Playerbase shrinking rapidly -10% in the last month

[cyresdog]

You guys are trying to give all the credit to Brytenwalda. It's not true. I give them credit, because the mod is fantastic. It's still a mod. They still used someone's engine, license, resources, platform.....They built the mod from the Mount and Blade engine. You can't change that.

You HAVE to give Taleworlds credit.

You're not on the Brytenwalda forums. You're on the TW forums.

Neither company is 100 percent responsible for VC. That's the truth.

Regardless, Bannerlord is still in Beta. Comparing it to a game that's been around for 10 years is stupid. Bannerlord still has to be finished. It will still go to the modding community.

Crying the sky is falling because Beta participation is down is absolutely meaningless. Taleworlds doesn't depend on micro-transactions. All of you have already paid full price.

What matters is how many people play the game when it's finished.

The rest is drama queen nonsense.

Now lets face the actual truth, take away the mod community like Brytenwalda and Warband and TW would have long been dead.
I like Warband, but to say that Vanilla can keep you playing for several hundreds if not thousands of Hours, is a lie. Maybe there are a few exceptions here and there, but those few people are not enough to keep a company going.
Bannerlord is in development for over 8 years. Its in EA for ~9 months, and we have not gotten anything new so far. To hope that changes rapidly anytime soon is delusional at best.
And seeing how little they interact with their community i highly doubt that even if they introduce anything new to the game, that it will be good.
The greatest new addition to Bannerlord is one of the most despised ones, the smithing. Player Feedback on that is on these forums since day 1, and hardly anything changed so far in that regard, they did say that they gonna look into it and rework it. But thats been quite some months ago aswell.

Which gives me again the impression that they hope that people just forget about it. Another example, the one perk that was really game changing and exciting was the one that gave you the opportunity to place your troops on a battle map before a fight starts. I personally can't find that one in the game anywhere, it got replaced with another "+% damage in Simulations". Which shows what kind of route they take when things get too hard.

I think what you miss is why 90+% player quit the game already, not because its EA, not because its featureless, but because TW has shown us in this EA how much of a lost cause this game is. And how little TW actually cares about us, the playerbase.
And that does not only shows in the playerbase stats, but also in how much forum activity is here. Its the same people everyday, i don't expect it to be as high as the numbers at launch. But saying that is not a drastic change would be ignoring the truth.

And for what exactly do i have to give TW credit when it comes to VC? Paying more talented developers who are in touch with their community? Sure if thats what you wanna hear, then here i go: Good job TaleWorlds, please do the same now with Bannerlord, just pay a bunch of dudes from Nexusmods to work on Bannerlord so that we can have the game we all waited almost a decade for.

 

[Old-Bull]

I guess we found a Shinobi replacement right here
If i pay you to make a desk for me or whatever you can craft with your own hands, then it is still not my accomplishment, all i did was to pay you to do so. And neither is it the accomplishment of that person who invented the desk, its your accomplishment.

If you built it from scratch it would be yours to claim.

If you built it from a concept someone else created, and then use the core of the old desk to add a few more drawers, while making it much prettier, all the while doing it under the license of the original desk maker, it's not yours.

Taleworlds created a game genre and an engine. Brytenwalda created a mod in that genre, with that engine.

Giving all the credit to Brytenwalda is bull****. They didn't create the genre. They didn't create the foundation that the house was built on. They built the mod, they did it in a genre completely unique to TW with an engine created by TW.

 

[Old-Bull]

Can you find a picture of Doc Rivers fans crying, because his basketball team(that was still in summer work-outs) wasn't as good as one that played together for ten years, that was assembled by the front office of the staff that proceeded him.

That would be a lot more relevant.

 

[cyresdog]

If you built it from scratch it would be yours to claim.

If you built it from a concept someone else created, and then use the core of the old desk to add a few more drawers, while making it much prettier, all the while doing it under the license of the original desk maker, it's not yours.

Taleworlds created a game genre and an engine. Brytenwalda created a mod in that genre, with that engine.

Giving all the credit to Brytenwalda is bull****. They didn't create the genre. They didn't created the foundation that the house was built on. They might have built the game, they did it in a genre completely unique to TW with an engine created by TW.

Do you also thank Pong for every video game that followed? I personally don't. Sure you are right, TW did a great with creating the genre, but back in the day when they created it they worked with the community on it. The founders of TW some dude and his wife, i can't recall their names i am sorry, did develop this genre hand in hand with the community and created something big.
They stopped doing that for some reason afterwards, and we see how it ended. We saw that in the past with multiple, way bigger, way more influental developers. Blizzard, greatest example. Once beloved by everyone is now nothing more than a greedy company that ignores all feedback.
That slowly but surely starts to crumble. Most of their games are dead, and they all killed them themself. That was not some hater community.

 

[Old-Bull]

Now lets face the actual truth, take away the mod community like Brytenwalda and Warband and TW would have long been dead.
I like Warband, but to say that Vanilla can keep you playing for several hundreds if not thousands of Hours, is a lie. Maybe there are a few exceptions here and there, but those few people are not enough to keep a company going.
Bannerlord is in development for over 8 years. Its in EA for ~9 months, and we have not gotten anything new so far. To hope that changes rapidly anytime soon is delusional at best.
And seeing how little they interact with their community i highly doubt that even if they introduce anything new to the game, that it will be good.
The greatest new addition to Bannerlord is one of the most despised ones, the smithing. Player Feedback on that is on these forums since day 1, and hardly anything changed so far in that regard, they did say that they gonna look into it and rework it. But thats been quite some months ago aswell.

Which gives me again the impression that they hope that people just forget about it. Another example, the one perk that was really game changing and exciting was the one that gave you the opportunity to place your troops on a battle map before a fight starts. I personally can't find that one in the game anywhere, it got replaced with another "+% damage in Simulations". Which shows what kind of route they take when things get too hard.

I think what you miss is why 90+% player quit the game already, not because its EA, not because its featureless, but because TW has shown us in this EA how much of a lost cause this game is. And how little TW actually cares about us, the playerbase.
And that does not only shows in the playerbase stats, but also in how much forum activity is here. Its the same people everyday, i don't expect it to be as high as the numbers at launch. But saying that is not a drastic change would be ignoring the truth.

And for what exactly do i have to give TW credit when it comes to VC? Paying more talented developers who are in touch with their community? Sure if thats what you wanna hear, then here i go: Good job TaleWorlds, please do the same now with Bannerlord, just pay a bunch of dudes from Nexusmods to work on Bannerlord so that we can have the game we all waited almost a decade for.

You want to know why people took a break from playing the game? They know it will be much better when it's finished and even better than that after it's modded.

They don't have to play an unfinished game. They can wait until it's finished.

I played the game a couple of thousand hours on Covid lockdown. I took a break at 1.5.3. until they added the changes I want to see to make the game fun for me: the fixes coming in 1.5.6. I'm sure I'll play 1.5.6 until I find the thing they need to work on to keep me interested. I'll take a break then until the patch comes out that fixes it. That's how it works. It's called early access for a reason.

The games not finished yet. People can wait until it is.

 

[Great White Nanuk]

Can you find a picture of Doc Rivers fans crying, because his basketball team(that was still in summer work-outs) wasn't as good as one that played together for ten years, that was assembled by the front office of the staff that proceeded him.

That would be a lot more relevant.

You're trying way too hard to be a Chad and you're coming off as Virgin instead.

 

[Is Milse Póg]

Do you also thank Pong for every video game that followed? I personally don't. Sure you are right, TW did a great with creating the genre, but back in the day when they created it they worked with the community on it. The founders of TW some dude and his wife, i can't recall their names i am sorry, did develop this genre hand in hand with the community and created something big.
They stopped doing that for some reason afterwards, and we see how it ended. We saw that in the past with multiple, way bigger, way more influental developers. Blizzard, greatest example. Once beloved by everyone is now nothing more than a greedy company that ignores all feedback.
That slowly but surely starts to crumble. Most of their games are dead, and they all killed them themself. That was not some hater community.

Armağan and Ipek Yavuz. I believe they divorced, but I have no real clue.

Anyway, TW doesn't need to care, and maybe they don't. They got a ****ton of money, and in Turkey, especially with the current state of their crumbling economy, that money is worth way more than in highly developed countries (the US, Western Europe, Japan, Australia, et cetera). Even if they totally give up on the game, it wouldn't matter that much to them, since they are rich as **** now.

I doubt they will give up on the game, but it seems like they switched to maintenance mode before the product was even finished.

By the way, the Brytenwalda team should get almost all of the credit for VC. Warband modding was a mess. Modders had to figure everything out and develop tools and techniques to work with the rather poorly designed bodged-together engine and TW's idiosyncratic scripting language. They frequently had to work against the engine in order to get things to work, or fix/modify systems that are either rudimentary or broken in vanilla Warband. For a very small company like TW back then, it is expected that the modding capabilities are rudimentary, and that there won't be be a lot of support; but for the much bigger modern TW, which expects modders to carry this game, the poor support they give modders is pretty inexcusable in my opinion.

 

[cyresdog]

Armağan and Ipek Yavuz

Thanks could have googled it, but was too lazy for that.

 

[Dreed89]

The idea that VC should be credited to TW only stands in terms of ownership of the game: Yes, TW owns VC because they paid for it and bought its rights.

What most other people are stating, and I strongly support too, is that owning VC does not prove TW guys have the vision, project management skills, communicaton, or technical capabilies for ability to develop such a game.

 

[Cornelis]

-10% Gain in the last month...
Considering we are on track to full release by around march of next year I just cant see how you can pull off increasing your player count at the current rate of development.
Especially if you are ignoring the most requested features of the player base (example: custom servers and a load out system in MP)

There has to be a point where you have to pull your head out of the dirt and start fulfilling the player bases needs, we don't want your esports or skins.
The day there is a direct Competitor that actually values its players and modders this franchise will absolutely die unless Taleworlds wise up

Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord - Steam Charts

An ongoing analysis of Steam's player numbers, seeing what's been played the most.

steamcharts.com

I was looking at this the other day and it seems to peak players on updates then starts stabilizing again. I think players are going to continue to drop few people are going to wait around for updates they will take breaks I even did for a while but I'm back quite satisfied I think that 1.5.6 is what many people are holding out for that's why we saw such a large drop off of players as of recent everyone is hyping up 1.5.6 to be some glory game changing update we can only hope it is good luck to TW hope it goes well

 

[Roaring Mouse]

Wow, this place still sucks.

I am waiting for more substance before I return to the game, but I'm more disappointed in the whiny babies on the forum than the game oe what TW has made.

 

[Blood Gryphon]

as of recent everyone is hyping up 1.5.6 to be some glory game changing update we can only hope it is good luck to TW hope it goes well

I'd say the next update will only be satisfying to people who are already enjoying the game and want it to last for multiple generations so you can play as your kids with a viable world still around(snowballing reduced).

Anyone who is bored of the current gameplay loop likely wont be swayed by this upcoming patch. I don't think it will have some of the more intricate content they are working on (rebellions, politics, clan party orders, etc.).

I wouldn't go as far to say this is the patch that will bring glory to the name of bannerlord, still a ways to go.

 

[vmax]

... we are on track to full release by around march of next year...

Are we? I bought the game as soon as it went into EA and have played for around 50 hours then and again. I have the impression that the game needs about two more years. And personally, I'm okay with that. Not even sure why I'm commenting. Oh well, I'll just go for a walk, the day will not enjoy itself.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

I've played a whole bunch 1600+, I'm on the burn out border, SO I basically just start new games after updates and play to see what changing, trying old saves to as comparison, then taking a break before I reach full burn out.

At some point (hopefully 1.5.6?) I'll feel it's developed enough to do more extra long games, aiming to complete the map, raise children and such.
For now though it's just a bit of testing because I've pretty much honed my early game and late game needs more development. I do look forward to when some stuff early game gets sorted out tough, it will be more challenging and have slower pace when certain things are changed.

 

[Wolfmensch007]

Y'all need to chill out, and get a life. This is a VIDEO GAME we are talking about here.

You got totally destroyed by @Great White Nanuk , better stfu for the next week or so.

 

[Etrepcar]

So many naive people here: I can't believe that after at least 6-8 months of unfulfilled promises, performance issues, game-breaking bugs, awful multiplayer, people still have hope for this game.

I am thinking about uninstalling this game until it get miraculously fixed, but I don't have much hope. The fact that these naive, almost cult-like people (caused by the mainstream release, before Bannerlord, the zealous people were only a small minority) still put hope in a company only motivated by money is astonishing and pretty sad.

But I can't change people: I am jealous of their hope, but for me, that hope is dead.

 

[shadyroluo]

haven't played since May, i'll play if they actually fully implement the perks/character development, what's the point if i can't progress... also, they need to make the crafting system better, why can't we craft armors if we can craft weapons, whole inventory should be craftable, obviously other than horses which might be able to do with raising horses on a farm or something

 

[Younes]

All i am getting from this thread is people trying to "justify" the declining playerbase, while there isn't anything to justify, the game is simply dying.

It doesn't mean the game is bad. It's that it's lacking a lot.

And if you've followed taleworlds for a bit, you would know that communication is not top notch for a game that puts itself the early access sticker and then barely communicates with the people who have put their faith into the company and the game.


The fact there isn't any actual roadmap makes it hard, especially with an established company such as taleworlds, for those unaware a roadmap looks like this:

隐藏: Roadmap

Not like this:

 

[Koyaan]

haven't played since May, i'll play if they actually fully implement the perks/character development, what's the point if i can't progress... also, they need to make the crafting system better, why can't we craft armors if we can craft weapons, whole inventory should be craftable, obviously other than horses which might be able to do with raising horses on a farm or something

Implementing craftable armors would be hard as **** do to do, weapons with a static mesh are way easier to set up since they wont deform, thats why there arent even craftable bows. So I don't blame them on that part... on the other hand decade old missing features from warband... come on

 

[black_bulldog]

Correction, VC was made by Taleworlds and modded into VC by Brytenwalda and Taleworlds.

As others have stated yes the engine is TW and they published it but many of the assets, the features and story are all Brytenwalda. Saying that this was made by TW is like saying that every game that is uses Unreal 4 engine is owned by Epic Games.