Why I think this game never became popular

[V]

First, I want to say that I was truly pleasantly surprised to find this game. The love put into it is obvious and I really wish it were still supported today.

Second, I want to offer a few reasons why it didn't catch on and why it will never, in my opinion, catch on.

The first iteration of this game, the classic version, is visually painful to me. There are simply too many features demanding my attention on screen at the same time. For example, do I really need to see the little imps cleaning their wings or smirking at me all game? If nothing else, there should have been an option to turn off certain display items to make it look cleaner onscreen. The other aspect was, of course, the random deployment of units and their attack targets. The random feature may have made the game challenging but it also made the game NOT FUN. Game developers sometimes forget that a game is, almost by definition, meant to be fun.

The second iteration of this game, Foundry, is far easier on the eyes. It looks and feels smooth and polished and the little imps are kept only to the introduction before a match starts. The game could, in my opinion, be a hit for $10 to access all cards instantly with one caveat: when a hero is killed a ghost version of itself (a simple icon somewhere on the lane where it died to indicate that the unit was killed in battle, in order to build some emotional connection with the hero units) should remain for one turn in order to allow spells and attachments to still be played in that lane. The idea that I could have a hand full of blue spell cards and then suddenly be unable to use them at all because a kill spell wiped out my unit makes the game, not to be pedantic, NOT FUN. Yes, there are ways to predict these situations to a certain degree but it takes a lot of skill so must casual players will just throw up their hands and play a different ccg.

Lastly, I was surprised to see that, despite having no player base, people seem to think the game is fine the way it is/are just apathetic about it. I know there is a certain degree of pride associated with learning a difficult game or activity but I think that pride may be misplaced here. Anyway, just my two cents. Flame away, if you'd like.

[S3SSioN Solaris]

Greed. That's why.

[V]

Originally posted by S3SSioN Solaris:

Greed. That's why.

Certainly, greed played a large part of this game's familure, Solaris. What I mean, though, is that even after almost 100 hours of game time there are times when I am totally confused by the games mechanics (for example, a 2 damage spell killing a hero unit with 6 health and no modifiers in that lane and no armor reduction on the unit) but there is no way to review what happened). This is, despite the wonderful artwork, unique mechanics, and great music, just intolerable to most players. They couldn't add a history bar to track what happened during the game?

[Rifluvr]

Simple answer - review bombing. People launched hate wagon even before the game came out. They hated that this is not HL3, that this is card game, and they hated Hearthstone and moved their hate to Artifact for some reason. Also Artifact wasn't f2p like most of casual card games normies plays. So behind this easy for critic wall only a small percentage of people actually played it.

Wasn't help that later Valve decided instead of updating one version split it into 2, holding already interested and wanting to play people in uncertainty of which version they should invest their time in. In the end of the day, player base simply not played any of version, waiting for Valve to determine the final vision of the game, and bringing it to the state they wanted it to be in. But Valve wasn't Valve, if they wasn't so slow and radio silent. Apathy from Valve bought apathy to players. Valve looked at the online numbers and said "♥♥♥♥ it".

[bemy, hungertide]

the original artifact died cause it wasn't good. you don't lose 99% of your player base in 2 weeks because of a starting price.

Artifact foundry is better but it still suffers from some unnecessary systems, foundry failed because it was too late. the long haul was a meme and there was no demand for it.

[Rifluvr]

Originally posted by bemy 유령:

the original artifact died cause it wasn't good. you don't lose 99% of your player base in 2 weeks because of a starting price.

Many people buy the game because of hype, even if they've never played anything like it. Many people buy the game to bomb the reviews and get their money back. You're confusing the player base with the tourists.

People should stop referring to online numbers as an argument that they think should speak for itself. Absolutely any game's online go down after release. How much depends on the time sample, necessary for the clickbait title.

[1MantisPhoenix]

Originally posted by S3SSioN Solaris:

Greed. That's why.

Facts. I was NOT going to pay a single dime for dota cards, after helping port dota to dota2; AND then trying to make it a magical gathering of Same-sex-cards.

[1MantisPhoenix]

Originally posted by Rifluvr:

Originally posted by bemy 유령:

the original artifact died cause it wasn't good. you don't lose 99% of your player base in 2 weeks because of a starting price.

Many people buy the game because of hype, even if they've never played anything like it. Many people buy the game to bomb the reviews and get their money back. You're confusing the player base with the tourists.

People should stop referring to online numbers as an argument that they think should speak for itself. Absolutely any game's online go down after release. How much depends on the time sample, necessary for the clickbait title.

Yeah, this is also correct, time and place in the market, when it goes live, who did they invite to the breakfast, and who to the brunch, and who get's the left overs...
but in this laggard-space-market... the prices of games soaring over and above the real costs to develop things is beyond fanatical.

Dota didn't need a card game. It just needed icefrog. For which OpenAI came very soon after,,, AI and development have masked the real costs of too many things in the past 12 years...

[Lelouch vi Kazakhstania]