MsPudding
Elite
- Joined
- Feb 2, 2011
- Posts
- 4,365
- Location
- Salt Lake City, USA
- Avatar Name
- Rachel MsPudding Hawkins
I've been very curious about CV-19's impact on EU, as I've noticed myself, as have others, that the game "feels" more vibrant than ever. Well, it's not just a "feeling" we have anymore, it's a fact, and I have the numbers. And numbers don't lie. The best way, in my opinion, to measure the game's success/growth has always been to look at the CLD payouts. By taking a look at the weekly player cycle on Calypso, we can see the exact impact CV-19 has had on EU, thus far.
If you look at a week, or a month of CLD payouts, you don't get a very good picture. However, when you step back and look at 90 days or 180 days you get a much clearer picture of the direction the game is headed. Nothing is as stable of a measuring stick as the CLD, well of course if I had access to MindArk's books and server data, that would certainly be more accurate, but alas I don't.
We've now got 31 weeks into 2020, and 19 weeks of CV-19's impact.
Again, we notice that the CLD payouts for this 19 week period hold pretty stable from 2016 - 2019, with an average of 59.34, which becomes our comparison number. So seeing that we're at 76.07 in 2020 compared to a usual 59.34, we're seeing 28% higher turnover in 2020 when compared to the past four years.
(CLD Payout) Current Annual Growth for 2020: +15%
(CLD Payout) Current Covid-19 Growth for 2020: +28%
Take home message: It's great to see 28% growth during Covid! I love logging in and seeing my friend's list light up green. I love seeing more people in game, hunting, crafting, mining, chatting, enjoying EU. Growth is good for everyone, not just MindArk, but the community. It becomes easier to sell your loot, easier to find/upgrade your gear, easier to socialize and explore the game. It's been awesome reconnecting with old friends I haven't seen in years, it's been awesome seeing all the "new blood" in here... A thriving community is what we need. EU has been very stable the past 5 years, we haven't been shrinking, we've just been stagnant. We're just now seeing a big jump in the in game activity, something we haven't seen in years!
Call to MindArk: Your game activity just grew by 28% since April! Congratulations! Your platform is one of the few benefactors of a worldwide pandemic. Consider yourselves very lucky to not be among the millions of businesses that are failing right now. People want to escape. They want to escape their lives, their fears, their stress, their problems, so they're playing your game. Not only that, people have time again. Current players are playing more than they have before, old players are logging back in for the first time in 5+ years. New players are poking their heads in while stuck at home. DO NOT MISS THIS OPPORTUNITY! It's my hope that you're having focused meetings with your team right now on what to do to retain all this growth. Hopefully you guys have goals in place to entice and reward people for coming back, for trying out your game for the first time, for cycling & depositing more than they have in the past.
Obviously, this is your business, and I'm not telling you how to run it, but I do have some suggestions as a contributing community member & loyal player that I at least wanted to voice:
I get excited when others get excited about EU. I've been playing this game for 10 years, and it offers so many things on so many different levels that no other game does. We've got one of the best communities around. There's no right way to play EU, there's no one way to play EU, the sandbox feel in here is so incredible. There's a lot to explore, people to meet, goals to achieve, and you've got more of that going on right now than you have in the past seven to eight years! Let's take advantage of this! Let's build, not tear down.
Remember,
The rising tide lifts all boats
If you look at a week, or a month of CLD payouts, you don't get a very good picture. However, when you step back and look at 90 days or 180 days you get a much clearer picture of the direction the game is headed. Nothing is as stable of a measuring stick as the CLD, well of course if I had access to MindArk's books and server data, that would certainly be more accurate, but alas I don't.
We've now got 31 weeks into 2020, and 19 weeks of CV-19's impact.
5 years of in game activity on Planet Calypso from January through July (31 week period):
Year | CLD Revenue (January - July) 31 Week Period |
2016 | 98.47 |
2017 | 94.3 |
2018 | 96.04 |
2019 | 95.39 |
2020 | 110.19 |
Next, let's deal in averages so we can get an accurate comparison. Between 2016 and 2019, the last four years, the CLD average payout for the first 31 weeks of the year was 96.05, that's our baseline. So, we're comparing an average payout of 96.05 to 2020's first 31 weeks, which was 110.19, and we see about 15% growth for the year. Ok, so we're up 15% for the year, next let's focus in on the period where Covid really began having an effect, April - July.5 years of in game activity on Planet Calypso from April through July (19 week period):
Year | CLD Revenue (April - July) 19 Week Period |
2016 | 60.66 |
2017 | 58.52 |
2018 | 59.81 |
2019 | 58.38 |
2020 | 76.07 |
Again, we notice that the CLD payouts for this 19 week period hold pretty stable from 2016 - 2019, with an average of 59.34, which becomes our comparison number. So seeing that we're at 76.07 in 2020 compared to a usual 59.34, we're seeing 28% higher turnover in 2020 when compared to the past four years.
(CLD Payout) Current Annual Growth for 2020: +15%
(CLD Payout) Current Covid-19 Growth for 2020: +28%
Take home message: It's great to see 28% growth during Covid! I love logging in and seeing my friend's list light up green. I love seeing more people in game, hunting, crafting, mining, chatting, enjoying EU. Growth is good for everyone, not just MindArk, but the community. It becomes easier to sell your loot, easier to find/upgrade your gear, easier to socialize and explore the game. It's been awesome reconnecting with old friends I haven't seen in years, it's been awesome seeing all the "new blood" in here... A thriving community is what we need. EU has been very stable the past 5 years, we haven't been shrinking, we've just been stagnant. We're just now seeing a big jump in the in game activity, something we haven't seen in years!
Call to MindArk: Your game activity just grew by 28% since April! Congratulations! Your platform is one of the few benefactors of a worldwide pandemic. Consider yourselves very lucky to not be among the millions of businesses that are failing right now. People want to escape. They want to escape their lives, their fears, their stress, their problems, so they're playing your game. Not only that, people have time again. Current players are playing more than they have before, old players are logging back in for the first time in 5+ years. New players are poking their heads in while stuck at home. DO NOT MISS THIS OPPORTUNITY! It's my hope that you're having focused meetings with your team right now on what to do to retain all this growth. Hopefully you guys have goals in place to entice and reward people for coming back, for trying out your game for the first time, for cycling & depositing more than they have in the past.
Obviously, this is your business, and I'm not telling you how to run it, but I do have some suggestions as a contributing community member & loyal player that I at least wanted to voice:
- In Game Community Managers: Gathering groups of people at various parts of the game to spawn a few of the more rare mobs (Hussk, Hogglo Diablo, etc) Traditionally this has been done at various TP's, like Twin Peaks for instance, but it could be done at any TP
- WebShop Opportunities: Design a few new "Welcome Back" packs with new incentives to deposit, and a "New Player" pack totally revamped and made to encourage 1st time depositors, or even a "Quarantine Pack" w/ some cool aesthetic items (face masks, etc.) Throw in some pills, trinkets, gizmos, and other stuff you find appropriate
- AMA: You guys are already planning one of these, this is awesome, great idea! Looking forward to it, My
- Fine Tune the Loot: Re-balance some of the drop rates to reflect the current in game demand, including but not limited to: Empty skill implants, tier components, opals, pyrite, and other valuable resources, etc. Obviously, these changes would need to be done slowly and monitored so as not to crash the market (I'm looking at you Redulite Rush of 2020)
- Enhanced Loot Drops: Add some valuable loot drops into the loot pool, based on the level of the mob. This includes some armor pieces, weapons, you decide (don't go crazy, but even just one really nice drop every couple months for the next 3-6 months would be a nice carrot for a lot of people
- Skill Bonus Weekends: Let players grind up their skills on certain weekends with added bonus (please don't implement this without first increasing ESI's, as many players don't actually want skill, or allow people to turn the skill increase bonuses "off" if they don't want to participate... Or even better yet, re-tune your Mayhems so as to increase the rewards and incentives for skilling up. I mean, if we want to get at the heart of the problem, your Mayhems are currently partially broken, in my opinion. People are paying money to take their avatars in the opposite direction you want them to, removing their skill and halting their progress. I'd love nothing more than to get my hands on tweaking your Mayhem, but I'm gonna have to save that post for another day
I get excited when others get excited about EU. I've been playing this game for 10 years, and it offers so many things on so many different levels that no other game does. We've got one of the best communities around. There's no right way to play EU, there's no one way to play EU, the sandbox feel in here is so incredible. There's a lot to explore, people to meet, goals to achieve, and you've got more of that going on right now than you have in the past seven to eight years! Let's take advantage of this! Let's build, not tear down.
Remember,
The rising tide lifts all boats
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