Why did this game die?

['za]

What was the cause? It was popular last year.

[Rachetz]

pretty sure the developers moved on to ps4 and stopped updating the pc version

['za]

Originally posted by Rachetz:

pretty sure the developers moved on to ps4 and stopped updating the pc version

They stopped updating ps4 too

[R-800]

It's fun, but I'm tired of killing bots. Would be nice if there were more people out there who want to play vs. humans, so I don't have to wait forever to match up.

[SpaceCodet]

A game has a life span. Most people get burned out after a bit. When the game first came out people were on all the time. Those like me lasted longer cause we didn't keep playing all the time. Still, you get tired of it with the same things happening. "It's all over powered!" Of cause it's not because people were getting real good at the game.

That was what the updates turned into for this game. EoR didn't want to make any major changes for the game either. It's there right to do that. The only real thing that I see that TF2 had over Loadout was events. If they made something like 'The Mad Hatters Tea Partty' board and other such things. I think they would've done better. Once or twice a year have a new event with some random theme and sell a costum for it as a package deal.

[NPC]

The issue here is multifaceted. There really is no single explanation why the game died, though many (such as myself) argue which ones were the most likely to have ended the game's life.

Let's make a short list and go through them rather quickly:
-Hackers and exploitation of maps
The game at start was rife with hackers. Surely the antihack system was good, but it still happened. After the hacker waves died down some, people started to exploit map bugs. Both contributed to some of the playerbase quitting early, or atleast until the map exploits were fixed (Some were, some were not).
-Patches and Updates
The game had several early patches, some were mostly bugfixes. However, as time went about, we saw less and less patches regarding to weapon balancing and the such. Some weapons were legitimately over-powered (Cough Beam Cough Early) until they were fixed, but we ultimately only saw 2-3 patches for weapon balancing. The last one was contributed after a heated debate with ROB. The other issue was the Player VS Kroad update, which had a short lived beta, before it was ultimately removed. The consoles received a number of updates, while computer gamers (which funded through microtransactions, bug reports, and general early access help) were left in the dust. This fueled hostility.
-Platforms
Loadout was originally only on PC, which meant the team only had to develop FOR PC. However, the Developers decided (at a rather bad time in the early access cycle) to put Loadout on other platforms, namely the Playstation 4. This was a bad idea, because now your development team is split, causing updates for either one to be delayed significantly. This was perhaps the number 1 game killing cause, as PC players never saw updates, but Playstation players saw a few updates. This turned off many people, as the banner for their now obsolete website basically bragged how the playstation 4 was getting these new updates.
-Competing games
As mentioned, many people drew parallels to other games in the same market. I don't know why @SpaceCodet mentions TF2, as TF2 is a FPS, and loadout is TPS and both share no similarities at all, save for certain map objectives/game modes. However, you must bear in mind that if there are two games, and one is losing playerbase constantly, you will search for other games to play, even if they are not alike. This is another reason why people left: They could tell the ship was sinking, and they wanted to leave before it really soured over. For some people, they left at the best moments when they could have one more PVP game. For others, it ended with a boring, lackluster Bots game. This ultimately, soured reviews.

-Lines of Communication (Players and Developers)
There was very little line of communication between players and developers.
There was no "RoadMap" of planned ideas, and the only thing really was the short lived "Dev-diaries" that former employee Arctyc (bless him) had started with a few others. Also, there was no discussion between the developers and the playerbase if they would be okay with the spread across platforms. Players were expected to accept it, and as anyone should know, that is not how people work. Logically, legally, the developers did have that as a right. But it certainly did not build trust with the main playerbase, and it was certainly at an inappropriate time to do so. With no discussion, many PC players believed the developers to be seeking out more cash, instead of continuously updating and making the game better with new parts and such. Whether true or not, it ultimately led unto a "self-foretold Prophecy".

While this does not cover everything that happened, especially on the old forums, it covers a massive part of the issues. Several notable issues seemed to have been inside strife among the developers, employees being laid-off, forum moderation issues, and hackers.

With all of this piling ontop of itself, it was bound to happen. There is also the issue that the game may have been "ahead of it's time", which I feel is not the case here; Loadout was certainly a great game, but these issues created player distrust in the company.
Perhaps at another time, this game will be "revitalized", and the developers may return to it.

[TheWrongName]

Originally posted by ...:

The issue here is multifaceted. There really is no single explanation why the game died, though many (such as myself) argue which ones were the most likely to have ended the game's life.

Let's make a short list and go through them rather quickly:
-Hackers and exploitation of maps
The game at start was rife with hackers. Surely the antihack system was good, but it still happened. After the hacker waves died down some, people started to exploit map bugs. Both contributed to some of the playerbase quitting early, or atleast until the map exploits were fixed (Some were, some were not).
-Patches and Updates
The game had several early patches, some were mostly bugfixes. However, as time went about, we saw less and less patches regarding to weapon balancing and the such. Some weapons were legitimately over-powered (Cough Beam Cough Early) until they were fixed, but we ultimately only saw 2-3 patches for weapon balancing. The last one was contributed after a heated debate with ROB. The other issue was the Player VS Kroad update, which had a short lived beta, before it was ultimately removed. The consoles received a number of updates, while computer gamers (which funded through microtransactions, bug reports, and general early access help) were left in the dust. This fueled hostility.
-Platforms
Loadout was originally only on PC, which meant the team only had to develop FOR PC. However, the Developers decided (at a rather bad time in the early access cycle) to put Loadout on other platforms, namely the Playstation 4. This was a bad idea, because now your development team is split, causing updates for either one to be delayed significantly. This was perhaps the number 1 game killing cause, as PC players never saw updates, but Playstation players saw a few updates. This turned off many people, as the banner for their now obsolete website basically bragged how the playstation 4 was getting these new updates.
-Competing games
As mentioned, many people drew parallels to other games in the same market. I don't know why @SpaceCodet mentions TF2, as TF2 is a FPS, and loadout is TPS and both share no similarities at all, save for certain map objectives/game modes. However, you must bear in mind that if there are two games, and one is losing playerbase constantly, you will search for other games to play, even if they are not alike. This is another reason why people left: They could tell the ship was sinking, and they wanted to leave before it really soured over. For some people, they left at the best moments when they could have one more PVP game. For others, it ended with a boring, lackluster Bots game. This ultimately, soured reviews.

-Lines of Communication (Players and Developers)
There was very little line of communication between players and developers.
There was no "RoadMap" of planned ideas, and the only thing really was the short lived "Dev-diaries" that former employee Arctyc (bless him) had started with a few others. Also, there was no discussion between the developers and the playerbase if they would be okay with the spread across platforms. Players were expected to accept it, and as anyone should know, that is not how people work. Logically, legally, the developers did have that as a right. But it certainly did not build trust with the main playerbase, and it was certainly at an inappropriate time to do so. With no discussion, many PC players believed the developers to be seeking out more cash, instead of continuously updating and making the game better with new parts and such. Whether true or not, it ultimately led unto a "self-foretold Prophecy".

While this does not cover everything that happened, especially on the old forums, it covers a massive part of the issues. Several notable issues seemed to have been inside strife among the developers, employees being laid-off, forum moderation issues, and hackers.

With all of this piling ontop of itself, it was bound to happen. There is also the issue that the game may have been "ahead of it's time", which I feel is not the case here; Loadout was certainly a great game, but these issues created player distrust in the company.
Perhaps at another time, this game will be "revitalized", and the developers may return to it.

All of this is untrue, I wrote a post consisting of information that was relayed to me and a few others with the reason the game died here, with Rob confirming truth of almost everything I mentioned.

In this confirmation he also wrote about "trusting the wrong person", and while unconfirmed, this person was most likely Arctyc, given his position, power and attitude. He deserves most of the credit to why this game failed, and that is mostly because of aformentioned attitude. He went around claiming that he knew what was best for this game because of his background, which was being an MLG pro, and he completely ignored any suggestion and wiped them off by repeating this part of his background over and over again.

[♂verfiend]

I still take a quick go here and there on it. Loved the game (except for 2 hit snipers) The game died a long time ago though. Pity.

[BurlsoL]

The hacks and exploits led to most just not wanting to play. This lead to a situation where new players would repeatedly be matched against experienced ones (due to small community) or exploiters, getting killed repeatedly, getting nowhere game after game, and just losing all interest. Even though there were some systems in game to balance this to a degree, the majority of those systems still required you being able to make a kill or survive against people who have hundreds more hours of experience with the maps and the game.

When a game isn't fun to play, even when you're losing horribly, it becomes hard for people to retain interest. When the majority of the funding for that game is dependent on people being interested enough in the game to buy cosmetic items, it becomes a losing situation.

[Ronin 8]

As BurisoL said between the exploits and players not buying the cosmetic stuff sealed the games fate without enough income then cuts come in with the removal of 2 servers, Some blame can be put down to EOR but most of it is on players not spending and thats the hard truth for people who want free games unless you spend money on it then what do you think is going to happen not surprising it's where it is.

[KERN]

Guess Im Unloading this heap then

[lula]

Originally posted by Ronin 8:

As BurisoL said between the exploits and players not buying the cosmetic stuff sealed the games fate without enough income then cuts come in with the removal of 2 servers, Some blame can be put down to EOR but most of it is on players not spending and thats the hard truth for people who want free games unless you spend money on it then what do you think is going to happen not surprising it's where it is.

Dev's fault, not player's. Something good and updated consistenty attracts money one way or another.

[GreyNaide]

I agree with BurisoL, and also Lula.
Players cannot be expected to spend money on a free game when they're given something that isn't 100%. It would be like winning a new car in a raffle, then being told it has dints in the bumper, breaks-down regularly, leaks oil & costs $1000 a week to maintain,....you just wouldn't take it. However, if you give the players a great game that recieves updates regularly & supports it's player base with honest feedback, great tech support, & loyalty rewards,....then the players will come,....& more importantly,....will STAY! It's only THEN, that the game will recieve money in return, because happy players will invest in something worthwhile, & will support a game that supports them.
At the end of the day, I think it's more important to learn from the death of this game & prevent it from happening again, rather than assigning blame. As much as I would like to see Loadout "revived", I can't see how venting my/our frustrations & problems with the game here, achieves anything more than exercising typing skills on a keyboard.
All that can be hoped for, is for a new development team/company to pick up the game & give it a "re-birth" & inject new life into what once was,........& possibly still is,........a great game.

Long live Loadout!

[CasualReux]

Loadout died because Limitation =/= Balance.

[north]

It died because it was a pretty ♥♥♥♥ game with microtransactions, P2W, hackers going unpunished and 0 balance. Why waste time playing this turd of a game when you can play vastly superior games for free? Or skip the microtransactions and buy a better game?

[GiantPixie]

Originally posted by ...:

Arctyc (bless him)

According to Rob, and quite a few others, Arctyc is possibly one of the main reasons the game flopped.