Why does empyrion have such few players

[Poki Doki Woki Loki Roki]

i just want ppl to play with, but barley ever find a single person, this is literally my dream game. Why hasn't this attracted much attention?

[Socipat]

To put the OP's question in perspective. When No Man's Sky came out Empyrion was said to be what NMS was suppose to be. Fast forward to today (as in right this minute) twice as many people are playing NMS than Empyrion.
People who think that we are waiting for the next "BIG" update and than start playing again is just kidding themselves. The truth is Empyrion has stagnated. With out a real update to game play or content than the game will lose more players till the player pool is not large enough to support the game and it will die with never leaving early access.

[thaalien]

Publicado originalmente por piddlefoot:

Multiplayer was designed into Empyrion from day one 2015, before that MP was planned to be more of a co-op thing, Empyrion used to piggy back the steam network [ 2014 ] , but went over to its own true dedicated code for servers, its been on that path ever since.

This is one of the very few games that has the potential to become a mini MMO in its own right.
HWS has proven that beyond any doubt, with there advanced coding skills they have shaped the game into what suits them, Empyrion is pretty flexible even without a fully built modding API.

As a single player game I find Empyrion a little dis-orderly, an example of a very well ordered SP survival sandbox game, subnautica or farcry or similar like games, but Empyrion has good plans to address that in the near future so hopefully that will change SP side of game to become more immersive.

MP though is where theres a huge potential for big spikes in the development funding, SP side of the game kinda keeps it chugging along but the MP updates bring spikes of cash to the devs, so in my opinion MP has brought a whole lot more to this game, features we would have never seen otherwise.

Look at what happens to games in this specific genre without MP, Planet Nomads tried it, with a bigger team, better start funding, an established business in iphone games, failed kickstarter for Nomads, stripped the game of its MP feature, so hundreds of really early backers like myself just lost the whole reason we purchased [over 100 bucks a shot back then also and promised bonuses never delivered from the kickstarter also ] and the game is megga slow in its updates with bugger all content in them and now there trying to finish it by June this year with no mention of a Beta period for bug fixing or performance because its terrible also.

Careful what you wish for in this genre.!

It's really a double edged sword when you tailor a game favoring one over the other. If you look at games like Ark it's pretty successful, and I think it's because they allowed single player in that game. When you compare Ark with Atlas, it's exactly the same game, except that Atlas was built around multiplayer. Ark is FAR more successful than Atlas, in my opinion, because there is single player. Atlas failed simply because people don't like to play games where they spend hours playing, only to have their reward destroyed within seconds after they log off. Now I know that Empyrion has safeguards when it comes to that issue, but still, there are many people who play survival games, who prefer to play single player, or even co-op only. When you look on the Atlas forums you will see people begging the devs to include single player.

[Sik Style]

bc this game sucks now

[NovaTopaz]

Publicado originalmente por socipat:

To put the OP's question in perspective. When No Man's Sky came out Empyrion was said to be what NMS was suppose to be. Fast forward to today (as in right this minute) twice as many people are playing NMS than Empyrion.
People who think that we are waiting for the next "BIG" update and than start playing again is just kidding themselves. The truth is Empyrion has stagnated. With out a real update to game play or content than the game will lose more players till the player pool is not large enough to support the game and it will die with never leaving early access.

Honestly the fact anyone would ever make such a quote is kidding themselves. No man’s sky is a completely different game and was aspiring for much higher goals than any other game(before or now), and failing to deliver any of it on launch. Empyrion has absolutely no hope of delivering that sort of gameplay, nor has it ever tried to deliver such gameplay. Should it try to? Probably not to the extent of NMS, but yes, a little. Empyrion is suffering a bit from the “lack of replayable content” stick.

(not for me personally, I was never really able to play the game for the longest time(in spite of buying it like 1-2 years ago) and I have only now really started playing this game in any meaningful way)

But it is also true some people are setting the game down for the moment because A10 looks to be a pretty big content update(there has been a couple hints now on the Empyrion Discord with teaser images). The combination of both is not helping the numbers by any amount... But even just the hundreds of players who play on MP servers will keep the lights on at night for Empyrion, the same can’t be said for NMS. And I doubt any of the current servers are going to migrate elsewhere or lose population quite rapidly enough to make everything die out. Could it die eventually? Possibly, all things come to an end, but if it was under the threat of folding from lack of interest, I’m pretty sure it would have already done so a while ago... And it’s obviously still here.

[Socipat]

Publicado originalmente por NovaTopaz:

Honestly the fact anyone would ever make such a quote is kidding themselves.

https://www.pcgamer.com/no-mans-sky-alternative/

Here you go. By Steven Messner September 27, 2016.

[ravien_ff]

The closest game we can compare Empyrion to is Space Engineers but they're still both very different games with different design focus. Some Space Engineers players try out Empyrion when they want a more survival focused game. At the moment, Empyrion seems pretty unique within the genre, with no other game offering a similar focus and feature set that come close to competing, even though Empyrion has been in early access for several years already.

A game type like Empyrion is hard to pull off and takes a lot of dedication from the developers. They seem to be doing a good job even if I think they've made some mistakes here and there.

[Andbrew]

Publicado originalmente por socipat:

Publicado originalmente por A. Max.:

I would rather have steady river of updates than a shallow lake of full release

Your opinion does not make my fact any less true.

Well, in all honestly, we're both are right.
Why, you ask?
1. Because as you said, some people wait for the release, once the game is fully fleshed out and they can experience to it's fullest. Thus, they don't play the game all thye time.
2. And I said that I like having constant updates like other people and only tend to play the game only when they release to experience whats new. Thus, we don't play the game all the time too.
3. Of course there is the thrid party than just enjoys the game all the time, but we ain't about that now.

[Democracy Officer 0311]

Publicado originalmente por A. Max.:

Publicado originalmente por socipat:

Your opinion does not make my fact any less true.

Well, in all honestly, we're both are right.
Why, you ask?
1. Because as you said, some people wait for the release, once the game is fully fleshed out and they can experience to it's fullest. Thus, they don't play the game all thye time.
2. And I said that I like having constant updates like other people and only tend to play the game only when they release to experience whats new. Thus, we don't play the game all the time too.
3. Of course there is the thrid party than just enjoys the game all the time, but we ain't about that now.

Respect on how you replied to this guy. I don't do a hell of a lot of talking here but i know "i have facts and you have opinions" usually doesn't turn out to well. Nice answer.

[fligmin]

Publicado originalmente por Aetrion:

He's completely correct though. The main reason is simply that this game has been in early access for so long that even though people are buying it and playing it, people will take breaks that last for years waiting for more substantial releases.

That's not saying the developers are doing anything wrong, it's just reality that people who support early access games will often play for a while, and then when they like the game but have become aware of all the bugs or missing features decide to wait for its full release before playing again.

I agree, My current break is waiting on new content and I noticed that with unity update the game feels sluggish when I turn(bought a threadripper to run games smooth) It was smooth - still sorta is but I did notice sluggishness so im waiting on next update which has not yet hit.

[Kasba]

Publicado originalmente por A. Max.:

Publicado originalmente por socipat:

The real reason is the simple fact that it has been in early access for over 3 1/2 years with no release date in sight. This turns off a lot of players that would normally play this style of game.

I would rather have steady river of updates than a shallow lake of full release

Same here! My favorite game. I remember back when you had to make each style block....>.<

[AH-1 Cobra]

The development is too slow for my liking. It's been in Alpha for a very long time. I'd rather get back into Empyrion (or decide not to touch it ever again) once the game has finally figured out what it's going to be. After nearly all the major changes are finished.

I think Empyrion is going to end up being something like Minecraft was. Vanilla, the vanilla game sucked, but with mods it was good. For awhile. Then MS got their hands on it.

What the developers do as far as balancing changes go no longer interests me, as long as I have the option of customizing whatever I want.

I'm only interested in new content and features that enrich the experience in some way. Something new as a way of gating progression doesn't interest me in the slightest, and adds nothing to the game for me. Like with minecraft, I don't care about multiplayer at all.

I like being able to settle into a game. A game that's constantly being "balanced" is going to bore me quicker than a game that never gets any patches. Because they'll release one patch I don't like and I'll just quit the game and never touch it again. This has happened for me on a lot of games. I've sorta done this with Empyrion, but where the game is still in Alpha, I'll give it another shot in Beta, and after full release.

How moddable the game will be will have a great impact on whether I'll play this again or not, because I'd almost guarantee I'm not gonna like the finished vanilla product, and that's based on recent and projected development trends. Right now, it looks like they're aiming for space age Ark: Survival Evolved. With a massive multiplayer focus. If that's what the game ends up as, then it better be extremely moddable, or I won't touch it with a 10ft pole.

Based on my experience with Empyrion, and another EA game, I've decided to never, ever support EA games again. Every single EA game I've gotten has developed into a game I didn't like. I might try a game that's late beta, that's projected to release in a few months, but no more alpha or early beta games. I went into supporting EA games with an open mind when I got Empyrion, but Empyrion is the game that was a major deciding factor in me never supporting EA games again.

[Xango2000]

Publicado originalmente por OTKZuki (◕‿◕✿):

Why does empyrion have such few players

Because Eleon refuses to give us an easy way to share PvE content.

[Amici Nybråten]

Publicado originalmente por OTKZuki (◕‿◕✿):

i just want ppl to play with, but barley ever find a single person, this is literally my dream game. Why hasn't this attracted much attention?

When I've tried to join public multiplayer I only find all Points of Interest cleared out and nothing to do but mine comets and build ships. It's honestly terribly boring. PvE on Multiplayer needs a proper redesign.

[AH-1 Cobra]

Publicado originalmente por Xango2000:

Publicado originalmente por OTKZuki (◕‿◕✿):

Why does empyrion have such few players

Because Eleon refuses to give us an easy way to share PvE content.

That's regrettable. Hope this changes. PvE mods are the only reason I played minecraft. And why I got over 800 hours, instead of 20-30hrs out of Skyrim.

Would be nice if Elreon releases a modding utility at some point. I don't expect them to do that until some time closer towards release though. But it would bring a lot of players into the game. Best case scenario, it'll turn into a situation where player mods are what's selling the game, like with Skyrim, or Minecraft.

[piddlefoot]

Programming takes time, Eleon have not done anything to annoy any of you on purpose, a modding API isnt really possible to finish until game is finished and they have more sharing feature inbound, like all good games in this genre, patience is a virtue.

The game has not been in EA for to long, theres no such thing as to long, what defines that, people that dont understand how programming games work, seriously ? !

AAA companies take 5 odd years to build a game from scratch with all the bells and whistles, and they have a megga huge budget and up to or more than 60 people working full time on that code, Empyrion on the other hand has 6 odd devs coding and a dozen building assets for the game like POIs.

So if we do the math on that its about 97 years to completion so the fact Eleon have come this far in just 5 odd years is truly amazing.

Games like this, usually take around 8 to 10 years to complete.
That is what you should expect for Empyrion.

PvE is the main focus of the game, for SP and MP. Fact.
PvE is technically SP gameplay.
Empyrion does have a SP side of the game, but you cant expect that to be great while its story is incomplete.
But the features in this game, most are designed around PvE gameplay.