dead game with 1000 players

[Necodemuss]

only twinks, premate teams, no balance, dead game, useless to play in 2 month it is dead

[Mivo]

1000 concurrent players means the game has an active player base in the 10s of thousands, because nobody is online 24/7. For an indie game in early access, this is actually very good. Numbers like those of DOTA2 and LOL aren't realistic expectations for most games.

[Kugelfisch]

the game is dying before release, which is free 2 play.

[Vegas Dad]

Originally posted by Mivo:

1000 concurrent players means the game has an active player base in the 10s of thousands, because nobody is online 24/7. For an indie game in early access, this is actually very good. Numbers like those of DOTA2 and LOL aren't realistic expectations for most games.

hah not sure what you mean by this. I will wager no where near 10,000 player log a match in any given week in mecha. You know you can actually see most anyone that is currently playing a match. I'll bet you not even half the players online at ANY given time are actively playing a match versus another human player. The active population is far worse than you think. Then if they counted IP addresses instead of accounts cause you know alt spam the number would get even lower for the number of unique human beings actively playing.

[VulpineMachine]

I just play with my family. I honestly don't care. We're having a blast with it. My wife and I play a match or two every single morning before work. We love it.

[HolgFromHell]

Originally posted by VulpineMachine:

I just play with my family. I honestly don't care. We're having a blast with it. My wife and I play a match or two every single morning before work. We love it.

Awesome!

[some guy]

oh no, cant be seen on the schoolyard playing a dead game!

[Flush Entity]

Where's the data on number of players from? Just curious since I couldn't find it after a brief couple minutes of looking.

That said, it's not in the top 100 games currently played... but on the other hand I think the game just hasn't had much of a publicity push since the first initial push either. With Baldur's Gate 3, Starfield, and a lot of other big titles grabbing attention right now (including from content creators and streamers), it's natural that there would be some drop-off. Still, I think the game could do better if it got more noticed again.

As for a "lack of balance" I couldn't disagree more. Heck, if anything, the Devs might be spending too much time on that, but I don't know if they've got different people working on that compared to balance, so maybe how it's set up it's fine. I can't speak to the number of "twinks" but it doesn't take long to get the most relevant Tech unlocked... and that's literally the only progression in the game. Beyond Tech options there is no mechanical benefit to playing a lot, and you can't transfer any of that Tech. All you carry is experience and knowledge... Which is another way to say: "learn, and you'll do better."

But regardless, I can't dictate to someone else whether a game is "fun" or worth playing or whatever. If anyone doesn't enjoy the game they are under no obligation to stick to it. For me though, I still have a lot of fun, playing it in my own way, at my own pace, for my own reasons, and because I find it fun, I'm still going to recommend those that I think might be interested to play, and learn, and hope that they have at least as much if not more fun with it than I do. Same with most other games I still play and enjoy too.

[Sten]

I agree with Flush Entity completely. Id like to know where the OP got most of what he said from because it sounds like he justs wants instant gratification and is failing at that. Oh and premade teams? It's a duo queue of course you get that so whats the complaint just play solo queue if it bothers you. I for one solo queue into duos a lot. it's a fun challenge and feels real good when you can eek a win out with a teammate that is having problems with their side.

[zero]

For an early access game, by a small team, that’s going F2P on launch the game is doing quite well. It has a great chance to be successful long term.

BUT the game does have serious issues that need to be fixed for that to happen. Primarily a serious lack of variety long term due to all maps being functionally identical and the unit balance combining with this issue to make it worse.

[Garuda One]

Originally posted by Sten:

I agree with Flush Entity completely. Id like to know where the OP got most of what he said from because it sounds like he justs wants instant gratification and is failing at that.

Probably steamcharts. The information is readily available. Current players as of 11:01 am CST is 1,013

The game has a 30 day avg of 963 players, with a 30 day gain of -113 or -10% which, is better than I expected because in recent months it's numbers had been falling by a third. So the game reaching a plateau is good. That number being 1k globally... not so good. The issue here is the game is still months away from going F2P and there is a very real risk going F2P will come too late to build up a core playerbase. Even if the playerpool ends up being like 2k globally, that is really not a healthy number for a game that relies on matchmaking and is trying to have a ranked ladder. Die hard fans of the game will say otherwise, but in a general, macro sense it's not great.

Primarily a serious lack of variety long term due to all maps being functionally identical

What can you do to change the 'functionality' of maps in an auto-battler without breaking the core design themes? Especially if their angle is ranked/competitive matchmaking as the core basis, adding more chaotic elements doesn't seem intuitive. If they had an actual, GOOD single player game mode then this would be welcomed.

That to me is what this game needs more than anything right now. A strong single player experience to help lock down more people long enough to actually fix the plethora of issues they're facing with the multiplayer systems.

Edit: Just as an aside, looking at the charts, I do find it interesting- I think the game is more popular in EU judging by peak player times. 2pm CST is usually when the game has it's daily peaks which is prime time in Europe, 9pm CET I believe. By contrast, during US prime times, around 8-10pm CST the game sits around 500-600 active players. Not really relevant in general but find that interesting personally.

[Flush Entity]

Originally posted by Garuda One:

Originally posted by Sten:

I agree with Flush Entity completely. Id like to know where the OP got most of what he said from because it sounds like he justs wants instant gratification and is failing at that.

Probably steamcharts. The information is readily available. Current players as of 11:01 am CST is 1,013

Thanks... but where do I find that? I looked on Steam but didn't find it, is steamcharts a seperate webpage? I'm curious not just about the data for this game but comparing it to others (Super Auto Pets for example, or the playerbase of Tales and Tactics) both out of general curiousity and for the sake of this specific discussion.

Edit: Just as an aside, looking at the charts, I do find it interesting- I think the game is more popular in EU judging by peak player times. 2pm CST is usually when the game has it's daily peaks which is prime time in Europe, 9pm CET I believe. By contrast, during US prime times, around 8-10pm CST the game sits around 500-600 active players. Not really relevant in general but find that interesting personally.

I'm not surprised. From what I saw, more Europeans participated in the #ad content push and/or playing it out than US. Though I also think that the DOTA2 Auto-Chess and such were more popular outside the US too, so it's hard to pin down cause and effect exactly.

[Garuda One]

Originally posted by Flush Entity:

Originally posted by Garuda One:

Probably steamcharts. The information is readily available. Current players as of 11:01 am CST is 1,013

Thanks... but where do I find that? I looked on Steam but didn't find it, is steamcharts a seperate webpage? I'm curious not just about the data for this game but comparing it to others (Super Auto Pets for example, or the playerbase of Tales and Tactics) both out of general curiousity and for the sake of this specific discussion.

I use steamdb.info personally. I do believe it has a comparison function built in too.

[Kvay]

> is steamcharts a seperate webpage?
yes

steamcharts mechabellum:
https://steamcharts.com/app/669330#1m

:)

Edit:
at least its in the moment (at steamcharts By Current Players) at place 425

[puschit]

Most of the games I play are "dead" if 1000 online players could even be considered "dead" and i really don't care as long as I get matchups. In fact, it's usually the very popular, overrun games that I don't like for various reasons. Part of that is that most players don't have any clue about what a "balanced" game actually is. Mechabellum is a game that is hard to master, a game where lack of skill can easily be misred as bad balancing. If all of those little Dunnings and Krugers leave the game for good, I am all for it. Better than tweaking the game towards a mob that has very limited grasp of what they complain about. I'd rather play a game with a small but dedicated community where I can actually meet familiar avatars and where gameplay matches an actual vision of a smaller team of devs than an overengineered AAA title that is infested with chobos and features a mix of streamlined features and "balance" that tries to cater the median of the unwashed masses.
There are tens of thousands of games on Steam alone. I am better off finding my personal kink instead of playing what everybody else does.

[Colonel Poochie]

I believe they shot themselves in the foot stating it is going to be free to play in the future. I know people holding off buying it after I recommended it. They either go for free play now or at least go on sale. I'm gonna keep playing it myself.