The amazing thing to me is that all Console have the SAME hardware and memory configuration, etc. IE You would think QA would have NO PROBLEM finding and documenting the major bugs you describe.
What do you want bet maybe they did and upper management thought they could just do a fast 'fix it' patch? (But said patch took longer to get Microsoft/Sony approval?) Either way, just shows how messed up it must be to work for Cryptic where quality is job 42 it seems.
Job 1? - Releasing whatever you have in whatever condition you have on the advertised street date, then getting someone to make the Podcast rounds saying - "STO is the best game ever, and the Players love it."
Like another poster has said, the The XBox and PS4 run totally different Operating Systems - The Xbox runs Windows 10, so is almost identical to the PC version with the exception of a different UI - The PC version already had the controller calls added to it. Plus, the Xbox UI is being backported to the PC eventually so both versions will completely identical.
However, the PS4 runs Linux and OpenGL. So effectively, they are having to maintain an entirely different version with vastly different API's. They can't even use DirectX with it.
Also, Xbox and PS4 hardware is actually very different - The Xbox runs (I believe) an AMD GPU, and the PS4 runs an Nvidia GPU, the processors work differently - The Xbox has an X86 CPU, whereas the PS4 uses a RISC CPU, which is one of the reasons they went with Linux as the base OS, as the kernel supports multiple architectures.
You are probably right however about the Upper Manglement setting a Hard Deadline by which it MUST be released, come hell or high water, regardless of playability, whilst throwing out promises to MS and Sony that some QA problems will be be fixed "shortly". As a dev, there is little you can do but sit and cry at your desk as the game you have just spent the last X number of years trying to perfect gets bodged and rushed out by a management that only cares about their bottom line.
it says there are 1.1 mil captains, and 2.7 mil bridge officers. that is less than 3 bridge officers per captain. does this mean the majority of that 1.1mil stopped playing very early? because don't you get more than 3 bridge officers pretty early in the missions?
well when u create a toon u have 0 if u advance a bit u get 2 very fast....
if a lot of ppl stop playing early they will have 0-2 boffs.... there charts proove lots of acccorpses
Looking at the Infographic again, I think it's actually referring to just the number of Tactical BOffs, which are most popular at 48%, so around 5.6 Mil total BOffs. Poor design choice on the infographic if so.
Though, the PS4's most popular Fed ship is the 'Tactical Escort', which, if they aren't including variants, is the level 30 freebie ship...
Looking at the Infographic again, I think it's actually referring to just the number of Tactical BOffs,
just looked again. there is absolutely nothing that suggests it is only talking about one type of boffs. where in the world did you get that from?
by that logic, the 1.1 mil captains number would only be talking about tac captains. but there is also nothing to suggest that.
Red part of the circles seems to be the Tac BOffs, and the 2.6 Mil is right next to it. A number being next to something usually indicates that it is a label for what's next to it. 1.1 Mil Captains is next to all three little people rows, so would apply to all three in total. Faction infographic has the rings split into three distinct columns with the numbers underneath. It might be that the BOff numbers were indicated in the same way as factions, but got combined into one graphic with the three rings nested together and only one label being applied to the new combined ring without thinking about how the might affect perception of what the label is even pointing to.
There's also the possibility that people are using their additional character slots for mules. Don't need bridge officers for mules.
With no DOffing or Admiralty, what are they using Mules for with so few BOffs? Not that many Dil sources without going to end-game PvE, which use 5 BOff ships, or is there something I'm not thinking of?
It would take an extremely large portion of the player base making mules with all their free slots filled to drop the average number of BOffs that much. I'm more inclined to go with the try-and-bail people being counted theory, if it's not a labeling issue in the infographic itself.
Edit:
Is there any sort of player statistics available from Microsoft or Sony for games like there is for Steam?
There's also the possibility that people are using their additional character slots for mules. Don't need bridge officers for mules.
so either a large number of people arent playing long enough to get a 3rd boff, or a large chunk of the 1.1mil are mule accounts meaning the 1.1mil number isn't accurate and real players are probably much lower. either way is not a very good thing.
it says there are 1.1 mil captains, and 2.7 mil bridge officers. that is less than 3 bridge officers per captain. does this mean the majority of that 1.1mil stopped playing very early? because don't you get more than 3 bridge officers pretty early in the missions?
Spambots.
NO, I'm serious. Spambots.
the in-game e-mails hawking EC for real world money, promising to sell you lockbox and event ships? The various hawkers in sector space advertising phishing sites looking for your credit card? (in zone chat) with 'cleverly' set up site-addies so the automatic system can't see them?
all of them have to have 'an account' and that means a 'Captain'.
someone on zone today mentioned hitting three different ones an hour-in each instance/map/social zone he visited.
That is a LOT of **** spam bots. a lot of 'Captains' and none of them 'need' more than bare minimum of bridge officers.
This problem really got notable about two years ago, and based on the length of just MY 'ignore' list, (which is exclusively reserved for spambots), it's not getting better.
Spambots are a pain in the rear, but if the game was "doomed" they would not be bothering with this game either.
What is really interesting is that Klingons are at 20% and Romulans are at 12% even though they didn't go through the extreme lack of content that KDF players on the PC had to go through in STO's early years. I wouldn't be surprised if the PC version has similar numbers.
Well it's simple...each is smaller than the next...they showed Feds all the love since the start thus they're the most popular...KDF has a lot less options than Feds but the RR has even less than the KDF.
As has been said, this wouldn't affect console players as much as veteran PC players. On PC the same holds when people start playing, normally they wouldn't educate themselves on all end game stuff before choosing their allegiance, but play what they want to play on the first try. And if they were educating themselves on how to make the best toon, they'd go Rom. While I do agree that KDF and Rom could get more love in this game, the fact that most people play fed isn't only self made, and I think those accusing Cryptic of ruining it themselves have to realize that there will always be more Feddies than others, because Star Trek is a Federation franchise. (Okay, many realize that, some apparently don't)
But even 25K per console isn't exactly a small figure. I would say Neverwinter is hovering around those numbers, and most likely so is ESO, Warframe and quite a few other multi-player games on console. Its a very healthy number of steady players.
Yeah but how many of those other games are getting slow to no support and suffering lots of game breaking bugs?
Well, ESO and Neverwinter do. The others I don't know. Of course you can always argue what you would call "game breaking", because I don't see a "game breaking" bug on STO. Quite a few very annoying ones, but I can still play the game.
Even if they made up half the playerbase - which I doubt - that would still mean only 5 to 6 boffs per toon which I consider little, especially since most players in for the long term would in my guesstimate use up the free boff slots you get while leveling.
But if we see that apparently only 1 in 5 players picking up the game continue on (reaching level 10 is where it starts), those starting tutorials will make up a large part of the playerbase. If I am not mistaken, three factions get their four starter boffs in the order Tac-Eng-Sci-Tac2, only the Roms switch Eng and Sci. Which also would explain there being about twice as many tacs as either of the others. You would expect Eng to outdo Sci more though, for players leaving the game after getting Zarva/Ch'gren will only get one.
Possibly it is just too early for such a statistic to have any substantial meaning.
My mother was an epohh and my father smelled of tulaberries
X1 version is tanking as the fleets are getting smaller and smaller since there's no content. As new games with content and mods come out sto is collecting dust. Can play through eso mostly bug free now, but everything in sto is infested with bugs. Its a shame. Now the fanboy defense force shall continue:)
But this is an infographic for consoles that was released after about 1.5 months from launch. So there is no bias as far as the lack of Klingon or Romulan development is concerned.
This "infographic" is from Cryptic, not an independent third-party. Do you believe them? It's the same company that announced full PvE factions before doing market research.
Actually, I do believe this infographic since if they were going to fudge the numbers for faction percentages, then they would fudge the numbers for the amount of bridge officers available. 2.7 million bridge officers and 1.1 million captains is not a good sign since it means that most players are not even spending a couple of hours on the game. Just create a character, try it out for about half an hour or less, and not play it again.
Besides tons of video game companies are overzealous about their upcoming game and announcing features that get cut before launch. Peter Molyneux and Sean Murray are notorious for this. If Cryptic had a couple of more years developing the game before launch, then there would have been full PvE factions instead of a PvE faction that could have used some more missions and a PvP faction. Cryptic had a deadline of 18 months to create STO while most MMOs take about 3 to 5 years to develop so it is not surprising that Klingons were originally added as an afterthought.
'But to be logical is not to be right', and 'nothing' on God's earth could ever 'make it' right!'
Judge Dan Haywood
'As l speak now, the words are forming in my head.
l don't know.
l really don't know what l'm about to say, except l have a feeling about it.
That l must repeat the words that come without my knowledge.'
48.55% of the PSN users who played STO completed a tutorial.
22.59% have reached lvl 10 (Ps4)
14.73% have reached lvl 20 (Ps4)
11.38% have reached lvl 30 (Ps4)
9.23% have reached lvl 40 (Ps4)
7.92% have reached lvl 50 (Ps4)
1.73% are level 60 currently. (Ps4)
Wow. Those figures are quite interesting. The fact that you level fairly quickly in the early game levels and yet only 14.73% of players have reached level 20, seems to suggest over 80% of people who try the game don't stick around. I wonder how that compares with other game's retention rates?
Played was probably too lose a word if you're trying to speculate on retention rates. 48.55% of everyone who downloaded STO or had an account on their friends ps4 w.e played through the tutorial. Their graph said 1.1 Million captains were made across both consoles. You could look at the numbers compared to the tut and make some guesses but it's just a snapshot of current achievements.
48.55% of the PSN users who played STO completed a tutorial.
22.59% have reached lvl 10 (Ps4)
14.73% have reached lvl 20 (Ps4)
11.38% have reached lvl 30 (Ps4)
9.23% have reached lvl 40 (Ps4)
7.92% have reached lvl 50 (Ps4)
1.73% are level 60 currently. (Ps4)
Wow. Those figures are quite interesting. The fact that you level fairly quickly in the early game levels and yet only 14.73% of players have reached level 20, seems to suggest over 80% of people who try the game don't stick around. I wonder how that compares with other game's retention rates?
As Patrick pointed out, these numbers include spambots. Spambots have no reason to ever complete the tutorial. It's hard to say how many of those 51.45% who didn't complete the tutorial are spambots, but you'd probably be close to right if you double all those numbers posted.
Comments
Like another poster has said, the The XBox and PS4 run totally different Operating Systems - The Xbox runs Windows 10, so is almost identical to the PC version with the exception of a different UI - The PC version already had the controller calls added to it. Plus, the Xbox UI is being backported to the PC eventually so both versions will completely identical.
However, the PS4 runs Linux and OpenGL. So effectively, they are having to maintain an entirely different version with vastly different API's. They can't even use DirectX with it.
Also, Xbox and PS4 hardware is actually very different - The Xbox runs (I believe) an AMD GPU, and the PS4 runs an Nvidia GPU, the processors work differently - The Xbox has an X86 CPU, whereas the PS4 uses a RISC CPU, which is one of the reasons they went with Linux as the base OS, as the kernel supports multiple architectures.
You are probably right however about the Upper Manglement setting a Hard Deadline by which it MUST be released, come hell or high water, regardless of playability, whilst throwing out promises to MS and Sony that some QA problems will be be fixed "shortly". As a dev, there is little you can do but sit and cry at your desk as the game you have just spent the last X number of years trying to perfect gets bodged and rushed out by a management that only cares about their bottom line.
My character Tsin'xing
well when u create a toon u have 0 if u advance a bit u get 2 very fast....
if a lot of ppl stop playing early they will have 0-2 boffs.... there charts proove lots of acccorpses
Though, the PS4's most popular Fed ship is the 'Tactical Escort', which, if they aren't including variants, is the level 30 freebie ship...
just looked again. there is absolutely nothing that suggests it is only talking about one type of boffs. where in the world did you get that from?
by that logic, the 1.1 mil captains number would only be talking about tac captains. but there is also nothing to suggest that.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
Red part of the circles seems to be the Tac BOffs, and the 2.6 Mil is right next to it. A number being next to something usually indicates that it is a label for what's next to it. 1.1 Mil Captains is next to all three little people rows, so would apply to all three in total. Faction infographic has the rings split into three distinct columns with the numbers underneath. It might be that the BOff numbers were indicated in the same way as factions, but got combined into one graphic with the three rings nested together and only one label being applied to the new combined ring without thinking about how the might affect perception of what the label is even pointing to.
Except you left out the word "only" and the rest of the quote
With no DOffing or Admiralty, what are they using Mules for with so few BOffs? Not that many Dil sources without going to end-game PvE, which use 5 BOff ships, or is there something I'm not thinking of?
It would take an extremely large portion of the player base making mules with all their free slots filled to drop the average number of BOffs that much. I'm more inclined to go with the try-and-bail people being counted theory, if it's not a labeling issue in the infographic itself.
Edit:
Is there any sort of player statistics available from Microsoft or Sony for games like there is for Steam?
so either a large number of people arent playing long enough to get a 3rd boff, or a large chunk of the 1.1mil are mule accounts meaning the 1.1mil number isn't accurate and real players are probably much lower. either way is not a very good thing.
48.55% of the PSN users who played STO completed a tutorial.
22.59% have reached lvl 10 (Ps4)
14.73% have reached lvl 20 (Ps4)
11.38% have reached lvl 30 (Ps4)
9.23% have reached lvl 40 (Ps4)
7.92% have reached lvl 50 (Ps4)
1.73% are level 60 currently. (Ps4)
Active numbers dipped a little after latest round of bugs + the usual. 15th should see some return. Hopefully it goes well.
0.0% have spent 30 points in a captain specialization.
4.28% have been assimilated by the Borg
Sony Trophy numbers
40.9% of the PSN users who played STO completed a tutorial.
19.4% have reached lvl 10 (Ps4)
11.7% have reached lvl 20 (Ps4)
8.9% have reached lvl 30 (Ps4)
6.8% have reached lvl 40 (Ps4)
5.4% have reached lvl 50 (Ps4)
0.7% are level 60 currently. (Ps4)
0.0% have spent 30 points in a captain specialization.
2.4% have been assimilated by the Borg
Spambots are a pain in the rear, but if the game was "doomed" they would not be bothering with this game either.
As has been said, this wouldn't affect console players as much as veteran PC players. On PC the same holds when people start playing, normally they wouldn't educate themselves on all end game stuff before choosing their allegiance, but play what they want to play on the first try. And if they were educating themselves on how to make the best toon, they'd go Rom. While I do agree that KDF and Rom could get more love in this game, the fact that most people play fed isn't only self made, and I think those accusing Cryptic of ruining it themselves have to realize that there will always be more Feddies than others, because Star Trek is a Federation franchise. (Okay, many realize that, some apparently don't)
Well, ESO and Neverwinter do. The others I don't know. Of course you can always argue what you would call "game breaking", because I don't see a "game breaking" bug on STO. Quite a few very annoying ones, but I can still play the game.
Even if they made up half the playerbase - which I doubt - that would still mean only 5 to 6 boffs per toon which I consider little, especially since most players in for the long term would in my guesstimate use up the free boff slots you get while leveling.
But if we see that apparently only 1 in 5 players picking up the game continue on (reaching level 10 is where it starts), those starting tutorials will make up a large part of the playerbase. If I am not mistaken, three factions get their four starter boffs in the order Tac-Eng-Sci-Tac2, only the Roms switch Eng and Sci. Which also would explain there being about twice as many tacs as either of the others. You would expect Eng to outdo Sci more though, for players leaving the game after getting Zarva/Ch'gren will only get one.
Possibly it is just too early for such a statistic to have any substantial meaning.
My character Tsin'xing
My character Tsin'xing
Actually, I do believe this infographic since if they were going to fudge the numbers for faction percentages, then they would fudge the numbers for the amount of bridge officers available. 2.7 million bridge officers and 1.1 million captains is not a good sign since it means that most players are not even spending a couple of hours on the game. Just create a character, try it out for about half an hour or less, and not play it again.
Besides tons of video game companies are overzealous about their upcoming game and announcing features that get cut before launch. Peter Molyneux and Sean Murray are notorious for this. If Cryptic had a couple of more years developing the game before launch, then there would have been full PvE factions instead of a PvE faction that could have used some more missions and a PvP faction. Cryptic had a deadline of 18 months to create STO while most MMOs take about 3 to 5 years to develop so it is not surprising that Klingons were originally added as an afterthought.
l don't know.
l really don't know what l'm about to say, except l have a feeling about it.
That l must repeat the words that come without my knowledge.'
Wow. Those figures are quite interesting. The fact that you level fairly quickly in the early game levels and yet only 14.73% of players have reached level 20, seems to suggest over 80% of people who try the game don't stick around. I wonder how that compares with other game's retention rates?
My character Tsin'xing