Productive Discussion on Population

[Stylez]

How about this ingenious idea! Let this game die already...

I mean, there are valid points made in this thread, but seriously, lets move on. This game was five or so years over due for termination.

Each zone is dying out, one by one. Nothing, I do mean, nothing, can save it. The game is simply dying out due to it being prehistoric. No one wants to play a ten year old game when they have more modern things to occupy their time. Seriously, think, most the people here have been playing this game for years. When you think about it, it's pretty sad.

Type ?usage, if you have 10000 hours logged into this game, you know you need to get more fresh air. Go outside, play, get a girls phone number, hang out with your friends, play Defense Grid: The Awakening (good game by the way). Plenty of other things to do than rant on about how to save a zone within a game that's on its last leg.

Go ahead, prove me wrong, the fuck if I care. If this game goes on for another five years, hopefully I won't be here to cherish those moments, rather I'll be doing something more productive.

Holy shit, you know I'm about to hit Submit Reply and knowing that I'm gonna get flamed for this and yet I'm typing as I'm thinking this through... Sleep, yeah, sounds good...

[Stylez]

Some great ideas from some of the public members. Maybe we should listen to some of the posts from this thread and put them into practice. (That's when they aren't one huge fucking paragraph that should be separated for easier reading! *Peter Griffin* ~Love You~) We had dumbrit! offering to help out with the advertising and then you go and shut him down xog because it wasn't what you was asking for. We all know the reasons for people quitting the game, it hardly takes a rocket scientist to figure that out, but we should concentrate on bringing new players to the zone.
I like the idea of a tutorial arena, why not have the tutorial arena as the first arena we goto, rather than pub? Maybe have a staff member doing shifts in there, or use it as an afk-like arena, where players can offer advice and tips to the new players joining the game.
But we definately need some sort of a tutorial for begginers and intemediate players. Public players are not encouraged to form squads or even know twd exists, maybe you could have a map where we are directed to when we first enter which has a small practice map but also a detailed description of the game and what it entails. I like the idea what kthx said, why don't we do a description of the game and enlighten new players of the history of the game. We could also mention about all the different leagues we have to offer and give them the basic commands every new player needs, such as: ?go (arena name), ?find (player name) and how to join chats etc..
We could also show them how to apply for a squad or signup a squad.
That's just a few of my ideas, I'll post some more later on when I'm at home and not on my iPhone.
But I do know when I first started this game, that if it wasn't for my brother showing me the basics of the game and then I would of just logged off and probably would of been a porn star or something, who knows.
P.s I don't have time to read through what I said, so I'm sorry if I have any mistakes. God, how I hate predicted text.

<3

P.s. RUM AND COCK, WOOOOO!

[Vys]

Some great ideas from some of the public members. Maybe we should listen to some of the posts from this thread and put them into practice. We had dumbrit! offering to help out with the advertising and then you go and shut him down xog because it wasn't what you was asking for. We all know the reasons for people quitting the game, it hardly takes a rocket scientist to figure that out, but we should concentrate on bringing new players to the zone.
I like the idea of a tutorial arena, why not have the tutorial arena as the first arena we goto, rather than pub? Maybe have a staff member doing shifts in there, or use it as an afk-like arena, where players can offer advice and tips to the new players joining the game.
But we definately need some sort of a tutorial for begginers and intemediate players. Public players are not encouraged to form squads or even know twd exists, maybe you could have a map where we are directed to when we first enter which has a small practice map but also a detailed description of the game and what it entails. I like the idea what kthx said, why don't we do a description of the game and enlighten new players of the history of the game. We could also mention about all the different leagues we have to offer and give them the basic commands every new player needs, such as: ?go (arena name), ?find (player name) and how to join chats etc..
We could also show them how to apply for a squad or signup a squad.
That's just a few of my ideas, I'll post some more later on when I'm at home and not on my iPhone.
But I do know when I first started this game, that if it wasn't for my brother showing me the basics of the game and then I would of just logged off and probably would of been a porn star or something, who knows.
P.s I don't have time to read through what I said, so I'm sorry if I have any mistakes. God, how I hate predicted text.

[gran guerrero]

because PH tells them we're having a mass migration from trenchwars to IRC and then everyone quits and he comes back and says he's just recruiting

fuck that guy

for once in my life I agree with you!!

[the_paul]

because PH tells them we're having a mass migration from trenchwars to IRC and then everyone quits and he comes back and says he's just recruiting

fuck that guy

loooooooooooooooooooooooool

[lamebob]

yep

Has happened to me (not getting picked in base).

Now I don't even respond to "join my squad?" requests.

Its extremely hard for new folks to get into the actual fun part of TW, i.e. TWD/TWL. One of the best sharks in the game could be mindlessly playing in pub for years and years and never get picked up by a basing squad because noone knows him/her. You could say "but ?go base will help him get known" but noone will ever pick him in base unless they absolutely have too, and then only 8-10 ppl will see him play. Plus how is a guy supposed to practice being good at basing when he never truly practices, but only gets to play in pub.

If he goes to base and ask to be picked, most likely some asshole will tell him to STFU and GO BACK TO UR PUB. About the only way i see to get into basing is too get extremely good at WB/Jav in elim, get picked for DD/JD squad then beg your squad to start basing.

Why not make pub 0 into ?go base rules. no caps obviously, but dissallow freq changes unless lopsided and post a basing style report at rounds end. include only players that played whole round in the report. This would discourage TKing since the zone sees how many tks the crappy jav had. Better yet, only allow the round MVPS(one for each freq) to even be a jav. sharks would get some love this way too since it would display RPD and FT for them. Also make it the 10min continuous clock style round setup, with 1min between rounds.

Maybe if the pub was a little more fun/base oriented then you wouldnt see 40 ppl afk in TWBD all the time. Maybe those guys would be in pub inbetween rounds and the new guys to TW would actually get picked up by squads more often.

?go base gets ruined by TWBD matches all the time, it should exist solely for squads to practice in.

Just the thoughts of a filthy pubber, now tell me to STFU NOOB and GO BACK TO UR PUB.

[Ilya]

Why do people quit

because PH tells them we're having a mass migration from trenchwars to IRC and then everyone quits and he comes back and says he's just recruiting

fuck that guy

[Xog]

http://forums.trenchwars.org/showthread.php?38626-Continuum-Marketing-ACTIVE

worked out for a month or two.. spent a total of about four hundred bucks

[Twenty Four]

Sorry I don't have much time to post (Just spent my last hour reading everything)

Why do people quit. Good question. Think we already have our longwinded answers above.

As I've said for the last few years, the skill level between pub/twd is HUUUUUUGGGGGEEEEEEEE! There was a recent push by a few token people (Turban, Fludd, ME ) to create squads specifically to get people from public arena's to join twd squads - then we could compete against each other at the same level. Well, that worked for about a month or two, but getting public players to
1) care
2) actually have fun in TWD
is rediculously hard

NOONE likes to enter a game and get their butt's whooped continously by players that have a 5-10 year headstart on them. Unless we can close that G A P, we'll continue to have people leave and continue to lose possible new players that try out this game for a week or two.

If you can Xog, link me to the discussion on advertising/promoting the game. I think that anyone reading this thread would be interested in reading that one as well.

-24

[9 Kisses]

I started playing in 2001. I was a member of an Earthbound (SNES) fansite/forum for quite some time, and the members congregated in a private arena in the DSB zone, and I played under the name PhantomPhoton. I joined in and loved being able to play a game with familiar people. Eventually it died, and I moved on to Trench Wars due to the sheer number of players shown in the zone list. I went from PhantomPhoton, to ni_hi_li_st, to FemalePersuasion, to Fem., and now, this.

Anyway, it didn't take long for me to get sucked in to the intelligent discussions, annoying hecklers, and ship functions. But what always sticks out in my mind is this:

I was hanging out in pubs one day, playing as a Warbird, constantly having my up arrow held down and someone noticed this. Man, I cannot remember his name for the life of me, but he took me and a few other novice players up to the top of the map and taught us how to aim, by shooting at rocks, and taught us how to maneuver, by dodging him. His advice helped me out tremendously, and I will never forget his niceness and thoughtfulness to try to teach us to reach our full potential. That cemented my place in the community, sometimes with long periods of time between when I play, but when I do have the opportunity, I play quite a bit.

I keep coming back because I play a lot of games on a lot of different platforms, and I've yet to find a community that compares to that of Trench Wars. I've also found, as weird as it sounds, that other games are entirely too easy...I master them too quickly, or it just doesn't pose a challenge because the game ends...and that's it. This game on the other hand, I am still working on my Warbird ability, I'm a decent basing spid, but there are ships I still have no idea how to play. There is depth here, a perfect balance...I dig it.

I don't think the game is dying, I just think we need to advertise to the right market. I read that we should focus to the old-school gamer group, and I agree. It also should be noted that my favorite console is SNES. That's probably why I continue to play here. Graphics don't matter as much to me as the actual game itself.

[Xog]

Its extremely hard for new folks to get into the actual fun part of TW, i.e. TWD/TWL. One of the best sharks in the game could be mindlessly playing in pub for years and years and never get picked up by a basing squad because noone knows him/her. You could say "but ?go base will help him get known" but noone will ever pick him in base unless they absolutely have too, and then only 8-10 ppl will see him play. Plus how is a guy supposed to practice being good at basing when he never truly practices, but only gets to play in pub.

If he goes to base and ask to be picked, most likely some asshole will tell him to STFU and GO BACK TO UR PUB. About the only way i see to get into basing is too get extremely good at WB/Jav in elim, get picked for DD/JD squad then beg your squad to start basing.

Why not make pub 0 into ?go base rules. no caps obviously, but dissallow freq changes unless lopsided and post a basing style report at rounds end. include only players that played whole round in the report. This would discourage TKing since the zone sees how many tks the crappy jav had. Better yet, only allow the round MVPS(one for each freq) to even be a jav. sharks would get some love this way too since it would display RPD and FT for them. Also make it the 10min continuous clock style round setup, with 1min between rounds.

Maybe if the pub was a little more fun/base oriented then you wouldnt see 40 ppl afk in TWBD all the time. Maybe those guys would be in pub inbetween rounds and the new guys to TW would actually get picked up by squads more often.

?go base gets ruined by TWBD matches all the time, it should exist solely for squads to practice in.

Just the thoughts of a filthy pubber, now tell me to STFU NOOB and GO BACK TO UR PUB.

I've seen this to be a major contribution to the problem for several years now, mostly because I was in that situation myself. What I did however was squad hop, to try and find the horrible squad with atleast the right amount of players and an interest in TWBD.. The noob squads really brought me into the basing scene. I learned with other noobs throughout the years, often switching out to focus on DD or JD just to get my name noticed. It was a strategy I used because I knew it was the only thing I could do. The negative impact is the fact that I have about 100 squads on my squad history now. But I did what I had to do. Heck I even got into Sk8 back in the day when I wasn't focused on TWBD.

Another thing is lack of advertising. I have NEVER heard anyone EVER talk about this game online. I would have never found it if it werent for some nerdy kids in highschool I saw playing it. At the time there were basically no free games, so of course it was easier to find. This is NOT the case anymore.

I've actually been hearing a lot about Continuum from other people while browsing the Jumpgate: Evolution, and Black Prophecy forums (these are upcoming space MMOs)

[riske]

I started playing 2002and played for about 6 months(maybe an hour or so a day) in pub/go javs and quit because it got boring. Had no idea about TWD or anything like that.

I started playing again in 03 or so and found out about baseelim and TWD and havent quit for more than a month or so.

I think the main problem is people dont know how much the game has to offer outside of pub, and it is very high learning curve.

The graphics have little to do with it, the type of people who have to have cutting edge graphics arent the type of people you want to play anyway. They will leave as soon as the next new game comes out anyway.

Besides that, this game would NOT work in any other type of setup, you have to have a huge topdown view, or it would be a completely different game. You cant have a game like this in 3d, yes there are aerial combat games etc, but its a completely different type of strategy etc. You have to be able to see 360 degrees around you in this game or it would not work at all.

Another thing is lack of advertising. I have NEVER heard anyone EVER talk about this game online. I would have never found it if it werent for some nerdy kids in highschool I saw playing it. At the time there were basically no free games, so of course it was easier to find. This is NOT the case anymore.

[Kraftyjack]

Pubbers stuck being pubbers.

Its extremely hard for new folks to get into the actual fun part of TW, i.e. TWD/TWL. One of the best sharks in the game could be mindlessly playing in pub for years and years and never get picked up by a basing squad because noone knows him/her. You could say "but ?go base will help him get known" but noone will ever pick him in base unless they absolutely have too, and then only 8-10 ppl will see him play. Plus how is a guy supposed to practice being good at basing when he never truly practices, but only gets to play in pub.

If he goes to base and ask to be picked, most likely some asshole will tell him to STFU and GO BACK TO UR PUB. About the only way i see to get into basing is too get extremely good at WB/Jav in elim, get picked for DD/JD squad then beg your squad to start basing.

Why not make pub 0 into ?go base rules. no caps obviously, but dissallow freq changes unless lopsided and post a basing style report at rounds end. include only players that played whole round in the report. This would discourage TKing since the zone sees how many tks the crappy jav had. Better yet, only allow the round MVPS(one for each freq) to even be a jav. sharks would get some love this way too since it would display RPD and FT for them. Also make it the 10min continuous clock style round setup, with 1min between rounds.

Maybe if the pub was a little more fun/base oriented then you wouldnt see 40 ppl afk in TWBD all the time. Maybe those guys would be in pub inbetween rounds and the new guys to TW would actually get picked up by squads more often.

?go base gets ruined by TWBD matches all the time, it should exist solely for squads to practice in.

Just the thoughts of a filthy pubber, now tell me to STFU NOOB and GO BACK TO UR PUB.

[Lethe]

Blah blah blah

WTF? Stop jerking it over an ancient game. People are leaving cause they get bored or arent having fun. Let the game die in peace.

[blackrazor]

I've played Subspace since 2000, always TW, always pub. I disagree that the graphics are bad. They are topdown-2D sure, but some people find that less dizzy than 3D or 2D-isometric variants. It's not tile-based (and heck, people still play tile-based MMOs, so go figure), and it has decent cheat detection and prediction algorthims, making it a fun online "twitch" experience.

More active mods to warn TKers would be nice. Personally, I prefer that people say all kinds of stuff in chat. I think this world is way too "politically correct" as it is. PC doesn't make the hate go away, it just hides it under the rug as a big ugly bulge that everyone can see anyways. I appreciate that there is one tiny corner of the world left where I can still read people saying stuff they honestly believe, even if I don't agree with them. And heck, I can blow their pixels to kingdom-come if they offend me.

The game isn't too hard or too simple. Tutorials would be pointless, most are ignored. The whole LT vs Pure pubs is interesting, voting was interesting too, but people adapt. None of the little tweaks are deal-makers or deal-breakers, either way. The most useful addition to TW over the years has been the Roboboy timed games. That gives the arena a pulse, a rthym, just perfect.

All games suffer from attrition. This is a similar game to Infantry, coded by the same Jeff Petersen. SOE did us all a favour for a while, by making Infantry Pay to Play, for a few years. Their numbers dropped from 4K online, to just a few dozen, and we picked up players from that. When SOE reversed policy and made Infantry free again, the numbers started to favour Infantry over Subspace again. Infantry is a bit newer than Subspace, but honestly, the two games are similar and would appeal to similar needs.

So a good question to ask would be: what does SOE have that Trench doesn't? Well, SOE has a portal, a wide pipe through which many internet eyeballs come to visit. And related, they have advertizing, well placed, well targetted (although we could do better I think). A few mentioned it before me; advertizing isn't only for growing a playerbase, it's for maintenance too, to replace numbers lost to normal attrition.

When people type "free multiplayer space online game" into Google, make sure that Trenchwars rates high on that list. Make sure we're current on wiki's list of free online games, and on MPOG and other portal gaming sites. Start banner exchanges, subscribe to current banner exchange programs; crappy free games, like AdventureQuest seem to get lots of mileage from stuff like that. We can, too. (Plus, our game is actually good.)

In addition, if there was any way to port a version of the client to blackberries, cell phones, i-products, etc., that could only help. That would open up whole new segments of casual users to a fast-paced simple-to-use addictive enjoyable game that is Subspace.

You want to know why people leave Subspace? It doesn't matter. Why? Because there are no major flaws with the game. If you compare a list of reasons to the reasons why people leave other games, you will likely find lots in common. Assuming an online game isn't a programming or management nightmare, then people still leave for a variety of personal or taste reasons, or just boredom over time. No way to fix that, it's called attrition. Your only option, and what successful companies do, is to bring people in with various forms of marketing. We're free, low budget, and it's fun being small, so we don't even need a huge marketing campaign (nor could we afford one), but a few small smart well-placed links, banners, ads, etc., should draw in enough eyeballs to replace those lost to normal attrition.

Good-luck, and whether or not it's the answer you wanted ... well, it's my honest heartfelt thought-out answer. I know we all care about the game, and I guess posting and brainstorming here is one casual way of showing it (besides playing, of course).

Cheers.

How I see this game: It's like the holy grail of MMO for me. Imagine the grind and leveling is finally over, and 8 distinct but balanced classes are available from which to choose. And you can switch classes at will. Two (or more) teams (think guilds, factions, armies) battle it out for supremacy on an ancient battlefield (which looks in the most uncanny way like JeffP's Harmless Games teddybear logo) for possession of the flag. Hold the flag and gain ultimate power and prestige over your enemy. Keep the flag for 3 minutes, and you have won an adhrenaline pumping heart pounding match full of intense conflict: bullets, bombs, shrap, bursts, repels, mines, bricks, cloaks all put into action by both teams. For honour, for glory, for the flag!