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LawBreakers' peak concurrent Steam playerbase dropped to 431 today [Up2: Down to 302]

mrqs

mrqs

Member
RedlineRonin said:
I'm so conflicted about Cliff.

The whole thing is just kind of a bummer. Hopefully they get a chance to make something again and when they do, the game can speak for itself.
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It hurts EVEN MORE when you know about that Samaritan tech demo. It WAS a game, it WAS being made. But Epic changed, just like Valve and many others, and wanted to focus on Multiplayer only games.

H6AUvAh.png


This video talks about that: https://youtu.be/oqg4ub5ao9s

It's really a shame. As far as I know, Cliff was involved in this project. When it was cancelled, he tried to pitch other games but got rejected. Then he left Epic to do his own thing.

Cliff could be a Kojima-like developer, he could have gone the high-risk path and make an AAA game that feels unique. But it's a shame that he too made ANOTHER multiplayer only game that died.

BTz2xUg.png


YjvtlyA.png
 
R

RedlineRonin

Member
MarquesZero said:
It hurts EVEN MORE when you know about that Samaritan tech demo. It WAS a game, it WAS being made. But Epic changed, just like Valve and many others, and wanted to focus on Multiplayer only games.

This video talks about that: https://youtu.be/oqg4ub5ao9s

It's really a shame. As far as I know, Cliff was involved in this project. When it was cancelled, he tried to pitch other games but got rejected. Then he left Epic to do his own thing.

Cliff could be a Kojima-like developer, he could have gone the high-risk path and make an AAA game that feels unique. But it's a shame that he too made ANOTHER multiplayer only game that died.

BTz2xUg.png


YjvtlyA.png
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Fascinating.

Did not know that. Was him pitching other games around the time EPIC got bought by Tencent? I imagine that when Tencent bought EPIC, they probably had some influence on the direction EPIC was going to go moving forward.

I mostly agree on the Kojima comparison, except the ego.

That's the difference. Kojima may take FOREVER to make stuff, but the quality of his finished products speak for themselves. He's not out there creating all kinds of verbal hype and expectations for his games. He does it through trailers and slowly revealing details. Hardly saying that's the only effective method, but when you're out there with a boat load of hubris, saying all the stuff that's been quoted in the last however many pages of this thread, you're inevitably going to alienate some people and set up a narrative where people want to see you taken down a peg (which I don't advocate, but is still the truth).
 
E

E92 M3

Member
RedlineRonin said:
It's a hero driven, class based, team shooter.

You and Cliffy and like three other people are on an island by yourself if you think this game isn't competing against OW.
Click to expand...

It's really not hero driven or class based. Every character is good and can be used to win.

Nothing like OW at the end of the day. OW is slow, players rely on teamwork and hero synergy. LawBreakers is different in that regard.
 
E

enzo_gt

tagged by Blackace
Thread theme music.

Cmagus said:
I feel like the higher costume unlocks would have been a better design for the game imo. Since the game is like a futuristic cops and robbers and the empahsis isn't really on the characters but gameplay I feel like these designs are more appealing imo (not all of the designs just some)
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The key problem across every design in this game is that they're suuuuuper overdesigned and lose visual identity as a result. Sure many of them look cool, in the same way that looking at elaborate gun porn looks cool, but there's hardly anything memorable there because there's always a ton of bits and bobs to plug up any chance you get to use negative space. So it just end up looking like every other mech design that has also come to become a stereotype of characters designed in UE. Warframe is bad with this too but it tries a bit harder to create a consistent visual identity across designs.
 
W

watership

Member
I don't think a multiplayer game needs cute characters with fan-art and excessive backstore and lore. I feel the best balance for that was TF2, but Overwatch is gameplay I actively dislike. It seems all style and no substance. Yet that's what sells. "Huge art following" means more than gameplay it seems.
 
R

RedlineRonin

Member
E92 M3 said:
It's really not hero driven or class based. Every character is good and can be used to win.

Nothing like OW at the end of the day. OW is slow, players rely on teamwork and hero synergy. LawBreakers is different in that regard.
Click to expand...

I get that the actual balancing and pacing of the games is very different, as I eluded to by classifying it as something more similar to an arena-based shooter, but regardless of how it actually plays, that's the game they're pitching. You don't have to look past the games website to understand that

http://lawbreakers.nexon.net/en/game/roles

From an outsider's perspective, both games appear to be class/role based, hero driven (arguable, as LB doesn't seem to have as much identity as others like TF2 for example) team-based shooters.

Again, understand that they play very differently, but if you're trying to get people to play your game, a lot of people are going to identify those games as being in a similar genre on a surface level.

Foxy the Fox said:
Sorry but Kojimas ego is one of the biggest in the whole industry.
Click to expand...

I know what you mean, and maybe my phrasing was poor, but do you know what I mean? He's not out there being a verbal hype man saying I'm making the next billion dollar franchise with Death Stranding, ya know?
 
CGwizz

CGwizz

Member
This was suposed to be free to play but the greed was to much and they wanted those dolars in each copy like overwatch did. The diference is that blizzard have millions that buy and play ANYTHING they release. They could charge 200 dolars i bet there would be millions that would buy overwatch.

Now i dont even know if this can be saved by going free to play.
 
G

Gator86

Member
CGwizz said:
This was suposed to be free to play but the greed was to much and they wanted those dolars in each copy like overwatch did. The diference is that blizzard have millions that buy and play ANYTHING they release. They could charge 200 dolars i bet there would be millions that would buy overwatch.

Now i dont even know if this can be saved by going free to play.
Click to expand...

No, it's dead. Any initial launch hype is gone, it has no name recognition, and even more ferocious competition is about to launch.

Even if it were to go F2P this winter or something, some casuals would jump on and get absolutely fucking wrecked by people who have been playing it since launch. Attrition for high skill ceiling games leads to a pretty tough base so new people would probably get destroyed so badly they'd just quit immediately anyway.
 
G

Give War A Chance

Member
I do find the fascination with this game strange. Even in this bread, evidently there are more posts than concurrent players. For a game that seems extremely middling, there is a lot of chatter behind it.

Is it because Cliff made a game that may fail?
 
S

Seth Enosh

Member
Gator86 said:
No, it's dead. Any initial launch hype is gone, it has no name recognition, and even more ferocious competition is about to launch.

Even if it were to go F2P this winter or something, some casuals would jump on and get absolutely fucking wrecked by people who have been playing it since launch. Attrition for high skill ceiling games leads to a pretty tough base so new people would probably get destroyed so badly they'd just quit immediately anyway.
Click to expand...
The game does have SBMM so if a ton of casuals jump in they'd probably be fine since they would be matched against each other.

As someone who is primarily an Xbox gamer I picked the game on steam up this weekend and after playing less than 3 hours I managed to get several 3rd/2nd and a 1st place finish. So I wonder if the skilledAF marketing scared off people who might have actually done fine.
 
N

Ninja Scooter

Member
Give War A Chance said:
I do find the fascination with this game strange. Even in this bread, evidently there are more posts than concurrent players. For a game that seems extremely middling, there is a lot of chatter behind it.

Is it because Cliff made a game that may fail?
Click to expand...

Cliffy is a well know/high profile guy in enthusiast circles so his name being attached is naturally going to raise the profile of a game as well.
 
Northeastmonk

Northeastmonk

Gold Member
Foxy the Fox said:
Sorry but Kojimas ego is one of the biggest in the whole industry.
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Wait a minute... so you guys think Cliffy B could make a larger impact than/equal to Metal Gear Solid?

When? When he was at Epic?

I agree he has ideas, but where's his Snatcher, Policenauts, or his multiple Metal Gear games? His military fiction was Gears of War maybe?

He takes one picture with Kojima flipping everyone off and he thinks he'd mess up Silent Hills. Lol what was once known as silent hills.

He needs to stick to it with large SP/MP games. He goes off and all he wants to do is MP. If he was going to be like Kojima he'd make games like Kojima.
 
G

Gator86

Member
Seth Enosh said:
The game does have SBMM so if a ton of casuals jump in they'd probably be fine since they would be matched against each other.

As someone who is primarily an Xbox gamer I picked the game on steam up this weekend and after playing less than 3 hours I managed to get several 3rd/2nd and a 1st place finish. So I wonder if the skilledAF marketing scared off people who might have actually done fine.
Click to expand...

I don't think SBMM is going to do much with such low pop numbers. Also, I would guess Gaffers are significantly more skilled than the general gaming population. Who knows though.

Unrelated to your post, why do posters keep acting like people are persecuting Lawbreakers? We've seen this player count tracking interest for just about every notable or big game that's come out and bombed. It's pretty standard around here. The first Titanfall 2 OT is filled with player count commentary. Same with Evolve and tons of other games.
 
K

killroy87

Member
Gator86 said:
I don't think SBMM is going to do much with such low pop numbers. Also, I would guess Gaffers are significantly more skilled than the general gaming population. Who knows though.

Unrelated to your post, why do posters keep acting like people are persecuting Lawbreakers? We've seen this player count tracking interest for just about every notable or big game that's come out and bombed. It's pretty standard around here. The first Titanfall 2 OT is filled with player count commentary. Same with Evolve and tons of other games.
Click to expand...

Hard to git gud when we all spend more time talking about games on the internet than playing them :p
 
B

badb0y

Member
Northeastmonk said:
Wait a minute... so you guys think Cliffy B could make a larger impact than/equal to Metal Gear Solid?

When? When he was at Epic?

I agree he has ideas, but where's his Snatcher, Policenauts, or his multiple Metal Gear games? His military fiction was Gears of War maybe?

He takes one picture with Kojima flipping everyone off and he thinks he'd mess up Silent Hills. Lol what was once known as silent hills.

He needs to stick to it with large SP/MP games. He goes off and all he wants to do is MP. If he was going to be like Kojima he'd make games like Kojima.
Click to expand...

Both are pretty big icons in the industry not sure why you are trying to have a dick waving contest.
 
S

Seth Enosh

Member
Gator86 said:
I don't think SBMM is going to do much with such low pop numbers. Also, I would guess Gaffers are significantly more skilled than the general gaming population. Who knows though.

Unrelated to your post, why do posters keep acting like people are persecuting Lawbreakers? We've seen this player count tracking interest for just about every notable or big game that's come out and bombed. It's pretty standard around here. The first Titanfall 2 OT is filled with player count commentary. Same with Evolve and tons of other games.
Click to expand...
Yeah I dunno. I mean I'd like to think I'm "skilledAF" (lol) but I am not great with mouse based games at all.

I think it's less about the interest in player count and more that some people seem to have been actively rooting for the game to fail because of disliking CliffyB or the art style.

I don't really remember seeing those type of posts about titanfall 2. Of course titanfall 2 and evolve also did much better than this game anyway right after launch.
 
K

KDR_11k

Member
I can only speak for myself but after seeing a whole lot of footage of the game I still never though to myself "I'd like to play that". It didn't seem badly marketed or badly covered, just not appealing.
 
B

b0bbyJ03

Member
Izayoi said:
Wow, this is downright miserable. How are things going in the OT?
Click to expand...

What a shame. I played this game and it was really a lot of fun but sometimes that's not enough. I loved Titanfall and the same thing happened to that. Had to give up on it (PC version)
 
Northeastmonk

Northeastmonk

Gold Member
badb0y said:
Both are pretty big icons in the industry not sure why you are trying to have a dick waving contest.
Click to expand...

It's just about the games people play or what I play. I just see it being very different.

It's like comparing the fantasy author to the military fiction author.
 
K

Kayant

Member
BernardoOne said:
Evolve failed to transition to F2P because they took too damn long to do it.
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That's completely false. It failed because when it transited its numbers dropped exactly like it did at launch a month later.

http://steamcharts.com/app/273350

Released in February 2015 peak player numbers - 27,403
March 2015 peak player numbers - 6,992
April 2015 - 4,044
...

Released as F2P July 2016 - 51,099
August 2016 - 13,897
September 2016 - 4,985
...

Them waiting too long might have made them decide to suspend development quicker but the game still had a player retention problem after going F2P and having 2x numbers than since at launch. Plus the fact they also now don't have guaranteed revenue would have contributed to the quick suspension.
 
G

Giftofgab24

Member
Why are people so sure it's going f2p? I never have trouble finding matches on ps4. I think this game is great. A miniscule pc player base says nothing about the ps4 player base.


Edit: I guess the post above answers my question.
 
K

killroy87

Member
Giftofgab24 said:
Why are people so sure it's going f2p? I never have trouble finding matches on ps4. I think this game is great. A miniscule pc player base says nothing about the ps4 player base.


Edit: I guess the post above answers my question.
Click to expand...

The real question is, why are people so sure that going F2P would solve anything? I don't think there is a mass audience of people who are being held back by the $29.99 price point.
 
K

Kaako

Felium Defensor
I don't think going F2P will save this game in a market saturated with such multiplayer only games.
 
K

kuYuri

Member
I swear we have this conversation every year and the conclusion is pretty much the same. You can only have so many shooters and other kinds of games or forms of media vying for people's time and money.

Lawbreakers not only has to compete with the other games that released this year, but with all the other shooters and other multiplayer games that have been released in the last two to five years or more. Between Overwatch, PUBG, Call of Duty, Rainbow Six Siege, Battlefield, Destiny, Halo 5, Paladins, Counter-Strike GO, League of Legends, Dota 2, Smite, Hearthstone, Grand Theft Auto V, Minecraft, etc. I mean I can literally go on and on. The market can only support so many games and the rest are just going to get buried.
 
Mossybrew

Mossybrew

Member
Nocturno999 said:
There's like a billion new games to play.

Market is bloated.
Click to expand...

So true. Many have chimed in to say they found Lawbreakers "fun" but the game doesn't exist in a vacuum. To succeed in this market you need something to grab potential players' interest, both from games they are currently playing and other high profile games coming out in the near future. Lawbreakers just didn't have that extra something to do that and the market has spoken. Or quiety shrugged in this case.
 
M

MehsterChief

Member
GiantBombGamer said:
I dont really understand the defense force for this game. Is it people trying to defend and justify their purchase or...?
Click to expand...

They defend it because it is an excellent game that deserves better. Even worse that people here and journalists have been concentrating on its low poulation than on how good it is.
 
K

Kaako

Felium Defensor
kuYuri said:
I swear we have this conversation every year and the conclusion is pretty much the same. You can only have so many shooters and other kinds of games or forms of media vying for people's time and money.

Lawbreakers not only has to compete with the other games that released this year, but with all the other shooters and other multiplayer games that have been released in the last two to five years or more. Between Overwatch, PUBG, Call of Duty, Rainbow Six Siege, Battlefield, Destiny, Halo 5, Paladins, Counter-Strike GO, League of Legends, Dota 2, Smite, Hearthstone, Grand Theft Auto V, Minecraft, etc. I mean I can literally go on and on. The market can only support so many games and the rest are just going to get buried.
Click to expand...
Honestly this makes me questions the mentality of devs like CliffyB who see this supersaturated market and still decide to develop these multiplayer-only style of games. Too many devs chasing them teenage whales and that bottom line only.
 
K

Kayant

Member
GiantBombGamer said:
I dont really understand the defense force for this game. Is it people trying to defend and justify their purchase or...?
Click to expand...
Defense force?

Majority of people that are from the OT have either being having a discussion about F2P not being the saving grace as people think it will be, fixing misinformation that has spread from out of context interview quotes or the like.

No one is really "defending" anything as much as we are just having a discussion.

It's perfectly reasonable for people passionate about something to have lengthy conversations about said thing.
 
G

Gator86

Member
kuYuri said:
I swear we have this conversation every year and the conclusion is pretty much the same. You can only have so many shooters and other kinds of games or forms of media vying for people's time and money.

Lawbreakers not only has to compete with the other games that released this year, but with all the other shooters and other multiplayer games that have been released in the last two to five years or more. Between Overwatch, PUBG, Call of Duty, Rainbow Six Siege, Battlefield, Destiny, Halo 5, Paladins, Counter-Strike GO, League of Legends, Dota 2, Smite, Hearthstone, Grand Theft Auto V, Minecraft, etc. I mean I can literally go on and on. The market can only support so many games and the rest are just going to get buried.
Click to expand...

This is really going to become more of an issue going forward. As more games pivot to focus on being games as service titles, there's simply going to be fewer successful games, unless the market increases considerably. Games like Lawbreakers bomb now, but in the future they're probably not even getting greenlit.
 
Nydius

Nydius

Member
I'll just repeat what I wrote on a YouTube video elsewhere.

I have no doubt that sites like SteamSpy aren't entirely accurate but that is offset by the wide array of statistics available. All signs have been negative for Lawbreakers: Player counts tanking day-over-day, average time spent getting progressively lower, number of Twitch streams and Twitch viewers dropping every day since launch, and even a weird roller coaster of owners data where it keeps peaking then dropping by several hundred then going up again by almost twice as much.

I don't relish any game failing. I don't have any issues with CliffyB but even if I did I wouldn't allow my dislike of ONE developer in the studio to actively wish for a game's failure, a game that has the livelihoods of many people attached to it. But things just don't look good for Lawbreakers. Marketing played a part, crowded genre played a part, trying to copy elements from three different types of shooter genres and blend them into one played a part, and timing played a part. Now they're up against a wall with the biggest releases coming soon and the Destiny 2 PC beta stealing a TON of press and mindshare with how good it ended up being (I knew a lot of people expecting a really shitty port). E: Not to mention they got undercut by Overwatch too; Even though they're different games, generally, Overwatch's announcement of adding Deathmatch and Junkertown came on the heels of Lawbreakers' release. Since most people tend to only play 2-3 shooters (a fact that CliffyB once mentioned in an interview), they really needed to do something to get people interested in breaking away from their old habits... and simply didn't.

dishonestjest said:
There isn't one.
Click to expand...

Nah, there is a defense force for the game, they're just less active than they were a week or two ago. The first week the game was out people were posting concerns about the CCU numbers and those posts were getting shouted down - or at least shouted at - by people claiming those numbers are inaccurate, that they're not indicative of long term performance, and so on. Then CliffyB came out with his "this is a marathon, not a sprint" comment in a post-launch interview and the whole thing blew up again. Hell, IGN posted a long ass OpEd about not focusing on player counts specifically using Lawbreakers as the "proof" for their opinion article.
 
K

Kuro

Member
watership said:
I don't think a multiplayer game needs cute characters with fan-art and excessive backstore and lore. I feel the best balance for that was TF2, but Overwatch is gameplay I actively dislike. It seems all style and no substance. Yet that's what sells. "Huge art following" means more than gameplay it seems.
Click to expand...

If it didn't have any substance it wouldn't have such a big competitive scene. Sure its not quite as technical as some FPS but it is more team based than a lot of FPS. In order to stand out in the multiplayer FPS crowd you NEED a good hook and Lawbreakers has absolutely no charm and its aesthetic is incredibly boring which is a major part of the reason its doing so poorly. Looks mean a lot when the market is so saturated. On the other hand PUBG is a fairly ugly game but its concept is very well pulled off and got a lot of people streaming it etc. It has its own hook just with its concept.
 
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