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Nexus Forums _ Community Board _ What Stagnation Looks Like

Posted by: halombobtk Nov 30 2016, 07:06 AM



Note: Dataset begins and ends on a Tuesday for easy comparison (11/1/16 - 11/29/16)

From Wony on 8/15/2016:

QUOTE
Creating a new server running in parallel next to the current one could be an interesting idea, but we do not want to split the growing community at this point. Yes, Nexus is growing. And fear not. Your game play will not abruptly end.


If Wony's "Yes, Nexus is growing" statement was true in August (paint me a skeptic), it certainly wasn't in November. As the months roll on I'll feel better about my sample size, but in the early going it's concerning that cool weather has arrived in the Northern Hemisphere and we're not seeing cyclical growth yet. I'm guessing we'll still see a slight upswing in December/January, but November shows pretty clear stagnation.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think the population has changed much since the start of summer. Even with the release of Oh San, it's doubtful there will ever be a major uptick in users on the current server. The only thing that would be compelling enough for former players like me to resub and actually play (not afk), would be a new, retro server. Wony is delusional if he thinks minor improvements are going to make people excited about playing the game again. Even Oh San is a minor improvement in the grand scheme of things since it's so incredibly overdue. It's hard for people to get excited about a new feature when they already associate negative feelings toward it.

Speaking of which, please put your feelings about a second server aside for a second and listen to my experience. It's the familiar story of a former player who logged thousands of hours in the early '00s and came back to give it another go, which means I fall directly in this game's primary target market for growth. Just like many others, I returned to NexusTK on my own after navigating to NexusAtlas and getting the itch. I was greeted by the barren wasteland that was Tangun, but it was new content, so I didn't mind it initially. Once I got out, I ran around looking for hunts and was immediately frustrated by the lack of players to hunt with, but still joined a clan and had some fun for a couple months. The glaring problem was the game felt hollow due to the lack of players anywhere near my stats. I thought about restoring my Sam sans, but even that seemed pointless as I watched the same person sage for a hunt three times in a row without anyone else saging in between.

The only remedy for this hollow feeling and the quick departure of returning players is to get a substantial number of new players to all sub at the same time. I don't understand why this is hard for many of you to comprehend. A new, retro server will do exactly this. I promise you there isn't a single feature Wony could release on the existing server (including Oh San) that would get a significant number of players to resub simultaneously and be excited about playing for >3 months. A "ladder reset" in the form of a new server is a tried-and-true way of getting people hyped about an old game. You can whine all you want, but there's just no arguing against this. It has been proven countless times on private servers for this game and others, many of which are often inferior products. It is known.

There were 9 resets in November. These resets reveal that between 65% and 75% of players are afk at ~2am PST. This supports my test in August where I whispered people at 12:30pm PST on a Saturday to see how many were afk. I only received responses from 25% of players. Taking dual-accounting into consideration, I'd wager that the number of distinct active users is easily <33% of logged users at any given time. This means that, on average, there are about 66 humans playing NexusTK based on average logged-in users per day hovering around 200.

A new server, timed with a minimal marketing push, wouldn't need to attract many people to literally double the number of distinct active users. I'm not sure many current players realize just how far the population has fallen. A new, retro server is the only option for growing this game meaningfully. None of this should be groundbreaking. You can choose to live in a fairy tale where someday Wony is going to make some monumental change and magically triple the population overnight, or you can acknowledge the painfully obvious: My unpopular suggestion is our only way to significantly grow the game.

tl;dr If you care about growing NexusTK, you'll read this post biggrin.gif

Posted by: Krmit Nov 30 2016, 11:22 AM

a new "Retro" server is really not a solid answer. For comparison, i borrowed an old school nintendo from my buddy, because i was like "OHHH SNAP, GONNA PLAY ALL THESE OLD GAMES I USED TO PLAY"

Fact of the matter is 20 minutes into the games, the graphics were so depressing the nostalgia quickly wore off.

Also growing may mean new active registered accounts, that could be people who tried to get the coin boxes and regged more accounts for bank space, or who knows...

Posted by: halombobtk Nov 30 2016, 06:40 PM

QUOTE (Krmit @ Nov 30 2016, 12:22 PM) *
Fact of the matter is 20 minutes into the games, the graphics were so depressing the nostalgia quickly wore off.

I'm not sure if you made the graphics comment because you think retro server = retro graphics, or just current graphics being depressing. For clarity, I'm not pushing for retro graphics since there are far more important issues imo. I would just want whichever is easiest to code/maintain (guessing new graphics to keep in line with current server). Either way, your analogy is super weak. MMOs are addictive. Duck Hunt is not.

QUOTE
Also growing may mean new active registered accounts

Please don't be pedantic. DarkMaverick already brings enough of that to the table. We both know what growing the game means. NexusTK is unplayable because no one plays. People logging in for 10 minutes every day to click on an NPC doesn't make the game more playable. I know you're probably just trying to translate Wony's statement, but it distracts from the point of this post. Only distinct ACTIVE (see: not afk) users matter to those playing the game.

Posted by: Doctor Nov 30 2016, 07:57 PM

People don't play the game because the game sucks. Hunting isn't fun or challenging, items are static and boring, and to pk you need to grind stats hunting for years, and we're not even getting into the fact that the paths and subpaths have remained completely unbalanced for almost 2 decades now.

Unless a reset magically turns this into a completely different game, you're going to lose more players who don't want to play the same crap game over again than you'll gain people.

Posted by: halombobtk Nov 30 2016, 11:11 PM

QUOTE (Doctor @ Nov 30 2016, 07:57 PM) *
People don't play the game because the game sucks. Hunting isn't fun or challenging, items are static and boring, and to pk you need to grind stats hunting for years, and we're not even getting into the fact that the paths and subpaths have remained completely unbalanced for almost 2 decades now.

Unless a reset magically turns this into a completely different game, you're going to lose more players who don't want to play the same crap game over again than you'll gain people.


You're in a bubble. I don't think you realize how many people used to play this game, or don't get how few of them you actually knew. How big was your circle of friends when you played? 50 at most? >2k people have played this game at one point or another. Fun is subjective, and your opinion is not representative of the entire 2k+ former player pool. A new server only needs about 60 players to be profitable for Kru and fun for the non-crotchety folks who want to sink another 1k hours into the game as adults with disposable income. I don't think it's outlandish at all to assume 60 players would get hyped for a new server with extremely minimal marketing.

I'm down to put some money on it too. I can find an escrow account that generates a return for us, where both parties get their money back (+/- market returns obv) if a new server doesn't happen in two years. If a new server happens, the bet is on the number of active players after one year. Wouldn't be hard to define the terms. Any takers? I'd be willing to do something in the $1k-4k range, but might entertain smaller amounts. I really feel I'd be printing money with that bet.

Try to think objectively, people! Set your emotions aside. They really inhibit rational thought.

Posted by: Conro Dec 1 2016, 12:48 AM

This only thing that would bring me back to TK would be a complete overhaul of the game.

KRU doesn't understand...

- Item balance and keeping new/old items relevant so people WANT to pursue them
- Path balance
- Solo/Multiplayer balance
- What a time investment quest is
- PVP Balance
- How to make unique PVE game modes that encourage the player to try them ([Content removed] was able to create instanced content, raid bosses, so it's entirely possible on the platform)
- How to add features that don't punish the player
- How to monitor the game without lame in game punishments


The game just isn't fun compared to plenty of other games on the market. It was fun for what it was when MMOs were new, but they've done nothing to keep up with the market.

Posted by: Ace Dec 1 2016, 01:20 AM

I'm going to save myself the typing and just write the tldr:

I don't think a retro server is a good idea. I wouldn't play it aside from a brief log in to check it out.

Posted by: Brant Dec 1 2016, 09:55 AM

I don't think a new server is wise either. The grinding in this game would make it so that after a week, the somewhat large group of players who hunt 16 hours a day would again be so far ahead of anyone else, it would be a matter of months before the game was back in the same spot it was before.

Rather than offering a way to start over and do the same thing, KRU needs to fix what's wrong with the game first. If KRU addressed the issues that others have mentioned above, then maybe I would consider starting over. Until that happens, I'm not going to waste any of my time re-rolling on a game with a [Content removed] foundation.

Truthfully, I don't understand OP's fascination with starting over, it doesn't make any sense and I haven't seen a single person who's even agreed with OP. If you want a chance at enjoying the game the way it exists now, you'd just be better off buying an account for $100 and getting a 5 year head start. Ain't nobody got that much time to waste.

Posted by: Krmit Dec 1 2016, 04:58 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Nov 30 2016, 06:40 PM) *
I'm not sure if you made the graphics comment because you think retro server = retro graphics, or just current graphics being depressing. For clarity, I'm not pushing for retro graphics since there are far more important issues imo. I would just want whichever is easiest to code/maintain (guessing new graphics to keep in line with current server). Either way, your analogy is super weak. MMOs are addictive. Duck Hunt is not.


Please don't be pedantic. DarkMaverick already brings enough of that to the table. We both know what growing the game means. NexusTK is unplayable because no one plays. People logging in for 10 minutes every day to click on an NPC doesn't make the game more playable. I know you're probably just trying to translate Wony's statement, but it distracts from the point of this post. Only distinct ACTIVE (see: not afk) users matter to those playing the game.


IDK whats worse, you using stupid words to try to look smart like pedantic or comparing me to DM

Posted by: Krmit Dec 1 2016, 05:04 PM

QUOTE (Conro @ Dec 1 2016, 12:48 AM) *
This only thing that would bring me back to TK would be a complete overhaul of the game.

KRU doesn't understand...

- Item balance and keeping new/old items relevant so people WANT to pursue them
- Path balance
- Solo/Multiplayer balance
- What a time investment quest is
- PVP Balance
- How to make unique PVE game modes that encourage the player to try them ([Content removed] was able to create instanced content, raid bosses, so it's entirely possible on the platform)
- How to add features that don't punish the player
- How to monitor the game without lame in game punishments


The game just isn't fun compared to plenty of other games on the market. It was fun for what it was when MMOs were new, but they've done nothing to keep up with the market.


Right, and to be honest, even though the economy is not great, it is FAR more stable than many other games ive played.

On a side note, The fact they're introducing so much cash into the game at such a fast rate through these minor quests and new games is actually making money just stupid overall. They really need to find ways to sink money to keep prices stable. Money these days is completely useless whats the point of it, besides repairs? Its essentially being printed and just handed out by the 10's of thousands by just clicking an NPC.

Posted by: Mazel Dec 1 2016, 06:11 PM

Looks like a graph of what your mom did to me last night?

JK


Well not JK, but I think any effort spent on crying about the game is wasted. My opinion is that "it is what it is" and if you want to stop people from growing up and leaving the game you should probably go paraplegicize them, break them up with their significant others, etc.

Posted by: Doctor Dec 1 2016, 06:52 PM

What I don't understand is what we get out of a retro server. What does that bring to the table? Nostalgia? Great... let's all meet up and play Rodger Rabbit and Mavis Beacon Type Tester too.

Posted by: Hijack Dec 1 2016, 10:04 PM

this thread is cancer

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 1 2016, 10:17 PM

QUOTE (Brant @ Dec 1 2016, 10:55 AM) *
Truthfully, I don't understand OP's fascination with starting over, it doesn't make any sense and I haven't seen a single person who's even agreed with OP.




What's there to understand? I enjoyed the game thoroughly and never experienced any of the drama Conro did. I would easily pour >1k hours and $50/month into a new pre-Vortex, pre-Tangun server. There are loads of people that left Nexus, not because they were butthurt like you guys, but because they went off to college and life got in the way. There are plenty of those people who don't want to come back to the current server, but would come back to a new one. I'm not alone. If you follow the NexusTK subreddit, you'll be able to see a constant trickle of former players returning to the game and almost all of them are rolling new characters. It's so obvious those people would play on a new server.

The thing none of you properly understand is just how much of a bubble you live in. You take your own thoughts and feelings about the game and project them onto >2k nameless, faceless former players and millions of people who are a Steam advertisement away from discovering NexusTK. If you seriously believe that there aren't ~66 people who think differently than you about the game, you're probably a bit delusional. People get addicted to Candy Crush ffs.

Step outside your bubble and try to think rationally. The success of crappy private servers is all you need to point to. People love blank slates in grindy games. Kinda telling that no one took me up on my wager btw. So much confidence displayed in these replies, so little to back it up.

Posted by: Krmit Dec 2 2016, 10:05 AM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 1 2016, 10:17 PM) *
What's there to understand? I enjoyed the game thoroughly and never experienced any of the drama Conro did. I would easily pour >1k hours and $50/month into a new pre-Vortex, pre-Tangun server. There are loads of people that left Nexus, not because they were butthurt like you guys, but because they went off to college and life got in the way. There are plenty of those people who don't want to come back to the current server, but would come back to a new one. I'm not alone. If you follow the NexusTK subreddit, you'll be able to see a constant trickle of former players returning to the game and almost all of them are rolling new characters. It's so obvious those people would play on a new server.

The thing none of you properly understand is just how much of a bubble you live in. You take your own thoughts and feelings about the game and project them onto >2k nameless, faceless former players and millions of people who are a Steam advertisement away from discovering NexusTK. If you seriously believe that there aren't ~66 people who think differently than you about the game, you're probably a bit delusional. People get addicted to Candy Crush ffs.

Step outside your bubble and try to think rationally. The success of crappy private servers is all you need to point to. People love blank slates in grindy games. Kinda telling that no one took me up on my wager btw. So much confidence displayed in these replies, so little to back it up.


So you're basing your argument off of what "sexman510" has to say LOL to you sir.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 2 2016, 10:39 PM

QUOTE (Krmit @ Dec 2 2016, 11:05 AM) *
So you're basing your argument off of what "sexman510" has to say LOL to you sir.

You called pedantic a "stupid word" ffs.

Posted by: BeReal Dec 3 2016, 08:30 AM

QUOTE (Conro @ Dec 1 2016, 01:48 AM) *
This only thing that would bring me back to TK would be a complete overhaul of the game.

KRU doesn't understand...

- Item balance and keeping new/old items relevant so people WANT to pursue them
- Path balance
- Solo/Multiplayer balance
- What a time investment quest is
- PVP Balance
- How to make unique PVE game modes that encourage the player to try them ([Content removed] was able to create instanced content, raid bosses, so it's entirely possible on the platform)
- How to add features that don't punish the player
- How to monitor the game without lame in game punishments


The game just isn't fun compared to plenty of other games on the market. It was fun for what it was when MMOs were new, but they've done nothing to keep up with the market.


So what you mean to say is you're never coming back.

Posted by: Gabe Dec 3 2016, 12:54 PM

It isn't so much that people are trapped in a bubble, they just see the reality of the game, and they want it to change. They don't want Kru to invest time and resources into another server when they should be fixing the current state of the game.

Sure the old times were great. In the days when the community was large and full of active players, there was so much to do and enjoy. Those days are gone though. Accept it. It's human nature to want to return to better times and days. That isn't reality though.
Every month you post about a new server, or argue for one, and beat that dead horse into the dust. Kru doesn't want that. Wony doesn't want that. It isn't going happen. No matter how many people you have on your side, that's just the way things are.

The community in these forums feel a certain way. You know this by now. Instead of spending your time trying to change everyone's mind here, why not just stick to reddit since you have so much support there? I'll tell you right now, you aren't going to change anyone's mind here; they want this game to either die already or get fixed properly. That's it.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 3 2016, 01:51 PM

QUOTE (BeReal @ Dec 3 2016, 08:30 AM) *
So what you mean to say is you're never coming back.


Conro's posts are always going to be derailing because he has far higher standards for this game than the average former player. He knows its failings intricately and is an intelligent/analytical dude. The 2k+ target market of former players and their fam/friends, on average, are not as smart as Conro or anyone else in this thread except Krmit (lol). At the end of one year, only ~66 of them still need to be actively playing on the new server to make it a worthwhile endeavor. That would double the current number of active users and be a nice boost in revenue for Kru with microscopic variable costs. The license, AWS, building, devs, etc. are already paid for. I doubt they'd even need to hire someone new to build/maintain it, as they could simply dial back all the useless updates we've seen so far on the existing server. After launch, maintenance would be minimal. With retro pacing and maps, there is more than enough content to churn through for 1-3k hours with everyone starting new. Grinding to 99 would take ages compared to how it is now, and people would be making multiple characters to max Glory/Legends/Ancients. Mounts, crafting bags, and misc. kruna for every character would be more than enough to justify the project, even if it died after a couple years.

@Doctor - why do you discount the market for nostalgia so heavily? Just because you don't see value in it, doesn't mean others don't. I sound like a broken record, but not everyone left NexusTK because they fell out of love with it. Plenty of players, like me, went off to college and have been itching to get back into it now that the chaos of their 20s has started to settle down. NexusTK is the perfect casual MMO for people >25 since the gameplay is so simplistic you can just put on an audiobook, podcast, learn a foreign language, chat with friends/fam, etc. while you grind. Just look at the NTK subreddit. Every returning player is rolling a new character, and those people would so blatantly prefer to be on equal footing with others, progressing together. Getting leeched is super boring when that's the only real way to progress. It bastardizes the carefully planned dopamine schedule of the initial designers. Also important to note that all these returning players are doing so with zero effort by Kru. It would not be difficult to get a bunch of people to sub at the same time for a new, retro server with ~30 minutes of social media outreach (or the Steam push Wony has mentioned). It would also not be difficult to get a reasonable % of those players to stay for >12 months. MMOs are addicting by nature. I mean, people still play and donate to [Content removed] and it has serious issues. That's all the evidence you need to know that a new server would be viable.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 3 2016, 02:16 PM

QUOTE (Gabe @ Dec 3 2016, 12:54 PM) *
It isn't so much that people are trapped in a bubble, they just see the reality of the game, and they want it to change. They don't want Kru to invest time and resources into another server when they should be fixing the current state of the game.

Sure the old times were great. In the days when the community was large and full of active players, there was so much to do and enjoy. Those days are gone though. Accept it. It's human nature to want to return to better times and days. That isn't reality though.
Every month you post about a new server, or argue for one, and beat that dead horse into the dust. Kru doesn't want that. Wony doesn't want that. It isn't going happen. No matter how many people you have on your side, that's just the way things are.

The community in these forums feel a certain way. You know this by now. Instead of spending your time trying to change everyone's mind here, why not just stick to reddit since you have so much support there? I'll tell you right now, you aren't going to change anyone's mind here; they want this game to either die already or get fixed properly. That's it.


Solid post, but I have to correct you on these rather important statements you made:

"Kru doesn't want that. Wony doesn't want that."

First off, Kru and Wony have one priority: USD. Second, Wony himself said that my idea was interesting, just not something he wanted to pursue at this time (August '16). If they can pull off a second, retro server on the cheap, they will do it eventually because it's an obvious goldmine for kruna sales. People refuse to consider this because they're so fixated on their own wishes, as you mentioned in the first couple sentences of your post. I know I'm biased having studied finance in college, but I promise you small business owners don't think like NexusTK players. When its cash cow gets sick, Kru will do something about it. I, personally, don't want that something to be Wony stepping away again and neglecting the game til it dies of natural causes, so I'm going to continue to lobby everywhere I can for a new server. That's far more preferable to me - a last-ditch effort by Wony to get people excited about NexusTK again, rather than further neglect.

You can pretend people like me don't exist all you want, but here I am, in the flesh, happily typing away. I don't have to convince any of you. Any discussion is positive, since there are always lurkers on forums/reddit/fbook/community/dreams who are going to agree with me. And like I've said, Wony really doesn't need many of them for a new server to be profitable.

Posted by: Conro Dec 3 2016, 07:28 PM

Pretty much, yeah, I won't be back.

It was a great game for what it filled in the market at the time, but the current model just doesn't work.

The private server E-TK did a great job of getting me reeled in and hooking me for a few months. It had what the game lacked, and had a bit more attention (especially for being a free to play game). If anything, KRU could learn a few things (how to create instances, how to create raids, how to create dungeons with lockouts and worthwhile gear, how to make quests, how to strike a balance between gear treadmill and horizontal progression).


KRU won't do that though.

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 3 2016, 10:18 PM

Was there supposed to be a link in your post? I'm not sure what data you are referencing.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 3 2016, 10:55 PM

QUOTE (darkmaverick @ Dec 3 2016, 10:18 PM) *
Was there supposed to be a link in your post? I'm not sure what data you are referencing.


I embedded an image at the top of my OP. Looks fine for me mellow.gif

http://i65.tinypic.com/15cebsz.png

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 4 2016, 11:43 PM

Ah for some reason images didnt load for me the first time.

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 4 2016, 11:57 PM

I do not disagree with your conclusion that Nexus is stagnating but your solution I don't think will work.

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 3 2016, 02:16 PM) *
"Kru doesn't want that. Wony doesn't want that."

First off, Kru and Wony have one priority: USD.


This is true, but Wony's opinion on the best way to make money is not in line with anyone else's.

Wony has always operated this game with the intent to spend as little money as possible running the game while trying to milk the playerbase through item shop sales.

I hoped that would have changed when he started posting directly, but it seems obvious that KRU will not be making any substantial changes to its business model.

QUOTE
Second, Wony himself said that my idea was interesting, just not something he wanted to pursue at this time (August '16).


That was just a nice way of saying he has no intentions to do it.


I also don't understand the obsession with a so-called "retro server" but the problems with this have been debated to death I think. They really need to fix the current server's gameplay problems before making a new server.

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 3 2016, 01:51 PM) *
Conro's posts are always going to be derailing because he has far higher standards for this game than the average former player. He knows its failings intricately and is an intelligent/analytical dude. The 2k+ target market of former players and their fam/friends, on average, are not as smart as Conro or anyone else in this thread except Krmit (lol). At the end of one year, only ~66 of them still need to be actively playing on the new server to make it a worthwhile endeavor. That would double the current number of active users and be a nice boost in revenue for Kru with microscopic variable costs. The license, AWS, building, devs, etc. are already paid for. I doubt they'd even need to hire someone new to build/maintain it, as they could simply dial back all the useless updates we've seen so far on the existing server. After launch, maintenance would be minimal. With retro pacing and maps, there is more than enough content to churn through for 1-3k hours with everyone starting new. Grinding to 99 would take ages compared to how it is now, and people would be making multiple characters to max Glory/Legends/Ancients. Mounts, crafting bags, and misc. kruna for every character would be more than enough to justify the project, even if it died after a couple years.


Firstly, Conro's post aren't really derailing if he's just pointing out a differing point of view.

Secondly, Conro is not the only former player who has actually played other MMOs. If you play one MMO, you probably play others, too. The observations Conro has made can be made by anyone who has played any other MMO besides Nexus, especially any made in the past decade.

Thirdly, I think you are severely over-estimating how many people will actually pay $10 a month to play NexusTK circa 1999-2001. Part of the nostalgia was the people who were active at the time, and those still interested in MMOs are not going to be dumping WoW and FFXIV for a game where one or two buttons represents the vast majority of gameplay for each class, whether it is holding spacebar for Warriors, Ambush + Invis for Rogues, zaps for Mages and healspam for Poets. There is this mechanic called rotations which WoW introduced 12 years ago that almost everyone agrees was a novel improvement to the point every MMO does it now. Old-school Nexus gameplay just is not that compelling, and what people remember are more the players they played with rather than their absolute love of mashing the same button for five hours a night while they killed farm animals that respawned in one room.

If you want to spend money into proving me wrong, by all means make a clone of NexusTK circa 1999. It's not terribly difficult to do these days with all the software available and pixel tileset resources floating around the net for reasonable licenses. It doesn't have to look exactly like Nexus to be Nexus, and if people really want the gameplay they will come play it as you say. But I rather doubt it since will judge it against other MMOs. We know how well these mechanics will work out, because Nexus already did it. Even when there was only Ultima Online to compete with in the NA market, people overwhelmingly did not choose to play NexusTK, and as games like Everquest, Ragnarok Online, Dark Ages of Camelot and WoW came out people went to those games instead.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 5 2016, 01:32 AM

QUOTE (darkmaverick @ Dec 4 2016, 11:57 PM) *
Wony has always operated this game with the intent to spend as little money as possible running the game while trying to milk the playerbase through item shop sales.

Holy mother of god how do you guys not see that a new, retro server falls perfectly in line with this statement? I feel like I'm living in the Twilight Zone. A new server where you rehash old content is exactly how you milk a former player base. If it's easy for them to pull off, they'll do it eventually, simply for the kruna sales. Not a difficult concept here, fellas.
QUOTE
I also don't understand the obsession with a so-called "retro server" but the problems with this have been debated to death I think. They really need to fix the current server's gameplay problems before making a new server.

And I equally don't understand the obsession with turning an old, simple game like NexusTK into a modern MMO. Why not just play a modern MMO if that's what you're looking for?
QUOTE
Firstly, Conro's post aren't really derailing if he's just pointing out a differing point of view.

This is correct. Not the right word to use at all. It was a bad way of trying to say that his "necessary improvements" aren't relevant to my OP. They just don't matter much to the target market for a retro server. I liked the game with all its faults, and I'm not alone.
QUOTE
Secondly, Conro is not the only former player who has actually played other MMOs. If you play one MMO, you probably play others, too. The observations Conro has made can be made by anyone who has played any other MMO besides Nexus, especially any made in the past decade.

Still think you're giving the bottom half of the NexusTK player pool too much credit here (I guarantee many former NexusTK players have sunk time and money into Candy Crush and FarmVille). Even so, it's not like that will always deter people from wanting to play a familiar game. It should be clear by now that I tend to analyze the crap out of things, but there will always be people like me who still want to play a simplistic, retro game.
QUOTE
Thirdly, I think you are severely over-estimating how many people will actually pay $10 a month to play NexusTK circa 1999-2001.

Possibly, but you might also be severely over-estimating how much $10 means to people in their late 20s and 30s. If you zoom out just a little, Stelio's server looked a whole lot like NexusTK circa 1999-2001, yet people still pay >$10/month for it. No one ever seems to address that when I bring it up though - how convenient.
QUOTE
Part of the nostalgia was the people who were active at the time, and those still interested in MMOs are not going to be dumping WoW and FFXIV for a game where one or two buttons represents the vast majority of gameplay for each class, whether it is holding spacebar for Warriors, Ambush + Invis for Rogues, zaps for Mages and healspam for Poets. There is this mechanic called rotations which WoW introduced 12 years ago that almost everyone agrees was a novel improvement to the point every MMO does it now. Old-school Nexus gameplay just is not that compelling, and what people remember are more the players they played with rather than their absolute love of mashing the same button for five hours a night while they killed farm animals that respawned in one room.

You made my point for me laugh.gif. I've played rotation-based, modern MMOs, and guess what? After a few weeks/months, rotations are just as mundane as holding down spacebar, but with a little more carpal-tunnel. After you've figured out optimum builds/rotations, executing them is no different than spamming heal in NTK. You're using system 1 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking,_Fast_and_Slow) and it's no longer compelling. There's a reason single-player MMOs aren't fun for most people. No matter how intricate you make the rotations, theorycrafting, etc. people will always get bored if there's no one to play with. I'm of the mindset that dopamine scheduling and community are far more important than anything else for MMOs. NexusTK's original design nailed both. The community only has the chance to make a small comeback if enough people sub at the same time and all make characters together. Dismissing the value of a new server entirely shows that you aren't grasping this basic concept. I think part of the problem is that everyone seems to be fixated on the "retro" part. Hate to break it to ya, but that's wayyyyyyyy more likely to happen than some utopia where Wony modernizes everything.
QUOTE
If you want to spend money into proving me wrong, by all means make a clone of NexusTK circa 1999.

I want to play, not run, the game. Doing both is obv not an option.
QUOTE
We know how well these mechanics will work out, because Nexus already did it.

Yeah, game only lasted a measly eighteen [Content removed]ing years, rofl. How can you possibly be trying to make this argument? Game obv still fills a niche and lives on with zero marketing. I'm guessing 30 minutes of social media outreach is all you'd need to get people to check out a new server. A hundred or so show up for launch, tell friends/fam, and all of a sudden 66 active users isn't so outlandish.

Posted by: Doctor Dec 5 2016, 03:31 AM

Dude. I don't understand what what you think would be rehashed. The game's content right now is pretty much EXACTLY what it was 10 years ago, 15 years ago. The game is better now than it was back then, simply because there is more content now than there was back then. There is nothing better about "back then" than right now. The only difference was that NexusTK wasn't an archaic monstrosity of a game compared to what was around back then, and so more people played it. As more games came into the world, as better games came into the world, people left NexusTK.

Creating a retro server does nothing. It doesn't bring back anything that we don't have now. It doesn't change anything. The problems that have caused the game to die out right now would be the exact same problems that would exist in a retro server.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 5 2016, 10:06 AM

QUOTE (Doctor @ Dec 5 2016, 04:31 AM) *
The game's content right now is pretty much EXACTLY what it was 10 years ago, 15 years ago. The game is better now than it was back then, simply because there is more content now than there was back then. There is nothing better about "back then" than right now.

1. Takes 3 hours to get to 99 instead of 3 weeks. If you don't see the difference and why that matters, your brain must be switched off.
2. Adventure/Glory/Legends doesn't even exist anymore.
3. Quests are broken because everyone just has everything. Need a bunch of WBs for Rogue Moon? Just ask around, people will give you them for free.
4. Blank slate. <--- Stop fixating on the retro part of a new server, because this point is massive for a new server's target market.
5. There is zero incentive to take up most crafting efforts. Starting a new warrior who's a gemcutter? Everyone's already GM+. Pursuing a craft feels hollow because your clanmate can just do it for you. There goes about 1/4 of the game.
6. Starting a new character and looking to hunt? Oh ya, no one is anywhere near your stats. How do you not understand how this is different than a new server?
7. As a result of 6, leeching is the only real way to progress which makes the game incredible dull. Leeching would go away overnight on a retro server, then eventually come back in a vastly diminished state since old school NTK didn't have all the extreme leeching opportunities it does now.

I just gave you 7 real, tangible examples of how the two servers would be different (and I just woke up!). I'm guessing you won't directly address any of them, just like you didn't address anything from my last post where I @Doctor'd you. When one person pulls quotes and directly addresses them in an argument and the other doesn't, it's generally a sign that the person pulling quotes cares more and has a stronger argument. It shows I'm actually thinking, while you're on autopilot, spewing nonsense. I mean, saying "There is nothing better about 'back then' than right now" is just blatantly wrong. At the very least, you're ignoring all the community/dreams/reddit posts over the years of people wishing Glory/Legends were a thing again. It's so easy to poke holes in your posts, yet so difficult for you to poke holes in mine. 90% of the replies in this thread amount to "I don't think that will work" with weak or zero logic backing it up. Once again, DM is the only person who even tried because he's one of the only people on these forums who can think critically.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 5 2016, 10:39 AM

To emphasize how weak the replies were:

Out of 8 non-Conro or DM replies, 6 were incredibly short with nothing backing up their opinion. Not a great batting average.

Krmit made a four sentence post comparing it to old school nintendo (lol).

Your initial reply was three sentences saying people don't play because the game sucks, which is easily debunked by the fact that people keep coming back to it and about a hundred people still play it after 18 years. Every week there's a new player posting on the subreddit. Game obv doesn't suck to all those people.

Ace wrote two sentences saying "I don't think a retro server is a good idea. I wouldn't play it aside from a brief log in to check it out." That actually supports my argument, if anything. There is a nonzero chance people like him would log in and eventually stick around.

Brant, like always, made an attempt at an argument. Easily one of the highest-content posters on this forum. Still, his fear of one subset of hunters out-hunting everyone else is a non-issue. With retro progression, the hardcore hunters would still be making multiple characters for maxing Glory/Legends/Ancients, and pacing was so much slower that it would take thousands of hours for there to be a significant divide in the community. Even with a divide, the more casual hunters would still be progressing together.

Mazel's post was three sentences that included a "your mom" joke. The meat of his post referenced how a new server wouldn't work because too many former players have significant others, which is just goddamn ridiculous. Having significant others might even improve the chances for a new server since they have the potential to introduce them to the game. Also, can't really ignore the fact that MMO players skew heavily toward being single with lots of spare time.

Then, of course, another post by you comparing a game people used to put literally thousands of hours into to Mavis Beacon Type Tester. [Content removed]post if I've ever seen one.

Hijack offered three sentences simply asking where my supporters were, and I promptly showed him examples from reddit.

Gabe made an insightful post about why people on this forum are so resistant to the idea of a new server, and speculated about the chances of Kru ever actually doing it. I've addressed this, but all either of us can do is speculate when it comes to Wony. I truly believe it just comes down to it being easy to implement or not. If it's difficult at all to make a new server, it won't happen based on Wony's track record. If it's easy, I def see Wony doing it as a money-grab. Only a matter of time.

Posted by: Krmit Dec 5 2016, 02:54 PM

To be honest i only played nexus for as long as we did because i didnt have a cable modem and with AOL dial up as a kid, it was the cheapest, easiest game to play with the lowest requirements.

Now i just play because i can wipe my ass with 10 dollars so a month of this game or 2 beers at the bar, ill take the game. (and the beers)

Posted by: Doctor Dec 5 2016, 03:16 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 5 2016, 08:06 AM) *
1. Takes 3 hours to get to 99 instead of 3 weeks. If you don't see the difference and why that matters, your brain must be switched off.
2. Adventure/Glory/Legends doesn't even exist anymore.
3. Quests are broken because everyone just has everything. Need a bunch of WBs for Rogue Moon? Just ask around, people will give you them for free.
4. Blank slate. <--- Stop fixating on the retro part of a new server, because this point is massive for a new server's target market.
5. There is zero incentive to take up most crafting efforts. Starting a new warrior who's a gemcutter? Everyone's already GM+. Pursuing a craft feels hollow because your clanmate can just do it for you. There goes about 1/4 of the game.
6. Starting a new character and looking to hunt? Oh ya, no one is anywhere near your stats. How do you not understand how this is different than a new server?
7. As a result of 6, leeching is the only real way to progress which makes the game incredible dull. Leeching would go away overnight on a retro server, then eventually come back in a vastly diminished state since old school NTK didn't have all the extreme leeching opportunities it does now.

I just gave you 7 real, tangible examples of how the two servers would be different (and I just woke up!). I'm guessing you won't directly address any of them, just like you didn't address anything from my last post where I @Doctor'd you. When one person pulls quotes and directly addresses them in an argument and the other doesn't, it's generally a sign that the person pulling quotes cares more and has a stronger argument. It shows I'm actually thinking, while you're on autopilot, spewing nonsense. I mean, saying "There is nothing better about 'back then' than right now" is just blatantly wrong. At the very least, you're ignoring all the community/dreams/reddit posts over the years of people wishing Glory/Legends were a thing again. It's so easy to poke holes in your posts, yet so difficult for you to poke holes in mine. 90% of the replies in this thread amount to "I don't think that will work" with weak or zero logic backing it up. Once again, DM is the only person who even tried because he's one of the only people on these forums who can think critically.


1. Good.
2. So add another character slot or two to accounts and re-open them, they had existed well into the new client.
3. So make some new quests.
4. Game is a blank slate now.
5. So put more emphasis into crafting and create new items and recipes.
6. That's what happens to every MMO. WoW isn't creating a retro server either because most of their players are max level. How do you fix this? Make things more soloable and make long quest lines that give you experience well into marks.
7. Not true, and also leeching existed to a high degree before you even played.

Feel free to give me 7 more.

Posted by: Ace Dec 5 2016, 10:55 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 5 2016, 08:06 AM) *
3. Quests are broken because everyone just has everything. Need a bunch of WBs for Rogue Moon? Just ask around, people will give you them for free.


This may be generally true but I just came back to the game after a long hiatus and decided to do some sublime alliances. Finished all the bosses easy enough, but I've been trying to buy the keys for days and days and nobody has any. You need 160 boss drop items to complete a sublime alliance, and as you kill the bosses you probably collect about 60 of those which leaves you needing to buy 100 more, or kill a crap ton of bosses to get them all yourself. The pool of people selling mythic keys is nearly non-existent right now...

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 5 2016, 11:48 PM

QUOTE (Doctor @ Dec 5 2016, 04:16 PM) *
1. Good.
2. So add another character slot or two to accounts and re-open them, they had existed well into the new client.
3. So make some new quests.
4. Game is a blank slate now.
5. So put more emphasis into crafting and create new items and recipes.
6. That's what happens to every MMO. WoW isn't creating a retro server either because most of their players are max level. How do you fix this? Make things more soloable and make long quest lines that give you experience well into marks.
7. Not true, and also leeching existed to a high degree before you even played.

Feel free to give me 7 more.

Keep in mind I made this list in response to you saying a new server wouldn't be different. You're actively contradicting that stance right now, so let me preface this with: get rekt, etc.

1. Not good, imo. Dopamine scheduling, bruh. It's one of the biggest factors in a game being fun or a game being boring, and a huge part of retention. Discounting its importance basically means you know nothing, John Snow.
2. You do realize this is Kru you're asking to do this, right?
3. Again, you're asking for Kru to add new quests instead of rehashing already made quests. Take a wild guess which is more likely.
4. What the actual [Content removed], mate? You not understanding what a blank slate is concerns me.
5. Your third request for new content from a company that hasn't put out good content in the better part of a decade. GLHF
6. Your fourth request for new content from Kru. I believe WoW hasn't done it because:
a ) Expansions are a reliable method for them to boost subscriptions and new content allows for movies, collectibles, HotS/Hearthstone sales, etc.
b ) Status quo is always favored in big companies. They'd have to lay off tons of people who are working on new content
c ) Despite falling from astronomical heights, the game is still massive
7. This being true or not depends on your definition of viable. If you were forced to roll a new character right now, how much fun do you think you'd have grinding 30+ hours to 99 without getting leeched, knowing that others are doing it in 3? I don't think a sane person would get much enjoyment out of that, so I wouldn't consider it viable. How many hunts (not leeches) do you plan on getting once you get to 99? Every post indicates that it's a barren wasteland until you get to Flower 3, at which point you're likely just getting leeched again. Leeching is a bigger part of the game than it's ever been in the history of NTK. You can't deny that because as gaps between players increase and player population (hunt availability) decreases, leeching has to increase by definition. As for leeching existing to a high degree before I played, what do you mean exactly? Before the Great Shift? Who cares? In Yuri 40 there just weren't many great leeching opportunities. Hunting was focused around Mythic and the caves all had reasonable limits. I'm not sure what you're on about.

Out of 7 points, 4 of your responses included having Kru simply add more content blink.gif. If you don't get why this is funny, you must be new here.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 6 2016, 12:01 AM

QUOTE (Ace @ Dec 5 2016, 11:55 PM) *
This may be generally true but I just came back to the game after a long hiatus and decided to do some sublime alliances. Finished all the bosses easy enough, but I've been trying to buy the keys for days and days and nobody has any. You need 160 boss drop items to complete a sublime alliance, and as you kill the bosses you probably collect about 60 of those which leaves you needing to buy 100 more, or kill a crap ton of bosses to get them all yourself. The pool of people selling mythic keys is nearly non-existent right now...


This still falls in line with my statement of "Quests are broken because everyone already has everything" - sounds counter-intuitive, but let me explain.

When people generally have everything they need, market liquidity drops considerably. In a healthy economy, the price of Mythic keys would rise to a level where people felt incentivized to boss hunt. The low population, combined with a lot of apathetic players with millions of gold in the bank already, is a formula for market stagnation. People also might just feel burnt out on how tedious their own Sublimes were. That's a tonnnn of bosses to kill.

Of course, it's possible that you're just not offering enough. Everyone has a price! Best of luck - you'll get there eventually.

Posted by: Doctor Dec 6 2016, 03:39 AM

You think that making a retro server would take LESS EFFORT than putting more content into the game.

I think we can be done with this now.

Posted by: KoLD Dec 6 2016, 04:49 AM

Odd feeling when I agree with Doctor. tongue.gif

Seriously, Nexus now is so much better. Sure, I enjoyed the old graphics, in the same way I enjoy pulling my SNES out and playing Earthbound. However, the game has advanced a lot through the years. I know I wouldn't want to go back waiting for Horse 3 LR Or Ox because it was the only decent experience. tongue.gif

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 6 2016, 09:59 AM

QUOTE (Doctor @ Dec 6 2016, 03:39 AM) *
You think that making a retro server would take LESS EFFORT than putting more content into the game.

Yes. Don't you have special insight into this? Please elaborate if so - that would be the easiest way to shut me up. Maybe DM can weigh in. Last I checked, copy+paste was a thing in computing. Also, the delete key is a thing. Dev presses delete until only pre-Vortex caves remain, delete overflow, delete Woodlands, delete Nagnang, delete Tangun, control+c, control+v, and voila! New, retro server. It's not like you're reinventing the wheel - the code is already there. I'm guessing it would take a single person one month to do this project once they understand how everything works. A year from now, the new devs Wony hired this year should be familiar enough to pull it off, no? Maybe tack on another month for Wony to set up CRM stuff, prep kruna shop, etc. The problem with asking for new content is that it's not easy to dream up new, solid content. It's far easier to reuse content that's already been built. No creativity necessary.
QUOTE
Odd feeling when I agree with Doctor. tongue.gif

Seriously, Nexus now is so much better. Sure, I enjoyed the old graphics, in the same way I enjoy pulling my SNES out and playing Earthbound. However, the game has advanced a lot through the years. I know I wouldn't want to go back waiting for Horse 3 LR Or Ox because it was the only decent experience. tongue.gif

Not calling for old graphics. I couldn't care less which graphics they use. The nice thing about a new server, is you wouldn't be stuck for nearly as long in Horse3 or Sheep3 because they could just copy/paste Vortex caves at that point. It would be a loooong time for that to even be an issue if you recall how slow pacing used to be. It took years to get to that point. I'm not sure people fully understand how long things would take, starting from scratch. There would be no clans, which is a massive gold sink and makes crafting take longer without warps/NPCs. The initial grind to 99 alone would take weeks, if not months. Selling exp at 99 would be meaningful again.

Posted by: Brant Dec 6 2016, 12:03 PM


Posted by: Songa Dec 6 2016, 12:36 PM

Pretty sure I've said this before but I remember when the game transferred to the new graphics we see now. There was an option in the loading screen to play the new or old graphics. The old graphics were horribly bugged and were eventually rid of. I might be wrong but I'm fairly certain that it was two different servers. What you're suggesting has already been tried. It didn't work. I obviously have no idea why it didn't work. I just know that we did have an old graphics server that was too buggy to bother keeping. A lot of players wanted it but it simply didn't work out.

Also, if this somehow was figured out and made to work, starting completely fresh would likely kill the other server. They have one now that they barely do anything for. Can't imagine how little they'd do with two.

Posted by: Xing-Yu Seong Dec 6 2016, 04:58 PM

QUOTE (Songa @ Dec 6 2016, 12:36 PM) *
Pretty sure I've said this before but I remember when the game transferred to the new graphics we see now. There was an option in the loading screen to play the new or old graphics. The old graphics were horribly bugged and were eventually rid of. I might be wrong but I'm fairly certain that it was two different servers.


Almost! As it was an option existed in the client, it was just a switch. The graphics were on an offset, and they had a fancy excel spreadsheet (SQL tables!) to say "when you select this, translate X tile to Y tile". Having done maps for some of the privates, I can tell you that the client contains every graphic current and old in it. Running two servers would mean that people on that server would be logging into a different resource. There would have been a separate login server, two Kugnaes, etc etc. That would have incredibly resource intensive, and knowing that they hosted on Windows 2003 servers for... forever, seems unlikely. smile.gif

Posted by: Doctor Dec 6 2016, 05:26 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 6 2016, 07:59 AM) *
Yes. Don't you have special insight into this? Please elaborate if so - that would be the easiest way to shut me up. Maybe DM can weigh in. Last I checked, copy+paste was a thing in computing. Also, the delete key is a thing. Dev presses delete until only pre-Vortex caves remain, delete overflow, delete Woodlands, delete Nagnang, delete Tangun, control+c, control+v, and voila! New, retro server. It's not like you're reinventing the wheel - the code is already there. I'm guessing it would take a single person one month to do this project once they understand how everything works. A year from now, the new devs Wony hired this year should be familiar enough to pull it off, no? Maybe tack on another month for Wony to set up CRM stuff, prep kruna shop, etc. The problem with asking for new content is that it's not easy to dream up new, solid content. It's far easier to reuse content that's already been built. No creativity necessary.


No that's not how it works. You can't just delete code and then things revert back to how they are. Think of it like like a sweater. You don't just get to pull out the threads you don't like and all of a sudden it becomes a t-shirt. Everything is mixed in with each other.

I don't think anyone wants to play a "retro" NexusTK except for you. Furthermore, what's the end goal? The game was BAD back then, it would be even worse now. So yeah, great, selling exp at 99 becomes relevant again. So in many years the game just becomes what it is now. 99 is easy to get to, leeching is simple, etc. So then what? We re-retro once again?

This feels like the least fleshed out idea of all time for so many reaons.

Posted by: Xing-Yu Seong Dec 6 2016, 05:53 PM

QUOTE (Doctor @ Dec 6 2016, 05:26 PM) *
No that's not how it works. You can't just delete code and then things revert back to how they are. Think of it like like a sweater. You don't just get to pull out the threads you don't like and all of a sudden it becomes a t-shirt. Everything is mixed in with each other.

I don't think anyone wants to play a "retro" NexusTK except for you. Furthermore, what's the end goal? The game was BAD back then, it would be even worse now. So yeah, great, selling exp at 99 becomes relevant again. So in many years the game just becomes what it is now. 99 is easy to get to, leeching is simple, etc. So then what? We re-retro once again?

This feels like the least fleshed out idea of all time for so many reaons.



Yeah, having read through this, I would have to agree.

There are too many systems tied in to build a server to begin with. Look at any of the private servers from a technical standpoint.
They have to set up a host, spend hundreds of hours just to define the parameters for what does what when, and then creates thousands of entries for items, stats, etc. It is no easy task. The mechanics of how this game works is math. The math is bad. It has been bad since I can remember. The Poet tutors of days old would spend a long, long time pouring over the math trying to figure out Ret. RET wasn't just 33%, there was more to it. The game works on such a simple engine that when the math is bad, it really shows.

I have always thought that Free To Play until 99, and getting rid of Tangun would be great. Replace the time-gating with registering. Make certain functions related to communication limited. People are too concerned with abuse they are letting the game die. Keep some of the Trials, but streamline the process. If people could just log in, it'd be awesome, but could the servers handle it? Who knows.

I will be the first to admit some of my ideas are flawed. But to segment an entire population in the game for a quick cash-infusion that would take more man-hours to do, and probably ROI very little, is not the answer. The problems that exist in this game will continue to exist on any other server there is. You cannot just undo all these changes, because that is WAY too much work, and a ton of risk on Kru's part.

Creating a separate server would be another Tangun all over again. If you foster segmentation, you will only get splinters. That's how we got this weird elitism with Player-controlled justice, ministries, clans, and paths. People could control your destiny in this game, and that's a huge detriment if a clique of people have power over you.

Posted by: Xyphier Dec 6 2016, 05:59 PM

Sorry, but as much as you would like a retro-server to be the end-all be-all solution, the truth of the matter is that it isn't.

If you ask me, and I think everyone can agree, the #1 issue that needs to be resolved before anything else, is to address the current server infrastructure.

Now, I don't know what Wony has planned for bringing in new players (advertising, selling through steam, etc) but if we think the server lag and the client freezing every several minutes is bad now, think of how bad it will get when add more players and how quickly that will detract those new players from wanting to pay/continue playing.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 6 2016, 10:21 PM

QUOTE
That would have incredibly resource intensive, and knowing that they hosted on Windows 2003 servers for... forever, seems unlikely.

Aren't they on AWS now?
QUOTE (Doctor @ Dec 6 2016, 06:26 PM) *
This feels like the least fleshed out idea of all time for so many reaons.

Says the guy who can't spellcheck his posts =/. What a perfect way to end this reply!

It's so baffling to me that all of you frequent this forum - one that gets ~one post per day on average - yet you don't take the time to actually read the posts. Why even come here? I've had to say it sosososo many times. I'm not asking for retro graphics. All I've been lobbying for is a pre-Vortex, pre-Tangun, pre-Nagnang blank slate server. Who cares about the graphics?? They're both retro-looking. Whatever's easiest to implement is what Wony would do anyway, so I'm guessing he'd use the newer graphics.
QUOTE
I don't think anyone wants to play a "retro" NexusTK except for you.

Again with the nonexistent reading comprehension. I've posted recent evidence of supporters in this very thread (bottom of page 1). Why would you ever think I'm the only person out of >2k former players who feels this way? Am I Jesus or something? Neo?
QUOTE
So in many years the game just becomes what it is now.

That's totally and completely fine. 1k-3k hours from a new server would be a success, and no one would even have to get to Sa San. I don't think you can reasonably ask for much more than that considering we're down to ~66 active users on average. Anything that gets people excited to play again for more than a year should be viewed as overwhelmingly positive. Oh San might accomplish this, but I'm skeptical since the vast majority of former players aren't Oh stats. Most of the people trickling in since August have been rolling new characters, and it's not like I'll be restoring my Sam Sans when Oh San gets released. I would've done it for Sa if that were the case. Other former players fit this logic. A blank slate is far more appealing to us than anything else, which is why new servers have worked in the past.
QUOTE
No that's not how it works. You can't just delete code and then things revert back to how they are. Think of it like like a sweater. You don't just get to pull out the threads you don't like and all of a sudden it becomes a t-shirt. Everything is mixed in with each other.

I think my favorite part of your logic here is how I have a conversation from reddit that I can link where you argue how easy it is to code this game. Surely removing maps/caves isn't as hard as you're making it out to be. How long do you think it would take you, personally, to take the existing code and make a retro server out of it? Be honest.

Posted by: Hijack Dec 7 2016, 09:38 PM

this thread is cancer

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 7 2016, 09:51 PM

QUOTE (Hijack @ Dec 7 2016, 09:38 PM) *
I didn't think it was possible for anyone to get to DarkMaverick's level, but you sir... you did it. Congratulations.

You want a retro server? Hire me and I'll make you one.


Honestly, not terrible company to be in. We think critically, convey opinions with semi-coherent arguments, and have both owned our own businesses. I'm guessing if I continue to post on these forums, I will eventually have as many "bad day" posts as DM, though I like to think I've got a decent handle on identifying when I'm being irrational/heated. If you look through my NTK reddit posts, there are plenty of times where I was being a dick to people, but just look at yourselves - so many posts exclusively written to belittle someone. I could pull a bunch of examples from my threads alone.

How long do you think it would take you? What would your strategy be? Do you have access to the current code or would you be forced to start from scratch?

Posted by: Hijack Dec 7 2016, 10:19 PM

this thread is cancer

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 8 2016, 09:11 AM

QUOTE
so many posts exclusively written to belittle someone.

QUOTE (Hijack @ Dec 7 2016, 11:19 PM) *
lol this guy

Like clockwork.

Posted by: Brant Dec 8 2016, 10:09 AM

It's happening

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKorP55Aqvg

Posted by: Songa Dec 8 2016, 01:38 PM

QUOTE (Xing-Yu Seong @ Dec 6 2016, 04:58 PM) *
Almost! As it was an option existed in the client, it was just a switch. The graphics were on an offset, and they had a fancy excel spreadsheet (SQL tables!) to say "when you select this, translate X tile to Y tile". Having done maps for some of the privates, I can tell you that the client contains every graphic current and old in it. Running two servers would mean that people on that server would be logging into a different resource. There would have been a separate login server, two Kugnaes, etc etc. That would have incredibly resource intensive, and knowing that they hosted on Windows 2003 servers for... forever, seems unlikely. smile.gif



Thanks for the clarification! It makes more (or less, depending on how you look at it) sense now. It sounds far more complicated than I thought haha. I honestly don't get the appeal in trying to fix this massively broken game. It would be easier to start fresh. Nexon knew that, that's why they left to create their own company.

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 8 2016, 09:17 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 6 2016, 09:59 AM) *
Yes. Don't you have special insight into this? Please elaborate if so - that would be the easiest way to shut me up. Maybe DM can weigh in. Last I checked, copy+paste was a thing in computing. Also, the delete key is a thing. Dev presses delete until only pre-Vortex caves remain, delete overflow, delete Woodlands, delete Nagnang, delete Tangun, control+c, control+v, and voila! New, retro server. It's not like you're reinventing the wheel - the code is already there. I'm guessing it would take a single person one month to do this project once they understand how everything works. A year from now, the new devs Wony hired this year should be familiar enough to pull it off, no? Maybe tack on another month for Wony to set up CRM stuff, prep kruna shop, etc. The problem with asking for new content is that it's not easy to dream up new, solid content. It's far easier to reuse content that's already been built. No creativity necessary.


Hypothetically? Maybe.

Realistically? I doubt it. I wouldn't be surprised to learn one of the core problems with NexusTK has been years of low paid programmers using all kinds of shortcuts and tricks, with code referencing some other code buried deeply in some obscure file. And there may or may not actually be any detailed documentation about what code does what. I mean, supposedly they "lost" the code to some event enemies like Zibongs. It's probably not lost, it's just buried on the server somewhere because Grin decided he would have job security if he was the only one who could understand his code.

This is just speculation, of course. But I don't know why anyone would want to delete decades of content that they have been paying for people to develop, unless it really hurts the game, which sure some of it does but only because it needs a few tweaks to correct the problem. So sure they could start deleting stuff but I suspect they would need to do a lot of bug testing to find all the [Content removed] that breaks when they start deleting stuff.

There is a difference between fixing a few leaky pipes in your house, and throwing your entire plumbing system out to replace it. And right now the analogy would be to replace all of the leaking PVC pipes with corroded rusty ones.

Also, Hijack would probably just take the server code the NexusTK clones are using and develop a stand alone client for it -- which honestly, that's what all these people making emulators should have done to begin with.

I will save you some time though. Go look at Illutia, which is pretty much exactly what you are thinking. Go see how poorly that game is doing and then re-evaluate whether this is really as amazing of a commercial idea as you think it is.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 8 2016, 11:46 PM

Thanks for the posts, fellas.

@Brant Lol, not sure how I haven't seen that before. So good. Yes, lots of similarities, but there are some important differences. The people in the video were asking for impossible things. It should be obv that what I'm asking for isn't impossible, since it's literally been done before. All the maps, monster values, dmg multipliers, item stats, quests, etc. are plastered on this very site. The other important concept that gets lost in all this is the power of a blank slate. Even if you simply duped the current server and nuked all the heroes, it would draw a crowd. Former players who are thinking about returning, including me, would go nuts over a blank slate. It's the same reason why every private server has had success, despite ugly maps, bugs, and annoying GMs like Stelio. Racing to 99/Il/Ee is fun for some people, even if only for a year or two.

It also doesn't help your argument much when Doctor (possibly the most qualified person in this thread to speak on the matter) says things like this to me on reddit:



@DM "Go look at Illutia, which is pretty much exactly what you are thinking." Err, I'd look at it but their Game FAQ is just a broken link. Gunna go ahead and assume your comparison is lacking.

Posted by: Doctor Dec 9 2016, 05:15 AM

Let me make it super simple, and also state that Hijack is more qualified than me to speak on this:

Adding to the current game, "creating" a private server, easy.

Removing things from the current game, "reverting" the current game into a private server, not easy.

If you want to make a retro server that's like old school nexus I'll give you all the files to go run a private server of Aspereta. It's essentially the same thing as old school Nexus but it has a tiered dungeon system that you can get gear from. Enjoy. https://github.com/kyokokken/jGoose

Posted by: Hijack Dec 9 2016, 08:12 AM

this thread is cancer

Posted by: OwnageII Dec 9 2016, 10:29 AM

QUOTE (Hijack @ Dec 9 2016, 09:12 AM) *
tbh a server with buya, kugnae, wilderness and mythic wouldn't take that long to create

the hardest part would be getting all the maps, but if I remember right one of our friendly archons went through and helped with that

but nobody wants to do it because only 5-10 people would play and it would be a waste of time


This.

Would just need the maps.

Posted by: Doctor Dec 9 2016, 01:52 PM

Right but remember this guy wants a retro server. Implement that packet throttle and all the buggy [Content removed] from back then to go along with it.

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 9 2016, 07:30 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 8 2016, 11:46 PM) *
@DM "Go look at Illutia, which is pretty much exactly what you are thinking." Err, I'd look at it but their Game FAQ is just a broken link. Gunna go ahead and assume your comparison is lacking.


Your first impulse was to go to GameFAQs rather than just Googling its website?

Illutia is a perfect comparison because the game was originally made by Inkey, a Nexus player who wanted exactly the old school NexusTK experience you are wanting.


Posted by: halombobtk Dec 9 2016, 10:01 PM

QUOTE (darkmaverick @ Dec 9 2016, 08:30 PM) *
Your first impulse was to go to GameFAQs rather than just Googling its website?

Illutia is a perfect comparison because the game was originally made by Inkey, a Nexus player who wanted exactly the old school NexusTK experience you are wanting.

The "Game FAQ" button on the Illutia website is broken. Also, "exactly the old school NexusTK experience" I want is not a completely different game. What the actual [Content removed]?

We're fixating on the wrong things here. Former players who are coming back to the game are creating new heroes, not restoring old ones. It's not even an option right now. >90% of these players will prefer to start out on even footing (or close to it), on a server with a fresh, non-broken economy. All I am personally looking for is a blank slate with the same quests I remember, the same carnages, bloodlusts, elixir wars, fox hunts, the same caves, the same crafting, the same handful of maps. None of you are really making it sound like this is difficult to pull off, which makes sense because I'm simply asking for rehashed content. The request is supposed to be simple because I try to stay firmly planted in reality. Wony just isn't going to implement all the changes you guys want.

I really enjoyed Mythic being a central hub where people hung out to find hunts, and this is a popular opinion among former players looking to rejoin the game (so, none of you people in this echo chamber of a thread). It's important to keep the number of maps/caves small when the player base of your game is small. This keeps it from feeling like a single-player MMO ghost town.

Not all former players will want all the things I listed, but the blank slate part is important. I also feel it needs to be Kru-sponsored, Tangun-less, and less laggy. I'm not sure any of the other "retro" things really matter. I'm just speculating what people would enjoy the most out of our extremely limited options for ways to grow the game significantly. All the wishes for new, modern content is just lol to me. It's like none of you have been paying attention for the last 10 years, or the last 6 months in particular.

Hijack, if you really think only 5-10 people would play, let's bet on it. I would happily take the over on that amount of daily avg users after a new server was up for a year. Would you take the under on 10.5 people?

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 10 2016, 03:17 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 9 2016, 10:01 PM) *
The "Game FAQ" button on the Illutia website is broken. Also, "exactly the old school NexusTK experience" I want is not a completely different game. What the actual [Content removed]?


Indeed. You seem to think a half-assed excuse like part of the website being broken is an excuse for not downloading the client and checking the game out to verify what I am saying. Or, you know, at least looking at some YouTube videos. Rather you want to discard the existence of Illutia, which is pretty much what you are arguing for in terms of game mechanics. But now we get to the heart of what you're really after; you want to play a rolled back version of NexusTK from when you first registered an account and personally re-live what you recall as its glory days. You do not actually care about its present commercial appeal in the market, and you just want to personally re-live that period of time from your life.

Well, sorry but that's profoundly nonsensical for so many reasons, as we are about to get into.

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 9 2016, 10:01 PM) *
We're fixating on the wrong things here. Former players who are coming back to the game are creating new heroes, not restoring old ones. It's not even an option right now. >90% of these players will prefer to start out on even footing (or close to it), on a server with a fresh, non-broken economy. All I am personally looking for is a blank slate with the same quests I remember, the same carnages, bloodlusts, elixir wars, fox hunts, the same caves, the same crafting, the same handful of maps. None of you are really making it sound like this is difficult to pull off, which makes sense because I'm simply asking for rehashed content. The request is supposed to be simple because I try to stay firmly planted in reality. Wony just isn't going to implement all the changes you guys want.


"Former players who are coming back"? Your own data indicates this isn't a true statement. Nobody is coming back.

Maybe people log onto a newbie because they get nostalgic and just want to check out the game for abit, or even go to re-reg an old account. But then they quickly recall the reasons why they left in the first place and they leave. It isn't because some people have millions more vita than they do or because people do not sit AFK in Mythic Vale occasionally saging for a party or an item they are selling. They leave because the game is not as fun as other MMOs. It offers nothing of substantial improvement in any particular area. A lot of the people still actively playing are addicts who have serious problems in their personal lives and are avoiding reality for the feeling of elitism, power and community they get from playing the same online game for the past two decades of their life. It isn't healthy and it's certainly not an indicator that a new server is what they want. It is actually rather tragic because out of the nigh infinite number of things they could be doing with their lives, they decided to invest their time and money into a [Content removed] game made by a company that doesn't care about them. And somehow in all of this, you think a new server with features you are personally nostalgic for will be a grand hit?

Nostalgia can be a powerful thing but looking at the past with rose-colored glasses makes for a terrible business plan. The game had humongous problems even in its heyday which is why it was the LEAST MOST POPULAR MMO AT THE TIME WHEN THERE WAS ONLY A HANDFUL OF MMOs.. Ultima Online, Everquest, and Lineage had way more players. Hell, the original Baram in Korea was vastly more popular than NexusTK ever was, because NexusTK was horribly managed from day 1. There was a period of three years where the game introduced absolutely no new content, and just recycled the same seasonal events with little to no changes whatsoever. We once went an entire year with no GM. This is not some spectacular design that everyone universally loved and appreciated. A lot of older players stuck around primarily because of the friendships they formed with people and not because the game was that fun to play. As newer, significantly better designed and managed MMOs came out, the playerbase gradually left for those.

You can invent any kind of idea you like for why the game was never popular but I played the game for a substantial number of years during this heyday period you speak of. I even recall the full page PC Gamer ad that Nexon took out and included a CD download of the game client. We got an influx of newbies for a few weeks, and then it petered out after about a month, because people just did not enjoy the crappy mechanics and limited gameplay compared to other MMOs that were out at the time. That is just the blunt truth. The game had problems and under Wony's management, they never got addressed because he hires people totally unqualified to be GMs of an MMO to run his games.

Frankly, there is not that many people who want to roll back the clock on a [Content removed]ty game to a point in time where it was even [Content removed]tier than it is now. The game needs its current issues resolved so that it can become popular enough for a second server. Right now it isn't even popular enough for one server.

I swear, NexusTK and City of Heroes have some of the most anal die-hard fanboys of any MMOs out there, who even when faced with the blunt truth reality that their most favorite game in the universe actually had critical flaws that led to their decline, they just refuse to accept it because they found something within that period of their life they can't let go of, and it has nothing -- absolutely nothing at all -- to do with the way they game mechanics were, and everything to do with the personal importance they placed into the game at a [Content removed]ty period of their life. That is the only way I can rationalize the obsession with remembering terrible game mechanic choices as some kind of thing everyone universally loved and that if only the game would be back to its former crappy state, everything would be right in the world.

You got to get over it, man. The version of NexusTK you want to play never really existed to begin with and the reason people can universally disagree with your ideas is because we all lived through this version of the game you are talking about, and we remember how it actually was rather than how you recall it to have been.

Posted by: Doctor Dec 10 2016, 06:09 PM

People aren't restoring their old characters because KRU isn't doing that service anymore. Not be cause they want to make and play new characters.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 11 2016, 12:46 AM

DM getting rekt in 3...2...1...

QUOTE (darkmaverick @ Dec 10 2016, 04:17 PM) *
Indeed. You seem to think a half-assed excuse like part of the website being broken is an excuse for not downloading the client and checking the game out to verify what I am saying. Or, you know, at least looking at some YouTube videos. Rather you want to discard the existence of Illutia, which is pretty much what you are arguing for in terms of game mechanics.

Website being broken is quite the red flag. At least NTK has the (lolworthy) "Comming soon" in some sections of its game guide, but a broken link is unprofessional af and shows instantly that it's just another bad knockoff made by a hobbyist. All I had to do was look at one screenshot to know that it wasn't even a NTK clone. No thx. How lost are you right now on what former players want? It's not just about the [Content removed]ing game mechanics. It's about playing the same game they used to love. Not an imitation - the same exact game. How is this so hard for you to understand? Like, I get you not wanting it for yourself, but how are you so bad at understanding the thoughts/feelings of others who aren't like you?
QUOTE
But now we get to the heart of what you're really after; you want to play a rolled back version of NexusTK from when you first registered an account and personally re-live what you recall as its glory days.

DING [Content removed]ING DING [Content removed]ING DING!
QUOTE
You do not actually care about its present commercial appeal in the market, and you just want to personally re-live that period of time from your life.

Sigh. The present commercial appeal in the market is a new server and always will be since people aren't stupid and no one wants to start an MMO years behind with no one else near their lvl/stats. This is common sense for me, yet monumentally difficult to understand for you.
QUOTE
"Former players who are coming back"? Your own data indicates this isn't a true statement. Nobody is coming back.

November's numbers show stagnation. We both know you're smart enough to know this can mean new players filtering in as old players get fed up with Wony's scummy money-grabs. It can also mean returning players coming back, then quickly leaving because it's not the product they wanted. Judging by these reddit posts, that is likely to be what's happening, though it's probably a combination of both.

That's 10 former players in the last two months alone who revisited the game and posted in the subreddit. It sounds like all but one (freshprincetrex) or two (greensky - not sure on this one) of them started from scratch, and many of them mentioned wanting to experience the 1-99 content again. 10 players that required a $0 marketing budget, zero social media outreach, and that number doesn't include potential friends/family or the rest of the nameless/faceless people waiting in the shadows for something to happen. If people are trickling back in without any real news, then the announcement of a new server would surely garner interest. It only needs to appeal to a hundred or so people to be a success based on microscopic variable costs for Kru.
QUOTE
Maybe people log onto a newbie because they get nostalgic and just want to check out the game for abit, or even go to re-reg an old account. But then they quickly recall the reasons why they left in the first place and they leave.

Or, the farfarfar more likely reason is because they returned hoping to have the same experience they had in high school, but the game is hollow and boring because no one is anywhere near their stats and everything seems different. Tangun is an aberration that they don't remember from their childhood, and no one hunts in Mythic anymore. You have such a strange relationship with this game that it's impossible to get into the shoes of someone who quit in 2006 after going off to college and hasn't registered since. They don't give a [Content removed] about the game being improved, or any of the drama that you've wrapped yourself up in over the years. There were hundreds, if not thousands of people who played the game without ever getting involved in subpath, archon, or clan drama. Those are the people who are coming back, and those are who this new server would be targeted at. It's by far the biggest segment of former players. Everyone in this thread represents the delusional minority who have completely different desires than the avg NTKer of the early '00s.
QUOTE
It isn't because some people have millions more vita than they do or because people do not sit AFK in Mythic Vale occasionally saging for a party or an item they are selling. They leave because the game is not as fun as other MMOs. It offers nothing of substantial improvement in any particular area. A lot of the people still actively playing are addicts who have serious problems in their personal lives and are avoiding reality for the feeling of elitism, power and community they get from playing the same online game for the past two decades of their life. It isn't healthy and it's certainly not an indicator that a new server is what they want.

Damn, dude. For owning your own business, you really seem to struggle with basic marketing concepts. You're rambling about a completely different segment of the market.
QUOTE
I even recall the full page PC Gamer ad that Nexon took out and included a CD download of the game client. We got an influx of newbies for a few weeks, and then it petered out after about a month, because people just did not enjoy the crappy mechanics and limited gameplay compared to other MMOs that were out at the time.

I had no idea about this. How funny! Thanks for sharing.
QUOTE
I swear, NexusTK and City of Heroes have some of the most anal die-hard fanboys of any MMOs out there, who even when faced with the blunt truth reality that their most favorite game in the universe actually had critical flaws that led to their decline, they just refuse to accept it because they found something within that period of their life they can't let go of, and it has nothing -- absolutely nothing at all -- to do with the way they game mechanics were, and everything to do with the personal importance they placed into the game at a [Content removed]ty period of their life. That is the only way I can rationalize the obsession with remembering terrible game mechanic choices as some kind of thing everyone universally loved and that if only the game would be back to its former crappy state, everything would be right in the world.

Uh, you're posting on nexusforums.com right now. Are you in denial or do you accept that you are just as [Content removed]ed up, if not more, as the people you just [Content removed] on?
QUOTE
You got to get over it, man. The version of NexusTK you want to play never really existed to begin with

I promise you 100% that NTK existed in the early '00s and I did play it. Are you drunk?
QUOTE
and the reason people can universally disagree with your ideas is because we all lived through this version of the game you are talking about, and we remember how it actually was rather than how you recall it to have been.

DM being smug/holier-than-thou? Wouldn't be a NF thread without some of that. Fun is subjective, bud. People like Nickelback, Candy Crush, Taco Bell, and Bud Light. This is the world we live in. Not everyone is like you. In fact, it should be obvious based on how [Content removed]ing weird you are that most people aren't anything like you at all.
QUOTE
People aren't restoring their old characters because KRU isn't doing that service anymore. Not be cause they want to make and play new characters.

@Doctor - Read the reddit posts. So much evidence of the contrary on reddit, yet here you are, spewing bull[Content removed] again. Get rekt, fellas.

Posted by: Doctor Dec 11 2016, 06:23 PM

So all but one or two of those people couldn't get their original chars unpurged...


Posted by: Hijack Dec 11 2016, 09:06 PM

this thread is cancer

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 11 2016, 10:24 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 11 2016, 12:46 AM) *
DM getting rekt in 3...2...1...


lol no.

QUOTE
Website being broken is quite the red flag. At least NTK has the (lolworthy) "Comming soon" in some sections of its game guide, but a broken link is unprofessional af and shows instantly that it's just another bad knockoff made by a hobbyist.


A broken link on a website has nothing to do with the quality of the videogame. For all we know they are updating something on the forum and the link broke. This is just a poor excuse for why you won't download the game and see what it is. The forum software and the game software are unrelated.


Mind you, I am not saying Illutia is a good game. I am saying you cannot determine if it is one on the basis of a broken website link. That is a completely absurd argument, and it is this kind of tendency to logical fallacy that taints your objectivity on this issue. You just do not want to check the game out and see it's not as fun to play old-school NexusTK mechanics as you recall.

QUOTE
All I had to do was look at one screenshot to know that it wasn't even a NTK clone. No thx.


First of all, graphics do not define what a game is or isn't; the game mechanics do. Game mechanics are unrelated to visual assets. As an example, Star Wars branded Monopoly is the same game as playing regular Monopoly even if the SW branded one uses SW character dies and flavor text. Game mechanics define what games are, not their visual assets. Illutia and NexusTK have fundamentally identical gameplay mechanics with few differences.

Rogues play like NexusTK Rogues, Mages play like NexusTK Mages, etc and so forth. Illutia was developed with the specific intent to attract the players you claim want to return to NexusTK due to nostalgia for the earlier build, and it failed to do so because -- surprise surprise -- the vast majority of players no longer find those mechanics that enjoyable compared to other MMOs on the market with superior designs. The creators of Illutia, much like yourself, refuse to acknowledge this and instead run the game with the same degree of competency as KRU does. Which is rather ironic when you think about it.


Second of all, the graphical design is nearly identical between the two games, to the point items are drawn on characters the same way. They are both pixel, tile based games. If you place screenshots of the two games side by side, this becomes extremely obvious.





This is no accident, because Illutia was made by former Nexus players wanting to recreate this nostalgic period, just as you do. It's entirely relevant.


QUOTE
How lost are you right now on what former players want? It's not just about the [Content removed]ing game mechanics. It's about playing the same game they used to love. Not an imitation - the same exact game. How is this so hard for you to understand? Like, I get you not wanting it for yourself, but how are you so bad at understanding the thoughts/feelings of others who aren't like you?


The glory day you think existed never did. The period of time you are talking about is when a lot of players were quitting the game. It's clearly not what they wanted, else they would not have left in the first place.

QUOTE
Sigh. The present commercial appeal in the market is a new server and always will be since people aren't stupid and no one wants to start an MMO years behind with no one else near their lvl/stats. This is common sense for me, yet monumentally difficult to understand for you.


And yet people start new characters on new MMOs that have been around for years and have no qualms with leveling up from 1 to whatever-the-level-cap-is. Furthermore, "catching up" with other players is a key motivation for people to play a game, not a reason for them to not.

QUOTE
November's numbers show stagnation. We both know you're smart enough to know this can mean new players filtering in as old players get fed up with Wony's scummy money-grabs. It can also mean returning players coming back, then quickly leaving because it's not the product they wanted. Judging by these reddit posts, that is likely to be what's happening, though it's probably a combination of both.


I completely agree that people are finding the game is not the product they want. Our disagreement is that you think returning the game back to an inferior product state is the solution. There's no evidence whatsoever to support that notion because the fact is people quit the game during this period of time you are speaking of. Not small numbers of people, large numbers of players. They quit NexusTK for other games. This is like what, the fourth time I have reminded you of this? You're completing ignoring this critical fact because it doesn't conform to the narrative you want. Stop doing that. It's an indisputable fact people didn't universally love this version of the game you did.


QUOTE
That's 10 former players in the last two months alone who revisited the game and posted in the subreddit. It sounds like all but one (freshprincetrex) or two (greensky - not sure on this one) of them started from scratch, and many of them mentioned wanting to experience the 1-99 content again. 10 players that required a $0 marketing budget, zero social media outreach, and that number doesn't include potential friends/family or the rest of the nameless/faceless people waiting in the shadows for something to happen. If people are trickling back in without any real news, then the announcement of a new server would surely garner interest. It only needs to appeal to a hundred or so people to be a success based on microscopic variable costs for Kru.


What people say and what they do are two totally different things. Anyone with even a small amount of business sense knows this. I've got mailing lists for pre-launched products and out of the tens of thousands of people who sign up for the list, only about a few hundred might actually sign up for the product when it launches. You're pointing to a handful of former players who say they want something and believing erroneously what they say applies to every other former NexusTK player. It does not.

Whenever I proposed solutions to problems in NexusTK's design, I never relied on what people said they wanted. I instead pointed to exhibited behavior. People aren't quitting NexusTK to play no videogames at all, they are switching to other games with more fun mechanics, better customer service, etc and so forth.

By contrast you're basing your strategy on what people remember about their gameplay when they were 12, and are now in their late 20s. It is the rare game from 1998-2001 that we still find fun in 2016. Even Minecraft is more engaging than NexusTK is.


QUOTE
Or, the farfarfar more likely reason is because they returned hoping to have the same experience they had in high school, but the game is hollow and boring because no one is anywhere near their stats and everything seems different. Tangun is an aberration that they don't remember from their childhood, and no one hunts in Mythic anymore. You have such a strange relationship with this game that it's impossible to get into the shoes of someone who quit in 2006 after going off to college and hasn't registered since. They don't give a [Content removed] about the game being improved, or any of the drama that you've wrapped yourself up in over the years. There were hundreds, if not thousands of people who played the game without ever getting involved in subpath, archon, or clan drama. Those are the people who are coming back, and those are who this new server would be targeted at. It's by far the biggest segment of former players. Everyone in this thread represents the delusional minority who have completely different desires than the avg NTKer of the early '00s.


#1. NexusTK was never the most popular MMO to start with. At it's peak we had like 1,000 active people on the server at once. Then Ragnarok Online, WoW, Dark Ages of Camelot and a bunch of much better designed games came out and most of the playerbase left for those games.

#2. Why would the people who left for those games actively play a game they abandoned due to not being as fun as other games? Games like WoW have remained king by constantly improving their game mechanics, not rolling back to earlier models that people may feel nostalgic for, but ultimately don't enjoy as much as the newer builds. FFXIV has the extreme example where the entire game was totally redesigned practically from scratch because the initial build was failing in the market, and now it's one of the most popular MMOs in the world.


What NexusTK needs is improvements, not roll backs.


QUOTE
Uh, you're posting on nexusforums.com right now. Are you in denial or do you accept that you are just as [Content removed]ed up, if not more, as the people you just [Content removed] on?


I have posted this before, but my primary goal for engaging in these sort of debates is to contribute to the book I am writing on game mechanic design. Due to my intimate familiarity with it, NexusTK serves in the book to provide examples of many bad design concepts and customer service decisions. Engaging in these debates helps remind me of stuff I may have forgotten or allows me to write up stuff I can repurpose as sections of the book. This forum is just one of a dozen places I regular read and post to.

There is a method to what you may believe is madness.

QUOTE
I promise you 100% that NTK existed in the early '00s and I did play it. Are you drunk?


The game existed; the version of the game you recall did not. That is the point I am making. You have rose colored glasses on about the actual state of NexusTK in the past.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 12 2016, 09:36 AM

@Doctor - First, thanks for revealing that you don't know what autism means. People who misuse it in online arguments instantly out themselves as immature idiots. If you actually read the tone of those reddit posts and followed the thread about character restores, you'd have gleaned that these former players aren't that interested in paying to restore characters that aren't even that buff, even if they had the option. Similar logic that I used when deciding I'd never restore my Sams. If you didn't do a bunch of minor quests, there's really not much benefit to restoring. You're also forgetting why people return to old games. They want to re-experience content. Dude even made it easy for you to understand by straight-up saying "I kinda want to experience the 1-99 grind again." Another said "I want to take my time to attain level 99 and enjoy as many quests as possible." You're so easy compared to DM.

QUOTE (darkmaverick @ Dec 11 2016, 11:24 PM) *
A broken link on a website has nothing to do with the quality of the videogame.

Yet another sign of you being clueless about running a business. The product extends beyond the game itself. A broken website means fewer players will end up playing, which is critically important for tiny MMOs.
QUOTE
First of all, graphics do not define what a game is or isn't; the game mechanics do. Game mechanics are unrelated to visual assets. As an example, Star Wars branded Monopoly is the same game as playing regular Monopoly even if the SW branded one uses SW character dies and flavor text. Game mechanics define what games are, not their visual assets. Illutia and NexusTK have fundamentally identical gameplay mechanics with few differences.

If you're going to write a book, you really need to stop doing this. It happens a lot more than you probably realize.
QUOTE
Illutia was developed with the specific intent to attract the players you claim want to return to NexusTK due to nostalgia for the earlier build, and it failed to do so because -- surprise surprise --

IT'S NOT EVEN THE SAME [Content removed]ING GAME LOL. JUST [Content removed]ING LOOK AT IT. IT IS NOT THE SAME GAME. Do you even know how nostalgia works? That's like someone's favorite childhood game being Super Mario 64 and you thinking that Banjo-Kazooie can just be substituted without them knowing or caring. Again, how [Content removed]ing clueless are you about the market's interests? When people want to tap into nostalgia, they want to play the same game they used to play. It's that [Content removed]ing simple. You are infuriatingly dumb sometimes.
QUOTE
The glory day you think existed never did. The period of time you are talking about is when a lot of players were quitting the game. It's clearly not what they wanted, else they would not have left in the first place.

This is spin at its finest. You can say this about the peak of just about anything. I played during the absolute best times for NTK financially, and I had a blast doing it. There is no arguing this. I don't even think you understand what "glory days" mean. Every marginally successful game has to have its glory days by definition. Are you saying I didn't play during the glory days because they happened during the Great Shift or something? wth? You can argue that the gameplay was not to your liking, but you can't argue that the game wasn't really fun to me in the early/mid '00s. It just was - I don't know what to tell you.
QUOTE
And yet people start new characters on new MMOs that have been around for years and have no qualms with leveling up from 1 to whatever-the-level-cap-is. Furthermore, "catching up" with other players is a key motivation for people to play a game, not a reason for them to not.

You're trying to compare a new MMO to an outdated, tiny MMO. There is obvious benefit to experiencing content in a new MMO, regardless of stat gaps. Plus, you're conveniently ignoring how much easier it is to progress in these games by soloing/grouping due to the much larger player pools. The point is that no one wants to restart a game they've already played when others are years ahead and the player base is tiny/fragmented. They will always prefer to restart on a new server where everyone else is progressing with them. You can squirm all you want, but this is an obvious concept that shouldn't really be up for debate.
QUOTE
Our disagreement is that you think returning the game back to an inferior product state is the solution.

LOL if you think the current state is an improvement. Do you even know what's happening with orbs right now? Are you conveniently ignoring the fact that people are maxing in less than 15 minutes? The economy is [Content removed]ed. Crafting is pointless. All those problems are solved overnight by a blank slate server. It doesn't even have to be retro. At least admit there are positives to a new server so you don't sound like such a Nazi.
QUOTE
They quit NexusTK for other games.

I've said this before - I didn't. I went to college. I'm not alone. You're also trying to pretend that when people leave a game they aren't occasionally drawn back to it. Such a dumb argument to make.
QUOTE
It's an indisputable fact people didn't universally love this version of the game you did.

You sound like a genuine crazy person. Just step back and listen to the argument you're making. People stopped playing a game, therefore they never loved it. Just, wth, man? Why do I even respond to this bs? =/
QUOTE
What people say and what they do are two totally different things.

Uhh, people saying they downloaded the client and started a new character = not doing something? Again, with the ridiculous arguments. People returning to the game does not equal mailing list
QUOTE
You're pointing to a handful of former players who say they want something and believing erroneously what they say applies to every other former NexusTK player.

You really enjoy putting words in my mouth. There are >2k former players. I've said repeatedly that a new server only needs ~100 to be a financial success for Kru.
QUOTE
People aren't quitting NexusTK to play no videogames at all, they are switching to other games with more fun mechanics, better customer service, etc and so forth.

Instant hypocrisy. How is this statement any different than anything I've said when it comes to generalizing former players? Holy [Content removed], mate.
QUOTE
By contrast you're basing your strategy on what people remember about their gameplay when they were 12, and are now in their late 20s. It is the rare game from 1998-2001 that we still find fun in 2016. Even Minecraft is more engaging than NexusTK is.

I'm basing my strategy on the shortest and surest path for Kru to get a significant number of new subs. I actually thought you might agree with me on this, simply because it's so obvious Kru can't release engaging new content and manage the economy.
QUOTE
#1. NexusTK was never the most popular MMO to start with.
#2. Why would the people who left for those games actively play a game they abandoned due to not being as fun as other games?

Way to just completely blow past my block of text and not address a single thing in it. I'll repeat this, because it's important:
You have such a strange relationship with this game that it's impossible to get into the shoes of someone who quit in 2006 after going off to college and hasn't registered since. Address this please. I can get inside your head. You can't get inside mine. I'm far more representative of the average former NTKer than you are.
QUOTE
What NexusTK needs is improvements, not roll backs.

Obv. I shouldn't have to keep saying this, but, GL with that.
QUOTE
There is a method to what you may believe is madness.

As much as I cringe at the thought of you writing a book, I actually am rooting for you. I'd certainly buy a copy.
QUOTE
You have rose colored glasses on about the actual state of NexusTK in the past.

It really wasn't that long ago. It's not hard to remember something I spent thousands of hours doing ten years ago.

Posted by: OwnageII Dec 12 2016, 10:40 AM

You guys should really stop feeding the troll at this point.

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 12 2016, 02:17 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 12 2016, 09:36 AM) *
Way to just completely blow past my block of text and not address a single thing in it.


I did address your, as you say, wall of text.

Not doing it again because in your latest post, you managed to just repeat yourself and all of my responses would be the same as I wrote in my last post. So, just re-read that one again?


Posted by: Hijack Dec 12 2016, 03:12 PM

this thread is cancer

Posted by: WereWulf Dec 12 2016, 03:22 PM

QUOTE (OwnageII @ Dec 12 2016, 10:40 AM) *
You guys should really stop feeding the troll at this point.


I agree. I honestly feel like he is trolling at this point to not realize what everyone is telling him.

The game mechanics are broken. I recently registered my two accounts. I walked around for a bit and to my surprise got whispered for a hunt. I played for an hour and I can 100% agree with what everyone is saying in this post. The hunting mechanics in this game are broken. After that hour I realized why I stopped playing all together... hunting is very boring. Sure, if you rolled back the game people would play to try and become the first to ilsan or eesan etc., but would hunting still be boring... yes. That one hour hunt I had to force myself to keep going and that's what everyone in this post is trying to tell you.

Fix the core broken game mechanics first than possibly explore your ideas of a roll back to a clean slate server.


--quick edit: and yes the reason I registered my accounts was because of this forum post. I truly wanted to see if a clean slate server would bring me back to long hours of Nexustk, but I couldnt even get myself to enjoy hunting for an hour. In my heart I wish I could love this game again because it truly does hold a special place as my favorite early MMORPG. It brought me into that genre of games.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 12 2016, 07:52 PM

QUOTE (WereWulf @ Dec 12 2016, 03:22 PM) *
I honestly feel like he is trolling at this point to not realize what everyone is telling him.

No, you don't. Having an debate about something does not = trolling and you're obv just saying that in an attempt to weaken my position. Such an incredibly zzz, low-content comment to make. There are two sides to this argument. If any of these guys were right about the prospects for a new server, Stelio's server wouldn't be running right now. They're blind to evidence staring them right in the [Content removed]ing face and every time I bring it up, no one addresses it. Just watch. No one will talk about it.
QUOTE
The game mechanics are broken. I recently registered my two accounts. I walked around for a bit and to my surprise got whispered for a hunt. I played for an hour and I can 100% agree with what everyone is saying in this post. The hunting mechanics in this game are broken. After that hour I realized why I stopped playing all together... hunting is very boring. Sure, if you rolled back the game people would play to try and become the first to ilsan or eesan etc., but would hunting still be boring... yes. That one hour hunt I had to force myself to keep going and that's what everyone in this post is trying to tell you.

They're trying to tell me that a game I find fun is boring. If you don't get how ridiculous that is, then I can't really help you. Games, like art, are a subjective experience and value varies from person to person. I'll try to make it simple for you.

For those of you that can't comprehend why even boring gameplay is fun for people:
Repetitive, mindless activities like Candy Crush, FarmVille/Harvest Moon, NTK hunting, killing Porings, Baal runs, WoW crafting, Pokemon Go, and Minecraft all have the same thing in common for the people who perform them - they're therapeutic. It's a way to let your brain autopilot for a few hours while you escape from the stress of work, school, relationships, health problems, etc. or simply unwind after a hard day's work. You all focus so hard on gameplay, but there is a reason people are still drawn to the simplicity of NTK and crappy mobile games. It doesn't "fit your narrative" to acknowledge that people still seek out and sub this game and its private servers after all these years, but our brains love getting dopamine with limited effort. There's no easier way than returning to a repetitive, simple game where you already know how all the quests/spells/caves work. Playing NTK puts me in a meditative state. I can think about other things while I mindlessly whack away at farm animals. That's always been the appeal for me, and I guarantee other people share that reason for enjoying the game.

The problem is, aspects of the game being broken due to the age of the server and poor design choices have altered the dopamine schedule. The simplistic gameplay and familiar quests simply need to be paired with a better dopamine schedule. You can do this by making extensive updates to game design and content or you can create a new server that relies on the old, reliable dopamine schedule. Either way, something has to change or people won't get excited about playing. Being meditative alone isn't enough, since there has to be some incentive to play and progress. A new server is a powerful incentive to play, even if it sucks like Stelio's.
QUOTE
Fix the core broken game mechanics first than possibly explore your ideas of a roll back to a clean slate server.

Please elaborate. I'm curious what your experience was and if it would apply at all to a new server for the first few years of pre-Sa play. I'm guessing it wouldn't, but we won't know unless you cobble a short list together.

If you guys can't explain to me why people still play NTK, eNe(x)ia, e(T)K, then you're not worth arguing with. None of you can even comprehend why people have been making new characters over the last few months or sticking it out with their Sa sans and maxing every 10 minutes, so how would you ever be able to comprehend people wanting to play on a new server? DM is so far out of touch with the average former NTKer that he will never be able to understand the concepts I've presented in this thread. It's a classic case of an uber nerd not being able to relate to casual fans of something they (used to) enjoy.

Thanks for the post btw WereWulf

Posted by: OwnageII Dec 12 2016, 09:13 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 12 2016, 08:52 PM) *
If any of these guys were right about the prospects for a new server, Stelio's server wouldn't be running right now. They're blind to evidence staring them right in the [Content removed]ing face and every time I bring it up, no one addresses it. Just watch. No one will talk about it.


But that server has been around for several years now, and a large amount of players went back to TK when Wony pretended to care about it again. People that play that server are -not- ones looking for nostalgia.

Posted by: Doctor Dec 12 2016, 11:37 PM

Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by impaired social interaction, verbal and non-verbal communication, and restricted and repetitive behavior.


Posted by: halombobtk Dec 12 2016, 11:41 PM

QUOTE (OwnageII @ Dec 12 2016, 09:13 PM) *
But that server has been around for several years now, and a large amount of players went back to TK when Wony pretended to care about it again. People that play that server are -not- ones looking for nostalgia.

Ok, I think I'm following your logic. Let's try to make this simple and break the pool of former players down into segments:

1. People who still actively play NTK, who have never unsubbed or have only taken occasional breaks from the game
I'm guessing somewhere between 20 and 60 percent of this group would sub a new server. Some would sub both the old and new. Some would be appalled by the thought of a new server competing with the current one. Some would thoroughly enjoy running around with a bunch of n00bs in Adventure carnages again, starting a clan from scratch, etc. There will be some people who hold out to see if the new server takes off, and if it's successful, they'll begrudgingly sub.

2. People who still actively play e(T)K
You might be right about this group not caring about a new NTK server. They have a lot of time invested in Stelio's server and many of them have already thoroughly scratched the itch. I'm guessing that at least a few would still enjoy racing to 99 and stuff on a new server, since that was part of the appeal of a private server in the first place. Let's say 10% try out the new server and get hooked.

3. People who played e(T)K but didn't find it fulfilling
I'm guessing that this could be the segment with the highest percentage of people who would try out a new Kru-sponsored server, but I'm also guessing some of you will have a problem with that statement. Somewhere in the 50-70% range, if you consider that 30% came to the conclusion NTK would never be fun again or sufficiently scratched the itch for the next decade. This includes people like Conro who would never dream of playing on a new Kru-sponsored server without a significant overhaul to the game (so he says anyway wink.gif ). It also includes people like me who really just want to play the officially licensed game with a blank slate.

4. People who haven't played on a private server, but come back to NTK whenever there's an interesting event/update like Sa San
No idea how big this segment is, since I'm guessing people who stay in-the-know about NTK have at least poked around on one of the private servers. Some may have abstained out of respect for the original server, failed to hear about them, or just weren't interested. Hard to peg this group at a % since they might skew toward either caring about their old items/stats or simply not caring enough about the game to play on a new server. I dunno, 20%?

5. People who stopped playing NTK in the early-mid '00s and have never played seriously since
This segment is going to be the most diverse since it's easily the biggest. There will be dads in this group that have zero time to game. There will be people who only ever played one MMO in their life and would laugh at the thought of playing one again. There are hardcore Candy Crush and Clash of Clans players in this group for sure. Reaching out to this segment may require some kind of Steam push, but you can probably get to some of them with basic social media outreach and an official announcement that spreads via word of mouth. If you can get 5% of this group, it would already come close to doubling the current avg. daily active population of NTK, but even 5% might be difficult to attain.

6. Friends/fam/randoms who have never played NTK before
Can't assign a % to this obv, but let's just conservatively say 5 people will get dragged into playing by some of the people in the above segments.

I should've bolded this statement in my OP, because I really believe this is all that any change in NTK has to accomplish:
QUOTE
The only remedy for this hollow feeling and the quick departure of returning players is to get a substantial number of new players to all sub at the same time.

As I've mentioned a bunch of times before, everyone keeps fixating on the retro part of my solution for some reason. I don't even think it has to be retro to be successful. I just happen to believe more people would get excited about it if things like Tangun were removed and the game initially focused on Mythic. You can always release new caves later with minimal effort since the maps are already made. The point is that a blank slate has been proven to attract players and be fun, even when the product is subpar/buggy. People like DM and Doctor don't like this proof because it hurts their argument that literally zero people want to play a new NTK server.

If you think the %'s I've allocated to the different market segments need adjustment, please share your thoughts. I'm guessing it wouldn't be hard to ballpark populations and percentages for all of them and figure out how many people would show up in the first few months. Segments 3, 4, and 5 are always going to be the most important, since they're the easiest to access for growth, whether your strategy is a new server or marketing/updating the existing one. Segment 6 isn't easy to tap into. Even with the pedigree of being in the Guinness book of world records or whatever for oldest MMO, you have to get extremely lucky to make a hit game. I guess NTK wouldn't need a home run though, and stranger things have happened to [Content removed]tier games (Flappy Bird).

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 13 2016, 01:58 AM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 12 2016, 11:41 PM) *
The point is that a blank slate has been proven to attract players and be fun, even when the product is subpar/buggy. People like DM and Doctor don't like this proof because it hurts their argument that literally zero people want to play a new NTK server.


No, it's because a blank slate NexusTK server has not been proven to attract players.

Even if you mean the private servers, they had some rather improved feature sets compared to anything that has ever been in NexusTK, and even then the server populations never exceeded what NexusTK has attracted. So your point here is totally moot. Those servers are also free to play, whereas NexusTK costs money. There's millions of people playing on private Ragnarok Online servers who will never pay for an official subscription. Basing a business decision on what people do when they aren't asked for money is how people lose their shirts on a venture. They think doing a free trial and getting users equates to cash. It does not.

Also I don't think I've commented on this before, but you seem to completely misunderstand how dopamine works, and are relying on a lot of very questionable pseudo-scientific psychology babble as some kind of proof for your arguments. Dopamine is just a neurotransmitter and while it plays a role in pleasure, it's far from being understood to the point it is an exact science to "schedule dopamine releases" in a videogame design.

Also, equating Flappy Bird to NexusTK is just dumb. Firstly, Flabby Bird was released for mobile devices and designed to be a short time waster for when people are on a bus or waiting on their laundry or standing in a line or something. MMOs requires a major time investment, and if you're going to invest time into something you want it to be the best kind of game. Second of all, Flappy bird was a free download and made its revenue from in-game ads.

The best comparison is Illutia, which you avoid because it clearly demonstrates the version of NexusTK you want to see in the market would do no better than what NexusTK is doing right now.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 13 2016, 10:00 AM

QUOTE (darkmaverick @ Dec 13 2016, 01:58 AM) *
Even if you mean the private servers

wth? I so obviously meant private servers. You're so weird. =/
QUOTE
they had some rather improved feature sets

And some enormous downsides that you're conveniently omitting. Half of the 1-99 grind was spent in giant, featureless rectangular maps that were all clones of each other. So compelling!
QUOTE
even then the server populations never exceeded what NexusTK has attracted.

At its peak? Why the hell would you ever think it's OK to compare it to that? Getting 100 players to play on a new server would be an enormous success at this point. Any significant growth when the game is at 66 active avg. players is a huge win for a stagnating or dying MMO.
QUOTE
So your point here is totally moot.

If by moot you mean debatable, yes, definitely. It's still evidence that there is always going to be some demand for a new server. You love making things all-or-nothing, but this so clearly isn't an all-or-nothing thing. You can't possibly say there would be zero interest. I maintain that you're both overestimating how many people would need to sub for it to be profitable (kruna, kruna, kruna sales) and underestimating how many random former players would try it out and get hooked again.
QUOTE
Those servers are also free to play, whereas NexusTK costs money.

Normally, this would be a huge difference with a ton of impact on the success of a game, but we're talking about a small subset of humans that probably don't care much about having to sub the game since it's always been that way. The player base is also entering their late-20s now, so $10-20/month is nbd. A new server that was F2P to lvl 50 wouldn't look much different than e(T)K imo. F2P would attract more players, undoubtedly, but I don't think having to sub is going to be a deal-breaker, and I tried to factor it in with the %'s that I see you didn't even try to comment on.
QUOTE
There's millions of people playing on private Ragnarok Online servers who will never pay for an official subscription.

Yes, but that can be explained by there being great private server clones available for free. e(T)K isn't even the same product. Show me an exact clone of NTK that's F2P and this argument will be foolproof.
QUOTE
Also I don't think I've commented on this before, but you seem to completely misunderstand how dopamine works, and are relying on a lot of very questionable pseudo-scientific psychology babble as some kind of proof for your arguments.

Lol at thinking dopamine = pseudo-science. Jesus, man.
QUOTE
Dopamine is just a neurotransmitter and while it plays a role in pleasure, it's far from being understood to the point it is an exact science to "schedule dopamine releases" in a videogame design.

Let's ignore the word dopamine for a second since you love being a baby who fixates on things like car keys jiggling above them while missing the meat of someone's argument. In your book, you're going to talk about good and bad design choices, correct? Are you actually trying to say that good and bad design choices have no effect on the player's brain? That's all we're talking about here. A game has to activate the reward centers of a player's brain, and we both know there is a delicate balance between aspects of a game being too easy and too hard. Games must feel rewarding. When you click on an NPC and it just gives you items for logging in, that's the equivalent of a win button. It's not compelling at all and leads to boredom, especially when you factor in the items flooding the market and becoming worthless. There has to be some modicum of challenge, even if it's simply holding spacebar and timing vita attacks. There's nothing therapeutic about afking in a room and waiting to click on an NPC, but that is what the current server, which you're so convinced is superior to a rollback, has come to. It's like a bad mobile game now, and has been for months. Wony obv has no idea what he's doing, which just strengthens my argument for leaning on the old content.
QUOTE
Also, equating Flappy Bird to NexusTK is just dumb. Firstly, Flabby Bird was released for mobile devices and designed to be a short time waster for when people are on a bus or waiting on their laundry or standing in a line or something. MMOs requires a major time investment, and if you're going to invest time into something you want it to be the best kind of game. Second of all, Flappy bird was a free download and made its revenue from in-game ads.

Sigh. Failed the test. I knew you would fixate on this and blow past the rest of my statement. Isn't it telling that I respond to the core of your arguments, while you routinely avoid addressing the core of mine? You didn't say a single [Content removed]ing thing about the percentages I assigned to NTK's various market segments. You do this so, so often. You're no better than Hillary or Trump. To address the time investment thing, I think you're overestimating this for nearly all of the market segments I listed. People sit on the couch at home and pour literally thousands of hours into FarmVille, Cash of Clans, and Candy Crush. If people were hyper-rational, your statement would be true. People obv aren't though. Again, you're projecting your own way of approaching this onto thousands of other former players. Not everyone thinks or makes decisions like you. Amazing that I keep having to explain this.
QUOTE
The best comparison is Illutia, which you avoid because it clearly demonstrates the version of NexusTK you want to see in the market would do no better than what NexusTK is doing right now.

I've addressed this repeatedly, but you refuse to acknowledge that this isn't even the same [Content removed]ing game. At some point I'm going to really start believing that I'm the only sane person ITT. How many times do I have to tell you that this ISN'T EVEN THE SAME [Content removed]ING GAME. Like, it's not the same game. How many ways/times do I have to say it for you to be able to put on glasses or whatever you have to do to see that it's a different game. It's not the same. If you showed a former NTK player that game and said, "Hey, I started playing NexusTK again! Why don't you play with me?" they would say, "wth man, that's not NTK." It's so [Content removed]ing obviously a different game with [Content removed]tier graphics, a [Content removed]tier UI, and I'm guessing different maps/quests/dialogue/caves/spawn rates/events. Once again, you have no idea how nostalgia works. I'll present another analogy, but I'm assuming you'll just ignore this like you did my last one. If someone's favorite childhood game was SMB2, and you give them Doki Doki Panic instead, they're not going to want to play it as much. I think I like my SM64 vs. Banjo-Kazooie example better though, since Illutia likely has different content.

Posted by: OwnageII Dec 13 2016, 12:42 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 13 2016, 12:41 AM) *
Ok, I think I'm following your logic. Let's try to make this simple and break the pool of former players down into segments:


That wasn't my argument, but kay.

Pretty much every person here has told you the same thing, there is no visible high demand for a retro server.

One person even went as far as to offer to make it happen for you if you could somehow show that demand.

Here's how it works: For a retro server, your target market is actively involved current and former players. If they aren't actively involved in some way you can grab their attention, you cannot pull them.

These boards and the subreddit you post on are that market. Where is the demand? A handful of reddit posts? The only reason NTK is even still running is because of the time invested sunk cost fallacy. A new server does not appeal to them.



The point I'm getting at here is that in order for NTK to grow it has to adapt and progress forward, not regress. Nexus did so well at first because there weren't much better games to compete with and now there are. Do what Hijack asks if you're really that devoted to making it happen. If Hijack doesn't want to do it, I'm always game as long as you supply all the maps.

Posted by: Hijack Dec 13 2016, 02:55 PM

this thread is cancer

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 13 2016, 03:20 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 13 2016, 10:00 AM) *
At its peak? Why the hell would you ever think it's OK to compare it to that? Getting 100 players to play on a new server would be an enormous success at this point. Any significant growth when the game is at 66 active avg. players is a huge win for a stagnating or dying MMO.


100 new players would not be an enormous success. I've posted before about the financial costs of NexusTK.

I'm not comparing NexusTK in any way that I wouldn't assess any other business venture. 100 new customers might be good for a B2B enterprise class product, but not a B2C consumer focused entertainment product like an MMO.

QUOTE
If by moot you mean debatable, yes, definitely.


No, by "moot" I mean completely irrelevant. You don't get to redefine the English language to suit your argument.

QUOTE
It's still evidence that there is always going to be some demand for a new server.


IT IS NOT EVIDENCE.

I don't know how to make this any [Content removed]ing clearer dude.

People lie. People misremember. People do not tell the truth.

Survey responses can at best be used to form a hypothesis.

Five [Content removed]ing people on reddit saying they would do something does not provide evidence that they will even do it, nor can their survey responses be used to make an accurate prediction for what thousands of other players would do, let alone the hundred you think might return.

QUOTE
You love making things all-or-nothing, but this so clearly isn't an all-or-nothing thing. You can't possibly say there would be zero interest.


I am not saying there would be zero interest. I am saying there is no evidence to suggest there would be any interest, and when there is no evidence to suggest something that doesn't mean you assume the possibility that evidence exists must mean it exists. That is some serious failure of logic. You're engaging in the fallacy of many possible worlds, which while it may have some value in computer programming where environments are virtual in nature, certainly has no application whatsoever to the real physical world we live in.

Just as people saying God exists is not evidence that God exists, people saying they would try a reset retro NexusTK server is no evidence they would actually do it. And when all you can get is a fisthul of people to say they would do it, out of the thousands of people who have played the game over the years, you can't even claim there is interest in the venture.

QUOTE
I maintain that you're both overestimating how many people would need to sub for it to be profitable (kruna, kruna, kruna sales) and underestimating how many random former players would try it out and get hooked again.


The burden of proof lies with the person making the claim. You claim hundreds of people would return, when you have no list of these people who have even said they would. I am rightly pointing out you have no proof and you are upset because I will not imagine along with you that proof exists.


QUOTE
Lol at thinking dopamine = pseudo-science. Jesus, man.


No, it's because I am actually familiar with the research that has been done on the topic and recognizing that you are not by the way you talk about it.

QUOTE
Let's ignore the word dopamine for a second since you love being a baby who fixates on things like car keys jiggling above them while missing the meat of someone's argument. In your book, you're going to talk about good and bad design choices, correct? Are you actually trying to say that good and bad design choices have no effect on the player's brain?


I'm not going to discuss it to the degree I talk in terms of physiology; why would I do that? The research is nowhere near to the point we perfectly understand how to manipulate this stuff in terms of chemical process. Else there would be a cure for all kinds of addictions already.

The book, like all game design books, talks about the theory of design. It uses examples of poor design and the consequences of which, and how the feature could have been designed better to produce the desired outcome which was not gained by the inferior design. It is about how to design well, and the topic of dopamine and brain research doesn't need to come up at all. You can talk about the subject without perfectly understanding the underlying brain function of thinking; we only need to go by the actual observations to form a workable and useful theory of how people respond to different game mechanics in certain situations. Just like how you do not need to go to automotive mechanics course to understand how to complete a driver's test for your state license exam. Needing to know how to operate a vehicle and needing to know how the car functions to its bare necessities are two different things.

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 13 2016, 11:13 PM

QUOTE (OwnageII @ Dec 13 2016, 12:42 PM) *
That wasn't my argument, but kay.

Wat. All you did was say that people playing e(T)K aren't looking for nostalgia. I humored you and used your logic in my post by saying that only 10% of current e(T)K players would try out a new server. Keep up, man.
QUOTE
Pretty much every person here has told you the same thing, there is no visible high demand for a retro server.

I've said this so many times by now to please you guys - it doesn't have to be a retro server. Stop fixating on that please. The point is it needs to get a significant number of people to sub at the same time.
QUOTE
One person even went as far as to offer to make it happen for you if you could somehow show that demand.

I've always said this needs to be a Kru-sponsored server. Unless Hijack plans on applying for a job at Kru, he's not really going to be able to help me. I do appreciate his offer though. That simple gesture has added more content to this thread than all the other posts combined. It might even motivate me to start a petition, just for the hell of it.
QUOTE
Here's how it works: For a retro server, your target market is actively involved current and former players. If they aren't actively involved in some way you can grab their attention, you cannot pull them.

Still kinda trying to decipher that last sentence. Weird way to say it, but I think you're just echoing my analysis of how difficult it would be to get a significant % from segment 5. I already expressed that in the post you just replied to.
QUOTE
These boards and the subreddit you post on are that market. Where is the demand? A handful of reddit posts? The only reason NTK is even still running is because of the time invested sunk cost fallacy. A new server does not appeal to them.

Despite the difficulty, a nonzero amount of people will come from segments 5 and 6. That "handful of reddit posts" included 10 people in the span of 1.5 months, and that doesn't include people who rejoined the game in that time without posting on reddit. It's really not hard to imagine 90 more players showing interest when 10 posted about coming back to the game in that short a timespan with no announcements or updates to get them hyped about subbing. I really don't think 100 players is a pipe dream.
QUOTE
The point I'm getting at here is that in order for NTK to grow it has to adapt and progress forward, not regress. Nexus did so well at first because there weren't much better games to compete with and now there are. Do what Hijack asks if you're really that devoted to making it happen. If Hijack doesn't want to do it, I'm always game as long as you supply all the maps.

Can we all just agree that NTK will never progress? I'm the only [Content removed]ing realist ITT. This is our best option of all the realistic, yet undesirable options. Face the facts please.

@DM
QUOTE
100 new players would not be an enormous success. I've posted before about the financial costs of NexusTK.

I'm not comparing NexusTK in any way that I wouldn't assess any other business venture. 100 new customers might be good for a B2B enterprise class product, but not a B2C consumer focused entertainment product like an MMO.

A small business owner who doesn't understand the concept of variable cost. You can't make this [Content removed] up.
QUOTE
No, by "moot" I mean completely irrelevant. You don't get to redefine the English language to suit your argument.

Today, you learned (might want to keep google at the ready when writing your book):

QUOTE
IT IS NOT EVIDENCE.
Survey responses can at best be used to form a hypothesis.

Aw, you got confused laugh.gif. If you scroll up, the evidence we were talking about was the success of e(T)K, not reddit posts. Either way, you can discount the reddit posts, but you can't discount them to zero. That would also be unwise as a small business owner. The point is to come up with an accurate picture of demand, and it lies somewhere between 0 and 10 when you have 10 reddit posts suggesting demand. I tend to believe that when people seek out an old game, download the game, sub a new character, and post about it on reddit, they're kinda serious about playing. I understand everything you're saying, but I think you're letting your emotions get in the way of some pretty actionable evidence here.
QUOTE
I am not saying there would be zero interest. I am saying there is no evidence to suggest there would be any interest, and when there is no evidence to suggest something that doesn't mean you assume the possibility that evidence exists must mean it exists. That is some serious failure of logic. You're engaging in the fallacy of many possible worlds, which while it may have some value in computer programming where environments are virtual in nature, certainly has no application whatsoever to the real physical world we live in.

Just as people saying God exists is not evidence that God exists, people saying they would try a reset retro NexusTK server is no evidence they would actually do it. And when all you can get is a fisthul of people to say they would do it, out of the thousands of people who have played the game over the years, you can't even claim there is interest in the venture.

More of the same about what I just addressed. Your God analogy is kinda cringey, even though I'm reading The Selfish Gene right now and should be digging the atheism. Maybe you're not smart enough to understand the difference between the power of Kru announcing a new server after 18 years and people's passive posting on a subreddit during a period of stagnation. An announcement like that from Kru would spread through the former NTK community pretty quickly.
QUOTE
The burden of proof lies with the person making the claim. You claim hundreds of people would return, when you have no list of these people who have even said they would. I am rightly pointing out you have no proof and you are upset because I will not imagine along with you that proof exists.

Err, I gave you a list and you said it meant nothing. Now all of a sudden a list has value? You contradict yourself quite a bit. Try not to do that in your book.
QUOTE
No, it's because I am actually familiar with the research that has been done on the topic and recognizing that you are not by the way you talk about it.

"Familiar with the research" - what a [Content removed]ing adorable statement lol.
QUOTE
I'm not going to discuss it to the degree I talk in terms of physiology; why would I do that? The research is nowhere near to the point we perfectly understand how to manipulate this stuff in terms of chemical process. Else there would be a cure for all kinds of addictions already.

Oh my god. You actually did it. You took the very same paragraph where I called you out for fixating on trivial things/missing the core of the argument and cut out the last 80% of it. Holy [Content removed] you're oblivious, lol.

Here's the part you were too afraid to respond to:

That's all we're talking about here. A game has to activate the reward centers of a player's brain, and we both know there is a delicate balance between aspects of a game being too easy and too hard. Games must feel rewarding. When you click on an NPC and it just gives you items for logging in, that's the equivalent of a win button. It's not compelling at all and leads to boredom, especially when you factor in the items flooding the market and becoming worthless. There has to be some modicum of challenge, even if it's simply holding spacebar and timing vita attacks. There's nothing therapeutic about afking in a room and waiting to click on an NPC, but that is what the current server, which you're so convinced is superior to a rollback, has come to. It's like a bad mobile game now, and has been for months. Wony obv has no idea what he's doing, which just strengthens my argument for leaning on the old content.

It's always so convenient which parts you decide to fixate on and which parts you decide to ignore completely.

Posted by: darkmaverick Dec 14 2016, 12:03 AM

"Your point is moot" is a common expression when someone makes a statement that has no relevance to the topic being discussed. There is vast consensus on this.

http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/96435/the-point-is-moot

"The adjective moot is originally a legal term going back to the mid-16th century. It derives from the noun moot, in its sense of a hypothetical case argued as an exercise by law students. Consequently, a moot question is one that is arguable or open to debate.

But in the mid-19th century people also began to look at the hypothetical side of moot as its essential meaning, and they started to use the word to mean "of no significance or relevance." Thus, a moot point, however debatable, is one that has no practical value."


So, don't look for an alternate use of the phrase that nobody has been using since the 1800s, and focus on the one people actually use today. That is how it was meant and you know that.

Of course, I do understand you would prefer to engage in arguments of semantics because you cannot prove your main point -- that there is demand for a second NexusTK server. But I am not willing to chase you around in circles while you make semantical arguments because it's just a derailment.

QUOTE
I've said this so many times by now to please you guys - it doesn't have to be a retro server. Stop fixating on that please. The point is it needs to get a significant number of people to sub at the same time.


You are not saying that NexusTK needs a second server using the same mechanics and content it has right now. You want to scrap substantial amounts of the content so it goes back to an earlier build of the game. "Retro server" is just a placeholder for what you want, because writing it out as I just did is too many words all the time. So stop trying to act like this isn't your main argument by focusing on the semantics of what you believe "retro server" could mean, and focus on what it actually means in the context of this discussion.


Also, just because I don't quote your entire posts doesn't mean I am not responding to your posts. I already gave satisfactory responses to all statements you've made. For purposes of brevity I chose to not quote block your entire essay and instead focus on the crux of your arguments. I am not going to sit here and respond line by line to your earlier rant, nor am I going to go around in circles with you about dopamine releases and game design mechanics. My prior response about how the research is still greatly lacking and is not understood to the point we can make accurate statements like you are trying to, still stands.


QUOTE
Err, I gave you a list and you said it meant nothing. Now all of a sudden a list has value? You contradict yourself quite a bit. Try not to do that in your book.


You don't have a list! What are you even arguing here?

Posted by: Gerdi Dec 14 2016, 04:17 PM

nexus

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 15 2016, 01:55 AM

QUOTE (darkmaverick @ Dec 14 2016, 12:03 AM) *
"Your point is moot" is a common expression when someone makes a statement that has no relevance to the topic being discussed. There is vast consensus on this.

http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/96435/the-point-is-moot

"The adjective moot is originally a legal term going back to the mid-16th century. It derives from the noun moot, in its sense of a hypothetical case argued as an exercise by law students. Consequently, a moot question is one that is arguable or open to debate.

But in the mid-19th century people also began to look at the hypothetical side of moot as its essential meaning, and they started to use the word to mean "of no significance or relevance." Thus, a moot point, however debatable, is one that has no practical value."


So, don't look for an alternate use of the phrase that nobody has been using since the 1800s, and focus on the one people actually use today. That is how it was meant and you know that.

Of course, I do understand you would prefer to engage in arguments of semantics because you cannot prove your main point -- that there is demand for a second NexusTK server. But I am not willing to chase you around in circles while you make semantical arguments because it's just a derailment.

The irony here is so lost on you.
QUOTE
You are not saying that NexusTK needs a second server using the same mechanics and content it has right now. You want to scrap substantial amounts of the content so it goes back to an earlier build of the game. "Retro server" is just a placeholder for what you want, because writing it out as I just did is too many words all the time. So stop trying to act like this isn't your main argument by focusing on the semantics of what you believe "retro server" could mean, and focus on what it actually means in the context of this discussion.

I've said repeatedly (and I'm saying it again, right now) that I'd be fine with a direct clone of the current server. The point is simply that a bunch of people need to get excited about playing and subbing at the same time. In this regard, a blank slate is more important than it being retro or not, even though I still believe that a retro server would be an easier sell and more enjoyable for casual fans of NTK who haven't played much, if at all, since the mid '00s. Those players represent a large and extremely important market segment if the game is ever going to grow again. Somehow, I'm guessing you'll still find a way to get mad about this paragraph.
QUOTE
Also, just because I don't quote your entire posts doesn't mean I am not responding to your posts. I already gave satisfactory responses to all statements you've made.

Nope. You still haven't addressed any of this despite me calling you out on it - here goes, for a third time:
We both know there is a delicate balance between aspects of a game being too easy and too hard. Games must feel rewarding. When you click on an NPC and it just gives you items for logging in, that's the equivalent of a win button. It's not compelling at all and leads to boredom, especially when you factor in the items flooding the market and becoming worthless. There has to be some modicum of challenge, even if it's simply holding spacebar and timing vita attacks. There's nothing therapeutic about afking in a room and waiting to click on an NPC, but that is what the current server, which you're so convinced is superior to a rollback, has come to. It's like a bad mobile game now, and has been for months. Wony obv has no idea what he's doing, which just strengthens my argument for leaning on the old content.
And you never will. You know I'm right and you'd rather lie and pretend you've addressed it than admit that I'm right about something. Hell, you're probably even going to include this as an example of bad game design in your book, but here you are again, effectively arguing that daily coins are positive for the game and championing all the wonderful new content from the past 10 years.
QUOTE
For purposes of brevity I chose to not quote block your entire essay and instead focus on the crux of your arguments. I am not going to sit here and respond line by line to your earlier rant, nor am I going to go around in circles with you about dopamine releases and game design mechanics. My prior response about how the research is still greatly lacking and is not understood to the point we can make accurate statements like you are trying to, still stands.

Companies like Blizzard haven't done significant research into what works and doesn't work in game design? Rofl. They are masters of dopamine scheduling without needing to know anything about neuroscience. Once again, you're missing the point completely and displaying more evidence that you'd rather fixate on semantics. The hypocrisy is palpable. You're the KING of pointless semantic arguments on this forum. Just read your post history! It's a big part of why everyone hates you here. If you weren't aware, DM is a dirty acronym, and it's not because you peddle unpopular opinions like me - you're just a huge douchebag.
QUOTE
You don't have a list! What are you even arguing here?

Those reddit comments from 10 people did not constitute a list? Looked pretty list-like to me. What are you even arguing here? I caught you in a contradiction and now you're trying to weasel out of it. So DM-esque!

Posted by: Doctor Dec 15 2016, 03:01 AM


Posted by: Hijack Dec 15 2016, 08:28 AM

this thread is cancer

Posted by: OwnageII Dec 15 2016, 09:42 AM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 15 2016, 02:55 AM) *
Companies like Blizzard haven't done significant research into what works and doesn't work in game design? Rofl. They are masters of dopamine scheduling without needing to know anything about neuroscience. Once again, you're missing the point completely and displaying more evidence that you'd rather fixate on semantics. The hypocrisy is palpable. You're the KING of pointless semantic arguments on this forum. Just read your post history! It's a big part of why everyone hates you here. If you weren't aware, DM is a dirty acronym, and it's not because you peddle unpopular opinions like me - you're just a huge douchebag.


So you think the company that is "master of dopamine scheduling" (that lost millions and millions of subs to the point where they no longer report it since wrath) knows best?

How about when they completely refused to do a Vanilla server and shut down Nostralius?

Posted by: Songa Dec 15 2016, 01:02 PM



Anyway...

How exactly would a retro server work? Would it just be to start over or whatever? I feel like a part of what makes NexusTK unique is the interaction with players (the subpaths, clans, etc.) I mean...you can just make a newbie character if you want to level up and start over? I'm not really understanding the purpose of a new server. It would be interesting to have the opportunity to start a brand new clan or subpath from scratch but I personally would never play a server without those features. It was a big part of me continuously playing the game.

(I also skimmed most of the conversation because--dear god--it's long and boring.) tongue.gif

Posted by: Xing-Yu Seong Dec 15 2016, 02:17 PM

QUOTE (Songa @ Dec 15 2016, 12:02 PM) *


Anyway...

How exactly would a retro server work? Would it just be to start over or whatever? I feel like a part of what makes NexusTK unique is the interaction with players (the subpaths, clans, etc.) I mean...you can just make a newbie character if you want to level up and start over? I'm not really understanding the purpose of a new server. It would be interesting to have the opportunity to start a brand new clan or subpath from scratch but I personally would never play a server without those features. It was a big part of me continuously playing the game.

(I also skimmed most of the conversation because--dear god--it's long and boring.) tongue.gif


From the gist of the general conversation, what I can gather is that a retro server constitutes:
Current graphics, but removal of any content, story post-2003. So, return to Mythic-only central hub, Pre-Quota Subpaths, etc.
Being a new server, everyone would start over, meaning Jadespear and Ironheart would need to be restored because Tangun, or even the old Tutorial with the questionnaire and Soothe, would be too new.

It would also mean that the Subpaths would have to be re-established per the Archons.
Yuri an Senshi would be Kings again, Nagnang would still possibly be an NPC kingdom, Pre-Blight Invasion? I can't remember that timeline for 4.0...
However, it is also mentioned that a Clean Slate isn't absolutely necessary, so basically going back to Mythic and maybe adding new tiers is a possibility.

It's confusing.

Posted by: WereWulf Dec 15 2016, 02:53 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 15 2016, 01:55 AM) *
You're the KING of pointless semantic arguments on this forum. Just read your post history! It's a big part of why everyone hates you here. If you weren't aware, DM is a dirty acronym, and it's not because you peddle unpopular opinions like me - you're just a huge douchebag.


Halombobtk throughout this entire debate DM has been perfectly honest, principled and inviting... however you have been a complete jerk to DM. If anyone in this debate is being the douchebag it's you.

DM new title is the halombobtk killer. On behalf of DM... Halombobtk, go kick a tree good sir.

Posted by: SilentS Dec 15 2016, 06:13 PM

What Stagnation Looks Like.............

This thread. Same things said over and over from both sides.

Give it up, while a small handful might enjoy a retro server, there are not enough players to make it worth while or sustainable. People would move on quickly, realizing it is not as fun as what they once thought. Especially if there is an even lower player base than what Nexus currently has.

Posted by: Mazel Dec 15 2016, 09:18 PM

QUOTE (halome @ Jan 4 2009, 9:40 PM) *
Mazel's post was three sentences that included a "your mom" joke. The meat of his post referenced how a new server wouldn't work because too many former players have significant others, which is just goddamn ridiculous. Having significant others might even improve the chances for a new server since they have the potential to introduce them to the game. Also, can't really ignore the fact that MMO players skew heavily toward being single with lots of spare time.


I'm just so proud someone said my name! smile.gif One cool part of Nexus is getting famous. We all know Songa is famous for eating babies, and DarkMaverick is famous for having a video game review channel and posting on www.nexusforums.com!

Posted by: halombobtk Dec 15 2016, 10:35 PM

QUOTE
Halombobtk throughout this entire debate DM has been perfectly honest, principled and inviting... however you have been a complete jerk to DM. If anyone in this debate is being the douchebag it's you.

I guess you missed the part where I responded to every single statement he made, while he ignored half of mine and fixated on the trivial things he could rebut without having to agree with me on the more important parts. If you don't know why that's infuriating, you must also suck at debates.

@Doctor's signature - dude is not a doctor, nor does he get jokes. Misses the joke, then puts it in his signature. Yikes. Every person who has ever used autism as a way to slight someone online is the same.

@Everyone - thanks for reminding me that playing this game again would be a surefire way to surround myself with a bunch of degenerates. Probably not the best choice to make. I think I've officially snapped out of it. Judging by the number of posts ITT, I hope we at least had some fun. Enjoy all that haterade, fellas. I know it tastes good, especially when you're feeling down, but it won't get you very far in life.

Successfully scratched the itch without even playing. Ahh, sweet freedom! Feliz Navidad y adios.

Posted by: Doctor Dec 15 2016, 11:26 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 15 2016, 07:35 PM) *
Misses the joke


QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 15 2016, 07:35 PM) *
Misses the joke..........


QUOTE (halombobtk @ Dec 15 2016, 07:35 PM) *
Misses the joke................................................................



Posted by: Hijack Dec 16 2016, 08:14 AM

this thread is cancer

Posted by: Songa Dec 16 2016, 01:52 PM

QUOTE (Xing-Yu Seong @ Dec 15 2016, 02:17 PM) *
From the gist of the general conversation, what I can gather is that a retro server constitutes:
Current graphics, but removal of any content, story post-2003. So, return to Mythic-only central hub, Pre-Quota Subpaths, etc.
Being a new server, everyone would start over, meaning Jadespear and Ironheart would need to be restored because Tangun, or even the old Tutorial with the questionnaire and Soothe, would be too new.

It would also mean that the Subpaths would have to be re-established per the Archons.
Yuri an Senshi would be Kings again, Nagnang would still possibly be an NPC kingdom, Pre-Blight Invasion? I can't remember that timeline for 4.0...
However, it is also mentioned that a Clean Slate isn't absolutely necessary, so basically going back to Mythic and maybe adding new tiers is a possibility.

It's confusing.



If this is true, KRU would never go for it. Why? Simple: it would destroy what they currently have. Right now they have a bunch of players who are more than happy to pay for a game running on rusty wheels, a broken engine, and no steering wheel. Making a new server that would reset the game could possibly bring in new and old players. But the biggest problem is that there would be no point in playing the old (current) server. Whatever people think that they've built would be pointless if you can start all over again. The two would cancel each other out.

QUOTE (halombobtk)
I guess you missed the part where I responded to every single statement he made, while he ignored half of mine and fixated on the trivial things he could rebut without having to agree with me on the more important parts. If you don't know why that's infuriating, you must also suck at debates.

@Doctor's signature - dude is not a doctor, nor does he get jokes. Misses the joke, then puts it in his signature. Yikes. Every person who has ever used autism as a way to slight someone online is the same.

@Everyone - thanks for reminding me that playing this game again would be a surefire way to surround myself with a bunch of degenerates. Probably not the best choice to make. I think I've officially snapped out of it. Judging by the number of posts ITT, I hope we at least had some fun. Enjoy all that haterade, fellas. I know it tastes good, especially when you're feeling down, but it won't get you very far in life.

Successfully scratched the itch without even playing. Ahh, sweet freedom! Feliz Navidad y adios.




Take it from someone who poured too much into the game and became very stressed and drained very quickly, take a step back. Take a breath. Look at what you have going on in your life and concentrate on that. This 2D [Content removed]hole of a game really isn't worth the trouble. You're so much better than this. You need to re-asses the efforts you're putting into something that will give you nothing in return. You may not want my words to sink in now, but hopefully they will in the future.

Instead of trying to scream at brick walls, if you really are passionate and care about your ideas, why are you bothering to tell us on these forums? Try going to the source. I'm serious. I just don't see the point of you screaming your head off to people when you don't seem to want their opinions. But that's what is frustrating about playing this game. You might think you have a good idea, it may even be a great one, but trying to tell others about it when they really don't care is a pointless task.

Posted by: Pebbles Dec 17 2016, 12:35 PM

QUOTE (Songa @ Dec 16 2016, 01:52 PM) *
Instead of trying to scream at brick walls, if you really are passionate and care about your ideas, why are you bothering to tell us on these forums? Try going to the source. I'm serious. I just don't see the point of you screaming your head off to people when you don't seem to want their opinions. But that's what is frustrating about playing this game. You might think you have a good idea, it may even be a great one, but trying to tell others about it when they really don't care is a pointless task.



As much as I dislike the community, I've found that as long as you present enough evidence, people will listen. Blaming the community for being apathetic is a cop-out. If you're struggling to find others who share your viewpoint, it's more likely that either your idea sucks or you're not good at expressing it. It's ironic that you mention brick wall, when multiple people have explicitly told the OP why his idea is bad. OP has been extremely dismissive towards others and pretty much a rude [Content removed] every time someone disagreed with him.

This is the first time I've ever seen DarkMaverick, ShuZu and Conro all on the same side of an argument. It takes a special type of retardation to make that happen.

Posted by: Alston Dec 20 2016, 04:10 AM

Holy hell, what did I miss?

Edit: Never-BLEEP-ing mind. Every one else got this handled.

halombobtk, You have no idea what "old" TK is. You also use the worst analogs for gauging demand. You don't listen to intelligent conversation whilst attempting to create echos of your own statements until they drown out dissent. Then you have the audacity to feign intelligence and superior knowledge to several people who have dedicated far more time than you have to this forum and this game.

I think every thing else has been said that needs to be said. I concur with the majority here. A "retro" or "vanilla" server (where you have no hotkeys, leveling to 99 took months, ginseng cave being mined to death, and mythic being a god damn cluster-BLEEP) will do more harm to Kru than good. This isn't just from a business standpoint, it's also from a psychological stand point. You cannot re-create the community that existed back in the day. Most of that player base has grown up, had families, found new obsessions and have had their tastes in vices shift. That's the thing about nostalgia. You can't have the "good ol' times."

At the end of the day, even if you could (somehow) manage to re-create pre-4.0 Nexus, it wouldn't be the same. Also, in this day and age, only a fraction of the original players would sample it and they wouldn't even stick around. This game has nearly no appeal to newer gamers either. It's outdated, uses mechanics that feel like bigger chores than MMO grinding, and there are plenty of free alternatives that provide a superior experience.

DarkMaverick hit you with some knowledge and you bobble-headed your way back into this argument with the same, tired tune. I'm changing the channel before I care enough to invest time into truly eviscerating your self-contained attempt at building an echo chamber here.

Posted by: Krmit Dec 30 2016, 02:08 PM

QUOTE (Alston @ Dec 20 2016, 04:10 AM) *
Holy hell, what did I miss?

Edit: Never-BLEEP-ing mind. Every one else got this handled.

halombobtk, You have no idea what "old" TK is. You also use the worst analogs for gauging demand. You don't listen to intelligent conversation whilst attempting to create echos of your own statements until they drown out dissent. Then you have the audacity to feign intelligence and superior knowledge to several people who have dedicated far more time than you have to this forum and this game.

I think every thing else has been said that needs to be said. I concur with the majority here. A "retro" or "vanilla" server (where you have no hotkeys, leveling to 99 took months, ginseng cave being mined to death, and mythic being a god damn cluster-BLEEP) will do more harm to Kru than good. This isn't just from a business standpoint, it's also from a psychological stand point. You cannot re-create the community that existed back in the day. Most of that player base has grown up, had families, found new obsessions and have had their tastes in vices shift. That's the thing about nostalgia. You can't have the "good ol' times."

At the end of the day, even if you could (somehow) manage to re-create pre-4.0 Nexus, it wouldn't be the same. Also, in this day and age, only a fraction of the original players would sample it and they wouldn't even stick around. This game has nearly no appeal to newer gamers either. It's outdated, uses mechanics that feel like bigger chores than MMO grinding, and there are plenty of free alternatives that provide a superior experience.

DarkMaverick hit you with some knowledge and you bobble-headed your way back into this argument with the same, tired tune. I'm changing the channel before I care enough to invest time into truly eviscerating your self-contained attempt at building an echo chamber here.


Exactly, that noob doesn't know what it was to have to go farm squirrels for acorns just to go sell them 200 for like 1k coins (but you are one of 60 noobs fighting for the same farming spots). Mountain ginseng being farmed because 10 sold for 10k but you were one of 30 people running circles around the cave (oh then have your kill or drop stolen). Finding a group to go grind hamgyong grim ogres for months at a time because that was some of the best exp out there. You want to know beta/3.0 grinding lmao? Go get spark/singe and sit there and try to farm a cow in the kugnae farm or horse hut, only to run out of pipes or livers, have someone else steal your crappy few hundred exp, then have to go do it all over again.

You sir, have never had the luxury of spending a your life in pig 1/2 because every room of every cave was taken. People are very spoiled now with what they've got. Basic quest items now are plentiful but back then, even the most basic of quest items were tall order to acquire holy rings, tit gloves, Lucky silver coins, magic dusts, ST/Electra's/SS's ETC. Imagine getting these things for your quests when the entire population used these items as Best in slot at the time.

Nostalgia is one thing, thats why i still enjoy being a part of the game and hopping on here or there for the 10 bucks a month. But Nostalgia is where all that ends. I would love to see something like that on another server type thing as a fun "weekend" type of thing but its not something i particularly want to experience again from the start. The game mechanically is much different now than it was then.

Posted by: Hijack Dec 30 2016, 04:16 PM

this thread is cancer

Posted by: Nacostradamuss Jan 2 2017, 02:09 PM

I'm so glad we came together to put the slam on that stupid millenial

Posted by: Krmit Jan 3 2017, 02:41 PM

LOL!!! /\ /\ /\

Posted by: Tynan Mar 3 2017, 08:42 PM

A "retro" server is the exact opposite direction Kru should go in, as it assumes that Nexus was, from a gameplay perspective, a better game in the past than it is now. To be fair, I have not played Nexus since...2008? 2009?...but I can say with certainty that the game got better in the decade that I played mostly on and sometimes off.

Was 3.0 fun? Undoubtedly. You have no idea how much fun I had finding the secret Boa room in the snake cave and the hours I spent there, running, zapping, and smoking that sweet herb pipe. Or later, leeching people in the Elder Monkey room? Awesome. But, that is just a subjective experience and, objectively, the game was primitive and had minimal content.

The only reason past nostalgia and social bonds that Nexus seemed better in the past is that it actually was, relative to other games, better back then than it is now. When it primarily competed with Ultima Online and EverQuest, it was quite good. Sure, the graphics were primitive and the mechanics simplistic, but really, the others weren't much better. The trouble is, Nexus had the barest of incremental improvements since 4.0, which was the last era, in my opinion, where it was a strong game relative to the market.

Nexon, and later Kru, squandered the vast potential Nexus had by simply not recognizing the changing market, the advancements in other games, and adapting their game and investing in it. There is absolutely no reason the graphics and engine of Nexus could not have supported something approaching the gameplay complexity and engagement of a modern MMORPG, and it is a shame it never did. I loved (and probably still do) the style of Nexus, but the developers did not ever seem to love it as much as other players and I did, and it showed. Minimal updates, recycled events, and lazy, grind-based mechanics that reward nothing but time invested.

Do you know what would bring me back? A complete re-imagining of Nexus rebuilt from the ground up and moved forward, not backward. The basic style and look of the game (minus the atrocious blend of graphics from 3.0/4.0 and later clients) is absolutely fine, but the mechanics built around it - from paths to hunting to crafting and everything in between - are miserable. They do not have to be. The game could have, mechanically, a modern feel and tons to do. It was mentioned earlier how private server versions implemented raids, etc. - yes! This is exactly the stuff Kru should have done and should be doing, as opposed to rolling back a decade of work in the vain pursuit of chasing nostalgia.

Posted by: Krmit Mar 6 2017, 11:02 AM

QUOTE (Tynan @ Mar 3 2017, 08:42 PM) *
A "retro" server is the exact opposite direction Kru should go in, as it assumes that Nexus was, from a gameplay perspective, a better game in the past than it is now. To be fair, I have not played Nexus since...2008? 2009?...but I can say with certainty that the game got better in the decade that I played mostly on and sometimes off.

Was 3.0 fun? Undoubtedly. You have no idea how much fun I had finding the secret Boa room in the snake cave and the hours I spent there, running, zapping, and smoking that sweet herb pipe. Or later, leeching people in the Elder Monkey room? Awesome. But, that is just a subjective experience and, objectively, the game was primitive and had minimal content.

The only reason past nostalgia and social bonds that Nexus seemed better in the past is that it actually was, relative to other games, better back then than it is now. When it primarily competed with Ultima Online and EverQuest, it was quite good. Sure, the graphics were primitive and the mechanics simplistic, but really, the others weren't much better. The trouble is, Nexus had the barest of incremental improvements since 4.0, which was the last era, in my opinion, where it was a strong game relative to the market.

Nexon, and later Kru, squandered the vast potential Nexus had by simply not recognizing the changing market, the advancements in other games, and adapting their game and investing in it. There is absolutely no reason the graphics and engine of Nexus could not have supported something approaching the gameplay complexity and engagement of a modern MMORPG, and it is a shame it never did. I loved (and probably still do) the style of Nexus, but the developers did not ever seem to love it as much as other players and I did, and it showed. Minimal updates, recycled events, and lazy, grind-based mechanics that reward nothing but time invested.

Do you know what would bring me back? A complete re-imagining of Nexus rebuilt from the ground up and moved forward, not backward. The basic style and look of the game (minus the atrocious blend of graphics from 3.0/4.0 and later clients) is absolutely fine, but the mechanics built around it - from paths to hunting to crafting and everything in between - are miserable. They do not have to be. The game could have, mechanically, a modern feel and tons to do. It was mentioned earlier how private server versions implemented raids, etc. - yes! This is exactly the stuff Kru should have done and should be doing, as opposed to rolling back a decade of work in the vain pursuit of chasing nostalgia.


You made the very valid point of Nexus was a top class game compared to other games of its kind, at that time. So we remember playing the best of the best, now the way the gaming landscape has changed, we hold onto those memories but the quality of game is much different now.

Posted by: Mrdie Feb 21 2018, 02:07 AM

I know this thread is old, but I agree that I just can't see a retro server being a good idea.

Would it be fun? I think veterans players would check it out, relive a bit of nostalgia, declare "those were the good old days" and continue on with their life. You obviously aren't recreating the same community from 15+ years ago, and Nexus' gameplay is already very limited nowadays, let alone back then.

If I install Duke Nukem 3D, Deus Ex, Civilization III, or any number of great games from the past, I will have fun with them. If I install then decades from now I will likely still have fun with them. That sort of "eternal" fun factor doesn't apply to MMORPGs which thrive on communities, expanding universes, new things to do and explore, etc.

I know the idea is to build on the "old Nexus" rather than literally sit around pretending it's 2003 (or even earlier) forever, but why deconstruct so much of the game that has been built up since then? The goal, as others have said, is to change Nexus as it currently exists. Nexus back in the day really isn't that different from Nexus now, it just had less features and more primitive music and graphics (albeit with their own charm.)

Posted by: halombobtk May 27 2019, 08:24 AM

TKReborn, a new retro server, has 30+ people (100 concurrent logins this weekend) chomping at the bit to play despite numerous crashes. Subpaths aren't even released yet. Elixirs and carnages have higher turnouts than NTK already. Too early to declare that I was right and all of you were wrong?

Posted by: darkmaverick Jun 5 2019, 11:27 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ May 27 2019, 09:24 AM) *
TKReborn, a new retro server, has 30+ people (100 concurrent logins this weekend) chomping at the bit to play despite numerous crashes. Subpaths aren't even released yet. Elixirs and carnages have higher turnouts than NTK already. Too early to declare that I was right and all of you were wrong?


Getting 30 people to download a free to play game isn't hard. The NexusTK Facebook groups have 340 to 695 people in them.

More people play freakin AdventureQuest these days than NexusTK, and I doubt that will change anytime soon because as previously stated the old school Nexus gameplay only worked in a world where lots of people had PCs that couldn't run Everquest so we played NexusTK instead.

Now a cheap smartphone can run better looking mmo games with better gameplay than NexusTK has ever had.

Instead of starting a private server for a crappy game why don't you spend a little more time and make a good game using original art assets that can run on a tablet, using a client that doesn't need to load in Windows 7 compatibility mode?

I mean just go get a cheap Hero Engine license, lock the camera up in birds eye mode and build a game that has similar gameplay as Nexus but uses 3d models and has better graphics and GUI, and actually runs on current OS.

Posted by: halombobtk Jun 7 2019, 09:17 AM

No one would play the game you're describing. People are playing TKR because it's extremely similar to the game they remember playing 10+ years ago. Population is now north of 110 as people continue to filter in, and global announcements of people opening mount boxes ($5/pop) occur >5 times a day because people are having enough fun to donate. Subpaths haven't even been released yet.

Of course it's easy to get 30+ people to play - thank you for finally agreeing with the point I've been making this entire ~6 page thread. Feels good, man.

Posted by: Xing-Yu Seong Jun 7 2019, 11:41 AM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Jun 7 2019, 09:17 AM) *
No one would play the game you're describing. People are playing TKR because it's extremely similar to the game they remember playing 10+ years ago. Population is now north of 110 as people continue to filter in, and global announcements of people opening mount boxes ($5/pop) occur >5 times a day because people are having enough fun to donate. Subpaths haven't even been released yet.

Of course it's easy to get 30+ people to play - thank you for finally agreeing with the point I've been making this entire ~6 page thread. Feels good, man.


Nice. Not only are you gambling for digital goods, it's digital goods whose assets don't belong to you or the people who you won them from. laugh.gif

I can't even fathom the stupidity of people paying money for loot boxes, but to do it in a TK private server? Just... LOL

I like watching people double-down on their stupid. Feels good, man.

Posted by: darkmaverick Jun 7 2019, 07:27 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Jun 7 2019, 09:17 AM) *
No one would play the game you're describing.


Literally millions of people play other MMOs.

More people play freakin Terraria than NexusTK.

Hell, more people played Mafia Wars on Facebook than have ever played NexusTK.

I'm sure more people have played Graal Online than NexusTK.

Just as more people have played Ragnarok Online than NexusTK. And are playing right now.


Make an original game using current gen game making technology for current operating systems. It's bound to be more popular than NexusTK, and especially more popular than a NexusTK private server.

I mean jesus christ man. You think 100 people playing an MMO is some kind of big deal. Every garbage low effort game on Steam has at least 100 people play it. This is no benchmark of success.

Let us know when you get 100,000 players.

Or, you know, try some of these other MMOs you don't think exist. You'll probably realize why people left NexusTK and aen't ever coming back.

QUOTE (Xing-Yu Seong @ Jun 7 2019, 11:41 AM) *
Nice. Not only are you gambling for digital goods, it's digital goods whose assets don't belong to you or the people who you won them from. laugh.gif

I can't even fathom the stupidity of people paying money for loot boxes, but to do it in a TK private server? Just... LOL

I like watching people double-down on their stupid. Feels good, man.


Yeah that sure is double stupid.

I mean it's dumb enough to still be shoveling money into NexusTK. But to do it in a private server for NexusTK when every server eventually implodes under drama is an extra stupid thing to do.

With a lot of elbow grease, thoughtful design input and effort NexusTK could be great for the current era. But it aen't going to happen until Wony isn't running the show anymore. So it probably will never happen.

You're better off building a spiritual successor game using current gen tech. I might someday do so.

Posted by: halombobtk Jun 7 2019, 10:37 PM

QUOTE (darkmaverick @ Jun 7 2019, 08:27 PM) *
Literally millions of people play other MMOs.

You're better off building a spiritual successor game using current gen tech. I might someday do so.


Your game will fail. You've never made a successful game like you described when you moved the goalposts to the other end of the Earth, and never will. Why? Because making a successful game is extremely hard and takes an absurd amount of advertising dollars and/or luck. Making a F2P private server reboot of NTK that aims to get 50-100 players is very, very doable and is being proven right now. My argument during this thread is being validated before our eyes, but you're too immature to acknowledge it. All you know how to do is make strawmen arguments like in your last post. Quote me anywhere in the 6 pages of this thread where I said that a rebooted NTK server would pull significant (let's say >1000) players. Don't respond without that quote or I will ignore your post. You have this weird fantasy that you're going to make some hit game, so you exist in a bubble and twist every argument into something that no one's talking about except you. This thread is about creating a TKR server, not a random successful game.

Strawmen arguments are infuriating. You're seriously the worst, DM.

As for the guy who chimed in about "loot boxes" - lol at him not understanding how donations to small private servers work. Jesus, the people in this forum are dumb. Kinda entertaining, kinda sad. The price of a random mount box on TKR is basically the same as the price of a pre-selected mount.

Posted by: Alston Jun 7 2019, 11:09 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Jun 7 2019, 08:37 PM) *
Your game will fail. You've never made a successful game like you described when you moved the goalposts to the other end of the Earth, and never will. Why? Because making a successful game is extremely hard and takes an absurd amount of advertising dollars and/or luck. Making a F2P private server reboot of NTK that aims to get 50-100 players is very, very doable and is being proven right now. My argument during this thread is being validated before our eyes, but you're too immature to acknowledge it. All you know how to do is make strawmen arguments like in your last post. Quote me anywhere in the 6 pages of this thread where I said that a rebooted NTK server would pull significant (let's say >1000) players. Don't respond without that quote or I will ignore your post. You have this weird fantasy that you're going to make some hit game, so you exist in a bubble and twist every argument into something that no one's talking about except you. This thread is about creating a TKR server, not a random successful game.

Strawmen arguments are infuriating. You're seriously the worst, DM.

As for the guy who chimed in about "loot boxes" - lol at him not understanding how donations to small private servers work. Jesus, the people in this forum are dumb. Kinda entertaining, kinda sad. The price of a random mount box on TKR is basically the same as the price of a pre-selected mount.


Anyone can make a game that reaches 100+ players. I know several discord rp servers and old-school muds that retain that many simultanious logins. So, no. You haven't proven anything. Get back to us next year.

Also, calling people childish and moronic whilst ignoring the point they're trying to make is highly reflective of your own attitude. "Look at me! I made a private classic server and it has 100 concurrent logins" has been your phrase of the week.

Your statements speak for themselves. Insanity is to further attempt to reason with you.

Posted by: Xing-Yu Seong Jun 8 2019, 12:14 AM

I played Kaze before it was RG, and I was also involved in RG as well as COM afterwards. I've been behind the scenes and I agree with DM about the personal politics between the devs.

One of the reasons RG failed was that currency dupe glitch that drove Odin up the wall, but the main reason was because no one was in charge. Everyone had their skills, and there were certain focuses they all had, but SOMEONE was more interested in using all their packet knowledge on getting their gibs with their TK spy buddies or currying favors in TK.

CoM was overly complicated and had a ton of great people involved. But more and more people kept showing up in the GM room, and the main two who had started it stepped back. There, people were clearly in charge at first but burn out occurred fast. After subpaths happened, the game kinda waned in direction. By the time rebalancing was taking place, we already had passed the life expectancy and no one really wanted to go forward.

I don't really care what you believe, but it's a known fact that these projects end up not going SOMEONE's way and the passion dies. We're on something like 4th or 5th iteration of the RG template now. There have been upgrades to LUA integration, more dynamic events and replayability. Maybe this one woeks? Who knows. Definitely not you.

As for your point about how donations and gambling work on digital goods for a private server, well that's verifiably incoherent as an argument. Its more likely incompetence attempting to cash in on your nostalgia. Every single speite and the illogically large number of color palettes you can apply to them is as easy a text file or SQL table entry. By all means, go ahead and send them money on things that don't exist in a private server likely to shut down as soon as there's a grudge SOMEONE can't get over and they start over again as something different with new promises that never get fulfilled.

Feels good, man.

Posted by: halombobtk Jun 8 2019, 11:51 AM

QUOTE (Xing-Yu Seong @ Jun 8 2019, 12:14 AM) *
By all means, go ahead and donate money to a server that brings you entertainment.

Feels good, man.


FTFY. Are you really not able to understand this concept? I hear what you're saying, but you don't hear what I'm saying at all. I've got disposable income and I want to support this project that brings me immense joy, so I donate. I would donate for nothing in return, but the opportunity to play - so would others.

I'm convinced this forum is filled with completely delusional nerds who all think they're going to create a hit game and it's making you all argue strawmen instead of sticking to the topic of the thread. I'll say this one last time (maybe caps will help?):

I'M NOT TALKING ABOUT CREATING A HIT GAME. I'M TALKING ABOUT REBOOTING AN OLD GAME THAT HAD A SMALL COMMUNITY.

None of you thought it could be done. You all said no one would play. People are playing. You all lose. I win. G, [Content removed]ing, G. Go back and read my posts in this thread - if the game only lasts 2 years, I'm still the winner, because we've already discussed that reality. It's tough to make games and keep people engaged. God damn it feels good to win an argument when literally the entire rest of the thread is people hating on you smile.gif

Posted by: darkmaverick Jun 8 2019, 11:51 PM

It's funny how you declare yourself the winner when it's been repeatedly said by most everyone in this thread that a retro server would only appeal to a small number of people, and not enough to actually support the work that goes into running the game.

Which is exactly what happens in every single emulator server. A handful of people playing it, for abit, until [Content removed] implodes and people leave. And with you running this one I honestly can't see that pattern changing.

Reading through the forums it does seem Hijack gave the number as 5-10 but he was being flippant, not literal. His point, as was everyone else's, is that from a business perspective a retro server would not appeal to enough people to be worth the time investment into making and running it. The same amount of time you've spent setting up and admining, and creating new content for your server would be more productive spent doing a lot of other more productive things -- like making an original game with modern graphics for modern gaming operating systems.

I mean let's be really honest here halombobtk. The NexusTK client requires you to run it in Windows XP compatibility mode just to play on Windows 10. That's completely ridiculous considering Windows 10 was released almost 5 years ago, and XP was totally discontinued for Microsoft support four years ago. KRU is not running a serious game company here. The level of incompetance is spectacularly outstanding. Any critical review of NexusTK done today would be like bullying the kid in class who has Down Syndrome. It just lowers you. The fact so many of my brain cells are devoted to storing information related to NexusTK is something to be ashamed of. The only way I can justify it to myself is by using it as a case study of how not to design and run an MMO in a book I've been writing on and off over the years about game design.

There's just SO MUCH that is wrong here that it's almost like a surreal parody of how a game company should operate. If Wony came out one day and said that NexusTK has all been a long term sociology experiment to see just how much abuse customers will take from a business I would totally believe it, because that's the only way any of this [Content removed] makes any sense at all.

The only thing that these private servers have proven some posters wrong about is the idea that additional NexusTK servers would cannibalize the playerbase. That really hasn't been the case, as there has been a few hundred people still sticking to this game for some reason I can't figure out, even though my own brother is engaging in this insanity.

But what has most certainly not been proven is that a retro NexusTK server would attract a lot of people. In fact you've got about as many people on your server as in the official NexusTK server, which nearly everyone including yourself universally agrees sucks and is a failure in the market. So it's quite a contradiction you've created here declaring your server a 'success' when the same numbers make NexusTK a failure.

But we already knew this, because as I said back in 2016 Illutia was a 100% original game that was designed to mimic old school NexusTK gameplay. And it has done extremely poorly in the market.

You believed adamantly that people quit NexusTK because it wasn't as good during its early glory days, and everyone would come back if there was a retro server. Everyone in this thread doubted that would be the case, and you haven't proven otherwise.

I also made this statement in 2016 and it is still true today concerning why people don't play NexusTK, and why some people still do.

QUOTE
It isn't because some people have millions more vita than they do or because people do not sit AFK in Mythic Vale occasionally saging for a party or an item they are selling. They leave because the game is not as fun as other MMOs. It offers nothing of substantial improvement in any particular area. A lot of the people still actively playing are addicts who have serious problems in their personal lives and are avoiding reality for the feeling of elitism, power and community they get from playing the same online game for the past two decades of their life. It isn't healthy and it's certainly not an indicator that a new server is what they want.



Also....

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Jun 7 2019, 11:37 PM) *
Your game will fail. You've never made a successful game like you described when you moved the goalposts to the other end of the Earth, and never will. Why? Because making a successful game is extremely hard and takes an absurd amount of advertising dollars and/or luck. Making a F2P private server reboot of NTK that aims to get 50-100 players is very, very doable and is being proven right now.


.....it is because I know making a successful MMO game is difficult that I haven't done it. I do however in fact have around 800 pages of game system design notes, world building and such which if I wanted to turn into an MMORPG I could do.

Haven't done it, because I am too busy trying to make a different software focused business into a success ( Zenither, a TV Anywhere app ) which is as equally challenging and similarly expensive (so far $1.3M in development costs, and we'll likely spend another $4M before we can get to profitability) as developing an MMO.

I don't spend my time creating a retro NexusTK server that will barely attract 100 people to it because that's not a reasonable thing to do. That's not a productive use of my time.

What is a productive use of my time is developing a TV Anywhere app like Zenither that allows, in addition to carrying others TV channels, for me to run my own TV channels and develop my own original intellectual property into TV shows which can build audiences and eventually be adapted into other media such as videogames, and all but guarantee that hundreds of thousands of people play the games I produce in the future. That's what I've chosen to do, because it's going to lead to the end result I want. It's a longer route but it's an actual well thought out business plan which will lead to being able to make other media such as video games and effectively fund their development and conduct the marketing for them.

Your own mileage may vary.

I could probably have chosen to raise capital and fund an MMO instead of making Zenither, but if Zenither succeeds it will result in being able to have the cash flow and marketing reach to make an unlimited number of games. Putting all my eggs into one MMO basket seemed more risky. So I chose this route instead.

It may very well be that because of the route I chose I will be in a position to purchase KRU when it finally goes on the market, which I think one day is bound to eventually occur. Even if the games are old and the playerbase practically non-existent, it still has some IP value and years of customer information data which could be useful for marketing other games. If the price was reasonable I might buy the company just for the customer data list alone. But as the NexusTK vets still playing the game die IRL and the technology stack doesn't stay relevant to today's operating systems, the opportunity to turn NexusTK around into a MapleStory level of success decreases rapidly. It seems to me a spiritual successor to the game is what will need to be created, if not an outright properly licensed sequel. With sufficient funding it probably wouldn't be too difficult to convince NEXON to license the Baram name to a sequel MMO engine developed by a third party game studio.

It does seem NEXON has somewhat done this already with a mobile MMO game, Baram: Yeon developed by a third party studio called Supercat under license from NEXON. So it's not out of the question.


Posted by: halombobtk Jun 10 2019, 07:10 AM

QUOTE
And with you running this one I honestly can't see that pattern changing.


I stopped reading after this. I refuse to argue with someone whose reading comprehension skills are so poor that they don't understand I'm a donating player who has nothing to do with the creation or maintenance of TKR. It's amazing how consistently you fail to comprehend what people write, then expect someone to read your messy walls of text.

Posted by: darkmaverick Jun 11 2019, 09:09 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Jun 10 2019, 08:10 AM) *
I stopped reading after this. I refuse to argue with someone whose reading comprehension skills are so poor that they don't understand I'm a donating player who has nothing to do with the creation or maintenance of TKR. It's amazing how consistently you fail to comprehend what people write, then expect someone to read your messy walls of text.


Then why the heck are you so adamantly defending it then and declaring yourself the "victor" in things?

Jesus christ.

Also the whole "I stopped reading thing", pretty sure nobody believes. It's just that you don't have any good answers to the points I make. And that's okay, because I'm not expecting you to have any.

The "glory days" of NexusTK were possible due to the time period and state of competitor MMOs.

*NexusTK was the only anime inspired MMO for its time period.

*The player-ran subpaths and clans / militias created drama and rivalries.

*The PVP events in Carnages and elixers created drama and rivalries.

*The limited hunting ground rooms in mythic dungeons created drama and rivalries.

*There was a huge aspect of mystery to the game, with players trying to figure out how to complete quests like Wind armor and Staff of the Elements, which it turned out were unfinished quests that couldn't be completed until Eldridge finished them.

As better MMORPGs were released that offered better gameplay and still had opportunities for drama and rivalries to form, and goals that were actually achievable because the quests were not part implemented into the game in unfinished states, players left NexusTK for those games and other new gamers looking to get into MMOs gravitated toward the better, more popular games.

NexusTK today is arguably a better game than it was during its "glory days" since now all Warrior and Rogue paths have a rage / cunning spell, and there are more than just 12 dungeons with only 3 or 4 huntable rooms in the end-game. The cash shop items mitigate some of the dumber aspects of the game, like break on death items and having to travel to different zones to sell your XP to buy stats. But NexusTK still is nowhere near as fun to play as say Final Fantasy XIV or World of Warcraft, or even Ragnarok Online. RO better delivers an old-school MMO experience than NexusTK does, because RO is at least balanced and well thought out. NexusTK is a mess of bad design choices.

As it stands right now substantial parts of NexusTK need to be completely redesigned to make it competitive in the market. I'd say at least half of the dungeons need to be either removed or totally redesigned, as many dungeons now just have no real purpose since the experience rewards aren't as good as other dungeons are, and some dungeons just never did have good xp rewards to begin with (Woodlands is a good example).

NexusTK, like WoW and FFXIV, needs a reboot, another Great Shift event where all the maps and dungeons get redesigned, and some of the core parts of classes are redesigned. I just don't see it occurring under Wony's management of the game. He doesn't know how to do it and he cannot afford the designers who know how to do it. I and a few other veteran players I can think of might be able to do it, but we have no incentive to do it. Most of us are more successful in other careers we've fallen into to ever want to deal with NexusTK for Wony.

It'd be easier to make a new game, a spiritual successor or sequel to NexusTK, than to fix NexusTK. It isn't just design problems but technology problems with the server and client that also need addressing, and while it certainly can be done it's a lot of work for unclear gain.

Posted by: Hijack Jun 11 2019, 10:32 PM

Edit: God dammit [Content removed] it.

Good luck with zenither. I can't tell what is different about it and pluto.tv. Also stop being so passive aggressive on your reviews on play store. It looks really pathetic to tell someone to "look closer". Take it as constructive feedback to make your options clearer.

Posted by: halombobtk Jun 11 2019, 11:15 PM

If I've done anything in the 6 pages of this thread, it's establish the fact that I have zero idea what goes into coding a game. That you would think I'm one of the creators of TKR is un[Content removed]ingbelievable and shows how wildly poor your reading comprehension and critical thinking skills are. You truly are in your own strange little bubble, where you ignore all context and make labored arguments that only make sense against whatever dreamt up adversary is part of your inner monologue.

Posted by: Mrdie Jun 13 2019, 04:34 AM

At the end of the day, if you enjoy working on a private NexusTK server and can get around 100 people to play on it who are having a fun time, I don't see the harm. But I don't think it justifies declaring that all of us were wrong, since you still have to surpass the "actual" NexusTK in terms of avoiding stagnation and growing the community.

Posted by: darkmaverick Jun 13 2019, 01:57 PM

QUOTE (Hijack @ Jun 11 2019, 10:32 PM) *
Edit: God dammit [Content removed] it.

Good luck with zenither. I can't tell what is different about it and pluto.tv.


Some of the features Pluto doesn't have that Zenither does.

1. We have Search, so you can search for films, stations and shows.

2. You can scroll back on the channel guide timeline and watch episodes released earlier in the day without needing to DVR.

3. We have Station pages you can follow, and can be accessed by clicking on the Station logo from the channel guide timeline or by searching for them.

4. When you follow a station any newly released content will be available from the activity feed page, kind of like Facebook's activity feed page.

5. We have integrated merchandise stores for stations, so you can buy t-shirts, dvds, etc related to the show you are watching directly from the apps without leaving it.

6. We have commenting and live chat on episodes.

7. We also have a proprietary ad system that eliminates any chance of getting malware and doesn't load third party websites when you engage with the ad, instead emailing you an offer from the advertiser which you can look at later after you're done watching the program.

8. We can support scheduling of live streams into the channel guide timeline to make it easier for viewers to find live shows as they would with regular TV channels. I'm not talking about the simulcast stations here but having a channel that has a mix of prerecord and live programming. None of our stations are using this feature atm though.

9. We also have patents on all of this stuff as it pertains to our system.


Admittedly we could do a better job of explaining some of these features to our users inside the app using some indicators in the GUI the first time you load it up, instead of having the explanations on a help file accessed within the bottom menu. The indicators haven't been added yet because we're still adding some new features, and my intent was to add them later after all the features were implemented, but some of the technical challenges are taking longer to work out than expected.

Posted by: halombobtk Jun 14 2019, 09:20 AM

Since I imagine it must be difficult/capital intensive to get good content for your platform, is the goal just to get bought? If so, by whom? We certainly live in strange times when it comes to entertainment. Six different apps on my phone to watch sports and none of them work well. It's like the one thing nowadays that no one seems to be able to get right. Will Alphabet/YouTube inevitably win as Gen Z grows up?

Posted by: Hijack Jun 14 2019, 08:52 PM

As a consumer, I LOVEEEEEEEE having to subscribe and have multiple apps just to watch stuff now /s

[Content removed]ing insane

Posted by: darkmaverick Jun 15 2019, 03:00 AM

The goal of Zenither from a business perspective is to replace other methods of broadcasting, in particular using expensive licensed broadcast automation software to beam signals into outer space and for those feeds to be downloaded by third party multichannel programming distributors, ran through CDN (content delivery network servers) and loaded on video players loading m3u8 -- which is how Sling TV, YouTube TV, Hulu Live, etc. work. They aren't very sophisticated pieces of software, just a half step above what is in a cable box.

Even content providers who just use broadcast automation solutions to run the CDNs directly still have enormous overhead costs which make it too expensive for many content providers to be on services like Sling TV.

Our patented Dynamic TV broadcasting method is significantly cheaper method of distribution since it segments content in a way that creates efficiencies that don't exist in the other methods (for example, we don't have to record hundreds of hours of linear feeds and play them back on delay systems for each time zone we operate in, which is an enormous overhead expense in data storage) and our API allows the stations feeds to be loaded into third party apps like Sling TV synchronously, complete with meta-data information like comments appearing across all devices, platforms and apps.

Content licensing is expensive, which is why we don't have all the major channels on board, yet. But we also don't necessarily need them because there are many other content providers who cannot afford to operate channels on competitor apps but can on Zenither, and are significantly cheaper to onboard.

Basically, Sling TV at best will have hundreds of channels due to the high cost of operating a channel with their service creating economic barriers to entry for many content providers.

By contrast Zenither could potentially have tens of thousands of channels since our cost to entry is significantly lower.

Much like any new technology, the major studios and networks will embrace it once it becomes popular. The goal is to eventually be that one app where you can "watch it all", which is our trademarked slogan.

All these other apps will never be the one stop shop for all content, due to inferior technology creating barriers to entry for content providers which limits what content they have. It's one of the reasons so many content providers are trying to make their own apps, but the market can't support hundreds of TV and movie apps. It can really just support 3 or 4, at best. The vast majority of services around right now won't be around in 10 years. They'll be a consolidation into virtual multi-channel programming apps like Zenither, and whoever has the best technology for the consolidation is going to stick around. The others which are basically poor imitations of Netflix, or piggybacking on outdated broadcasting methods will not be.

Posted by: halombobtk Jun 15 2019, 02:53 PM

Does traditional "broadcasting" go away at some point in the near future? That market has to be shrinking rapidly, no? People are moving to places where there is internet, and baller wi-fi will soon cover the planet. Or is it just cheap enough to maintain outdated infrastructure even after the internet is ubiquitous? There are obv other ways to deliver live content nowadays and I'm guessing it's cheaper/better to do so via the internet, as evidenced by Twitter, Facebook, Periscope, etc.

I guess I just don't understand why any of your patents are important 5-10 years from now, but I have no idea what goes into broadcasting live content, nor how big that market segment even is. I know sports and news are $$$, but won't they eventually retire outdated infrastructure?

Posted by: Hijack Jun 16 2019, 11:59 PM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Jun 15 2019, 02:53 PM) *
I know sports and news are $$$, but won't they eventually retire outdated infrastructure?


Sports is already starting to move to their own apps for broadcasting games like NBA TV and NFL app.

Posted by: darkmaverick Jun 24 2019, 01:39 AM

QUOTE (halombobtk @ Jun 15 2019, 03:53 PM) *
I guess I just don't understand why any of your patents are important 5-10 years from now, but I have no idea what goes into broadcasting live content, nor how big that market segment even is. I know sports and news are $$$, but won't they eventually retire outdated infrastructure?


Patents last 20 years in the USA.

Our dynamic broadcasting is a digital kind of broadcasting. It's not radio wave broadcasting.

Broadcasting just means "the transmission of programs or information by radio or television." So livestreaming is a type of broadcasting.

As for sports, the rights to broadcasting sport games for professional and college teams is very expensive and generally locked down in exclusivity agreements. There are some apps specializing in it right now, notably ESPN's app, but the subscription fees they charge for access don't cover the cost of licensing the games to begin with, and with limited ability to generate revenue with ads against the streams they aren't very efficient business models. I foresee many of these niche video content apps eventually shutting down as they switch to virtual multi-channel programming distributor apps like Zenither, operating channels like they traditionally have done.

The biggest problem in the space right now is everyone thinking each TV channel should be its own app, and that consumers view their smart phone screens as a channel guide. That's just not how consumers are actually behaving. Consumers do not want a dozen different apps for each type of content they watch, which have entirely different user experiences and subscription billing to manage. They just want one app they can watch anything on. Nothing exists like that right now, but Zenither has the technology to be that one app. We just need to get the content.

Posted by: Xing-Yu Seong Jun 27 2019, 11:19 AM

QUOTE (darkmaverick @ Jun 24 2019, 01:39 AM) *
Patents last 20 years in the USA.

Our dynamic broadcasting is a digital kind of broadcasting. It's not radio wave broadcasting.

Broadcasting just means "the transmission of programs or information by radio or television." So livestreaming is a type of broadcasting.

As for sports, the rights to broadcasting sport games for professional and college teams is very expensive and generally locked down in exclusivity agreements. There are some apps specializing in it right now, notably ESPN's app, but the subscription fees they charge for access don't cover the cost of licensing the games to begin with, and with limited ability to generate revenue with ads against the streams they aren't very efficient business models. I foresee many of these niche video content apps eventually shutting down as they switch to virtual multi-channel programming distributor apps like Zenither, operating channels like they traditionally have done.

The biggest problem in the space right now is everyone thinking each TV channel should be its own app, and that consumers view their smart phone screens as a channel guide. That's just not how consumers are actually behaving. Consumers do not want a dozen different apps for each type of content they watch, which have entirely different user experiences and subscription billing to manage. They just want one app they can watch anything on. Nothing exists like that right now, but Zenither has the technology to be that one app. We just need to get the content.


Have you set up analytics for channels to supplement Nielsen or other advertising metrics? Also, how do you plan on deploying advertising as it is, because like YouTube, the user data helps create targeted advertising content with advertising blocks set by the channel. Are you running the ad schedules or, are they going to receive metrics from you so that they can just prompt ad buys at certain blocks? That sounds like a lot of work to implement something as seamless as Google's ad market.

Posted by: Dritz Aug 23 2019, 08:57 PM

Wow this was a long way to go just for DM to end up promoting his start-up.

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