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NQ: Time to answer the question - Will there be a wipe?


Thunderblaze

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1 minute ago, Shredder said:

Anecdotal from discord & forums, nothing verifiable. 

Other MMOs last on much less than 50-100k subs. If that's what's required to keep it afloat, its not going to stay afloat. There is 0 chance the current server setup can take even 2x the current player base, much less 20x+. The issue we are going to run into is dead servers and server restarts nearly hourly in that case. With the tech they have, they should be able to add more power to the cluster to prevent issues, but it looks like they have issues even now with what kind of juice we should be using. Like I said, there isnt 50-100k people sitting there waiting for this to "officially" release. We will see 2-3x the current numbers then it dribble off after a bit once people get bored due to lack of content. There is no content in the game that isnt player made. The New World expansion had more content the entire game. A wipe will remove all meaningful content and make it "haha, gotta re-grind and wait for autominers to get your stuff back where you were". It doesn't solve any real issues in the game. We need them to actually do something when exploits happen instead of hand slapping and letting people keep what they get from it. Maybe some modification to missions? Although the speed thing is a lot bigger than people think it is for that.

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15 minutes ago, Shredder said:

Anecdotal from discord & forums, nothing verifiable. 
 

Actually the 4K current subs number I think is always quoted as that’s what those MMORPG tracking websites estimate.

 

I believe the 50k - 100k needed subs, is based on current costs, estimated by staff numbers at NQ.

 

 

Hard / impossible to estimate current subs (those MMO trackers aren't very accurate) but that seems within the likely ballpark. 

 

Consider that NQ has two offices (in expensive locations!) staffed with a lot of expensive engineering talent and has ~50+ employees overall. Supporting 50 employees at only $80k/year is already $300k/month. 

 

By comparison, the company I work for has fewer employees, no office, slim server costs, and only a handful of engineers -- and needs $900K+ in revenue still to make everyone happy and have some room to grow...that's with fairly good margins, too. 

 

So...50k or even 100k subs isn't a ton of revenue for a company of NQ's size.

 

Plus, they need ~20% of their subscriber count in fresh subs every month until the end of time just to combat churn rates (assuming 80% retention, which is considered very good for a subscription product).

 

Unfortunately, I don't see how they keep going post-release without closing one of their two offices and doing some layoffs, which truly sucks. 

 

Keep in mind that other niche MMOs with slim pops probably have far less overhead and have a more carefully considered monetization strategy like FTP + microtransactions --- you might not like these models, but they do work. 

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9 hours ago, blazemonger said:

 

While I get that you may see it that way and certainly some will have pledged to gain access "now", effectively access prior to release has been a perk for backers and not paid for. The payment on a pledge was represented for by the DAC inclusded inthe pack which only come into effect on release. So from that, and effectvely, as long as the game is not being released backers have access (and play) at no cost to them which I woudl say implies they play for free (upto release).

TL;DR

Your payment only comes into effect on release, anything prior to that is abonus and free access.

How about no. If it was free, then it would have cost nothing, like countless betas before it. I’ve participated in tons of betas dating back to Anarchy Online, and they were actually free. Literally free.

 

Hell, I dropped $250 on the secret world and that got me beta access + a lifetime sub (and theirs was much more expensive monthly).

 

No one paid $150-250 solely for 3-9 months of sub. That’s 2+ years of sub time, based on the 12 month cost of $7/mo. If that’s true, then early backers got fleeced by your logic.

 

If you add the time there have even BEEN subs, plus whatever game time they gave as a bonus, then the numbers make sense. They don’t have to pay a sub until release precisely because they paid more than anyone on a subscription plan has by a large margin (even factoring in DAC). It’s no different than paying a large sub plan to get a greater discount - the more you pay up front, the better the value.

 

We apparently have very differing views on free.

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1 hour ago, blundertwink said:

 

Hard / impossible to estimate current subs (those MMO trackers aren't very accurate) but that seems within the likely ballpark. 

 

Consider that NQ has two offices (in expensive locations!) staffed with a lot of expensive engineering talent and has ~50+ employees overall. Supporting 50 employees at only $80k/year is already $300k/month. 

 

By comparison, the company I work for has fewer employees, no office, slim server costs, and only a handful of engineers -- and needs $900K+ in revenue still to make everyone happy and have some room to grow...that's with fairly good margins, too. 

 

So...50k or even 100k subs isn't a ton of revenue for a company of NQ's size.

 

Plus, they need ~20% of their subscriber count in fresh subs every month until the end of time just to combat churn rates (assuming 80% retention, which is considered very good for a subscription product).

 

Unfortunately, I don't see how they keep going post-release without closing one of their two offices and doing some layoffs, which truly sucks. 

 

Keep in mind that other niche MMOs with slim pops probably have far less overhead and have a more carefully considered monetization strategy like FTP + microtransactions --- you might not like these models, but they do work. 

Well, if these numbers are even remotely correct, then NQ can’t afford to care too much about the current user base. They need to do everything they can to bring in significant numbers of new subscribers.

 

The VC company will be well aware of this, I assume therefore that there will be a huge advertising push before launch, which will include advertising a reset/wipe of the game to help attract people. 


People seem quite down beat about the prospects of hitting 50-100k users, I’m not. This game is pretty unique with the freedom to build and the potential for pvp. If the VC company didn’t think significant numbers were possible then they would’ve cut their losses sometime ago.
 

NQ should hope to attract significant numbers from EVE at the very least, where there is a big desire to find a new single shard type game. And those guys tend to be long term subscribers. There are also many games that attempt to bring together building and pvp, because the market is huge (thinking ark/conan/atlas etc), DU feels to be the closest to achieving that in a single shard type environment.

Edited by Shredder
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1 hour ago, Novidian Prime said:

No one paid $150-250 solely for 3-9 months of sub. That’s 2+ years of sub time, based on the 12 month cost of $7/mo. If that’s true, then early backers got fleeced by your logic.

 

I paid €240 for saphire which includes 40 DAC ..  DAC was expected to be sold in the store for around $20 back then, with straight gametime at €15 (same as EVE). Yes, I would expect NQ to compensate us for the devaluation o fthe packs as they went live with a silly amount for a sub and currently are stil well below the expected by about 30%. 

Although I can see them go to release on $15/mo for subscription.

Anyway, none of my value in the pack is currently being consumerd, that will only happen until after release. Access during Alpha (and initially also beta) was to be backers only and free as aperk for your pledge.

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21 minutes ago, Shredder said:

If the VC company didn’t think significant numbers were possible then they would’ve cut their losses sometime ago.

 

The most invested VC threw ~$11 million at a first-time developer who didn't have a clear, detailed design and had no experience in any part of the game dev industry at all.

 

So...I wouldn't say that the VC made the best choices, here.

 

Further, VCs often try to avoid early stage startups like NQ -- because the vast majority of startups fail (>75%).


This was an extremely risky investment on paper since day 1 -- but that money has already been spent. It isn't like they can just shut the doors and take money back, anyway.

 

The TLDR here is don't overestimate the ability of a VC to pick "winners" -- they know that the odds are against them and that most these investments fail. It's worthwhile because they only need a few big winners to earn absurd returns.

 

For example, if DU did deliver on having millions of players like all their adverts claim, that $11 million would suddenly seem like a brilliant investment...but we all know it can't achieve that sort of scale.

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52 minutes ago, blazemonger said:

 

I paid €240 for saphire which includes 40 DAC ..  DAC was expected to be sold in the store for around $20 back then, with straight gametime at €15 (same as EVE). Yes, I would expect NQ to compensate us for the devaluation o fthe packs as they went live with a silly amount for a sub and currently are stil well below the expected by about 30%. 

Although I can see them go to release on $15/mo for subscription.

Anyway, none of my value in the pack is currently being consumerd, that will only happen until after release. Access during Alpha (and initially also beta) was to be backers only and free as aperk for your pledge.


That’s actually not far from the $7 average that the current subs are. It’s about two months difference. Interesting how the current sub price lines up with the pledge dollar to DAC ratio, now.

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14 hours ago, CyberDay said:

 

There are plenty of tiles with tons of resources on them all over. If I wanted to get more of anything, I'm 99% sure I could find a ton of good/decent tiles for them. Autominers make ore trivial and saying there is some kind of scarcity to any of it is just a lie. That and Asteroids can provide you 100% of anything you might need. Wiping is bad faith on those who stayed and played, those who paid, with no indication on the purchase page there would/could be a wipe, and will likely end up removing more people than they will end up back with. The game doesn't really have any good press to begin with, and as I have said many times, there isnt a huge crowd lined up ready for "release". The game has been out for awhile as soon as they started taking direct subs and not "founders early access".

 

I'll explain it for the last time. I am in favor of the wipe, not because I think it is a solution to the problems that we all know well (I don't know the problems of pvp, it takes a lot of talents and a lot of time to be able to look at this aspect of the game). I am in favor of the wipe for a simple matter of fair-play: regardless of what some players, even rightly, have gained in all this time of exaggerated extension of the beta version, as the word itself says it is a test version and data collection, implementations, continuous adjustments and so on and so forth. So as SH that launches a product that claims to be in the final version (even if this does not mean that there will be no more changes in the future) you cannot afford to leave unchanged situations matured by players who have been able to exploit unbalanced situations, maybe deliberately proposed, both for evaluation and feasibility tests, and to speed up the achievement of contents that would normally require years of play. I'll give a small example (the ships built that travel at least in pve areas are industructible, you repair them as many times as you want ... will it be like this even in release?) Before the underground mining system that they moved with the advent of asteroids you had under the house. Do you understand that this was a huge advantage as long as it lasted between the asteroids have a static respawn, will it be so even in release?) For so many reasons that have nothing to do directly with the criticisms of this game as a software house you can't afford to leave things unchanged. And these are for me the type of reasons that push me to be in favor of wipe. For the rest I could agree with you (wipe is useless because it does not bring any definitive solution and it is unthinkable to continue wipe after the official release of the game). here are what I think are the criticisms of the game, absolute consideration from the market forecasts on the expectations of how many players in release will subscribe to this game but being a mmorpg the architecture should be designed in such a way as to accommodate a massive amount of players who they share the same game online. otherwise we are talking about a single player game with cooperative mode (maybe):

1) Economic system not compatible with a possible growing number of players who start this game, first come, best stay concept only works for veteran players. By deduction it is not a game that aims at large numbers and at a community that is constantly renewed.The same concept of exclusive ownership of limited territories can only work in case of marginal influence in the dynamics of the game which could be a system of housing but, it does not work when the bases of the whole economy of an mmo game depend on it.

2) Quite exclusive and questionable game mechanics, such as: The concept of being able to give shape to many things by giving great freedom to the players, however, for those who face these dynamics for the first time inevitably remains displaced, confused and frustrated. To then lead again into the more complex part which is the LUA programming of the elements. All very nice but, only for a few players. Not that there aren't any games with editors out there (the Sims in its various versions is the most simplified system of editor of the environment, with this I don't say that DU should be trivial like The Sims, but not that complex either. , if they point to the numbers of players).
all this then inevitably clashes with the concept of balance in pvp, or with the concept of uselessness applied to the dynamics of the game. Example (how much does the use of Honeycomb count and how does it count? There are many stats related to materials but currently in the game dynamics only the mass of a material counts. So what is the use of all this? Only for hedonism? And if tomorrow became functional as you would expect, how do you balance a pvp with the current resource system?

3) Blueprint functionality and copyright concept. It's not a major problem, but it creates confusing interpretations. The current game dynamics allow the deployment of a construct only if a Blueprint exists behind it, with the option of confidentiality of the creator's copyright. To date I wonder why to buy a building I must also pay for the blueprint that allows me only one use? And if for any reason I want or have to buy the same construct several times, paying the same BP 2 times or more times seems like a scam. Without considering that the current system greatly favors the scam. Until I deploy a construction I don't know what will come out, I only have a list of elements and materials used, but it could easily come out a column of elements and a stack of honeycombs and maybe a monitor that says "and now have fun" I'm not asking much but at least a preview of what I'm buying.

4) improper use of LUA scripts, I recently discovered that the drastic drop in FPS often finds its origin in the dearth of mine, but above all in the massive use of scripts that are around. It might not be the only reason, but it certainly is a major cause.
5) lack of content and those few that exist are often deadly boring such as: Missions, scanning of the resources present in the territories, gathering surface resources.

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35 minutes ago, Shredder said:

A wipe will attract more players, the game needs more players to survive. 
 

Thats all the justification that’s needed. Period.

New players that are attracted to the game only because it wiped will stay around for how long? DU is not a single purchase and NQ got its money from you and does not mater if you continue to play. NQ needs people to keep subscribing. 

 

And if you want to use the argument that No one plays now. Then you cannot use the argument that these few players have such a huge advantage that that warrent a wipe.

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2 hours ago, Doombad said:

 

Not one of those "things" remotely justify a wipe. 

you don't have to read what i write nor either answer just for defend your own interest. Just say you don't agree and you will seem more brilliant than that you show.  Meantime...someone might not agree with wipe for these reasons: https://www.epicnpc.com/threads/💰selling-dual-universe-quanta-currency-fast-and-cheap.2184813/

Edited by Neuritico
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51 minutes ago, Neuritico said:

you don't have to read what i write nor either answer just for defend your own interest. Just say you don't agree and you will seem more brilliant than that you show.  Meantime...someone might not agree with wipe for these reasons: https://www.epicnpc.com/threads/💰selling-dual-universe-quanta-currency-fast-and-cheap.2184813/

And for some reason RMT is 'fixed' with a wipe? The only thing that will do is make quanta MORE valuable... And that operation will be back in operation in weeks/months, you want to wipe again at that time? IF that is an actual RMT (and not a scam), then NQ should do something about it (as in permanently banning all related accounts, both buyers/sellers/farmers). Wipe-wipe won't fix this issue, especially not long term!

 

I was also thinking: "That's a lot of money ($60) for 500M quanta!"...

But you might also want to look at ALL the other games that are available on that forum for RMT, do those also need to be wiped on a regular basis?

 

RMT is a whole seperate issue.

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42 minutes ago, Cergorach said:

And for some reason RMT is 'fixed' with a wipe? The only thing that will do is make quanta MORE valuable... And that operation will be back in operation in weeks/months, you want to wipe again at that time? IF that is an actual RMT (and not a scam), then NQ should do something about it (as in permanently banning all related accounts, both buyers/sellers/farmers). Wipe-wipe won't fix this issue, especially not long term!

 

I was also thinking: "That's a lot of money ($60) for 500M quanta!"...

But you might also want to look at ALL the other games that are available on that forum for RMT, do those also need to be wiped on a regular basis?

 

RMT is a whole seperate issue.

Maybe i wasn't able to explain my thought. Wipe will not fix any problem of those i listed noe either other problems i did not listed... so for such reason if nothing change i agree with you, it might be just a useless action. Wipe it's just a temporary patch as the new moon with a view to attracting and making as many new players as possible to play for as long as possible. Change what i listed and then wipe sounds enough good for a new start, but they also need to do good advertisement and marketing again fix problem of low fps and i don't know now what else.  mmo with no players will not last so long.

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5 hours ago, Shredder said:

A wipe will attract more players, the game needs more players to survive. 
 

Nope. I have never heard of a new player that joined because there was a wipe. New players join MMO sandbox games for a new experience and potential for being part of something larger than themselves.

Agree that the game needs more players to survive. The game simply needs to be more fun to attract new players.

Most of the arguments about mechanics are just noise. NQ needs to stand back and revisit the concept of fun.

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Besides, you won't need a wipe soon. I stopped playing due to tile taxes (I can't commit to a fixed schedule), and I visit here occasionally to see what is new and if it is worth my time to come back.

 

My guess is that there won't be many veterans left by launch (unless changes are made). Only people that play are the ones who have seen the misleading ads and play for two weeks while they are confused as to where the action is.

 

Why are the ads misleading? They show a large vibrant population and imply PvP activity. Also the real people in the ads haven't been active for more than a year.

What happened to land territory warfare outside the safe zone? Game is boring because there is no risk. You don' t need risk everywhere, but it should be available somewhere with meaningful rewards equivalent to the risk.  It needs survival-type challenges in addition to legit PvP.   Why should I fight for plasma? Lack of plasma doesn't affect me.
 

Edited by Carnegie
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If DU is going to fail, it'll be because it's a poorly designed game with opaque and shallow mechanics that fails to retain enough players.

 

The endless wipe vs. no wipe BS will be 99% irrelevant compared to the many other challenges facing DU. Very few new players will care one way or the other (if they even know about this whole drama, which is unlikely).

 

That said...it's been plenty of time, NQ should have clarified this crap by now.

 

As has been said before, they haven't done a good job practicing for release in terms of community management and communication. 

 

This sort of silence after a big and vague announcement has caused enough frustration even at this scale...it doesn't get easier post-release.

 

They don't know how to build goodwill with their community and that's not a wise strategy for a subscription based game where you have to earn the player's trust monthly.

 

I don't think NQ has ever truly understood what being a subscription game means. In terms of update cadence, messaging, and community engagement they just aren't ready...and that's on top of the game itself not being ready. 

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There's literally nothing to do for a new player, and a wipe isn't going to fix the new player experience.  It might be for 3-6 months, but then they'll be back to square one where their game is designed poorly and there isn't anything to do for new players as the vets have it all handled already (market production at most efficiency) and then they'll be stuck again.

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I am also one of those, who have left the game a long time ago (about a year) because all the promises were not met.

View from the "outside": The game is so broken, I will not come back even if there is a wipe.
I totally do understand the financial aspects of the the wipe/no wipe discussion. But a wipe will not bring me back.

After all I have read on this forum the current state is this;

Game was marketed as a building game. Pretty much everyone and their mother left after they figured out this is only a game about building nice stuff. Building itself is so boring/easy in this game, only people who have not heard about "Blender" before will like this game. See the whole "Airbrake obstruction discussion" if you want a reference.

So there is nothing left to have fun in this game. The only people playing it are hardcore fans about builind nice stuff. Which is extremely niche. And NQ tried to bring in all of the 1k people there are, to attract others into this game.

It did not work out, so nobody from the community can really safe this game.

Neither the builders, because nobody except the people already playing this game care about any of their stuff.

From the EVE/PvP perspective this game is still in alpha, so NQ is still years into building the actualy game they promised.

 

TLDR: NQ management never had a plan and **** up.

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Just an observation but I just visited Market 7 and it looks like a wipe happened there - no ships are present at all. I do wonder if we really need a wipe if its like that everywhere else too.

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On 4/12/2022 at 12:34 PM, Carnegie said:

What happened to land territory warfare outside the safe zone? Game is boring because there is no risk. You don' t need risk everywhere, but it should be available somewhere with meaningful rewards equivalent to the risk.  It needs survival-type challenges in addition to legit PvP.   Why should I fight for plasma? Lack of plasma doesn't affect me.
 

I believe that is the current update being tested on the PTS.

 

13 hours ago, PleiJades said:

I am also one of those, who have left the game a long time ago (about a year) because all the promises were not met.

View from the "outside": The game is so broken, I will not come back even if there is a wipe.

The game is still in beta so you cannot really says its broken because its not actually finished. You could say 'its not quite finished' or 'something is not done yet'. Once its actually version 1 of the game that is when you could talk about something being broken because its at the point NQ says its how they want it to work.

 

I do as a rule really like most changes they made based on how it changed the way I play the game. All I was doing before was mining and now I am out and about doing things so its better than it was before in my opinion. It is just a case of NQ bringing it over the line for everyone. :)

Edited by ADCOne
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49 minutes ago, ADCOne said:

The game is still in beta so you cannot really says its broken because its not actually finished. You could say 'its not quite finished' or 'something is not done yet'.

 

Really with the "it's beta" argument still...?

 

Per NQ, this is the last major update before release...for a game that's been in development for over 8 years now (NQ was founded in Jan. of 2014).

 

This is basically the 1.0 version of the game -- the few minor updates between now and release won't change all that much.

 

Hopefully they improve UI/UX and mop up the laundry list of bugs left to kill, but even that will be a lot of work to squeeze in before release considering NQ's development cadence.

 

At this point, the game's fate is sealed one way or the other. They don't have time to make major changes or additions and it'll either scale or it won't...but we can drop the "it's beta" line because beta is ending and this is the last big update before it ends. 

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If the "beta" excuse was still valid (it is not, that ship has sailed a long time ago),

then there should be a constant stream of actual changes, improvements and new features.

 

After all that is why you call software beta (actually alpha, but this is NQ so..), to allow large and sometimes game breaking changes without making people angry. But that is not what NQ has been doing for the last 3+ years. Instead all we have been seeing are small incremental changes and low effort features additions as if the game is already finished, and just need some intermittent polish and maintenance now and then.

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Still see the basic pro wipe comments as:

 

I feel like I would be behind in a game that has no win condition.

I feel like people before me took advantage of the state of the game before this current version and I feel like I would be behind.

 

 

Both of these reasons will not and cannot be addressed via a wipe. Maybe short term but give it a year and both matters are back. 

 

I guess anyone that agrees to this pro wipe reasoning should just support a wipe every X days and stop asking for a one time event that changes nothing. 

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