Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: SirNuke on June 14, 2013, 02:12:18 AM
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(http://i1145.photobucket.com/albums/o507/Snaildude/killstatsbytype_zps3c5d1ef9.jpg)
What do you guys think? Causes and possible fixes? Are tanks killing the game?
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Interesting graph however I think it reflects the drop in player numbers over kill stats by type
Three main reasons imho
1. Graphics are killing the game they are now very dated especially terrain,light,shadows and effects.
2. Price now is expensive for a online game needs to be $9.95 or lower (especially considering reason 1).
3. Pace of development has been slow to non existent since AH2 released. And AH2 basically has the same look,feel and gameplay as AH1
<S>...-Gixer
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One more thing, Arena Split almost killed squads over night.
<S>...-Gixer
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Interesting graph however I think it reflects the drop in player numbers over kill stats by type
Three main reasons imho
1. Graphics are killing the game they are now very dated especially terrain,light,shadows and effects.
2. Price now is expensive for a online game needs to be $9.95 or lower (especially considering reason 1).
3. Pace of development has been slow to non existent since AH2 released. And AH2 basically has the same look,feel and gameplay as AH1
<S>...-Gixer
Can't really disagree.
Amazing how A/A kills alone have dropped off by what appears to be over 100,000 since roughly February?
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The two ends of this graph are in economic downturns. Yes vehicles do draw players away from the complications and ego bruising of air combat. You wouldn't jump to this conclusion if it were at the 2006 - 2007 spike in both. There would be more players to shoot at and no one would be focusing on coincidental numbers.
Until the economy turns up it might be a better direction to reduce the numbers of large maps so players are condensed a bit more. Tonight in the AvA we had about 20 players concentrated in 2 sectors. We furballed the heck out of each other for several hours. It was all the old tales from our elder vets who constantly bemoan the current gamey worthless style of combat. Regardless of economic conditions. Closer environs create combat. Larger maps disperse players and kill competition\combat.
300 guys across 10x10 sectors and Hitech will have to ban ch200 and half of us in the forums the next day. Because we will have gotten so PO'd at each other from having no breathing space to hide in. Very few of us run to the biggest dar bar and dive in. Most humans are risk avers unless forced into a death match. At which point cornered like a rat, they become ruthless survivors and killers who never want to experience that again.
Currently we don't have the numbers to support our large maps. But, they are comfortable for the larger number who are risk avers. I stopped understanding if players want in your face combat, or a game they can play comfortably from their computer chair with little to no risk. From reading the blogs over at War Thunder, it seems many players would gravitate to that kind of arcade risk avers game at the moment. But, after awhile, probably come back here.
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The two ends of this graph are in economic downturns. Yes vehicles do draw players away from the complications and ego bruising of air combat. You wouldn't jump to this conclusion if it were at the 2006 - 2007 spike in both. There would be more players to shoot at and no one would be focusing on coincidental numbers.
Until the economy turns up it might be a better direction to reduce the numbers of large maps so players are condensed a bit more. Tonight in the AvA we had about 20 players concentrated in 2 sectors. We furballed the heck out of each other for several hours. It was all the old tales from our elder vets who constantly bemoan the current gamey worthless style of combat. Regardless of economic conditions. Closer environs create combat. Larger maps disperse players and kill competition\combat.
300 guys across 10x10 sectors and Hitech will have to ban ch200 and half of us in the forums the next day. Because we will have gotten so PO'd at each other from having no breathing space to hide in. Very few of us run to the biggest dar bar and dive in. Most humans are risk avers unless forced into a death match. At which point cornered like a rat, they become ruthless survivors and killers who never want to experience that again.
Currently we don't have the numbers to support our large maps. But, they are comfortable for the larger number who are risk avers. I stopped understanding if players want in your face combat, or a game they can play comfortably from their computer chair with little to no risk. From reading the blogs over at War Thunder, it seems many players would gravitate to that kind of arcade risk avers game at the moment. But, after awhile, probably come back here.
The numbers are not the problem. Imbalance is. Whenever any country has a lot more players than another, seal clubbing happens. Especially when bish are typically the largest country and they start hording. Whenever I end up having to fight 20:1 hordes I just quit in disgust and do something else instead. It's just not fun.
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Stop analysing and play!
This is why graphs and statistics are dangerous, it can get you too caught up in reasons to enjoy what's infront of you.
Sure, there are some issues out there, that need addressing; but the wishlist is the best place to discuss possible ways to deal with them, right?
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Whats the point? nothing is going to get done about it, its going to die eventually if the game isn't updated even the hardcore players who have been around for years wont be able to save it unless HTC improves it somehow. 3 years ago there was easy 400+ people on at night time in uk now there is about 150 people at night in uk you do the maths its obvious its on the decline.....bugs me to see it go like this I thought ah2 would be around forever but I have my doubts these days.....
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One thing I have noticed is a growth in the number of players learning then using the flight model limitations pushing AH further away from a simulation. If AH would add a better momentum and G model to reduce direction change that would help. As players become more educated about the limits of AH simulation and how to take advantage of that, the more AH becomes a game and less like a simulation. I saw a P51 last night do things that were beyond the limits of both plane and man.
Small things too like tracers being off. I have noticed the number of players with tracers off is rising quickly. It was a real world option but in a simulation like AH where skill levels vary dramatically, a tracer stream might give a less skilled player a small break. The best don't need this but most do. This reduces the simulation but it a way to offer a small balance to skill levels.
Discontinue ch 200.
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After staring at the graph for a few minutes and turn to look at a white surface....I think I saw Elvis? :rolleyes:
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This is the original post (http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/index.php/topic,345669.msg4622693.html#msg4622693), which contains also some very important disclaimer & explanation, which were unfortunately skipped here. I think I see already starting to jump to quick conclusions which this kill stats chart doesn't really provide the necessary data. ;)
Whats the point?
I can answer that limited to this very chart itself: It's just information. It's just a different, condensed representation of the plane and vehicle kill stats I'm posting for years. This time just putting all the scattered data into one big graph: Kill stats by category.
For myself, the most interesting thing is how A2A and G2G kill stats are moving indepently from each other at various times. You can see it's not just "less plane kills because there are more GV kills", which occasionally has been claimed.
Or that the new GV icon settings gave Gv, and especially Wirbels a huge advantage. You can now see there is not much of a difference in A2G vs G2A kills.
And if you find this graph scary, you might suffer from chartophobia :old:
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What it looks like to me is that it became easier to find ground action, and faster, and players who play both tend to more ground now. At least thats what the arena appears like to me and is whats supported on this graph.
Economic downturns? I bet 9 out of 10 who left paid $$ to buy and play another game. Or numerous games. This isnt the 3rd world....yet and gamers usually cut their games out only if they are totally broke. Having "free" games out there certainly didnt help either.
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We don't want maps with more fields than players.
small/medium maps only please, specially with summer coming up, 90% want fights, big enemy radar bars etc.
Unfortunately for HTC, many players find other games in same genre or maybe another genre, with flashy graphics etc.
I guess HTC have to let them users with old computers / notebooks with mediocre graphics card, that many are currently running AH on, go/force them to switch to a little more modern computers.
This is unfortunately the only way to go forward, so we can have better graphics/environments in AH(3).
The other option is what Warbirds did, supporting old platforms like mac's, and old computers, trusting player base will stay there 4-ever.
I was a happy camper there 1997-2011, but decided finally to move away.
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your graphs are great I appreciate the time and effort you put into them. :aok
I also agree with others we need smaller maps as the action is far to sparse.
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One thing not delved into is the fact we have many long term players and thier skill level has been rising. Where you could easily achieve a 10 kill streak in the past many are landing only 2 or 3 kills. I credit this to the players working on thier air combat skills. Either you all are getting better or I'm getting worse. :eek:
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The Fury, guys, take this to the wishlist forum; despairing about it here isn't gonna make anything good come of it.
My idea about centralizing the situation into 2 arenas (1 MA and 1 TA [free]) and the rest into instanced custom is the kind of thing we need to be talking about. Post your own take on the situation if you so please.
Giving up and despair is no way to keep a good mind about situations.
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I have two thoughts. One, over my three years I've heard/read many players leave due to finances. It is less about $14.95/mo, more about time. Second, AH may want to bring in a professional marketing team. I know eMBA programs take real world businesses and perform complete analysis for them for free. Hitech should consider reaching Rich, UofTexas, etcs MBA program and request being part of the program. Very valuable feedback for free.
Boo
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Didn't HTC state that they want AH to be a game with a small player base? Because honestly...if they ever wanted a surge of new players, put an ad or interview on simhq.com or some sort of gaming news website. I honestly have never seen a single ad on the web for AH, besides the TV commercials people put on YouTube.
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Didn't HTC state that they want AH to be a game with a small player base? Because honestly...if they ever wanted a surge of new players, put an ad or interview on simhq.com or some sort of gaming news website. I honestly have never seen a single ad on the web for AH, besides the TV commercials people put on YouTube.
No they did not.
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It appears that AH2 is going the same way that FA did, and I see the primary cause being there are too many opinions voiced by non-playing people being listened to by someone at HTC, the second reason being that too many people refuse to update/upgrade their computers and OS's. While it is nice to have a game that can be played by those who don't have newer computers, that same agenda is causing newer players not to stay in the game long enough to find out how much fun it is. Add in players who bash newcomers horribly, causing them to not proceed past the first few days, and you get a path straight to oblivion. As an example, we in the 133rd had decided to take in a couple of fresh faces to try to make the game enjoyable for them, and to encourage them to continue in the game as paying customers. The third day of his trial, we were in the DA, several of us and a new player. We were on country channel, and a certain player who will go unnamed,(his nick is the same as a smoking implement) trashed this new player, badly and with many obscenities. The new player logged and never came back. Aces High is a fantastic game, populated by outstanding(credits to Zack1234), for the most part people from all over the world, but if something isn't done, I see the game following Fighter Ace into history sooner than later.
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I see the primary cause being there are too many opinions voiced by non-playing people being listened to by someone at HTC,
You can give a couple of examples?
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Didn't HTC state that they want AH to be a game with a small player base?
No.
They want to stay a small company, not having a small player base. ;)
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(http://ts2.mm.bing.net/th?id=H.4937894871828237&pid=15.1)
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Interesting graph however I think it reflects the drop in player numbers over kill stats by type
Three main reasons imho
1. Graphics are killing the game they are now very dated especially terrain,light,shadows and effects.
2. Price now is expensive for a online game needs to be $9.95 or lower (especially considering reason 1).
3. Pace of development has been slow to non existent since AH2 released. And AH2 basically has the same look,feel and gameplay as AH1
<S>...-Gixer
This ^
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AH has ZERO publicity. In my country I have never met in-person someone who has heard about this game and not from me.
I know zero about marketing, but I don't think that word-of-mouth is going to bring a lot of new players. AH needs some exposure in gaming websites. On many of the major ones AH is impossible to find even if you are looking at their combat sim category looking for such games. If you intentionally search for it on gaming websites, you find a page with minimum details, no reviews and a feeling of some game well past its time. Nobody will be tempted to download the free trial this way.
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The numbers are not the problem. Imbalance is. Whenever any country has a lot more players than another, seal clubbing happens. Especially when bish are typically the largest country and they start hording. Whenever I end up having to fight 20:1 hordes I just quit in disgust and do something else instead. It's just not fun.
:noid
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You can give a couple of examples?
Lusche, for the sake of getting along, I'd rather not. What I will say is that, in game, I have found out that some people that I have had different opinions than, in the forum, don't play any more, and haven't.
I enjoy this game immensely, and I feel it's more productive to not say, than to get more stuff started. My opinion about how much influence they have may be wrong, it could be that it's just fighting for status quo.
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and I see the primary cause being there are too many opinions voiced by non-playing people being listened to by someone at HTC,
You do realize this comment pretty much verges on insanity? Most of all by those who have been in the game thru its height and decline.
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I love flying these airplanes, but spending more time looking for action than actually being in the action is slowly driving me away from the game...
Also doing exactly the same things in th MA for 10years may be playing a part. Games need to renew themselves to keep being interresting...
Sorry for puting your graph out of his context snailman...I love graphs <3
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I love flying these airplanes, but spending more time looking for action than actually being in the action is slowly driving me away from the game...
I know how you feel :uhoh
Also doing exactly the same things in the MA for 10years may be playing a part. Games need to renew themselves to keep being interresting...
This is a form of self-awareness far too few players have. At some point even great things will start to look boring if you done them for too long. Unfortunately many people often totally ignore that and blame anything and anyone else for the declined enjoyment instead of asking themself "Maybe I have changed as well?"
(Usually at this point I tell the anecdote of that player who was racking up 100 kills in a Tiger while spawncamping with me in 2005, and constantly complaining about all that "gamey players today" in 2008)
Sorry for puting your graph out of his context snailman...I love graphs <3
:rock
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I love flying these airplanes, but spending more time looking for action than actually being in the action is slowly driving me away from the game...
Exactly why I'm not playing, and the times you do get into an engagement (for someone with a similar play-style to mine - aggressive) the opposition will either run away or eventually the #'s will overwhelm you.
Eventually - for me at least - it wasn't even worth $15, but I'm sure the itch to putz around in my flying sausage will come back, hopefully by that time the numbers will be on the rise again, too :x
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I love flying these airplanes, but spending more time looking for action than actually being in the action is slowly driving me away from the game...
That's the double-edged sword of sandbox type gameplay. What you wind up having to deal with on any given sortie depends heavily on your opposition. If all everybody does is up a horde and try to smash and grab a poorly defended base, they're either going to get sick of smashing and grabbing poorly defended bases, or they're going to get sick of trying to stop the horde.
A few times a night, I see a committed attack met by a reasonably committed defense force. That's when the game gets good. Too often though, one side or the other gets wiped and gives up.
People are free to do what they like. Sometimes it produces excellent gameplay, most of the time it produces little thought out hording. Personally I like the potential for unpredictability a sandbox affords. You never know what that bardar is going to be made up of until you get to it. Unfortunately, it's more and more made up of a gaggle of late war planes looking to isolate and gang you to death.
To give people their guaranteed action, it would have to be more along the lines of the other round-based games. Matched sides, everybody takes off at the same time, and whatnot. The problem I have with that is it is no less repetetive, everybody's funneled into doing the same thing over and over and over again. You're just guaranteed a crowd.
Also doing exactly the same things in th MA for 10years may be playing a part. Games need to renew themselves to keep being interresting...
Do anything for 10 years and it's going to get repetitive.
The problem I see is the majority of gamers look for the easiest way to accomplish their goal and then do that over and over and over again until they win. Horde rolling is the prime example of this. It makes for repetitive gameplay on all sides, and can result in boredom on all sides.
I've been playing here about 3 years now, 3 years or so before that in the other sim. I'm finding my thoughts gradually sliding over toward the crotchety 'nobody fights, everybody runs or gangs' grumpiness more and more often lately. From what I've seen, this seems to be one of the stages people go through in the game. Not quite sure if or when I'll hit 'excessive whining about it', but be prepared people.
I think with games like this, people just eventually burn out. Bombing, when you distill it down is really pretty much climbing to alt and pushing a button at the right time. Occasionally you get to shoot at a bandit. I don't understand how people can do it for years. Fighter on fighter is much more involved (to me), but eventually when the vast majority of your opponents are reacting the same way every time, and it's no fun, it can get boring too.
No matter what, a flight sim is pretty much doing the same thing over and over again. Strip away all the alleged 'strategies' and people around you, and you're left with either trying to shoot something, or drop a bomb on something. Over and over and over.
Wiley.
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AH has ZERO publicity. In my country I have never met in-person someone who has heard about this game and not from me.
I know zero about marketing, but I don't think that word-of-mouth is going to bring a lot of new players. AH needs some exposure in gaming websites. On many of the major ones AH is impossible to find even if you are looking at their combat sim category looking for such games. If you intentionally search for it on gaming websites, you find a page with minimum details, no reviews and a feeling of some game well past its time. Nobody will be tempted to download the free trial this way.
Its always perplexed me why the overwhelming majority of AH players are North Americans. I do think AH Needs more press.
A few thoughts:
First, flight sims are a niche genre, and one that seems to be dwindling just like all other PC games. I tell a friend that I play AH and their first question is "oh yeah? What platform?" Last person I talked too said it was "über nerdy" that I play games on a PC. She has three gaming consoles. And then if somebody does have a desktop gaming rig, I have to break the news to them that, no you really can't play it with just a mouse, you'll need a joystick. Remember joysticks? You used to be able buy them off the shelf in stores. Flight sims are a niche within the niche of PC games.
Second: Could the decline in the overall number of kills be due to the fact that noobs are out of supply. The arena is completely populated by players who are at least competent pilots. When I first started flight sims half of us in the arena couldn't fight our way out of a paper bag. We were meat on the table.
Third: This community has a lot of creative and productive people. As I said earlier this game needs more press, more exposure. We need to start hitting up the web sites, posting reviews and videos. And not external view rock videos, but videos that show what experience is actually like, sitting in an airplane cockpit coordinating with other players on vox and stimulating adrenaline. Ask not what AH can do for you. Ask what you can do for AH.
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I don't know about across the pond but you can get joysticks from store shelves here, and PC gaming is alive and kicking!
LoL, DOTA2, Starcraft, Various doom likes, Steam, indy games...and things are only going to get better now that consoles use X86 hardware! :banana:
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Second: Could the decline in the overall number of kills be due to the fact that noobs are out of supply. The arena is completely populated by players who are at least competent pilots. When I first started flight sims half of us in the arena couldn't fight our way out of a paper bag. We were meat on the table.
Nothing has changed in that regard. The majority of players still can't "fight their way out of a paper bag". There is a minortiy of palyers sitting on the top, feeding off the masses of ordinary pilots, with many of them barely able to control their plane.
But I agree with the first sentence, The "noobs" (= 'new players') are out of supply.
I will write something about that later.
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I don't know about across the pond but you can get joysticks from store shelves here, and PC gaming is alive and kicking!ware! :banana:
I know a lot of people still playing games on the PC. Quite a number has really decent rigs with vid cards 5x as expensive as mine.
None, literally NONE of them has a joystick. Many never had any. Even if I could get them interested in AH (actually impossible), they would probably quickly just be frustrated when trying to fly planes with a mouse.
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Matter of fact, the next time I post anything on YouTube I'm going to edit the flyaceshigh commercial into it at the beginning of the vid.
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After staring at the graph for a few minutes and turn to look at a white surface....I think I saw Elvis? :rolleyes:
Only this kind of thinking about statistics can save the human race :banana:
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Could be too the average age puts the number of players in a slow decline. At least around here things like golf are on a continuous decline due to baby boomers getting too old to want to invest the time and money.
Could be too the AH staff is aging and lost their zest for adventure, risk and glory. :old: :)
Could be too the younger players want to see streams of blood flowing from the cockpit after a cockpit shot. Maybe a cold blooded pilot scream when dispatched. They have so many blood gushing on the market for the young people.
Note too the help pages are duplicated in part and are outdated and incomplete. Lots of small things that are adding up.
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If you're bored....then you're boring.
My missions yesterday went from driving a tank to enemy strats to bring ack down to 36% to sacrificing a M262 after seeing my countrymen take off on a poorly planned strat mission that put them right next to the ME163 base.
I dragged a 163 out to sea and turned around to kill him when he ran low of fuel but he ended up running to the cv to hug ack while 5 other 163s came to help him out of the the jam so I dragged them away from the bomber group.
Perks be damned.....it was a fun mission and I'll bet a couple of 163s didn't have enough fuel to make it back or even have fuel to engage the bombers.
Next time I am on your country and you want to hit strats, let me know and I will help make it possible to make it to target and maybe even make it home.
Hint: you can't expect 15 formations of bombers to stay below 60 feet as you drive through a dar ring over trees so it's best to send a fighter or two in to kill the dar first as well as rocket the ack towers to form a corridor for safe strat ingress.
If you want things interesting, make it interesting.........take some risks with your score.
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Currently we don't have the numbers to support our large maps. But, they are comfortable for the larger number who are risk avers. I stopped understanding if players want in your face combat, or a game they can play comfortably from their computer chair with little to no risk. From reading the blogs over at War Thunder, it seems many players would gravitate to that kind of arcade risk avers game at the moment. But, after awhile, probably come back here.
That kind of attitude right there runs people off.
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Do not fear, I have the answer to the A2A concerns
(http://i1158.photobucket.com/albums/p620/monkeyfarmer/killstatsbytype_zps4be0e3f5.jpg)
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I used to help new players an awful lot at the furball lake. I partially stopped because I realised I was one of the few people bothering to do this. Also several bad experiences with the AirQuake / griefer types really made me become selfish with my time.
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In order for AH to make gobs of money and grow exponentially it would have to be a very different thing, a lame thing, a corporate snivel fest with marketing drivel and "FREE" schemes out the yingyang. So lets leave that aside. If they simply want to retain noobs and have a larger population ,(i am a perpetual noob,) then they have to raise the ratio of long aircombat engagement to flying, dying boredom above .1 or .01 or wherever it is for most noobs. The best part of the game, (and I am a noob,) is when by whatever chance of balanced position,aircraft,skill I get to experience a long fight against 1 or 2 without interference. I am not saying you need to make higher kill ratios. Just a higher ratio of quality to boredom. If you could make some structure to accomplish this you would have more noobs converting to veterans, without needing external view, simplified flight models, sidewinders and candy canes.
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I wish I was good at making You Tube videos. I bet if even 5% of the player base made
their own AHII commercials then potential interest would increase.
Of, course, they'd hafta be classy. I would make the classiest. Ahem. If I could.
Erm.
What a cool contest this would make. Haven't there been video contests before? :D
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(http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/fredgraph.png?&id=UNRATE&scale=Left&range=10yrs&cosd=2002-07-01&coed=2012-07-01&line_color=%230000ff&link_values=false&line_style=Solid&mark_type=NONE&mw=4&lw=3&ost=-99999&oet=99999&mma=0&fml=a&fq=Monthly&fam=avg&fgst=lin&transformation=lin&vintage_date=2012-08-06&revision_date=2012-08-06) If you look at this graph relative to the decline in AH kills, to me it does seem economy driven. Many have mentioned the lack of "noobs', well lets think about this. If Johnny's mother and father are now paying 4.00USD for gas 5-6.00USD for a gallon of milk, taxes increased, and the unemployed percentages are still in the mid 7% range, can Johnny play his used xbox game that cost 25.00USD from Gamestop or WoT for free verse mom and dad forking out 191.40USD a year for AH. And same might go for many other adults, and young adults.
I work in the an business that deals with memberships and automobile. I can assure you HTC is not the only right now seeing a decline in memberships. Unless you poll every single leaving player, I think its hard for any of us to accurately gauge the decline in number of accounts. Only HTC can do that, and I have faith in Hitech.
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No I believe you would see overall gaming numbers as high or higher. Just like cable TV people dont like to give up their home entertainment unless they are pushing the cat away from her bowl. Individual game populations ebb and flow all the time. COD comes out with a new FPS and BF3 servers see less usage. And on and on it goes. The only difference is AH is a monthly pay game, not a once and be done game.
Theres always something newer and shinier coming out. Thats the way it goes. If you dont keep up then you lose customers.
I dont think economics has zero impact but your graph lacks any kind of science cause you are only comparing it to one game. And an old game with an old engine at that.
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No I believe you would see overall gaming numbers as high or higher. Just like cable TV people dont like to give up their home entertainment unless they are pushing the cat away from her bowl. Individual game populations ebb and flow all the time. COD comes out with a new FPS and BF3 servers see less usage. And on and on it goes. The only difference is AH is a monthly pay game, not a once and be done game.
Theres always something newer and shinier coming out. Thats the way it goes. If you dont keep up then you lose customers.
I dont think economics has zero impact but your graph lacks any kind of science cause you are only comparing it to one game. And an old game with an old engine at that.
Per scope and design, AHII has no competition. Using graphics as the sole comparison it's kinda like saying one car company loses out to the other because of paint jobs.
Oh, look honey. Pretty Pinto. *kaboom* :D
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Per scope and design, AHII has no competition. Using graphics as the sole comparison it's kinda like saying one car company loses out to the other because of paint jobs.
Oh, look honey. Pretty Pinto. *kaboom* :D
It has a lot of competition. Its a game. But your right in that the population of those with an interest in the WW2 flight genre is also declining. Many of us learned of it on a fathers, uncles, or grandpa's knee. That or we were in the service ourselves. Its always been an older crowd in both WW2OL and AH, and both had a large foreign component. Well many of the young went to shiner games, many of us just got old, croaked, or whatever. The Euros moved on cause the crowd on their time got small. The economy is part of it , but the smallest part. Sure there are other reasons.
Were not talking about cars but about internet games. And can you show me one that hasnt seen a decline after so many years without a graphics/game play upgrade?
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Bingo. Bamaconomy
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It has a lot of competition. Its a game. But your right in that the population of those with an interest in the WW2 flight genre is also declining. Many of us learned of it on a fathers, uncles, or grandpa's knee. That or we were in the service ourselves. Its always been an older crowd in both WW2OL and AH, and both had a large foreign component. Well many of the young went to shiner games, many of us just got old, croaked, or whatever. The Euros moved on cause the crowd on their time got small. The economy is part of it , but the smallest part. Sure there are other reasons.
Were not talking about cars but about internet games. And can you show me one that hasnt seen a decline after so many years without a graphics/game play upgrade?
AHII has had both. You know this, right?
(http://www.hitechcreations.com/screenshots/natedog/b17g/b17g3.bmp.jpg)
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I've been a proponent of expanding the player base of Aces High. Yes, flying should be our bread and butter, but we also have an excellent platform for other streams including tanks and ships.
I've seen a slow decline in Aces High but I've also seen uptakes as well.
BUT, the bigger question and worry is that both Dale and Doug are getting older, and may want to exit and retire soon. Conversely a lot of this is not really work for them as they are doing something they love. Will they sell out and retire? Will the continue to develop the game for the next 10 years? Will they support the Oculus headset? Will pigs fly and sheep quack?
We really don't know but should we really care?
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I've been a proponent of expanding the player base of Aces High. Yes, flying should be our bread and butter, but we also have an excellent platform for other streams including tanks and ships.
I've seen a slow decline in Aces High but I've also seen uptakes as well.
BUT, the bigger question and worry is that both Dale and Doug are getting older, and may want to exit and retire soon. Conversely a lot of this is not really work for them as they are doing something they love. Will they sell out and retire? Will the continue to develop the game for the next 10 years? Will they support the Oculus headset? Will pigs fly and sheep quack?
We really don't know but should we really care?
Stop that. Those are fears I've managed to bury and ignore, thank you. :huh
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I've been a proponent of expanding the player base of Aces High. Yes, flying should be our bread and butter, but we also have an excellent platform for other streams including tanks and ships.
I've seen a slow decline in Aces High but I've also seen uptakes as well.
BUT, the bigger question and worry is that both Dale and Doug are getting older, and may want to exit and retire soon. Conversely a lot of this is not really work for them as they are doing something they love. Will they sell out and retire? Will the continue to develop the game for the next 10 years? Will they support the Oculus headset? Will pigs fly and sheep quack?
We really don't know but should we really care?
I care :confused:.
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Time to buy some more lotto tickets. :pray
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I care as well, love this game and the diverse people with in it. WoT bf3 and other games like that do not really have that element of the game for most players.
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can you show me one that hasnt seen a decline after so many years without a graphics/game play upgrade?
Can you show me one game that has been around for so many years even with a graphics/game play upgrade that has not declined in playerbase?
Wiley.
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Honestly, its more than just a lack of marketing, graphics, etc.
First, theres a been a bit of an economic slowdown recently. Now obviously, when people are legitimately strapped for cash, AH is going to (or logically should) be among the first to go, along with Xbox live, WoW, and other non-essential recurring charges. In addition to current players leaving, this also means fewer will join up. The entire gaming industry has felt the effects as well.
Second, the target audience isn't all that big to begin with. Add in the fact that fewer people seem to care even the slightest about history, and smart phones are doing more with gaming than before, and that means that out of the target audience, fewer have sufficient interest to download the game.
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the decline started about when I first signed up :bolt:
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Hitech should have a chat with the joystick manufactures and distributors/retailers and do a deal. Free CD of game in box, at least get the game's name infront of those who use the things. Bright picture on the box of AH gets name in front of millions who walk past the things in stores. Should be fairly cheap targeted marketing scheme.
No one ive spoken to has ever heard of AH. A targeted give away of free cds of game or flyers with website name handed out at airshows would also hit the right market. This could be done for cheap by the (dedicated) players who attend these events.
To populate arenas in off peak hours for euro and asia pacific players then target those markets, hell, there is only probably 10 airshows in all of OZ with a current player in each state who would easly turn up to promote AH. Warbirds over Wanaka in NZ is a good event, 4 big ww2 aircraft flying days at Temora in N.S.W. Quite a few 10's of thousands of potential customers there for not much work or investment.
These and many other ideas im sure you have will attract the "right type of gamer" those interested in aviation, and ww2, hell we could hand out stuff to anyone with greyhair at airshows and we are on a winner.
Yes we are all getting older, so this game cant last for ever. However the community of people who are interested in flight simming will only grow. With a huge increase in baby boomers due to retire over the next 10 years I think AH's immediate future is bright!
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A number of my squad mates have participated in the WThndr Alpha\Beta. They are of varying AH skill levels. Their combined 100% opinion is that game is for teeni weenies and xBox junkies. I've spent time in their various blogs and in many cases the bantor is exactly like ours or even more juvenile. With an exception. The newb questions and comments asked on a daily basis about that game would get character assassinations in our forum or in the game. We eat our young here at Aces High with great intolerance and premeditation. While acting like we are in a local sports bar that bans anyone 21 and younger.
WThndr is at it's beginning so every player is valuable to their community. Aces High is 12-13 years in and has an older community set in it's ways. Granted there are some squads who value youth and bend over backwards to accommodate them. Then many squads have an 18 year old minimum for joining. I suspect like mine it's too much hassle controlling the language out of the older members in deference to the problems associated with minors. So we stratify by age and eat our young as a consequence. Or our young in retaliation make their own squads dedicated to using every greifing tactic in the game to make their elders hate them as a badge of honor. The vTards come to mind.
By the way, what happened to them? We adults spent so much time over the last few years bashing them in this forum and in the game to force them to stop irritating us. Now I kind of miss how they at least were willing to keep NOEing bases all night long and providing targets to kill. We adults as a group effort over several years, turned their squad name into a curse word, and figuratively ran them out of the game for having fun playing the game in their own way. We didn't like how they played in "OUR" sand box and ran them out of town. Great way to grow a game community.
We eat our own young in this game to keep our comfort zones intact. When we should be encouraging them to keep playing the game how they see fit and giving us targets to shoot at. Our comfortable, ridged, community inflexibility is creating many of the problems we attempt to diagnose in these posts. If I were a tween to 20s something, I would have problems paying my $14.95 and being treated like dirt by a bunch of inflexible older men in their 30s to 60s.
I bet as usual, it will take a Hitech outside intervention to move things along with this game, in spite of our collective well polished broad comfort zones and specific dining habits.
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There's a new generation of players AH has to win over, and it's a different generation.
No, not "worse". This is not a "console gamer" bashing. Different. Just as 'we' were different to the generations before, had different interests and knowledge.
Those who grew up in the 60's 70's and early 80's (or maybe in the 19th century, hello Earl! :P ) had for the most part a genuine interest in and knowledge of WWII aviation before finally ending up on AH. For those, AH and similar games was a dream come true, a way to live the fantasy of being a Spitfire, Lightning or 109 pilot. I'm amongst them, going from books (google 'book' if you don't know what that is), plastic models (dam glue everywhere!) desktop (not computer!) flight sim games to the earliest computer sims.
But this generation is already dying out, not necessarily physically, but as gamers (yes, it's a game after all). Growing older takes it's toll. Interest fades, more responsibilities (family), bills have to be paid.
Like all games, AH needs a constant stream of new players. Young players.
And someone born in 1998 has a totally different history than one in 1968. WWII is WAAAAAAAY ago. Many other conflicts since them, other weapons and machines. WW2 planes may be as far away to him than Napoleonic cavalry was to my generation. And he has a totally different gaming socialisation than us as well.
For this 'new' player, AH2 is 'just another game' (which, again, it actually is.) He won't come in drooling because he finally will be able to fly a FW 190A-8 (wuts dat?).
It's a game, and he wants to be entertained by it. He probably does not even want to buy an archaic controller called "joystick" to see if he likes this game or not.
And 'we' players, not just HTC, have to keep these differences in mind when dealing with him.
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Heap big huge world-wide recession at end of '08, has been but little recovery, and many who lost their jobs STILL aren't making near what they were 5 years ago. Half the people on the bbs wouldn't grasp that, as they were still in middle or high school at the time
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Oh great, now I'm creating bustr like walls of texts... :bhead I hope it's at least barely coherent, it's late and I'm tired :(
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Oh great, now I'm creating bustr like walls of texts... :bhead
At least it's not Midway-esc drivel. :old:
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There's a new generation of players AH has to win over, and it's a different generation.
No, not "worse". This is not a "console gamer" bashing. Different. Just as 'we' were different to the generations before, had different interests and knowledge.
Those who grew up in the 60's 70's and early 80's (or maybe in the 19th century, hello Earl! :P ) had for the most part a genuine interest in and knowledge of WWII aviation before finally ending up on AH. For those, AH and similar games was a dream come true, a way to live the fantasy of being a Spitfire, Lightning or 109 pilot. I'm amongst them, going from books (google 'book' if you don't know what that is), plastic models (dam glue everywhere!) desktop (not computer!) flight sim games to the earliest computer sims.
But this generation is already dying out, not necessarily physically, but as gamers (yes, it's a game after all). Growing older takes it's toll. Interest fades, more responsibilities (family), bills have to be paid.
Like all games, AH needs a constant stream of new players. Young players.
And someone born in 1998 has a totally different history than one in 1968. WWII is WAAAAAAAY ago. Many other conflicts since them, other weapons and machines. WW2 planes may be as far away to him than Napoleonic cavalry was to my generation. And he has a totally different gaming socialisation than us as well.
For this 'new' player, AH2 is 'just another game' (which, again, it actually is.) He won't come in drooling because he finally will be able to fly a FW 190A-8 (wuts dat?).
It's a game, and he wants to be entertained by it. He probably does not even want to buy an archaic controller called "joystick" to see if he likes this game or not.
And 'we' players, not just HTC, have to keep these differences in mind when dealing with him.
I agree with all of this, too. But I am not sure that the younger players, without the prior interest in WWII aviation, will be willing to put in the time and effort to get good at this.
- oldman
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I agree with all of this, too. But I am not sure that the younger players, without the prior interest in WWII aviation, will be willing to put in the time and effort to get good at this.
Maybe not in the current form of AH, which may be a hidden point of all my blabber ;)
There is a tendency of very rigid conservatism within us "old" players. "Say NO to change."
Remember when the Gv control system was changed to make it more accessible and in line with today's standards? There were a lot of complaints in the line of "gamey" or "giving in to the Xbox generation", even though a key aspect - the GV gunsights had actually become more realistic than before. Not that I did (and do) like all parts of that changes, but most critizism was way over the top and just a kind of "it's always been this way!" conservatism.
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It's amazing the irony you can stumble upon when browsing the internet.
(http://images.elephantjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/the-sky-is-falling.jpg)
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You know as I think about Bustrs and Snailmans post, I have to agree, and yes condemn myself for basically "eating the young" and being resistant to change. Next time I log in, I'll be more welcoming and less cranky old 32yo. (Well minus Php or Midway or Who...you know the guy :rofl)
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I agree with all of this, too. But I am not sure that the younger players, without the prior interest in WWII aviation, will be willing to put in the time and effort to get good at this.
- oldman
I agree completely with Lusche's excellent post as well. And I am that drooling 190 dweeb born in 1967. However, sadly...I agree with OM too. My youngest son's (16) friends come by and check me out playing AH. I can see it in their eyes...and hear it in the comments..."He has to fly to the fight? No spawn points?" If he wasn't my son he wouldn't know a Focke Wulf from Frankenstein. None of his peer group do. It's ancient history to them. They don't want to hear that the game 'works'...just how fast loud and cool the action is.
Inevitably I'll find them on the console...cruising down main street in a stolen corvette...blowing off the law...whipping out their chrome 45's...shooting up pedestrians, and raping their ho's. All that in the time it took me to rearm.
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I've been pointing out the error of forcing people to play one set way and bashing the noobs who don't conform for years now :old:
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the worst part of ah graphics is the sky not the ground.
its one color... blue. and it dosnt get any darker the higher up you go even in low orbit in a 163.
the new planes look amazing.
the current ah2 terrain graphics can be used to make some good looking ground patterns but the sky and the clouds or lack of clouds or clouds clipping the ground and clipping in and out of view is in need of updating.
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We have one thing in our favor if we want to make use of it.
The under 27 gamers are willing to try new experiences longer if they feel accepted for giving the new game a go.
Many of the other Internet games are dominated with a pre accepting age population of similar minded gamers. We are asking them to accept the problems for themselves in hanging out with a bunch of bad tempered foul mouthed copies of their older brothers, fathers, uncles, and grand fathers. Kind of like Thanksgiving dinner for 2 hours every night. Then finding the family blog where they all describe in vivid detail what kind of a useless POS kid you are for leaving the dinner table after the 200th insult about your age and guessed at sexual proclivities.
In many cases it's like several hours of learning to ride a bike while their father tells them they are garbage because they can't keep the bike up and smacking them for asking too many questions about how to ride it. And then when they finally get some feel for keeping the bike going straight, dad demands a BMX race to the death while calling sonny boy a &ussy for not taking the challenge.
We eat our young around here and blame them for not being fast enough to get out of our way when we ambush them from the side.
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Yea, it has to stop guys; if we really care about the game we would treat others with the same respect as we would expect, for a decent and fun experience, ourselves.
I am guilty of ignoring newbies as well, the culture is infectious, I feel bad every time it happens.
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Maybe we need an intermediate arena. EW and MW are hardly used, but an arena for 2 weekers and newbs in general might be popular. With 80% of the players sharing only 26% of the kills you've got to wonder what HiTech's retention rate is for new players. Maybe an intermediate arena with actual gameplay would help newer players transition into the game and be more likely to stay.
From an old thread in Lusches AH Stats Megathread:
Re: Lusches AH Stats Megathread
« Reply #127 on: March 16, 2013, 03:01:19 PM »
Reply with quoteQuote
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Quote from: shoresroad on March 16, 2013, 01:43:26 AM
Lusche,
I'm curious about how dominant the pilots are in kills. Does the 80/20 rule apply. Can you get this stat.
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Yes, it applies to AH as well, more or less.
Taking the scores of tour 157 and looking at the (scored) kills in Fighter + Attack mode, we get a distribution like this:
X axis are all the players, from the one with most kills to the one(s) with the least number of them. In the end, the top 20% players had been credited with 74% of all kills in both modes combined, so it's almost 80/20
(Note: Taken fron the score sheets, these numbers also include kills of and deaths by GV's as well as deliberate or AFK augers. I would have liked to base it exclusively on the plane/player stats, but that would have been a lot more work for me.)
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70-99 Lusche
100-160 Snailman
AH Stats Megathread
http://www.lastfm.de/user/drkalv
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Maybe we need an intermediate arena. EW and MW are hardly used, but an arena for 2 weekers and newbs in general might be popular. With 80% of the players sharing only 26% of the kills you've got to wonder what HiTech's retention rate is for new players. Maybe an intermediate arena with actual gameplay would help newer players transition into the game and be more likely to stay.
I don't think this could work.
First, who's going to play there? Only "new" players? How are they going to learn? Who's showing them the gameplay? And if they could still join the "regular" MA, they would mostly ignore the "newb arena", because (almost) everybody wants to play were almost everybody else is. If they couldn't join the regular MA, they wouldn't really see what AH can be about, being limited to an arena full of players with zero experience.
Furthermore, when there are less than 100 players on in total for quite a part of the day, further splitting them up is hardly a good idea.
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I was thinking of a tiered platform of some sort (Yes I know its from WoT). It would show newer players as low teirs and seasoned players as high tiered. Bonus perks for killing higher tiered players. Oh oh wait, we actually kind of have that with planes, and then higher tiered players would have a constant target on them. grrr back to the drawing board... :bhead
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I dont think we've ever "ate our young". Yeah we have called them squeekers on occasion , yes weve chastised them for babbling on the vox on occasion, but overall the AH community has supported them. The young just never had a big interest in WW2 flight, or WW1 for that matter. You see it in other games in the genre as well, most of all on the PC.
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just enjoy it whilst it lasts. Would hate to see numbers get so low that it makes WT 32 player battles look exciting.
What we need are sure fire ways to increase take up, maybe tiered subscription levels that won't leave HTC out of pocket but would give outsiders a way in to get seriously hooked.
I'm thinking non MA rooms at a cheaper price or make the TA / DA / WW1 completely free. This way when they do dare enter the lions den that is the MA they will be a little prepared for battle. Just like the real thing. As for those pesky freeloaders just make sure they are in self contained areas where they cannot annoy or destroy the existing setups.
Maybe If you earned some sort of credible flying in the above rooms, look at I-racing's safety point system to prevent griefers from driving into people etc then they get some really high ENY planes. Once they lose them then back to the romper room unless they cough up.
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Gibberish! and you know it :old:
Like the two tiers in The Few when i was in it Gibberish! :old:
I have more money than you as well I am am a idiot :rofl
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I see the help channel ingame isn't used that much by experienced players I have it tuned all the time and try to answer questions whenever possible. Maybe that's a place to start it would be nice if we had a squad that trained new players like in Eve online there is a corperation (guild/squad) that you can join even on day one they will show you most things you need to know about the game.
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To many egos involved to be off any use :old:
Do as I say not as I do attitude :old:
Shame really :old:
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zack when your zooming around in your typhoon with no-one to kill what will you do? and who will you talk too?
so unless your posting constructive ideas or some sort of anecdotal evidence of player numbers when you get online you are adding no value to this thread. Hence Shida's quite appropriate thread about the decline of the forum of which you are around 10% to blame.
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Your to blame for your elitist arrogant suggestions that new players are not fit to fly in the same arena as you!
Its a game for gods sake not a competition :old:
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maybe you misread my post,
new players need somewhere to learn if they pay 15$ upfront just to get killed over and over why would they continue to subscribe? with free to play rooms elsewhere they can build up their skills without being soul crushed by people like you who can afford to play and only log minimal hours.
oh and thanks for the insult.
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I apologize for non intended insult :old:
This is type of game is for a limited type of person who is interested in this era of flying :old:
You are not going to get the numbers based on this fact :old:
Rise Of Flight is now moving on to STEAM and this will cause people to scream its not a sim its a console game :rofl
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enough new blood to stop the decline or death is what we need.
Most online games are now free to play and that has to be 80% of the reason why they have so many players. I think populating rooms that aren't even utilised by the paying majority is a good idea. Whilst keeping the core product where everyone wants to fight and the SEA arenas for subscribers.
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Must admit when we used to have them free arenas it kept me around for a while until I felt good enough to sub for the mains.
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Being nicer to noobs is probably a better for game.
The amount of people who abuse them by saying go to to training arena and keep away from our game is appalling :old:
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They should advertise more on anything related to WW2 combat or aviation perhaps. People that fly airplanes usually wanted to fly fighter planes before they got stuck driving an air taxi or a skybus.
I may be in the minority view here but it seems to me like AH has more people in it now than it did a year ago. one thing I've noticed though is the numbers of kills being landed is often 2-3 instead of 5-10 like it used to be and the frequency of landed kills in the text bar is way down in landed kills but the bomber sorties are showing up a lot. Personally I never have trouble finding a good gv fight or furball in the LWMA and even midwar has been having some really excellent action with around 20-30 players in it. EW and WW1 are pretty much not in the realm of active arenas.
So riddle me this...
This sudden drop in kills. it started about the time achievements were added to the game that encouraged players to man the bombers? if large portion of the ah population is now spending time climbing to altitude in bombers you have a big chunk of misleading data that does not show what is actually going on. Achievements were added at the beginning of the year in what Feb? I know I am flying bombers a lot. and when I am I might get 1-3 kills in that 1.5 hrs I spent getting to alt driving 200 miles to the enemy city and rtb back to base while in a fighter or GV i would have had about 10 sorties and 20-30 kills in that time.
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one thing I've noticed though is the numbers of kills being landed is often 2-3 instead of 5-10 like it used to be and the frequency of landed kills in the text bar is way down inlanded kills but the bomber sorties are showing up a lot.
The average number of kills per fighter sortie didn't change in the past 7-8 years. The k/h is somewhat lower than it had been in 05/06, but that has been a very gradual change over many years and not that massive at all.
this sudden drop in kills. did it start about the time acheivements were added to the game that encouraged players to man the bombers? if large portion of the ah population is now spending time climbing to altitude in bombers you have a big chunk of misleading data that does not show what is actually going on.
There has been no significant sudden increase in bomber time. There has been a minor one, but that has also been a gradual rise over the years with a minor bump when the strats were fixed. But again, this is very minor.
Oh, and the latest sudden drop in kills started in April, long after the achievements were introduced (that actually started lasty ear). Coincidentally right after WT opened the US server. Of course I can't say if it really was the sole cause, nor do I know if players fully transitioned or are just testing different waters ;)
(At this point I got to emphazise again that the chart does NOT show overall player or subscriber numbers. Just combat activity in terms of kills by category)
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I would probably never have started my virtual piloting hobby if it wasn't for warbirds offline mode and the free arena.
I practiced against the bots until I could hold my own against them and only then I even went to the free arena. I became a paying subscriber only after the free arena started to feel too limited.
To put the story short - if I only had 2 weeks of MA to get accustomed to the game with, I probably would have quit after the first few games. Just because the skill level would have been way too demanding when you had learning to do just with the controls and the flight model.
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Being nicer to noobs is probably a better for game.
The amount of people who abuse them by saying go to to training arena and keep away from our game is appalling :old:
:aok
Zack1234, obviously a man of great wisdom and insight. :old:
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Oh, and the latest sudden drop in kills started in April, long after the achievements were introduced (that actually started lasty ear). Coincidentally right after WT opened the US server. Of course I can't say if it really was the sole cause, nor do I know if players fully transitioned or are just testing different waters ;)
War thunder indeed sucked quite a few players out of AH. I tried that game and it sure sucks.
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Last night I played about ten rounds of World of Tanks. At the beginning I simple asking "If anyone had heard of Aces High or played it?" The majority of the players that answered had never heard of it, a couple had played a long time ago, one person said graphics were poor, and one person said it was very hard.
While this is not scientific data, but I think many of you are right, if they don't know about it, they are not going to play it. Next time I ask I'll write down the actual results on how many answer and what they say.
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There will always be an audience for "true realism" in a game and challenge.
For aces high, the promotions would have to be geared toward letting people know that the sim's adherence to realism is second to none and challenge them to see if they have what it takes.
Otherwise, the solution is to go the Xbox route and make all planes simply turn when you yank the stick..........and lose the current core audience.
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IMO..AH is perfect as it is except for two things.
1. Need more players
2. Better graphics
More players = more fights = make the map as large/extensive as you want because fights will be everywhere.
As for the graphics argument..well, there's a whole thread in the OClub about it...For me, I really think if AH somehow magically used CryEngine/Frostbite and all its features, along with all the attention that comes with it, AH would be racking in a hell of a lot more players.
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I am hoping that the staged missions gets better. There is a lack of clear cut enjoyable self training tools for players. The game is based on interaction between players which is the point when it comes to aircombat but maybe holds back skill development as if you want to practice you need another player. The staged missions offer the potential for skill improvement but they are a little cumbersome. An arena like the TA but perpetually populated by AI drones divvied up by sub area for different planes would be an example of something simple and fun to work on maneuvering and aim without needing other players or trial and error to find out what staged missions are what.
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But what does it all mean basil......
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The learning curve is too steep IMO. HT should add an offline mode with drones to let interested players first practice offline before subscribing to the live arena.
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:aok
Zack1234, obviously a man of great wisdom and insight. :old:
Cheers Midway :)
Your awesome :)
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The learning curve is too steep IMO. HT should add an offline mode with drones to let interested players first practice offline before subscribing to the live arena.
+1.....I've found a great way to practice new planes, practice gunnery (offline mode allows computer-aided pipper) The drones display more skill than a lot of people in the game......having missions for every plane-type would be a huge +. So many folks DL the game, imMEDIATELY launch a plane (in the hangar, of course) and are raped over and over......difficult to get a hand on air to air combat in two weeks. Getting some immersion in offline furballs would help
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The learning curve is too steep IMO. HT should add an offline mode with drones to let interested players first practice offline before subscribing to the live arena.
I think adding Vudu's YouTube channel to the front page of the website would be a good start. :aok
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I think adding Vudu's YouTube channel to the front page of the website would be a good start. :aok
I don't agree. While Vudu has done plenty of videos, he still has a very very long way to go till his presentation is up to something like that, and even if he did put a lot of effort into that aspect; there is no garuntee that it would be good enough on its own.
I would suggest that HTC do it instead, for the time being.
+1.....I've found a great way to practice new planes, practice gunnery (offline mode allows computer-aided pipper) The drones display more skill than a lot of people in the game......having missions for every plane-type would be a huge +. So many folks DL the game, imMEDIATELY launch a plane (in the hangar, of course) and are raped over and over......difficult to get a hand on air to air combat in two weeks. Getting some immersion in offline furballs would help
Look up my "f2p TA" wish in the wishlist forum and support it if you think its good. It would go a very long way to cultivate the kind of basis for people to enter the LWA/MA. Of course, supports alone wont get ideas in, HT has to like it as well.
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One thing many are probably over looking here as far as the numbers go. Many of us old vets don't fly in the MA's much anymore. We spend our time in FSO, Scenarios,or practicing for such events. This is the game to us, and what we enjoy. Nothing against the guys who enjoy the MA, I did for about the first 3-4 years. But I think it's possible there is an ever increasing part of the aces high population that is now playing like I do. If the subscriber numbers are about the same but the MA numbers are down, I think this is a likely explanation.
:salute
BigRat
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Snail,
Just curious, where was the 1hr to 12hr switch time?
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Look up my "f2p TA" wish in the wishlist forum and support it if you think its good. It would go a very long way to cultivate the kind of basis for people to enter the LWA/MA. Of course, supports alone wont get ideas in, HT has to like it as well.
I don't think a F2P TA would be such a good idea. It would get abused fast.
Offline AI is a much better choice as it induces little cost to HTC and lets new players to practise in a non-hostile environment. Whenever you put other players in the mix you get also competitive players who like to boost their egos by seal clubbing noobs. That's why I think the F2P TA would be populated by non-trainers whose sole purpose would be to ruin a noobs day.
In that sense WB offline was perfect - it let you focus on SA and ACM in a predictable environment without having any human intervention. Once you get accustomed to air combat in general the drones become boring and you'll want to subscribe to the live arena.
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Snail,
Just curious, where was the 1hr to 12hr switch time?
Shortly after AH went back to one LW arena it also went back to the 12h switch time, which the single LW format it had featured all the years before as well.
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Thank you Sir!
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Whenever you put other players in the mix you also get competitive players who like to boost their egos by seal clubbing noobs.
:lol
I've been playing about 6 months now and have finally gotten past the point of a baby seal (but not by much). The three new players I talked into the 2 week trial over the past 6 months didn't make it. They were seal clubbed out of the game.
I still think if there were an intermediate arena where new players could enjoy the game in the absence of the uber players it would be used and HTC would keep a lot more newbies who could evolve into good players. Maybe restrict an intermediate arena to players with a k/d less than 1 or 1.5 or something along those lines that would exclude the top 20% of players that appear to be so dominate. Player stats reset each month, but even if the uber players came down to the intermediate arena to club seals their k/d ratio would keep them out within a day or two after the start of a new tour.
HTC would have to figure it out, but I'm sure they could come up with an intermediate arena fairly easily if they thought it was a good idea.
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One thing many are probably over looking here as far as the numbers go. Many of us old vets don't fly in the MA's much anymore. We spend our time in FSO, Scenarios,or practicing for such events.
For this reason it is incredibly disappointing that HTC never finished Combat Tour. It could of been a big draw for subscribers.
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For this reason it is incredibly disappointing that HTC never finished Combat Tour. It could of been a big draw for subscribers.
Just as why I was thinking that HTC probably did some development already on combat tour, AI drones included. It wouldn't probably take a big effort to create an offline practicing arena with AI.
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We have one thing in our favor if we want to make use of it.
The under 27 gamers are willing to try new experiences longer if they feel accepted for giving the new game a go.
Many of the other Internet games are dominated with a pre accepting age population of similar minded gamers. We are asking them to accept the problems for themselves in hanging out with a bunch of bad tempered foul mouthed copies of their older brothers, fathers, uncles, and grand fathers. Kind of like Thanksgiving dinner for 2 hours every night. Then finding the family blog where they all describe in vivid detail what kind of a useless POS kid you are for leaving the dinner table after the 200th insult about your age and guessed at sexual proclivities.
In many cases it's like several hours of learning to ride a bike while their father tells them they are garbage because they can't keep the bike up and smacking them for asking too many questions about how to ride it. And then when they finally get some feel for keeping the bike going straight, dad demands a BMX race to the death while calling sonny boy a &ussy for not taking the challenge.
We eat our young around here and blame them for not being fast enough to get out of our way when we ambush them from the side.
QFT
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:lol
I've been playing about 6 months now and have finally gotten past the point of a baby seal (but not by much). The three new players I talked into the 2 week trial over the past 6 months didn't make it. They were seal clubbed out of the game.
I still think if there were an intermediate arena where new players could enjoy the game in the absence of the uber players it would be used and HTC would keep a lot more newbies who could evolve into good players. Maybe restrict an intermediate arena to players with a k/d less than 1 or 1.5 or something along those lines that would exclude the top 20% of players that appear to be so dominate. Player stats reset each month, but even if the uber players came down to the intermediate arena to club seals their k/d ratio would keep them out within a day or two after the start of a new tour.
HTC would have to figure it out, but I'm sure they could come up with an intermediate arena fairly easily if they thought it was a good idea.
How long would it take for that K/D to bubble to the surface though? If it's immediate, suppose on the first of the month, a newbie ups on his first sortie into the right situation, flies over to a deacked field and gets a few vulches and lands them. Does he then get punted for having too good of a K/D? If it's only going to be calculated daily or whatever, that runs into another problem.
Based on what I've seen, if it's going to happen, getting frustrated happens over a pretty short timespan. If you spend an evening getting clubbed repeatedly, it can be supremely frustrating. Suppose a vet logs in and goes in there knowing he has 24 hours to club people all he likes once a month. How do you set up a system that avoids the first scenario above that doesn't allow for this one?
Also, if you happen to be the 'man with one eye in the land of the blind' and you happen to be a newb with style and get your K/D up, it would boot you out even though you really don't know much of anything. You go into the MA, and you're still fodder.
How does that improve the situation?
Any attempt to create a beginners arena is effectively pointless. Any way you cut it, coming into the MA you're going to have a bad time at first. It's just the nature of the game.
Just as why I was thinking that HTC probably did some development already on combat tour, AI drones included. It wouldn't probably take a big effort to create an offline practicing arena with AI.
...Couldn't they just add a 'training' menu option when you start the game that has some offline missions that were a bit more engaging than the 4 planes flying in a circle over the base? Seems like something that would be cake to put together, there's probably enough missions that could be used from the people in the offline missions forum right now.
Wiley.
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One thing many are probably over looking here as far as the numbers go. Many of us old vets don't fly in the MA's much anymore. We spend our time in FSO, Scenarios,or practicing for such events. This is the game to us, and what we enjoy. Nothing against the guys who enjoy the MA, I did for about the first 3-4 years. But I think it's possible there is an ever increasing part of the aces high population that is now playing like I do. If the subscriber numbers are about the same but the MA numbers are down, I think this is a likely explanation.
:salute
BigRat
how much players do you get nowadays in FSO?
I was thinking, reading the comments that a few new playing modes would go a long way to get players to return to the game...like a door system à la redbull racing that would make warbirds racing something worth competing for.
Retaining new players is great but they need something to look up to.
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how much players do you get nowadays in FSO?
You can get an idea by visiting the events log page:
http://www.ahevents.org/event-logs.html
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I believe I figured it out: Snailman's graph doesn't show buildings destroyed. Whords tend to drive off opposition, which levees naught but the poor, defenseless buildings
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I believe I figured it out: Snailman's graph doesn't show buildings destroyed. Whords tend to drive off opposition, which levees naught but the poor, defenseless buildings
Heh! Now that would be an interesting comparison. Activity shown as buildings destroyed. Wonder if that stat could be pulled from the pages?
Wiley.
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Heh! Now that would be an interesting comparison. Activity shown as buildings destroyed. Wonder if that stat could be pulled from the pages?
No such numbers published.
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Pity. It would be interesting. I was thinking of FSO logs when I vaguely remembered something about 'objects destroyed'.
Wiley.
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Pity. It would be interesting. I was thinking of FSO logs when I vaguely remembered something about 'objects destroyed'.
Wiley.
Like this?:
Event Logs
Fire in the Phillipines Leyte 1944
02-08-08 20:06:26
USN stats:
Pilots: 250 Kills: 115 Assists: 88
Objects Destroyed: 118 Deaths: 140 Landed: 58
Bailed: 21 Captured: 40 Crashed: 15
Ditched: 11 Disco'd: 13
Japanese stats:
Pilots: 271 Kills: 197 Assists: 138
Objects Destroyed: 189 Deaths: 73 Landed: 149
Bailed: 13 Captured: 16 Crashed: 41
Ditched: 12 Disco'd: 16
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Any attempt to create a beginners arena is effectively pointless. Any way you cut it, coming into the MA you're going to have a bad time at first. It's just the nature of the game.
Wiley.
I think this is a bit of baby with the bathwater. Sure a handicapping system might be complex so maybe that wouldn't work but I think the game would benefit from an arena more capable than the TA especially for beginners. A start would be an arena with a small terrain with one airfield with ten airspawns that lead to different alts with AI drones waiting at each spawn. No missions to try to find out how to use and start, a high ratio of maneuvering and shooting to mouse clicking, waiting, climbing out, dying etc.
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I think this is a bit of baby with the bathwater. Sure a handicapping system might be complex so maybe that wouldn't work but I think the game would benefit from an arena more capable than the TA especially for beginners. A start would be an arena with a small terrain with one airfield with ten airspawns that lead to different alts with AI drones waiting at each spawn. No missions to try to find out how to use and start, a high ratio of maneuvering and shooting to mouse clicking, waiting, climbing out, dying etc.
Yeah, that was what I had in mind when I mentioned the offline missions, just having something like a 'training' menu in the main window that would have a set of buttons that would automatically launch something like you suggested there as 'general training', maybe a few others like 'bomber killing', 'bomber defence', 'jabo', and anything else that seems relevant. Have them like you say, airstarts, quick to get to. Click menu, it loads the mission. Nothing for people to figure out.
Wiley.
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No way guys, only way for newbies to really get a taste of things and prep for the MA is a free, open TA; so that everyone, even old out of subscription vets can pop in and have some fun flying around with them.
Any sort of combat with flying will build bad habits into them at first.
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No way guys, only way for newbies to really get a taste of things and prep for the MA is a free, open TA; so that everyone, even old out of subscription vets can pop in and have some fun flying around with them.
Any sort of combat with flying will build bad habits into them at first.
What would they do in this free, open TA?
Wiley.
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Well for newbies, something new is something new; fly around with other people flying around, trainers and vets popping in to help or to see if there are any new prospects. Some newbies maybe playing around mock fighting while others practice manoeuvres they see others doing with the trainers. With air-starts and the right environment; something like that could go a very long way to breathing more life into the new player culture. Guns would be loaded, but the bullets don't kill or destroy objects, same with bombs and ord that explode but do no damage. I suppose all planes would be unlocked as well.
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Not quite sure what the improvement is over the 2 week trial. The only advantage I could see there is you could spend more time there than 2 weeks. If you aren't interested in paying for it after 2 weeks, what would that offer that would make it desirable after a larger amount of time spent there?
Wiley.
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Its not what it offers, its what It doesn't.
The point is, that with such a place; the 2 week free trail can actually be removed or lessened to a major degree. While it is important that new players get a bite of the game itself, its also important that they develop their skills properly. That can be done offline, but in an environment with others; it can be much more beneficial.
I don't know if the 2 week part of the trial is meant to be a extension of the running joke, or some sort of mentally gauged standard.
If people just casually hung out there and flew, even if they didn't want to pay; there is a danger that it could create its own "game" out of what it has, but more likely then not, even if you had casual people hanging out there. It would go a long way to providing a base culture for the rest of the parts of the game to grow, without the tension and turmoil found in the MA.
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I think this is a bit of baby with the bathwater. Sure a handicapping system might be complex so maybe that wouldn't work but I think the game would benefit from an arena more capable than the TA especially for beginners. A start would be an arena with a small terrain with one airfield with ten airspawns that lead to different alts with AI drones waiting at each spawn. No missions to try to find out how to use and start, a high ratio of maneuvering and shooting to mouse clicking, waiting, climbing out, dying etc.
remove the AI, turn teamkill in, and I would fly such arena :x
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Myg, I guess I respectfully disagree about bad habits etc. It is easy to read bfm, acm, its easy to understand the concepts. The hard part is that without other players there is no way to practice that isn't obscure. You could make the TA free as a marketing thing but I don't think it would improve the new player experience. If you just want to work on your aim at 2AM for 20 minutes your kinda out of luck except for the luffberry circle offline.
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You mean the Trainers who CM the training arena can't lethal up the guns and damage a bit. Then tell their "real' newbies to go furball at some pre arranged location on the map while a trainer watches and ejects vets who interfere? Post a schedule in the MOTD of several days a week a trainer will be at this playground to kick out unwanted griefers. Heck even create a smaller version of the DA Furball Lake as the playground.
People are not complicated in this case. If they can rely on a schedule, they will show up. Even if it's only one newbie occasionally. Then better for the trainer and the student who will now practice ACM with more lethality for an hour or two.
Other wise the DA furball lake seems to be working fine as the training wheels arena. You can tell their play style off the merge in the MA.
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I think that it would be hard to have a newbie-only arena. If you try to limit it by stats, some griefers will have shade accounts that they keep at low K/D (or whatever) just so that they can go in there. Also, any limit on who can go in there will mean very few people will be in there. There aren't that many people in the whole MA at some times of day.
I think that the best way is an offline mode that gives practice with different things -- a training academy that you can go through offline. Sure, an online academy is good, too, but few players are willing to go through that.
One of the ways that seems to work in games these days is offline training then online free period of try then paid playing.
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I don't think we need a newbie only arena. What we need is an arena with features that are designed for newbies.
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I think that it would be hard to have a newbie-only arena. If you try to limit it by stats, some griefers will have shade accounts that they keep at low K/D (or whatever) just so that they can go in there. Also, any limit on who can go in there will mean very few people will be in there. There aren't that many people in the whole MA at some times of day.
I think that the best way is an offline mode that gives practice with different things -- a training academy that you can go through offline. Sure, an online academy is good, too, but few players are willing to go through that.
One of the ways that seems to work in games these days is offline training then online free period of try then paid playing.
there could be a message shown before clicking two week free trial. It should recommend some offline time before starting the trial, along with a link to some training vids or something. I would have heeded the recommendation.
I remember thinking "I wish I learned more offline before this trial."
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there could be a message shown before clicking two week free trial. It should recommend some offline time before starting the trial, along with a link to some training vids or something. I would have heeded the recommendation.
I remember thinking "I wish I learned more offline before this trial."
yeah....prolly more than not DL the game and pop right in, start asking endless inane questions. They would be FAR better served by practicing offline in some canned furballs (it's my understanding that nearly every time the game gets updated, the offline missions get wrecked? A shame if so, air-spawning into a furball of drones would give them better preparedness for the real 2 weeks, I would think)
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I don't think we need a newbie only arena. What we need is an arena with features that are designed for newbies.
Interesting..an arena that has:
No blackouts
No red-out
No stall
Auto rudder
Lead computing gunsight
Air spawns
1/2 weapon lethality (How much can a newb learn if he dies in half a second? On the other hand, more bullets required means more time on target required = practicing ACM)
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There absolutely needs to be better training and the opportunity to learn without being a target. I suggested a handicapping system awhile ago and was predictably shot down.
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There absolutely needs to be better training and the opportunity to learn without being a target. I suggested a handicapping system awhile ago and was predictably shot down.
Problem is not enough people seek help, when I first started flying here I came from Fighter Aces, Falcon 4 and Janes ATF Gold - I had an intermediate understanding yet I still begged to fly with trainers for a few months. Many people don't ask for help, they simply are a target until they get fed up.
Many squads don't have trainers, or take advantage of other players to help and guide them into learning.
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The game itself does not need to be dumbed down for more people to enjoy it, only the gui in bits.
People just need to be able to fly and learn from others, easily, that's why the Free TA (firing blanks) and the removal of all the other arena's except the LWA and TA idea would go a long way to making the game feel more solid and accessible. Look it up on the wishlist forum, it should be on page 2 or three by now.
1. People would know where to look for a fight.
2. People would know where to look for help.
That's all the normal/casual crowd want, custom arenas can be easily enumerated and identified on the same page and be used for events.
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re Newbs
A more dynamic, proactive interface with the stall limiter settings may assist an introductory period.
Actually a more proactive training package may help folk gain confidence and keep playing/paying generally.
A general observation would be that its far easier to "learn" the GV part of the game than the AC part of the game.
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Ah, I remember relaxed realism in AW.
Not thinking a persistent RR would do
much but divide the populace with no
real motivation to improve and go FR.
Such was the case when KWRR went
KWFR in AW.
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My fantasy TA would be the same as the current TA except that at different airspawns there would be drones with ai that you could kill but would respawn. The only relaxed realism would be that you couldn't die and you couldn't kill another player and you would have the option of the lead computing gunsight. No easy mode flight model, retain black and red out, stall limiter as in main game, fuel burn and ammo as in TA. I don't think you would divide the player base with this kind of arena as you can't kill anybody and the terrain would never change. Make it online so that there is something worth paying for in the realm of practice, (if you have offline missions that you fly offline you don't have to pay for them and they offer more practice than being in the TA with the crickets at 2AM.)
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All of the players asking for a training wheels arena already play full time in the MA or used to. All of you are willing to tell HTC what's wrong with the MA and TA in graphic gory detail. None of you are swamping the TA all hours of the clock looking for newbies to make sure they can or want to become full time MA players like yourselves.
What impresses a person more since this is a people business like selling cars?
1.- An impersonal but, killer series of accessible documents and masterful graphical interfaces saying please come to the TA we have everything to help you. XXXXOOOO We Luv New Players!!!
2.- Vets from the game hanging out in the TA in numbers. And personally in the game constantly offering to right then go into the TA with obviously floundering players and giving up some of their precious vulching and score building time. Choose to forgo the addictive mind cocaine session you login for now, to help grow a future crop to feed your need a few times a week. Push your chair away from the buffet so to say, to make sure you didn't just eat your last breeding stock heifer.
What will a real human being deciding to make an emotional purchase of a "community" respond to better?
Yeah just follow the signs to the second fork in the road and, oh yeah, look out for alligators. Or, hey we see you are interested in our community. Hop on and we will help you get settled in.
The 900lb gorilla in the road, is, no one wants to get their hands dirty for the future of the game. Many of you want to show Hitech your game development savvy or your business acumen instead. Very few people like or want to expend the effort it takes to being a car salesman person to person.
The old saying of the customer is always right has nothing to do with the customer. It has to do with no matter what kind of person the customer presents himself to you as, that's your pay check, so earn it. Or in this game's case. Our future.
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I don't think it either or Bustr. The game could use both. Speaking for myself, if I was to teach someone air combat they would have a very short career.
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The "Big Brothers, Big Sisters" organization hears the exact same thing pembquist. From their much longer experience than AH has existed, its the gesture and not being the equivalent of Fester in a 262 that makes the greater positive emotional impact.
It's the initial positive association with the game that helps the new player. Super Hero's are a symptom of fantasy cartoon games they will get used to.
Getting anyone to buy a situation is no different than selling a car, a house, or in the case of Aces High. A way of life if they are going to commit to longer than 2 weeks or then a few months.
How many of you with kids want them to grow up to be like player(????) ..... well think about some of our forum denizens and fill in the blank. Then consider if player(????) even cares beyond fulfilling their own short term desires.
Selling Aces High as a community follows the same rules of positive or negative input as any kind of sales environment. Granted a small percentage of players are only attracted to joining those players I asked if you wanted your child to grow up and be like. Some people are attracted to others pain visa "Cyber Bullying" which the uninformed about combat sims could misconstrue has been symptomatic in our forum for years. And not as our community knows from experience, natural virtual fist fights related to high emotions in the arenas. First impressions are all you get before fingers tell their personal impressions to others online.
So pembquist, I've watched how you interact with our community. As the first friendly hand up to a new player, you are ideal in the long process of helping them want to stay in our community. They can aspire to be a game Super Hero over time like everyone else. This is why Morfeind is so good as a game ambassador in his position as a trainer.
Pembquist, betcha a bottle of IPA this response gets the anti mushiness censorship brigade up in full sail............
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What a load of pure tosh. :old:
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Why just a 2 week free trial? Why not 4 or 6? I think the difference a new player would learn could be huge in an extra couple of weeks of free game time.
Thoughts??