.. so what?
Game can't be played for (free/casual/long or whatever) sorry folks, its a game, if you enjoy it, its not a grind; and if you don't enjoy it, why play? (I earned dil to buy char slots, slow but free - now I have 10 level 50 chars, just logging onto each for a few minutes daily and starting a bunch of doff missions earns me a small pile of dil daily... easy, quick and allows me enough dil to play with any character currently amuses me) Seriously though; why do so many players whine about "end game content" like its the only aspect of any game. Sure you need some end game content for max level characters, but I, personally, actually ENJOY the leveling process. Try a new character, try a new variant of the storyline quests, level a character WITHOUT bothering w/ the storyline (slow but possible) etc.. The point is, there is enough variety to do different things with your playtime. If anything your doing you consider a 'grind,' then try something different.
IF you really WANT the 'end game shiny' then do the mission/stf/daily or whatever; that 'end game shiny' wouldn't be all that special if anyone/everyone could get it easy now would it? Point is, you don't NEED any of it to play the game. I have played toons with all free stuff to level 50 and played with all zen stuff to level 50... easier with the zen? SURE. But not a huge or game breaking difference.
Complain about having to 'grind' for 'end game content' to get it next month, or pay now? That is NOT pay 2 win. Many MMOs don't have any method of earning the 'pay to win gear' THAT'S true pay 2 win. If you don't know the difference, try some other 'free' games before you complain.
Casual vs. hardcore gamer? Um... both take the same number of hours of playtime to earn the same thing. I know players that can level to 50 in a few days, others take a few weeks. Sure the casual gamer might miss out on some of the events, but that's about the only difference. Even the 'end game gear' can be earned by the 'casual' gamer, might take a year... but its possible.
Also noted there seems to be a few commentators in the above pages (from both sides) whose mind is made up, no facts from the opposite viewpoint will be tolerated. Business as usual on any forums I know. Amusing to read perhaps and quite evident to everyone except the most self-righteous poster. So let me just close with one of my favorite quotes which seems to be rather relevant to this thread in particular:
Arguing with an idiot is like teaching a pig to sing, wastes your time and annoys the pig.
This reminds me of a variation on an old fable.
Short version: King catches thief and wants to kill him, thief says, "wait, give me a year, and I will teach your horse to sing, and if I dont you can kill me then."
King has nothing to lose so agrees.
The guard escorts the thief to the stables and asks why the thief just said that, if he really thought he could teach a horse to sing.
The thief said, "alot can happen in a year: the king may die, the horse may die, I may even die... or maybe the horse will learn to sing."
::WARNING:: This game is not intended for use as a source of self-esteem.
In addition, the ongoing list of unfixed bugs and issues has made navigating STO akin to running through a field made of discarded pushpins; they may be small and nagging, but in total, they make for an unpleasant experience. There are bugs still crawling over this game years after being reported, but the longevity of a bug doesn't seem to be of concern to Cryptic, but rather if it makes the DLC delivery machine get bogged down. Can't stop people from spending their money.
I set down the $20 for a starter pack for LoR. I did this because I wanted to reward Cryptic for delivering us playable Romulans and the new UI (which I still think is the single greatest achievement for the team). Looking at the relative blackout of communication since LoR's launch and the mentions of reputation system expansions (for PvP, etc.), I honestly regret spending the money now; while I may have intended to reward them for LoR, I'm also inevitably encouraging their incredibly meh-worthy direction for the future.
No, the game is far from dieing on one hand, but on the other, its already dead..
The Game is metamorphosing. Cryptic has chosen the direction it wants to move towards, and all those games everyone thought this one was supposed to be, are dead. I dont know what the direction is that the game is moving in. It certainly is aquiring aspects that i personally like less and less, and in many ways it could be argued that the game is becoming just one more generic offering in the great sea of forgettable entertainment.
But it isnt dieing. Its still on course for a future glue factory..
"Critics who say that the optimistic utopia Star Trek depicted is now outmoded forget the cultural context that gave birth to it: Star Trek was not a manifestation of optimism when optimism was easy. Star Trek declared a hope for a future that nobody stuck in the present could believe in. For all our struggles today, we haven’t outgrown the need for stories like Star Trek. We need tales of optimism, of heroes, of courage and goodness now as much as we’ve ever needed them."
-Thomas Marrone
I second that. :P
i think STO is doing very well , thought the player base does have a revolving door . players come and go , then come back.
cryptic made it easy to do that . which is cool in my book
:eek::eek::eek::eek:
I've never had a problem with the launcher, ever....
This game fills a niche role of space combat that no other game fills, and the greed flows from it.
Its really like the Ferengi are running STO now and they could care less if the game is fun or not, so long as they can blatantly rip off people with overpriced content.
If it werent for the fact Cryptic put in a lot of missions prior to the PWE buyout, it wouldnt still be so enjoyable still.
I don't think the Klingons feel that way.
The only way it could go the way of SWG is if CBS decided to have another company remake Star trek Online from scratch; and then be so paranoid they might not get all current STO players to switch to the new version that they shut down Cryptic's STO a few days prior to launch.
So, no, I doubt this version of the game will go the route of SWG anytime soon.
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
LOL - the PVP setup of this game has never attracted or maintained a large following. That said (and I do PVP myself, but it's a cold hard fact) -- PvE themepark MMOs rarely attract a large contingent of PVPers; (those that they do attract are usually VERY vocal though); and also, if you know anything about Cryptic's days with City of Heroes; and the other two MMOs they've made (Champions Online and NeverWinter)-- They have (unfortunately) never really done a PVP setup that attracts PVPer's -- and PVP is not a major aspect or focus of any of the MMOs they've created to date.
Thus, basing the assumption a Cryptic MMO is 'dying' because you can't launch a PVP queue is a false assumption. This game survives on PvE players.
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
besides a few bugs taking the level 10 ship token then still being told to do so as remen kdf no skip and cant move on to another mission till you do that claim its pretty good inside sto. and yes i did indeed say that single issue incase any dev reads :P
I'm not leaving yet. Even there is a few bugs now and then. I'm sure they will sort them out in time. I got 4 characters going, and still having fun.
Reason you don't see PVP getting filled much. Could be they are like me and others. I hate doing PVP events. I had my fill with PVP stuff til I'm sick of it. So don't try to get me into PVP.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
However, that said, there has been lots of people disappearing from the once active channels and even Hardcore players have gone (not permanently).
IMHO, Cryptic needs to focus on some serious bug squashing, and turning "the job" into back what it supposed to be - fun.
reason:
customer support isn't answering some of its paying customers http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=663591
those ppl and me will probably NOT renew their subscription and stop spending money on the game... and a game can NOT be run without financial support!
I hope customer support will kick in soon and solve our problems