How have we lost so many people to this wonderful game?

[guncrasher]

We lost a lot players on Steam AFTER the free trial.    Read the reviews.    People complain about the sub.  Many don't even bother trying because of it. 

As noted, there is a huge psychological barrier to "cancel anytime" when you have to put in a credit card number.

I doubt many current subscribers would cancel to fly a Spit V.   I sure as heck won't.

I dont have steam so I cant read the reviews.  but I do know that a few aces high players that had been banned from aces high did post horrible reviews at the begining.  that didnt stop the thousands of downloads with people that only lasted 15 minutes.  if your idea would bring new subscribers, I have no doubt that it would have been implemented a couple of years ago.

semp

[CptTrips]

DCA MAFIA



"Don't change anything.  Got it?"

[Vraciu]

nope, I have no idea.  but I do know that people that dont last 15 minutes in the game with all planes available, for sure wont stay if they get the spit5 for free.  and I mean the spit5 is part of all the free planes in those 2 weeks.  however I do believe some current subscribers will cancel and fly the spit5 for free and this game will be known as spit5 high.


semp

You ignore the people who see "two weeks free, give us  your card number, $15 to subscribe after trial, cancel any time"  and don't even bother.   

If you can't up the retention rate then you need to attract more people to try it to make up for it.

Give them a free ride.  Tier the sub beyond that.   Fish attract sharks.   Get the fish in here.

[Vraciu]

I dont have steam so I cant read the reviews.  but I do know that a few aces high players that had been banned from aces high did post horrible reviews at the begining.  that didnt stop the thousands of downloads with people that only lasted 15 minutes.  if your idea would bring new subscribers, I have no doubt that it would have been implemented a couple of years ago.

semp

[Vraciu]

DCA MAFIA

(Image removed from quote.)

"Don't change anything.  Got it?"

That's kinda the vibe I sense.

Anyone can come up with a reason to say no.  We need more YES'es.

[SPKmes]

That's kinda the vibe I sense.

Anyone can come up with a reason to say no.  We need more YES'es.

 hahaha  when it suits  hahaha

[guncrasher]

You ignore the people who see "two weeks free, give us  your card number, $15 to subscribe after trial, cancel any time"  and don't even bother.   

If you can't up the retention rate then you need to attract more people to try it to make up for it.

Give them a free ride.  Tier the sub beyond that.   Fish attract sharks.   Get the fish in here.

actually you dont need a credit card for your 2 week trial.


semp

[guncrasher]

yup, that you have been doing for the last couple of weeks.  not that your ideas are bad but more like heard them a thousand times before from all kinds of players.

You are a smart guy, been around working here and there, how many new people have come to you and try to sell the same ideas that you heard before than you now wont work.

if anybody had a truly great idea that would bring players back, they would never post it.  they would call hitech streight up and say, hey I have this idea nobody ever thought before and I guarantee you it will work and will bring players back.  lets negotiate.  I know I would have done that, and you would too.  you dont have to sell that idea to us, you have to sell it to hitech.  and if it would work, pretty sure you would get a finder's fee.

it's not the same as giving ideas to improve gameplay.  for example a few months i had a hard time seeing bases, I posted it, couple of days later, I upped a plane, looked around and wow i can see the base from a sector away just like in ah2.  another was the expand the text buffer or whatever you call it.  idea was not entirely mine but I'll take credit for it.  lots of other players have given input on how to improve game play.

it seems that you post the same 2 or 3 ideas that have been discussed to death in the past.  why you keep pushing them after being told no, I have no idea, maybe it's like you said in another thread, it's just a mental exercise or however you described it.

like I said in another post, I have no idea how to increase players, if I had a winner, I would call hitech directly and talk about compensation, it could be maybe a life time membership in aces high.  but so far I have not seen anybody post a sure winner.  that's my opinion.


semp

[dieter]

I think this is a pretty good game, it has it's warts, but I like it.   I would like to see more missions, and for NOE to be something that could be pulled off.  If I were making changes to this game, I wouldn't pull the gv's, and I wouldn't pull field gunners.  I would change what NOE meant though.  I know RADAR altitude of detection vs curvature of the earth and line of sight would probably add too much overhead for the game, so I would make RADAR coverage inside of narrow valleys only good for the line of sight vs the elevation coverage of WW2 systems (not  much), and low altitude aircraft not detectable.  I would make them not detectable for anyone.  If I took off and stayed below say 100 feet AGL, no one on any side would be able to see me. I would have DFUSED bombs for real NOE penetration raids.  I would consider drawing a Forward Edge of the Battle Area (FEBA) on the map, and any low alt incursion would be flashed where it happened for 15 seconds, (or some low number under a minute), but with a probability built in for the flash, not guaranteed.  I wouldn't flash a base until the planes flew over it, or the first ordnance contact, then flash it.  That's where I would start, people with multiple accounts, two players on teamspeak on opposite sides, etc., don't matter then. 

The ego maniacs that get upset when someone doesn't fly to their particular liking are always going to be here, and they are just as irrelevant here as they are in real life.  I would aggressively mute them for talking smack, no one wants to try to learn in an environment with grumpy old coots that are egocentric.  They add nothing to the game.  If you want people to play the game, having someone complain at them for some perceived wrong is ludicrous; why fight the learning curve to play with grumpy old men.  Be civil, or mumble to yourself.  I like the idea of a noob feeding bowl, give em an air start, limited altitude, and a turn fighter.  Ki-43's, hurricanes and spits with 303's and let em figure it out.

My two cents

[FBKampfer]

The reality is that, for drawing more players and generating revenue for HTC, a free-to-play model is hard to beat.

We joke about AH being addicting, but a FTP model relies on it, and has been extremely successful monetarily, especially in the form of the micro transaction. Physiologically its very close to gambling addiction in the response it elicits in the human brain.

Not that I advise HTC go for the micro transaction route. It's catching major hell in virtually every sector from online forums, Youtube, and even being banned in certain guises.


However it gets one thing absolutely right: when someone else has something you don't, people will pay to get it.

FTP gets you:

Panzer IV H
M4(75)
SdKfz 251
Spitfire IX
Bf 109G-2
B-26
F6F
PT boat

$10/mo gets you everything else.




LIMIT LEGACY PLAYER ACCESS TO THE NEW GUY'S.

Accounts must be tied to an IP address (but will allow more than one) and are immediately launched to the training arena with a guided click-through and follow along tutorial, where they will learn how to adjust their ride, get in the air, are given a crash-course in BFM, and make their first kill against a gently maneuvering AI.


There are tutorials for tanks, boats, guns, and CV launches.


They have Access to the MA, the training arena, and the "newcomers" arena. Of long time players, only designated trainers with specific trainer accounts may access the newcomers arena for training and help.

There is a warning upon first entering the MA: The MA is for more experienced players, and those looking for an extreme challenge. Players have varying range of experience from virtually none, to decades of flying both in real life and in game. The fight will be brutal, and you are not expected to survive.

After say, 500 hours total flight time, they are graduated to the MA and lose access to the newcomers arena.

[Lusche]

After say, 500 hours total flight time, they are graduated to the MA and lose access to the newcomers arena.

For the average AH player, 500 hours total flight time is about two years worth of playing AH.
Just saying. 

[bozon]

...
I thought AH would not be noticed by many and would not generate much interest - Boy, was I wrong!  Tens of thousands of downloads!
But then I thought a good portion those that would find their way to AH would be pleased and subscribe. After all AH, even with all those little faults was a great game, the best I ever played!
Wrong again. They stopped by, shook their heads and moved on. Almost nobody signed up. I would never have thought of a retention rate as low as it finally turned out to be. Never. 

This does not surprise me.
A 17 years old downloads the game via steam. Fires it up.

Filter1: Does he have a stick? Very unlikely - instant uninstall for all players that try to fly with a mouse and hate it.

Filter2: What to do now? Click random menus manage to fly offline, where there is nothing but stupid drones. Where is the game? Uninstall all short attention span kids.

Filter3: got online! Hmm.. lots of empty arenas, one with 90 players. Choose that one and find yourself in a tower in the middle of nowhere. No activity whatsoever. Look at the clipboard- you don’t understand what you see. Spawn with some plane - what do I do now? What is the purpose of this game? Uninstall all players who can’t be bothered to read tutorials, forums, or look for YouTube videos that explain things.

Filter4: Make the effort to learn a little about this game. The game has been running since 1999! This is a great record if you are a traditional bakery or a brewery, but for a computer game? I mean, it started on 36,600 bps phone modems that I was saw in a museum. All the players on vox sound like they are 50. The interface says year 2000 (our player was born in 2002). Everyone are level 80 vetrans with gazillion gold (perk points), except him. No other noobs to be seen.
Uninstall for all players that dislike the smell of mothballs and old people.

Filter5: Got this far? It’s 15$ a month whether you actually log in or not. You can’t suspend it either. Uninstall all players that have already invested in other sims, don’t have credit cards, or are not used to pay for games.

Probability of retaining a new player = Filter1 x Filter2 x Filter3 x Filter4 x Filter5 = 1E-4.

So of the 10,000 steam downloads AH maybe got 1 new subscriber.

[ccvi]

Fewer possible ways to play the game means less players.

Removal of NOE, improved radar, increased town sizes, improved AAA, increased number of hangars, ... and fewer players (compared to the early days). This draws a lot more action to the PvE element of the game, leaving less room for PvP air-to-air action. While the changes are probably intended to improve that, they don't convert an NOE field grabber into a 1-vs-1 dogfighter, and force an extended focus on ground targets to play the team objective (*).

The game isn't the one single best game for 1-vs-1 fights. There is competition that didn't exist 20 years ago. Dogfights (1-vs-1 or furballs without a purpose) can be had elsewhere, for a fixed one-time purchase, with better looking graphics, too. It doesn't work as the worlds best flight simulator either, others are providing a much more detailed simulation.

The monthly payment is only worth it for the persistent world with its different tactical options and strategic elements. Those are what make it unique. Many changes haven't influenced these topics in a positive way I think.

None of the advertising, not the website, steam page, emphasize this aspect. New people join while expecting certain things, based on the material consumed before. Then they notice that the game doesn't deliver on those points, at least not any better than alternatives, and at a monthly payment, and they leave.
An "easy" way to increase the retention rate is to pull in the right kind of players, that are looking for what the game has to offer. "Great dogfights here!" draws in players that do expect 15$/month-better-than-elsewhere dogfights, and quickly notice that they won't get what they were looking for. "Complex strategic game with planes!" might draw in less players (not necessarily), but a lot more might stay (**).

(*) The probability to encounter an enemy tank preventing capture is much higher than encountering an enemy fighter that is looking for the goon, mostly because goons don't work anymore - so the proper action is to always take off heavy.
(**) When I first read about this game (actually, WB, but that's the same more or less), it was on a squad page that described the concept of the war, with planes as the means to fight the war. Would a description of doom-with-planes have drawn me in? Unlikely. With more alternatives available, even less today.

[RAG]

What about 1 free plane, but wait,...... to stop others cancelling their sub you can only go in the MA for say 45mins a day without a sub.... this enables them to get better, get hooked and also gives others in the MA a bit more action.  It also gives newbies a chance to make friends and find helpers who persuade them to join.... win win.
(dare i suggest this as not being a sub myself?, but i cant justify it at the moment, but if i was allowed even a crap plane for 45mins i would occasionally give you guys some bait and a spirited fight!)
I loved my free trial but i was useless, however i have improved vastly just from non paid arenas but i would love some MA action!

[ccvi]

For the average AH player, 500 hours total flight time is about two years worth of playing AH.
Just saying. 

Just enough to leave the "total noob" rank.