It's Closing Time
Blank Keating
😛
There's been a lot of talk lately about the game dying. Some people disagree (mainly ONE and newer players), but it's true. For those of you saying "no shit", you can probably skip this article. For you newbies - those of you that exist out there - and naysayers, I'll explain why I say this.
The war module has at long last been broken.
Oh shit.
Everything else has been broken over time - strategy, media, ads, parties, and so forth. The admin broke these to focus more on the war module, which makes most - if not all - of it's money. Annoying but understandable, the war module has always had a way to "right" itself. As in, when it leaned one way, it would naturally balance itself out in the end. Anyone who's familiar with history before the last six months knows this.
A country gets invaded by a stronger force, that country recruits harder, gets newbies, and eventually fights back. They go back and forth until, once a year, alliances split and reform. Then we do it all over again.
Somewhere down the line over the last couple months, that changed. Recruitment is dead. Newbies don't play anymore, and the few that do leave early thanks to admin interventionism and player negativity. Can you blame them? There's way more exciting things to do than try to crowbar your way into our society here while you're in a media-dominant country like the U.S., Japan, or France. The few that do stick around aren't loud or strong enough to make a difference anyway.
In all of these entertainment possibilities, eRepublik is the equivalent of debating philosophy with a hobo in one of these many fine alleys. And then cold selling magazine subscriptions for him.
Even ONE isn't growing, it's shrinking. They're just shrinking slower than the other side. Player counts dropped under 200,000 this month, less than 40% of what it was in V1. The admins even created a new home screen to hide this fact. TERRA will eventually break apart or be completely overrun, losing most of their players. Then ONE will probably turn on it's vassal states, then on each other, and continue to divide until there's nothing but the remnants of one country in a sea of cartridge casings and empty gold boxes, weeping at their lack of worlds to conquer.
There are things that can mitigate the game dying, like if a big ONE country decides to switch sides, or TERRA and EDEN decide to merge. But really, as long as new blood isn't pumping into the game, it's only a matter of time before the game dies completely.
The only one that can stop it is the admins, and it's probably not going to happen. eRepublik Labs is working on a Facebook app, presumably in the style of this game, which will probably bring in more money and less bandwidth troubles than anything here.
Now that that's been said...
I never like to write an article that's 100% negative, and this one has been incredibly bleak. So here's your happy times:
Dear Admins,
Thanks for all the cool people and insufferable assholes you've allowed us to meet.
Thanks for all the fun battles that were hosted here before you ruined them.
Thanks for distracting Pizza the Hut from pushing his agenda in real life for three years.
Thanks for all the alliances, breakups, useless drama, and nationalist fantasies you've allowed us to play out.
Thanks for making a game that was truly first in class...or at least a game that you could let us make first in class for a while.
And lastly, thanks for the forfeit point you'll inevitably be giving me for this article.
Thanks for the memories, eRepublik. This one's for you:
Comments
pertamaxxxxxx!
Uh, 2ndmaxxx?
wow, that was kinda bleak 😕
I wholeheartedly concur.
Good, first article I've read in four months. Glad to see you resigning yourself. Good stuff as always.
vote
"a game that you could let us make first in class for a while."
ORLY?
YaRLY!
It was once a selling point that we made over 90% of the game for them with all the military orgs and newspapers...etc,etc....
Guess they got jealous they weren't the center of attention.
I only played this so I could run a company. I played my fingers off and finally "EARNED" a company. Now they are given away for free making everything I played the game to get meaningless. Thanks for that one Bonte..cough cough, tool, cough.
At least I met some cool folks in game.(not one is an admin, BTW)
People don't play ERep for the great job the admins are doing, they play for people like BK here and it is a real shame the best people we have are getting tired of the up-hill battle against stupidity.
Vaya con Dio.
Yay! Mass ragequit time! 😃
umad because your country is not invincible like you thought.
For the record, I'm not quitting just yet. I need to see my dystopian prophecy play out 😛😛
In agreeance.
"Yay! Mass ragequit time!" again
By the way, you do know that "Closing Time" is an awesome Tom Waits Album. Right?
so bleak 🙁
but has a ring of truth 🙁(
i guess all enations will lose. if not now then soon. those statistics aren't surprising and the argument is sound.
"The few that do stick around aren't loud or strong enough to make a difference anyway."
i can't help but take offense to this remark. it stings my virtual ass in the special way only the admin's barbed, 12-inch broom handle can and will probably leave a mark. not in any hurry to show any gratitude to fellow players or allies?
whatever. that's why i keep reading our enation's group-therapy articles.
Here's my problem, just looks like your writing this because eUS is about to be taken off the map and your angry about that.
I can see the epitaph book - "From eRepublik to eEmpire". Yup.
Agree with...sadly D :
Hmm... I'm a new player about 5 days old or so. I used to do v1 and what a long time ago that was... I just had to speak up and say that here I am, at least one example of new blood.
Eventually when things start to reach critical mass, the admins will get their stuff together and do what needs to be done. That is human nature isn't it? Wait until the last second to fix things?
I am convinced that games like this never really DIE, they just get populated by a smaller community that knows its way around a bit better. The average skill level goes up and you don't get as many idiots. Maybe the community gets "cozier" even?
This sort of thing is cyclical, the sort of defeatist attitude that causes people to jump ship early when in the end all that is needed is to give it a little more time to right itself. But if enough people jump ship early it might not be possible to right itself...
great article
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