I love this game but no other game I play has me tabbing out to fill time in

[Oldman731]

It wasnt worth the money because he MAY have been spending his advertising money in the wrong place. You can spend a million dollars in ads in beauty magazines, or in aviation magazines, which do you think might be worth more than the other? 

Advertising is more expensive than people often think it is.  Just to keep your position on Google searches can run you $10k/month.  More, depending on how you want to be advertised, and in how many ways (per click?).  Then there's YouTube, specialized sites, all the other places you have to spend money to get your point across.  That's just the internet.  Moving to aviation magazines (does anyone buy them anymore?) is on top of that.  Major TV station advertising is reserved for companies much larger than HTC.  These days, that probably includes the Hitler Channel.

And yet people still seem to be looking, and those are likely the people most likely to be attracted.  As Brooke, Vraciu and HT have said, the problem seems to be keep them here - given their initial willingness to explore a WWII aviation game.

It would be nice if I could offer advice, but I'm stymied, too.

- oldman

[Lazerr]

Ive been here damn near 20 years... i still cannot get my controls to work for gvs.  Advertise all you want, if your toejams broken, people wont buy it.

Coupled with the rest of the lazyass gameplay features.. what do you expect?  Pay you to be bored?

[b4o2s9s]

Ive been here damn near 20 years... i still cannot get my controls to work for gvs.  Advertise all you want, if your toejams broken, people wont buy it.

Coupled with the rest of the lazyass gameplay features.. what do you expect?  Pay you to be bored?

Good god you old man!

Wait, I've been here 17 years.....crap.

[asterix]

...
in my opinion the answer is pretty simple: MISSIONS. when squads were doing missions, they were attracting and keeping new players. because missions are fun and anyone can do them and feel like they're getting somewhere.
...

Agree with this, but people who could do that seem to stay out of MA and appear in FSO or other events.

[Vraciu]

People hate drones, but I would love to see AI bombers here and there just to spice things up when numbers are low. 

Maybe that’s the ENY counter.   When one side gets lopsided you roll some drones to spice things up.

[715]

AH3 actually already has drones built in for quite some time. They will shred you in a few milliseconds; not fun to attack at all.

[Vraciu]

AH3 actually already has drones built in for quite some time. They will shred you in a few milliseconds; not fun to attack at all.

Easily adjusted.

[The Fugitive]

It's not worth the expense for many reasons.   Examples: Traffic-generated revenue does not exceed advertising expenditure.  People reached don't stay.   

Again, people STAYING is not an advertising issue. If they are getting 1000 downloads a day the advertising is working fine.

We are getting enough initial interest WITHOUT those dollars being spent on advertising.    Thus it isn't worth the effort according to internal data.  It doesn't matter where you spend it if the people don't stay.   

Im sorry, I didnt know you were privy to HTC's data. What happened last year as no bearing on what is happing now. We dont know how many people are trying out the game these days. I dont fly as much as I use to, but Friday and Saturday nights I dont see a heck of a lot of names on the roster with no rank, or no stars, or no squad affiliation. These would be the "new" guys for the most part.

I dont know what HTCs numbers are, I dont think they are getting the hits like they did after the Steam release. I hope they are getting a bunch, but I dont see THAT many new people trying out the game.

As I have said many times, game play has got to change because obviously what we have now isnt enough to KEEP these new players. 

[Vraciu]

Again, people STAYING is not an advertising issue. If they are getting 1000 downloads a day the advertising is working fine.

The people aren't coming because of the advertising,   

Im sorry, I didnt know you were privy to HTC's data.

There's a lot you don't know, you just don't know it.   

[Wiley]

We dont know how many people are trying out the game these days. I dont fly as much as I use to, but Friday and Saturday nights I dont see a heck of a lot of names on the roster with no rank, or no stars, or no squad affiliation. These would be the "new" guys for the most part.

What V's on about is the fact that during Steam, per HT, they were leaving after a minute or so.  When they go through with that kind of speed, it's not going to be very visible to a player I think.  I was surprised they had 40,000 people create accounts and log in when they went on Steam in a couple months.

It appears regardless of how many new people they're getting these days, they still aren't sticking, which is the next thing some people have latched onto.  Those who don't believe every problem can be solved by just advertising more at least.

Wiley.

[Vraciu]

What V's on about is the fact that during Steam, per HT, they were leaving after a minute or so.  When they go through with that kind of speed, it's not going to be very visible to a player I think.  I was surprised they had 40,000 people create accounts and log in when they went on Steam in a couple months.

It appears regardless of how many new people they're getting these days, they still aren't sticking, which is the next thing some people have latched onto.  Those who don't believe every problem can be solved by just advertising more at least.

Wiley.

This has continued long post-Steam according to Hitech.  People are pouring in but they're leaving almost immediately. 

[Ack-Ack]

Fugi is right the "stick" is the main arena but unfortunately, there are a few barriers that are preventing a sizable number of new players from being able to get into the main arena.  One of the barriers is the control set up, new players tend to find it difficult to set up their controls.  The learning curve is also one of the barriers new player complain about, most find the trial period insufficient to get used to the flying aspects of the game.

[Devil 505]

One of the barriers is the control set up, new players tend to find it difficult to set up their controls.

Setting up controls here is no more difficult than Il 2 or War Blunder. Hell, War Blunder still has not figured out how to make a hat switch work properly. If a new player can't figure out the controls here, they wont in the other games either.

[Wiley]

Setting up controls here is no more difficult than Il 2 or War Blunder. Hell, War Blunder still has not figured out how to make a hat switch work properly. If a new player can't figure out the controls here, they wont in the other games either.

If it were me, I'd pretty much do what the tutorial missions in DCS do.  Show you step by step and walk you through stuff, "Press <whatever is mapped> to start engine."  Walk them ingame step by step through mapping a control.  Videos are not enough, you need to grab them by the back of the neck and rub their faces in the information.

Wiley.

[MWL]

Greetings,

  IIRC Air Warrior had a relaxed realism arena.  That got me started in AW - could the same work here?  By the same, I mean an arena with a more forgiving flight model, reduced engine torque effect, less spin modeling, etc. . . .  Would this allow more players to 'stick'?

Regards