I think getting to 600 expertise should probably change. Grinding elite chests is really bad and boring. A lot of people probably quit after doing it a few times. I think doing a long quest line that takes you through all of the high end zones (reekwater, edengrove, and shattered mountain) and ends with the new upcoming dungeon would probably be a better choice. Maybe the questline doesn’t get you to 600, but something like a 50 point expertise bump along the way.
Well there it is New World is a success
I mean, a new mmo gets a lot of hype, and Amazon entering games had a lot of hype. I’m not sold on the idea ‘the devs made bad decisions that made people quite’ since the bulk of the 900k players didn’t play in alpha or beta - therefore new world was new to them. And according to steamcharts most of those left in the first 2-3 months, right?
Why did they leave?
We don’t really know.
But i’d guess it probably has less to do with dev decisions and more to do with the fact that the game just wasn’t finished when it launched. How many complaints are really downstream of a premature launch? End game content - check. Stability - check. Optimization - check.
Bugs - check. How long did anyone play No Man Sky at ‘launch’? How many people came back to it later?
900k players was peak concurrent. The game sold over 4.5 million copies, as reported by VG Insights in October 2021, and has maybe 150k active right now. That’s a huge amount of potential income given up.
The game not being ready was the direct result of dev leadership. The head of AGS stepped down yesterday. AGS needs qualified leadership.
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We are fully aware of the player numbers. Improving the game is our utmost priority to improve the player experience for current players and encourage others to come back. Thank you for the concern but we believe focusing on such a negative thought isn’t very productive.
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That’s good to hear. I was more concerned with the fact that it was never addressed in any of the blogs or posts, and it seems like you guys are doing just fine on turning things around.
I’ll admit, i kinda expected large scale reversals or something akin to it to match the large player losses- ostensibly in response to unpopular changes- but it’s good to know that it’s aware of.
What I’m noticing in a lot of MMORPG’s is, I feel like the Devs or whoever is responsible to design or bring in content ideas is missing of what people actually want to see in MMORPGS. I don’t mean that as an insult or being negative that devs have no clue, but I feel like working with people together that play MMO’s very actively for long long years in a progression and competitive environment would be ideal. Especially for studios that are lacking experience in that genre. Bringing in people with a lof of knowledge will help a lot. They know whats going on and what people actually like. I’m not saying AGS is just releasing boring content but it is not optimal. It is not optimal for the majority of players especially for those who already left. I know an MMO takes years of planning, content needs a long time to develop and its super expensive to maintain and thats why I find it super important. I love NW but seeing the decreasing numbers is kind of heartbreaking and sometimes I’m asking myself, what keeps me going. Yes if you ask me, I would see a lot of other things in this game aswell, including QoL changes and other type of innovative content. I also find it really impressive that AGS is still bringing in so much energy to release on a monthly base + keeping us informed through roadmaps / posts / videos. A lot of teams might given up already or would leave aswell.
I’m just saying if the player is not pleased, they abandon the ship and move on. Players like to stick to a couple games and if they leave one they move on without looking back. If there is something better, they will grind on that. Dungeon Mutations was a great idea but it still needs more love, its just based on GS instead of true skill. Just naming one little example out of many.
I don’t know man, LA lost 70% of its playerbase already and its objectively very good MMO. After a certain amount of time people get bored in every MMO because it has a limited content unlike MOBAs or RTS games and they quit no matter the quality of game. As LA shows.
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I am convinced that you can bring back a large number of players but also old ones, especially with the roadmap for this fall!
Don’t hesitate withdouble xp weekend for those who are stuck at lvl 30 (I saw that it was planned), and if possible being able to share your quests would be great to bring our lvl 20-30 friends back and help them pex, It seems essential to me and not impossible to add quickly enough.
We wish the game the best and the Absolutely Incredible world is a solid foundation! hoping that the big bosses don’t cut your development budget in favor of new projects, that’s the only point that scares me !
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Yeah as you said all MMO loose a big part of their release playerbase what they need is to catch a regular and “loyal” audiance,
LA still has 400k players and even if it goes to 100k it will be still fine because they designed the game with inter-server connection for donjons,raids and also the PvP arenas.
NW numbers are really under this threshold but as Shadow fox said they are working hard to bring people back wich is a good thing.
NW is limited with 2k players max per server and many of them are like 50/2000 players without inter-server connections.
At least if instancied areas like OPR were inter-server people may not care that much about global playerbase because 20-30K players in the same time would be enough to bring activites up for all I guess.
Maybe they will work on this in the future, fingerscrossed 
!
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If certain problems have been in the game for so long, it is simply because they are NOT able to fix them.
You don’t have to look any further…
I think is a pity that so many quit but actually I think that’s the new trend now, wait for a game to come out and then destroy it.
Many youtubers do that like Asmongold. Is what they do. First speak well and then start to generate that snowball of criticism and do big drama videos about how the game fail.
Also this phenomenon is happening to almost every game, not only new world: lost ark, wow last expansion, elder ring, etc, etc.
So I think the best is that every person do what they want and don’t let bad influenciate by the rumours or this kind of pessimistic people.
I play New World because I still like. And no one is make me move to the next game just because is what “they say”.
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I feel this is very true. With New World I have started to see YouTubers as a … Locust cloud. They swarm onto something popular that they can fully consume to leverage the popularity… Until there’s nothing left and they move on to the next one.
I started fishing recently in NW and have set a goal for myself to find all the hotspots I’ve unlocked. Today I went to an area in Brightwood I’ve never been to before, with waterfalls and various gathering nodes. It reminded me how beautiful the world is and how fun it is to explore it. It was genuinely enjoyable and it’s little things like this that keep me here.
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It’s the same for me with FF14. I play it for it’s fantastic storytelling and ease of hopping into and out of content quickly. But I can only stand it for 2-3 months max until the grind becomes inane and boring. The combat style of just “aoe everything” in the dungeons just gets old. Really old.
So far NW is an MMO I enjoy living in long-term. I wish the storytelling was a little better… I feel like there’s a story there somewhere but I just don’t have the patience to read all the pages. 
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I really have the impression that you take people for 
…
People who left the game did so because they no longer enjoyed playing it. Sometimes you don’t have to look any further… (with google translate)
I dont know if they do or dont realize it but the post you linked in the OP says that they dont want to focus on the negatives.
I mean… that says it all doesnt it. They just want to make the game better for the ones that stayed. Why talk about all the megatives when all it does is breed more negativity?
Objective criticism is great and all but its all been said and done from the start of launch till now. And if they dont change anything, they deserve a dead game zone. But they are changing stuff around. For the better of worse? Depends.
And i saw a post up top about player tolerance and standards. Its not about both of it. Its about expectations and managing it. The problem with new world is that it didnt manage the players expectations well enough.
True, while continuing making the game worst for the 99% that left. That’s very good business.
Just don’t complain when they put in a hyper aggressive, “pay to progress much faster” cash shop to make money off the 1% that’s left. On top of making future gear gap grinds very bad to progress without cash shop items. Very good future indeed.
If you guys truly have a mind to improve the game. Then add PvP modes where non-PvP gear has little to no influence on PvP in these modes. And make the game less of a boring time waster. And more of a skill-base action combat MMO. You know the one that captivated the 97% of us that left when you guys switch from that model.
I’ll put it to you guys like this. If people want a already made Korean grinder MMO. They will just go and play a fully feature Korean grinder MMO. That’s not want we brought in to and you guys know it. Make New World a highly accessible game in the PvP areas. And I’m willing to bet money, that you guys will be able to at least go back above 50k concurrent players.
Also a little of a note. Make it so all the weapons of New World feel fun and powerful in their own rights. Instead of what you guys have it at now. Where only 3 weapons truly feel powerful.
Also your Dev team should basically release one fresh start server in each region. Which people are never allowed to transfer in to. But can make fresh new characters on. And police these fresh start servers like your livelihood depends on it. This way in the gear based PvP activities like War and ORP. Players don’t have to get bored fighting exploiters and RMTers, that have 4 times their stats.
If you guys can do that. I am very sure you will be able to convince a few that left to come back. I’d be willing to bet you guys will see a minimal of 50k concurrent players.
To be honest we have same situation in FFXIV and Lost Ark where FFXIV lost around 80% of it’s playerbase Lost Ark lost 70% in 1,5 month xD around 390k online going down down and down. It will be same story after 6 month 25-40k will left in EU 
As I read posts here in November and posts month ago in Lost Ark Forum, I see same kind of players, they wanna just rush through the game get everything with no work do endgame content and quit. People who remian are players who really like MMOs. Thats why I do not really like games where “hype” around them was so high, people play LAO, FFXIV, New World not only cuz they like this type of game but only because is famous.
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