The state of rift

[Kelesti]

How many subs does Rift currently have?

The answer to this question is "enough".

They haven't publicly released sub numbers, nor do I expect that to change anytime soon. But they're for the most part stable, and work their asses off to appeal to the crowd they have, rather than gloat about big numbers as a draw for why others should play it too.

Do you know anyone playing? If yes, great. Don't need to know sub numbers. No? Well you can meet people as that aspect is still very much alive and kicking. And X million or X+2 million players doesn't make or break a game, just look at EVE.

[Raidboss]

The answer to this question is "enough".

They haven't publicly released sub numbers, nor do I expect that to change anytime soon. But they're for the most part stable, and work their asses off to appeal to the crowd they have, rather than gloat about big numbers as a draw for why others should play it too.

Do you know anyone playing? If yes, great. Don't need to know sub numbers. No? Well you can meet people as that aspect is still very much alive and kicking. And X million or X+2 million players doesn't make or break a game, just look at EVE.

Well thats an interesting approach... who would have ever thought that the amount of people playing an MMO wouldn't matter....

[Edge-]

Well thats an interesting approach... who would have ever thought that the amount of people playing an MMO wouldn't matter....

It really doesn't matter as long as the game remains stable, both in terms of content release speed/quality and playerbase. And based on the data we have access to, both have been pretty stable.

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see numbers because I'm interested in numbers (I like data and metrics, what of it?), but in the end they're only relevant in the context of change. SWTOR numbers were only relevant at launch to see the return on the investment, and relevant during its contraction. Once they stabilize(d), they cease to be relevant. The only time they gain relevance again is if there is a dramatic shift in population size or content quality/rate delivery.

[Raidboss]

It really doesn't matter as long as the game remains stable, both in terms of content release speed/quality and playerbase. And based on the data we have access to, both have been pretty stable.

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see numbers because I'm interested in numbers (I like data and metrics, what of it?), but in the end they're only relevant in the context of change. SWTOR numbers were only relevant at launch to see the return on the investment, and relevant during its contraction. Once they stabilize(d), they cease to be relevant. The only time they gain relevance again is if there is a dramatic shift in population size or content quality/rate delivery.

For me personally the size of the playerbase in an MMO is a huge factor. Coming from my WoW background if you roll Alliance on a Horde dominated server like Illidan-US than your ability to play with other people and enjoy the MMO factor will be greatly reduced. If I didn't want to play with other people I'd just play a single player game.

[gonterf]

For me personally the size of the playerbase in an MMO is a huge factor. Coming from my WoW background if you roll Alliance on a Horde dominated server like Illidan-US than your ability to play with other people and enjoy the MMO factor will be greatly reduced. If I didn't want to play with other people I'd just play a single player game.

That is fair. It is important to note, though, that after a certain cutoff 'total number of players worldwide' won't affect your game experience. Rift has so many servers, WoW so many plus so many more, but the individual servers for each game are arguably more or less the same size. The only situation where total population makes any difference beyond the population on any given server is if you're looking for out of game/server experiences such as UI modding, news sites, or theorycrafting.

I believe that Rift's servers individually have a higher population cap than WoW's servers. Rift also has cross-server chat, cross-server raids (including a cross-server LFG channel!), and free server transfers. How that translates into gameplay is that being on a 'dead' server in Rift is a temporary, easily/freely remedied, and really not-that-problematic-to-begin-with experience, whereas in WoW you might have to spend $25 to get some company. In English: Rift has a "functionally" higher population than WoW because it's easier to find and play with other players (Note that I have not yet personally experienced cross-server zones in MoP).

Edit: Forgot to add: Rift's factions can party/raid/guild together as well, making for even more players to meet, befriend, and dungeon crawl with.

[Fencers]

Publishers don't usually post their sub or concurrency numbers. Even less so for privately owned companies such as Trion. Best we get are usually guesses from "analysts".

World of Warcraft puts out their numbers for 2 reasons: 1. the parent company is public 2. WOW has something to brag about as the most successful MMO ever made.

I am sure if Rift or TSW had like a million players each we'd be awash in press releases. Otherwise, it is relatively rare to get hard numbers out of any given pub/dev.

[Edge-]

For me personally the size of the playerbase in an MMO is a huge factor. Coming from my WoW background if you roll Alliance on a Horde dominated server like Illidan-US than your ability to play with other people and enjoy the MMO factor will be greatly reduced. If I didn't want to play with other people I'd just play a single player game.

Well, Rift deals with that by letting you group cross-faction in BG's/dungeons/raids, and PvE servers allow for open world grouping across factions as well. You don't really have the "I'm on a server with tons of people, but only a handful play on my faction so it's basically empty for me" as much.

The total size doesn't even matter for what you're looking for. You're looking for the size of an individual server, not the total size of the playerbase. You could have a game with only 20k players, but have all of them on one server and it would fulfill what you are looking for.

[Slipmat]

How many subs does Rift currently have?

There's enough playing that when this zone event boss called Volan spawns at 10am on a weekday morning, he's assured of a warm welcome

[Kelimbror]

he's assured of a warm welcome

Warm welcome in this case translated to mean: 300-500 people blowing the server the fuck up. lol.

[RoninaThorstone]

Warm welcome in this case translated to mean: 300-500 people blowing the server the fuck up. lol.

Personally, I think that Volan would be made even better if he flashed the himself and the world around him black to white and back again every few seconds. So while we lag it could feel like a rave.

[Kelesti]

Well thats an interesting approach... who would have ever thought that the amount of people playing an MMO wouldn't matter....

When the total number of people playing World of WarCraft is split not only between factions you'll never see, realms you'll never play with, and how many servers on each realm? The "total" number of playing an MMO as far as subscriptions are concerned is very, very irrelevant to the player. Things that do matter:

Server population that you're on, and the percentage of population that you can actually interact with of that server. Both as a general size, as well as times it surges and times it wanes, both quite useful for different reasons.

EVE Online runs everything off of a single persistent server, for the entire world. Single. One. They have less than a million players. 9 years and running, I daresay they're pretty successful at what they do, and their community doesn't suffer because of it. Posting subs falls into nothing more than a pissing contest and the total number of players has no actual effect on pretty much anything, compared to the amount you have available to you on your chosen server/shard/whatever.

[Voidism]

There's enough playing that when this zone event boss called Volan spawns at 10am on a weekday morning, he's assured of a warm welcome

[video=youtube;cpNVShHRS0Q]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpNVShHRS0Q&feature=youtu.be[video]

I just upgraded my CPU so I get 20 fps when Volan spawns now, instead of my earlier 5. :P
My RiftMeter ("Recount") recorded 150 different people during the latest event.

Speaking of... maybe it would be good for my computers performance if I didn't use RiftMeter during these events. :P

[Vintersol]

The "total" number of playing an MMO as far as subscriptions are concerned is very, very irrelevant to the player.

Thats right. It's totally irrelevant if a game has 10 million subscriptions or 500k. You will realistically never play with kr/eu/us (depending on your location) so the population in other regions doesn't affect your gaming experience. You will be in contact with a handful of players only.

[Kelimbror]

Personally, I think that Volan would be made even better if he flashed the himself

I mean technically we are already stripping his armor off. If he 'flashed' himself we would get less IS from the event. I feel like I'm having a seizure already while doing the event, so flashing lights would at least make it interesting.

[Deleted]

I'm really not enjoying Rift at all, recently purchased Storm Legion and wish I hadn't of bothered. Everything about it is boring. It's too bloated with the talent trees, no spell feels super duper awesome, no class feels epic in it's own right. Everything is so samey samey, quests are just grinds. The zones are so boring, you don't feel a sense of epicness, plus they are really not easy on the eye.

[Tarien]

Everything is so samey samey, quests are just grinds. The zones are so boring, you don't feel a sense of epicness, plus they are really not easy on the eye.

I disagree with this bit. Carnage quests aside, I thought that the storylines in each zone were really well done (though the shorter, suddenly ending parts in Ashora/Steppes were a bit of a let down), and I felt that the zones themselves looked AMAZING, Seratos and some parts of Morban in particular are just epic.

[RoninaThorstone]

no class feels epic in it's own right.

o_O

Tactician is samey samey as the other rogue trees? Or harbinger in mage?

Really?

[Puremallace]

I'm really not enjoying Rift at all, recently purchased Storm Legion and wish I hadn't of bothered. Everything about it is boring. It's too bloated with the talent trees, no spell feels super duper awesome, no class feels epic in it's own right. Everything is so samey samey, quests are just grinds. The zones are so boring, you don't feel a sense of epicness, plus they are really not easy on the eye.

All I need to say about that

Thread: Worth it to start playing again?
by quikbunny

Replies
33
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1,361

Yes it is definitely worth playing. It's a better game than it was before, there is literally too much to do. All this Vanilla/BC nostalgia is hilarious, MoP is simply the superior game. Also, Cataclysm wasn't even that bad either for those of us that played in moderation.

The problem a lot of players have is they have this mentality of "OMG I WONT ALL DA EPIX NOAW" and they somehow think that they need to get to Exalted with every faction on day one. These are also the players that cried like little bitches that there was never anything to do at max level. You just can't please em. They will complain like 4 year olds no matter what Blizzard d

[Kelimbror]

All I need to say about that

This isn't really a good argument. All this WoW defensiveness from Rift players is beyond childish and doesn't prove your point at all. I do see where a lot of his criticisms do come from adhering to WoW developed principles, but there is a much better way of saying that.

I'm really not enjoying Rift at all, recently purchased Storm Legion and wish I hadn't of bothered. Everything about it is boring. It's too bloated with the talent trees, no spell feels super duper awesome, no class feels epic in it's own right. Everything is so samey samey, quests are just grinds. The zones are so boring, you don't feel a sense of epicness, plus they are really not easy on the eye.

1) Soul trees don't need to be dumbed down in every game. A lot of people still like making meaningful choices, even if it is damage increases. Considering how the entire soul system works, the level of customization is needed to really give freedom to play how you want. I completely disagree with your assessment.

2) I don't know a whole lot of games where spells feel 'super duper awesome'. I can't remember a time playing my Druid in Mists or any of my GW2 characters, or any game where I was just in awe of what my character could do. As an aside, mages being able to turn any weapon into a lightning sword or reaper scythe was pretty cool the 1st time I saw it.

3) No class feels epic in its own right? What do you even mean by that? I could say the same about every game, but it's all opinionated.

4) Everything is so samey samey...just like every other game. Except Rift gives you multiple ways to efficiently level, variety in the types of quests you actually do, etc. Playing it definitely felt like a departure from any MMO so far. The combination of zone events, rifts, quests, etc. At this point I'm starting to think you are responding with a heavy bias, which isn't really productive.

5) Zones are not boring, but I agree a lot of them aren't easy on the eye. You can attribute this to the fact that this game is much darker and more realistic than most MMOs out there. The pretty jungle/winter places are amazing, but the fact that 3 high level zones are basically barren deserts filled with skeletons, corpses, and meat bags is pretty lame. I did not like the direction the last bits of Storm Legion have gone.

I'm assuming the Dendrome will be a much wilder and lush jungle setting, which should give us a more aesthetically pleasing playground. Really though, your criticisms have no weight to them.

[Voidism]

5) Zones are not boring, but I agree a lot of them aren't easy on the eye. You can attribute this to the fact that this game is much darker and more realistic than most MMOs out there. The pretty jungle/winter places are amazing, but the fact that 3 high level zones are basically barren deserts filled with skeletons, corpses, and meat bags is pretty lame. I did not like the direction the last bits of Storm Legion have gone.

I'm assuming the Dendrome will be a much wilder and lush jungle setting, which should give us a more aesthetically pleasing playground. Really though, your criticisms have no weight to them.

I hope The Dendrome will be more lush too (when is it going to be released btw?).
Though, I really like the Forest of Flesh in Morban. Serenity! Calm! Death...