Ideas For Player Retention

[Mageofpie]

Help me brainstorm everyone!

 

So, I think you're going to find a lot of players don't want to stick around because of how "slow" the game feels. So here are a couple ideas off the top of my head:

 

1. Make turns quicker. Maybe take a page out of the test server and shorten them to every 30 minutes, let new people actually experience a new turn before they close the browser and don't play again. Wars & resources could be altered to reflect this.

 

2. Make a meaningful thing they can do on the side. When I was new, I spent more money on baseball then I should have, thinking it was a little thing I could grind for money for a bit of an edge on my competition. We already have mini games that are a part of the game, make them worth playing. Making money with baseball is possible, but only scraps because of the investment required to get there.

 

3. If you're a passive nation, maybe have the ability to scout the land for resources or something instead of espionaging other players.

 

4. Make a better chat system. IRC is old as hell and I know I was hesitant to use it when I started. There isn't anything inherently wrong with it, but currently if you want to join the IRC as a noob and ask questions you've got to have 2 tabs open because you can't click on any of your links while you're in the in-game IRC or you leave the IRC to view your objectives/messages/etc. There needs to be a chat system that players can use while still navigating the game. I remember as a noob I stopped joining the IRC purely because I kept clicking away out of habit when I was in the wrong tab. I know Alex plays league of legends so maybe consider something like the group chats that exist there. I also remember a lot seeing new players join the IRC and ask a question only to "leave" the IRC shortly after. Many new players simply aren't willing to download a client and sort out IRC just to ask a question, they'll just move on to try the next nation sim on their list.

Edited December 7, 2016 by Mageofpie

[Queen M II]

I absolutely co-sign making the turns quicker. Even every hour would be so much better and would make new players more inclined to see how much they gained throughout the day. All three of these suggestions are great.

[Greene]

Why not have the turns stay the same, but add a "bonus" turn for players under a certain number of days. Player retention is the hardest for newer players, right? Turns are only every two hours, so there's a whole additional hour that could be used to give newer players, maybe players under 30 days old, an extra "bonus" turn. Effectively doubling their potential for the first 30 days. As a check to that, I'd argue that the bonus turn should only be enabled if the nation is part of an alliance. After all, alliances foster community.

[Sketchy]

1: This has been brought up since the beta. I used to like the idea but tbh shortening the timer doesn't seem like a good idea anymore.

 

2. This is the best solution imo. Baseball is a horrible attempt at this. Captchas ruin it. You need something that is fun, worth the time, but not too profitable and with no damn captchas to ruin it.

 

3. Eh

 

4. Most of the community has moved to discord, it's about time Sheepy disavowed IRC and made the switch proper. 

[Antonzepro]

How did you find out that he likes LoL.

[Mageofpie]

Discord is great and all, but it isn't in-game. If I'm a new player to a game, I don't want to download a chat client or have to open another tab purely to ask a question on how to play.

 

How did you find out that he likes LoL.

 

Because there's a thread on the forums where people talk about LoL...

Edited December 8, 2016 by Mageofpie

[Aerys Targaryen]

Given that people are playing this game from around the world, from different timezones, shortening the turn timer will not increase participation. New players might find the short timer interesting, but during war, they will certainly regret that.

 

Baseball or any other mini games are a good addition only if they demand some sort of a skill/technique from those who are playing it. Right now, baseball is all about investing and clicking, some may find it a good way to earn money in long term, but it's no where near "interesting" and will not help player retention.

 

If the intentions behind this is to increase player base and make the game bigger and dynamic, the best way to do it is to encourage people from other countries to play this game too. Currently, one of the biggest hurdle for people from other timezones is, the update time. A lot of people who can't stay online during day change in orbis, will certainly underperform compared to others in alliance wars. I've personally lost several players due to this particular point, as the orbis day change happens at morning 05:30 am in my place. In other countries, it's impossible to be online at that time.

 

Making military buy reset every turn, creating a pay option for people from other countries, having support for other languages will improve participation from other countries and increase player base in my opinion.

 

Regarding IRC, it's one of the best ways for members to communicate, but yes it's hard for a new member. Right now, most alliances have their own slack/discord servers, so those members who join an alliance immediately after they create their nation shouldn't face this problem.

[Antonzepro]

Discord is great and all, but it isn't in-game. If I'm a new player to a game, I don't want to download a chat client or have to open another tab purely to ask a question on how to play.

 

 

Because there's a thread on the forums where people talk about LoL...

eh. 

[Mageofpie]

Given that people are playing this game from around the world, from different timezones, shortening the turn timer will not increase participation. New players might find the short timer interesting, but during war, they will certainly regret that.

 

 

Wars would be the same. # of turns needed to launch an attack just needs to change.