Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: DmonSlyr on July 01, 2020, 05:46:23 PM
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the #s are going up, this last tour completely reversed that :angry: March, April, and May, had decent #s in total death stats. I saw almost 200 in the arena. It was looking really good. Last tour all the growth disappeared and we were left back to about Februarys #s. I expect Covid had some involvement in that but I just dont understand how literally all of that new growth dissapeared in June. It just irritates me because with the subscription model, we will probably never see any of these players again unless they decide to subscribe one month just to retry it. One of my biggest issues with the subscription is that a player is less likely to retry the game after not playing it for months since they have to subscribe. With many people out of work and now out of money, they are going to play games that they have already bought or are free. I feel like Aces High throws away so many people to never fly again because of the subscription. Its incredibly difficult to get my generation to buy anything. A monthly fee just makes it sound expensive compared to tier pricing for goods that make them better than everyone else. (Not saying we should do that). But a tiered subscription would probably get more people back in the game.
Now, I dont want to just blame it on the subscription, perhaps it was too hard for them, perhaps people were mean to them, perhaps it was too far to a base to die, perhaps it was getting ganged by 6 people every time they got into a fight, then having to fly back to the fight which can be slow... Maybe they all went back to work and don't want to play video games anymore.
I don't know. Its just puzzling to me to see such a large drop off of #s in plane stats in June compared to the last 3 months before it. Hopefully we see some better #s in July...
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Let us know when your game is released. You seem to have it all figured out.
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It is logical that there would be a drop in numbers for June. Most states eased restrictions for COVID-19, so people naturally ventured out and some went back to work after months of being at home.
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Let us know when your game is released. You seem to have it all figured out.
You know this is what makes Aces High special.
Here is someone who is genuinely concerned about the amount of people actually playing and enjoying the game, and the first reply on the forums is negative and implicitly insulting. You know there's actually far more productive ways to state your opinion that might actually get a discussion going rather than calling the OP a know it all.
Class act Shuffler, Class act <S>
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You know this is what makes Aces High special.
Here is someone who is genuinely concerned about the amount of people actually playing and enjoying the game, and the first reply on the forums is negative and implicitly insulting. You know there's actually far more productive ways to state your opinion that might actually get a discussion going rather than calling the OP a know it all.
Class act Shuffler, Class act <S>
when I started it was a slow day when there were less than 300 during the day at night it was more like 30 to 40. it was frustrating for me to fly back then as I died a lot. yesterday it took me about maybe over an hour to get a kill as I died alot, but I ended up the night with perhaps 7 or 8 kills. and yet I had fun. when i started i would get that in an hour and wasnt having fun. somehow numbers either less or more dont equal to fun, at least that's not how I see it. now there's times when I play for perhaps 3 or 4 hours and sometimes I get 1 or 2 kills, but for some reason the game is more fun now than when I started.
perhaps I have different expectations than before, I am not really any better than when I started but I guess I adapted. I will quit this game when I stop having fun, being 1000 in the arena or one.
semp
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You know this is what makes Aces High special.
Here is someone who is genuinely concerned about the amount of people actually playing and enjoying the game, and the first reply on the forums is negative and implicitly insulting. You know there's actually far more productive ways to state your opinion that might actually get a discussion going rather than calling the OP a know it all.
Class act Shuffler, Class act <S>
You caress his hair all you want. He talks from zero experience. Some have all the answers.... so they think.
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I'd say the uptick would pretty much have to be because of the lockdown. Relaxing lockdown coupled with nicer weather, I think it's a pretty clear picture.
Maybe if they advertise? On the history channel and at airshows? :bolt:
Wiley.
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Maybe if they advertise? On the history channel and at airshows? :bolt:
Wiley.
AHC - American Heroes Channel would also be a great place. In the beginning of the lockdown DirectTV added to our package. Some awesome shows on it I always wanted to see, like the Civil War shows they created. Lots of WWII shows - advertising opportunities I’d imagine.
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I just didn't expect the drop off to be that large. 29,000 deaths from May to June is a lot. :frown: I thought we finally had something going...
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You know this is what makes Aces High special.
Here is someone who is genuinely concerned about the amount of people actually playing and enjoying the game, and the first reply on the forums is negative and implicitly insulting. You know there's actually far more productive ways to state your opinion that might actually get a discussion going rather than calling the OP a know it all.
Class act Shuffler, Class act <S>
It is the norm of people who think the game is a-ok. People don't realize that all good ideas come from a simple thought, and you never know what might take off.
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It is the norm of people who think the game is a-ok. People don't realize that all good ideas come from a simple thought, and you never know what might take off.
There are always going to be petty little self-appointed forum commissars who think it is their job to run around and stamp out any wrong-think that isn't abject, servile worship of the status quo.
:rolleyes:
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Doesn't help the game that the playerbase, in my opinion, hasn't policed itself very well.
It very difficult to find a vertebrate in the entire arena. :old:
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There are always going to be petty little self-appointed forum commissars who think it is their job to run around and stamp out any wrong-think that isn't abject, servile worship of the status quo.
:rolleyes:
That is exactly my point. We all care about the game. Some want to run it and have no clue about the gaming business. They have no idea what has and has not been done.
Play the game and make the best of it. None of us have access the the inside running of this business.
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HT certainly missed an opportunity to grow numbers by providing the game free for the stay-at-home people.
A service I used to develop (which is free) went from 500 to 5000 over the quarantine period; it settled down to the 3500 as the lock-down started to ease up.
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the #s are going up, this last tour completely reversed that :angry: March, April, and May, had decent #s in total death stats. I saw almost 200 in the arena. It was looking really good. Last tour all the growth disappeared and we were left back to about Februarys #s. I expect Covid had some involvement in that but I just dont understand how literally all of that new growth dissapeared in June. It just irritates me because with the subscription model, we will probably never see any of these players again unless they decide to subscribe one month just to retry it. One of my biggest issues with the subscription is that a player is less likely to retry the game after not playing it for months since they have to subscribe. With many people out of work and now out of money, they are going to play games that they have already bought or are free. I feel like Aces High throws away so many people to never fly again because of the subscription. Its incredibly difficult to get my generation to buy anything. A monthly fee just makes it sound expensive compared to tier pricing for goods that make them better than everyone else. (Not saying we should do that). But a tiered subscription would probably get more people back in the game.
Now, I dont want to just blame it on the subscription, perhaps it was too hard for them, perhaps people were mean to them, perhaps it was too far to a base to die, perhaps it was getting ganged by 6 people every time they got into a fight, then having to fly back to the fight which can be slow... Maybe they all went back to work and don't want to play video games anymore.
I don't know. Its just puzzling to me to see such a large drop off of #s in plane stats in June compared to the last 3 months before it. Hopefully we see some better #s in July...
You make an incorrect assumption. That total hours played varies directly with total number of players.
HiTech
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That is exactly my point. We all care about the game. Some want to run it and have no clue about the gaming business. They have no idea what has and has not been done.
Play the game and make the best of it. None of us have access the the inside running of this business.
We may not have access, but a lot of us have been here from almost the beginning in some cases. and see "trends" of things going on in the game. I dont think Hitech plays the game as much as he use to in days gone by. What with running the company, writing coad, and raising a family Im sure he is too busy.
I would hope that he does take the time to listen to and evaluate the suggestions and insights many post here who DO play the game often. Game play changes as the players change. With out watching/playing often you might wish some of the things that are going on in the game.
I think people should suggest away, and for those that feel the need to "poo-poo" everyones ideas, they should not bother with the negative comments and let the post sit on its own merits.
As you said, its not up to us to MAKE changes, that Hitechs spot, but there should be nothing wrong with people posting their ideas
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We may not have access, but a lot of us have been here from almost the beginning in some cases. and see "trends" of things going on in the game. I dont think Hitech plays the game as much as he use to in days gone by. What with running the company, writing coad, and raising a family Im sure he is too busy.
I would hope that he does take the time to listen to and evaluate the suggestions and insights many post here who DO play the game often. Game play changes as the players change. With out watching/playing often you might wish some of the things that are going on in the game.
I think people should suggest away, and for those that feel the need to "poo-poo" everyones ideas, they should not bother with the negative comments and let the post sit on its own merits.
As you said, its not up to us to MAKE changes, that Hitechs spot, but there should be nothing wrong with people posting their ideas
Everyone...... not just some. I would like to see his game when it is released.
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I think people should suggest away, and for those that feel the need to "poo-poo" everyones ideas, they should not bother with the negative comments and let the post sit on its own merits.
Some people just love to play Hall Monitor.
(https://frinkiac.com/img/S14E16/175759.jpg)
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You caress his hair all you want. He talks from zero experience. Some have all the answers.... so they think.
hehehehe. :airplane: :airplane: :old: :old: :old: :old: :bhead :bhead :bhead :bhead :bhead :bhead :bhead :bhead :bhead
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You make an incorrect assumption. That total hours played varies directly with total number of players.
HiTech
You must have misread, as I use total deaths as the measurement. I know that it doesn't directly correlate with player #s, or even subscribers, but it does show a lot less deaths compared to previous few months, which means less players flew in the MA last month and/or they didn't roll as much. Still, most players probably average between 100-300 deaths a month. Im seeing 29K death difference. Thats a lot of sorties. I'm aware that many people went back to work. I am just disappointed that it appears so much of the growth died down. I thought for sure we'd start seeing 200 avg in the MA again primtime. I saw 166 last sunday, which was higher than the weekends before, so hopefully the people who were burnt out come back in July. I was just shocked to see such a big decline in June from May which is why i brought it up. I hope that more of the players in the game can help to keep players interested to stick around longer.
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Some people just love to play Hall Monitor.
(https://frinkiac.com/img/S14E16/175759.jpg)
....and some people think they are funny :neener:
Nope, just "suggesting" that people could police themselves and we would have less negativity/toxicity on the boards.
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I came back after last flying in Tour 134, when my last decent gaming rig died an inglorious death. I finally found myself in a life position to get back with a new system.
I do think some advertising would do the game good.... I remember the uptick in numbers circa 2009ish (forgive me if I'm wrong) when the game was adverted on History Channel. Numbers back then were mid 300's every night.... we used to moan about low number nights at 130....
That being said, this is a niche product that has a niche audience. Basically, you need to target an audience that has a love for warbirds and the money to spend on a computer rig that can handle the state of expectation, graphically, writ large. The younger generation of aviation enthusiasts are locked into DCS at the moment. I don't know how you can interest them in the finesse that was aerial combat of the time period that this game focuses on. It certainly does not help that arcade games like War Thunder jumped into the space as well, ostensibly creating a poor dynamic for those that actually tried to get into WW2 combat. Air Warrior jumped into a wide open business space when it came out... and that space is now pretty crowded for Aces High. (Many of us "old timers" remember paying by the hour on dial-up to fly when Kesmai marketed Air Warrior.......but I digress)
The learning curve in Aces is also incredibly steep, and that leads to many folks leaving in frustration. The community here has also taken a step back from helping new people, IMO, even though some folks do go out of their way to try.
This game has some really great things going for it... Scenarios are second to none, and the flight model is pretty true to form. You simply need to find the right target audience again. Unless HT is simply going to let it fade away slowly, and move on to something new, there is space to make this game pop again, particularly if done in a concise, targeted way.
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You must have misread, as I use total deaths as the measurement. I know that it doesn't directly correlate with player #s, or even subscribers, but it does show a lot less deaths compared to previous few months, which means less players flew in the MA last month and/or they didn't roll as much. Still, most players probably average between 100-300 deaths a month. Im seeing 29K death difference. Thats a lot of sorties. I'm aware that many people went back to work. I am just disappointed that it appears so much of the growth died down. I thought for sure we'd start seeing 200 avg in the MA again primtime. I saw 166 last sunday, which was higher than the weekends before, so hopefully the people who were burnt out come back in July. I was just shocked to see such a big decline in June from May which is why i brought it up. I hope that more of the players in the game can help to keep players interested to stick around longer.
Total deaths is liner related to hours played on a arena wide basis. And it does not show less players played in the arena it can show the same number of players played in the arena but had less deaths because they played less. Hence why I said you made in incorrect assumption which you again made in the above quote.
HiTech
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Regardless of the units of measure or scientific methods used, I think we can all agree the subscription model is very rare in 2020 and likely a barrier for future growth. Combine that with the steep learning curve, cost of peripherals, and the ever fading light of enthusiasm for WWII air combat, and the future isn't exactly bright. Not dark, just not bright.
Assuming revenue is based solely off of new and renewing subscriptions, the only alternative for HTC is a flat fee to buy the game and a steady stream of paid DLC type content. Given the history of community contributions (skins, maps, sounds, etc), I'd say HTC was never really set up for that kind of business model. It's more of game that your buddy developed and you and your friends pay him each month to keep the servers up, in addition to giving him free stuff to make the game pretty and functional.
Quite the odd duck, this game.
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Violator had an idea a while ago for Special Events, and fortunately HiTech allowed me to make it happen.
https://www.hitechcreations.com
Amazing what a simple idea can do to help! :)
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Total deaths is liner related to hours played on a arena wide basis. And it does not show less players played in the arena it can show the same number of players played in the arena but had less deaths because they played less. Hence why I said you made in incorrect assumption which you again made in the above quote.
HiTech
I understand your point. I know its variable and there are many factors there.
I'm just shocked that there was that big of an impact related to people going back to work. I will say that I do notice a decrease in pilots per the top planes, which is still variable. I just hope we can pick those #s back up overall, which is why I wanted to call attention to it.
Violator had an idea a while ago for Special Events, and fortunately HiTech allowed me to make it happen.
https://www.hitechcreations.com
Amazing what a simple idea can do to help! :)
Just noticed this. I am so glad and thankful that Hitech allowed you to post the special events on the front page. I am happy to see the enthusiasm!
Thank you Hitech and Spikes!
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Just noticed this. I am so glad and thankful that Hitech allowed you to post the special events on the front page. I am happy to see the enthusiasm!
Thank you Hitech and Spikes!
:cheers:
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Regardless of the units of measure or scientific methods used, I think we can all agree the subscription model is very rare in 2020 and likely a barrier for future growth. Combine that with the steep learning curve, cost of peripheral
While the subscription is rare in 2020 a game like Aces High is also incredibly rare in 2020 and that must also be taken into account.
As far as peripheral, I fly in this game with a simple keyboard and mouse, nothing more and I can at least say I can give most other players a decent run for their money in a fight. No other flight sim game has implemented mouse and keyboard controls as well as aces high IMO.
Regarding the mouse controls, one thing I do find annoying in AH3 compared the AH2 is how the rudder is linked to the alieron controls while you're on the runway.
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You caress his hair all you want. He talks from zero experience. Some have all the answers.... so they think.
You did come out of the gate a negative Nancy.
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You did come out of the gate a negative Nancy.
Commended him on his knowledge and asked the obvious. With that knowledge he can't be wasting it.
You seem pretty negative about that.
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There are always going to be petty little self-appointed forum commissars who think it is their job to run around and stamp out any wrong-think that isn't abject, servile worship of the status quo.
:rolleyes:
So anyone who advances an opinion contrary to CptTrip is a Communist... interesting, I'm guessing he also agreed
with the chaos of late
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So anyone who advances an opinion contrary to CptTrip is a Communist... interesting, I'm guessing he also agreed
with the chaos of late
(https://i.gifer.com/Lt8i.gif)
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So anyone who advances an opinion contrary to CptTrip is a Communist... interesting, I'm guessing he also agreed
with the chaos of late
What chaos would that be, Ram? Can you explain?
If you're referring to Monday Night Madness, I'm in full support.
:rolleyes:
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Total deaths is liner related to hours played on a arena wide basis. And it does not show less players played in the arena it can show the same number of players played in the arena but had less deaths because they played less. Hence why I said you made in incorrect assumption which you again made in the above quote.
HiTech
Baseing on hours flown? Numbers not accurate due to game developer not wanting to kick AFK players that skew numbers and now evidently are use for the pulse of the game? For one tour remove from the lobby any player afk for said time and then look at numbers.
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People play video games less in the summer for obvious reasons.
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Baseing on hours flown? Numbers not accurate due to game developer not wanting to kick AFK players that skew numbers and now evidently are use for the pulse of the game? For one tour remove from the lobby any player afk for said time and then look at numbers.
Hours flown, not hours in game.
You seem to be wrong most of the time.
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What chaos would that be, Ram? Can you explain?
:rolleyes:
I think your statement is explanation enough
:salute
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I think your statement is explanation enough
:salute
Cluck cluck cluck...
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Cluck cluck cluck...
He says he doesn't care if he's banned. Let him prove that on his own, I say.
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Baseing on hours flown? Numbers not accurate due to game developer not wanting to kick AFK players that skew numbers and now evidently are use for the pulse of the game? For one tour remove from the lobby any player afk for said time and then look at numbers.
I seem to have lost my flippz decoder ring. Might anyone else have one they can share?
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I seem to have lost my flippz decoder ring. Might anyone else have one they can share?
I believe;
An account like cybro which spends time "in flight" but the player is afk, fudges the results and should be removed from the server after going afk for a set period.
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In the big picture, players like cybro still have a miniscule impact on arena wide stats like hours flown per tour. You can pretty much ignore it.
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I believe;
An account like cybro which spends time "in flight" but the player is afk, fudges the results and should be removed from the server after going afk for a set period.
But if you removed the 10-15 afk guys in the est am time zone the arenas would “seem” dead. There for we need window dressing to help the appearance of dead arenas.
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Hours flown, not hours in game.
You seem to be wrong most of the time.
Post counts don’t make you right mostly shows you are narcissistic
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I seem to have lost my flippz decoder ring. Might anyone else have one they can share?
Bet you ain’t lost that sponge bob burger flipper
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Post counts don’t make you right mostly shows you are narcissistic
Excellent proof of what I posted. Thank you!
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Excellent proof of what I posted. Thank you!
you as well good sir, keep that post count up
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Bet you ain’t lost that sponge bob burger flipper
For a young'n you sure do sound like an old sourpus. :neener: