For Folks who are 'Leaving'

[Kezrai_Charzai]

@Kellie_McCalamitie

They’re saying ( correctly or not ) that CCP has bad practices, that the game isn’t built for space battles ( unless there are 4000 players in a system duking it out ) but ambush play where you can’t do anything, they’re saying that the ‘open-world’ part of EVE is gone, they are tired of CCP nerfing crap, tired of Scarcity, tired of bullies, tired of resources changes… but ‘no handholds’ ?? Where did you read that?

Well said. Not exactly sure why Mike is confused that someone who is angry and disappointed in a game would rage-post; seems like a pretty common/expected response to me.

I’ve spoken to a lot of newer players and rookies over the years, and the number of people who quit with a tantrum or rage-post is by far the minority. On the order of less than 1% of people who quit or give up post publicly about it - in my experience more like 0.1%.

Of the people who’ve given me any feedback as to why they’re quitting, the vast majority have said that EVE is simply too boring, that it isn’t the PvP hotbed it’s advertised as, that the combat systems are awkward and dull, that the game is tilted towards ambush/gank play (as you said) - at least for the 99% of the game that isn’t large fleet battles. Fairly common is also that there “isn’t a lot to do”.

(Note these aren’t my own view, these are impressions from players I’ve spoken with, typically newer ones who don’t know much about EVE yet.)

There’s also been some who quit over specific nerfs or changes but even that hasn’t been a large percent. Bad game design leading to boring gameplay is the #1 reason for leaving that I’ve encountered, and from what I can see nearly all those people simply leave to play another game without saying a word.

As to any suggestions about “what should be done about it?”, there’s been thousands posted over the years, some good, most bad. The real issue is that CCP is stuck with a core game design that based around slow, repetitive gameplay and awkward combat mechanics, and it’s very hard to remake something like that into a more dynamic and interesting system.

It could be done, but would require a commitment to quality game development that CCP has not shown for the past decade or more. As it stands, they’ve got a cash cow, they’ve got people who will send money no matter what gets done to the game, and they’re just gonna milk that cow until there’s no milk left.

Moral of the story? Rage-quitters are a red herring. The silent majority of “not interested” quitters is way bigger, but CCP doesn’t care because hey, money’s coming in anyway so why change?

[Kellie_McCalamitie]

@Kezrai_Charzai

Not exactly sure why Mike is confused that someone who is angry and disappointed in a game would rage-post; seems like a pretty common/expected response to me.

I think Mike’s aim with this thread isn’t as much to understand why the rage-quitters post on the forum, even though he’s interested in the phenomenon as we all are, but to send a message: no need to come on the forum with a big o’ rage-quit rant since it’s a waste of energy because CCP won’t read it, and to maybe post a ‘leaving’ thread with more info than rant… But it’s like the cop telling the frantic mother whose little girl has disappeared “Calm down, miss”, or to the shaking man on the ground with a knee between his shoulder blades who can’t breathe “Don’t move, sir”.
It’s pointless.

@Kezrai_Charzai

Of the people who’ve given me any feedback as to why they’re quitting, the vast majority have said that EVE is simply too boring, that it isn’t the PvP hotbed it’s advertised as, that the combat systems are awkward and dull, that the game is tilted towards ambush/gank play (as you said) - at least for the 99% of the game that isn’t large fleet battles. Fairly common is also that there “isn’t a lot to do”.

I agree with them. The game is slow and boring. All those gates to go through over and over and over again, the mining is mind-bogglingly boring, I mined once for 40 minutes the very first time and told myself “if I have to do that everyday I’m gonna go nuts” and haven’t gone back mining yet and won’t, I thought I could get into some battle at first but nope, the skill training is… smh, I can’t even find an adjective for it, P.I isn’t done as far as I’m concerned, it looks and feels unfinished, a torent of information crammed into an awkward UI… yea, there’s a lot to be unsatisfied about the game to where it doesn’t surprise me when someone goes “F that, I’m done”.

@Kezrai_Charzai

Bad game design leading to boring gameplay is the #1 reason for leaving that I’ve encountered, and from what I can see nearly all those people simply leave to play another game without saying a word.

Yep. I don’t want to quit this early, I want to explore the game more and do more but I have to wait for training and I cannot just fly blindly with a ship half fitted or badly fitted because I’m waiting on training so I decided to only play a couple of days a week to minimize the frustration.

@Kezrai_Charzai

As to any suggestions about “what should be done about it?”, there’s been thousands posted over the years, some good, most bad. The real issue is that CCP is stuck with a core game design that based around slow, repetitive gameplay and awkward combat mechanics, and it’s very hard to remake something like that into a more dynamic and interesting system

I agree. I think many people have left or been fired from CCP who could’ve made it easier to redress the situation but now they’re gone, ooops.

@Kezrai_Charzai

As it stands, they’ve got a cash cow, they’ve got people who will send money no matter what gets done to the game, and they’re just gonna milk that cow until there’s no milk left

I agree, many developers have done that in the past and many more will do that in the future.

[Rroff]

@Kezrai_Charzai

There’s also been some who quit over specific nerfs or changes but even that hasn’t been a large percent.

I don’t have facts or figures for that - but I would say that player drop across 2014/15ish period was largely driven by dissatisfaction with nerfs/changes, changes which affected multiboxing also played some role there I believe. Most went quietly into the night but being active around various Eve communities when those who quit about that period commented on the why it was often one of the reasons mentioned.

[Kezrai_Charzai]

@Rroff

I don’t have facts or figures for that - but I would say that player drop across 2014/15ish period was largely driven by dissatisfaction with nerfs/changes,

For sure. I should have been more precise - I didn’t mean to imply that isn’t a big reason for players to leave, just that of the specific crowd I’ve had contact with, it hasn’t been a large portion of the complaints I’ve heard.

As it happens I was taking a break during much of 2014/15 so don’t have a lot of feedback from that time period. Releases had gotten pretty stale and slow for a while there (after Rubicon) and other, more actively developed games were getting my time and wallet-share.

[Zoiie]

Which gets to stay?

Linux vs Eve… Linux wins.

Perhaps after the Mac native we get Linux native.

Just stop breaking each patch on Linux Proton/Wine. It’s like living on a prayer.

It’s not that we want to leave, it’s that we’re effectively forced to leave.

[Gix_Firebrand]

@Jim_Halescott

To conclude
As a player who grew up playing videogames in the mid and late 90’s, I continue to play EVE, BECAUSE my gameplay and operations continue to get disrupted by players who want to cause problems for me
THAT CHALLENGE ALONE IS WHAT MAKES EVE GREAT, and all the players who cannot hack it are the ones who are leaving because they cannot adapt to the changing environment which is – EVE Online

Preach. It. Brother. Also the lack of good fighting games. The rise of the FPS lets them blame the team instead of their own skills. SF2? If you lost, you lost cause the other dude outplayed you, simple as that.

@Rroff

Reading through a couple of threads here had me contemplating about the thread for Eve on another forum I frequent

Again, you don’t even play bro. Please, The level of rroff you do to yourself is terrible.

[Benteen]

Before you posted that garbage did you stop to think there may be a reason for them not playing right now? I’m in the same boat. I don’t currently play EvE, my accounts are alpha’d after years of being paid up Omega because of recent changes and attitudes in game. If those changes became more palletable I might return and play again… but not if they keep nerfing every single thing and making it more boring and time consuming to do anything worthwhile. I waited and trained skills for years to be able to make my own Battleship hull… I got a massive sense of accomplishment from doing it, I couldn’t produce them quickly but i could do it if I took the time and effort to (though I’d rather do it with friends - who all left for various reasons but mostly due to nerfs and bordom). I mainly do mining as a way to relax from a very stressful IRL… but being hounded by the gankers gets tiresome after a few months… and then in comes CCP with the nerfs and changes that make it even harder to get by… so people making things got tired of being murdered repeatedly while trying to do something and left. Now people are complaining that there aren’t enough cheap ships… Hmmm I wonder why that is… maybe NOT killing the miners and makers would be a better idea huh… I’m currently waiting to see what CCP are going to do with the mining ships… I miss mining in something different but these days it’s too dangerous to mine in anything but the toughest thing around so i don’t mine at all.

[Moriar_theChosen]

The game is not boring. There is constant PvP content. I can’t log in enough. And no, none of the fights are 2hr formups for scared bigbloc fleets.

But because it’s all player generated content, you have to build community relationships to be able to find that content.

When people complain about no PvP, they must be complaining about not getting it served up like League of Legends or Starcraft.

[Benteen]

“Not boring” depends on what you find fun Moriar. If you don’t like PvP it’s annoying and not being able to do what you do enjoy without getting murdered gets boring.

Personally I don’t mind a little PvP sometimes but when it’s every single time you do anything it gets stale, more so when you’re rolling solo due to people leaving.

[May_Q_Cry]

@Benteen

these days it’s too dangerous to mine in anything but the toughest thing around so i don’t mine at all.

They have already said they want all mining ships to have “equal survivability” and we all know there is no way they would ever make mining ships tougher to kill…

[Twijn_Sunz]

@Benteen

so people making things got tired of being murdered repeatedly while trying to do something and left. Now people are complaining that there aren’t enough cheap ships… Hmmm I wonder why that is… maybe NOT killing the miners and makers would be a better idea huh…

No, they expect players to get blown up repeatedly and still go on like nothing happened… the definition of Insanity is to do the same thing over and over again while expecting different results.
Now they’re complaining that ships are too expensive. I guess they expect miners to be insane.

[Aisha_Katalen]

@Benteen

If you don’t like PvP

Then you’re in the wrong game. Not trying to be snarky or pointing pingers or anything, just the simple truth. But you can regulate how much PVP you open yourself up to on a day to day basis, you still have to be wary of people trying to outperform you (as that is the basis of the game) but the pewpew part of it you can regulate very easily.

[Cptn_Blood]

@Mike_Azariah

What I do not get is . . . why.

That’s pretty simple, to scare off CCP into changes, by creating a perception that people are fed up and leaving the game.
A way to make CCP to listen and change, a desperate attempt.

[Slippery_Sammy]

CCP has metrics, and knows how much cash is coming in, player counts, time played etc.

I “won” EVE Online several years ago, and come back by every once is a while to see that the same old sorts of person are saying the same old sorts of crap.

When someone mentions they’re thinking about playing EVE, I tell them this:

Playing EVE is like a guy setting up a massive set of dominos, spending days, weeks, months meticulously crafting and stacking. He’s the guy creating “content.” Then a pack of rabid monkeys come along, scatter your months of work and then take dumps right in the middle of it.

If you want to be a rabid monkey, crapping on what others are trying to build, you’ll have a grand time.

If you’re the guy that sees an amazing sci-fi sandbox, and wants to BUILD in that sandbox… Well, you’re CONTENT for the monkey, whether or not you want to be.

As long as it’s far easier to destroy than to build, EVE can kiss my ass. Find someone else to consume as content. You’ll get nothing from me, and CCP will get no money from me.

[Aisha_Katalen]

You clearly don’t understand EVE at all, as it turns out.

[Gix_Firebrand]

@Benteen

but being hounded by the gankers gets tiresome after a few months…

Learn how to EVE. They aren’t that hard to avoid if actually playing the game

@May_Q_Cry

They have already said they want all mining ships to have “equal survivability” and we all know there is no way they would ever make mining ships tougher to kill…

What if they make all barges proc/skiff lvl tank? Now that’d be pretty cool.

[Benteen]

I’m not new to this Gix… I’ve been around quite some time and I even lived in null for a while (and was bored stiff because I couldn’t do anything that I was invited out there to do - I even offered to “take point” in a fleet fight when some Tempests turned up fitted for sniping… they refused, sent in another guy i did not trust one bit and lost half their fleet for no kills… turned out he was a spy).

Gankers are IMPOSSIBLE to avoid if they’re actively hunting you… the only way to really avoid them is not play at all. Most systems have at least one Ganker in them, some have alot and they don’t always stay in one place, they roam looking for you.

As for CCP making all barges have a Proc/Skiff tank… that’d be nice and all but I can’t see them doing it because the gankers would moan that they’re too hard to kill (they’d need more ships and it’d take longer than one second).

[Gix_Firebrand]

@Benteen

Gankers are IMPOSSIBLE to avoid if they’re actively hunting you… the only way to really avoid them is not play at all. Most systems have at least one Ganker in them, some have alot and they don’t always stay in one place, they roam looking for you.

As for CCP making all barges have a Proc/Skiff tank… that’d be nice and all but I can’t see them doing it because the gankers would moan that they’re too hard to kill (they’d need more ships and it’d take longer than one second).

There are literally systems in every sec status that stand empty, so no, not every system has gankers in it ROFL. The way to avoid them is to actually play the game. I sense you don’t actually play anymore or you’d know this. The number of players getting ganked daily is very low compared to total population.

Oh and you know whose fueling these gankers? The ganked themselves. A dude got ganked last night and like an idiot gave 6.8 billion ISK to his ganker. So don’t blame the gankers. Its the ganked who aren’t playing smart.

That dude fueled that ganker for years to come ROFL. Bigger ransom then I’ve ever gotten. Somewhat jealous to be honest.

[May_Q_Cry]

More like making all mining barges and exhumers as weak as a Retriever. You honestly think that CCP would ever make mining ships harder to kill?

The only reason CCP wants miners around is so gankers have someone to gank.