Some musings on the popularity of Battleborn

Battleborn Battleborn General Discussion
#16

I honestly have no idea how Battleborn might be sold to a wider public. I bought it for the most shallow of reasons: my GF and I wandered in EB Games, and as she stood in front of the pre-order stands, she said to me “Look, this elf girl has a mohawk. And she’s kind of a babe!”

270+ PVP matches as Mellka later, here I still am.

I don’t really have gamer friends offline (just serious-minded academic colleagues who think I’m frivolous), and when I explain Battleborn to them, I still just run with “it’s a game that lets me play as a sexy mohawked elf.” Not a bad tagline, I think

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#17

And I bought it because, “That girl uses 5 swords!”

And it was at 55% discount.

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#18

Battleborn is not hard. Steep learning curve? Just a bit steeper than “drop in and shoot stuff” because you also have to think what happens around - and it’s PVP. In PVE you literally just drop in and shoot stuff, and it’s easy.

These games are very different in the core, it’s just some details may seems similar, but they are kind of general. Many games have “different playstyles”, “gear that improves your character”, etc.

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#19

@Rivaire

The point about better (and more) story missions would have brought in a higher number of the BL2 crowd is very well taken.

I bought this game because of BL2…

I had never played PvP.

But once I got in the game I tried it and liked it. I still suck at it but so what.

Getting more people to play is where the total effort should be in the future the way I see it. ENTICE new players and retain old players. Bring up the numbers! It’s really all that matters now.

Everything else is entirely secondary and almost irrelevant.

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#20

The fifty ton elephant that has destroyed more camel backs than it could count is the player base.

Everything falls apart if this number (325, as of writing) doesn’t go up.

If nothing is done, it will continue to free fall.

But a lot of people avoid this issue like the plague. They don’t want to talk about it. Or they do, but powerless to stop this downward spiral trend.

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#21

The sad truth is, unless you’re already good - very good at PVP (which generally equates to people with a lot of spare gaming time), or you have a lot of time to GET good, or you can be comfortable with losing a LOT in the time you can devote to it, OR you can somehow content yourself with what is not nearly enough story to truly keep large numbers of non-diehard PVE-ers interested beyond the short term, this game is not for you.

And, as we sadly know, the people who meet the requirements I described above are in the vast minority.

If they had gone pure PVP, I wonder if this would be different?

And if they had gone pure PVE, I may never have experienced these last amazing 425 hours.

@Rivaire

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#22

No man can serve two masters.

Video games, however, may be exempt from that rule.

Ideally, Battleborn would have served both demands adequately, both isles should be co-existing in harmony. I’m not saying we aren’t doing it now, but clearly that’s not the problem…

Battleborn faced the 50 ton elephant in the room, casualties high beyond belief, and when push comes to shove one side would have to be sacrificed in order to ensure survival. Whoever is abandoned would fracture the community base regardless, but the damage may, in theory, be mitigated somewhat. No guarantees, of course.

Now you have 325 players on Steam as of writing…

And PS4’s Capture and Meltdown are rumoured to be ghost towns. PC was way ahead of PS4 on that department.

Battleborn does have the potential to serve 2 masters, I believe that, but not with the game that came on release.

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#23

So can you (or anyone) think of any realistic solutions that Gearbox couid implement to draw new players in, in large numbers?

Would introducing a glut of new PVE maps or PVP maps or modes help?

I’m at a loss for solutions…

@Rivaire

#24

I already suggested short term solutions as we tread on this “Content-Less” Battleborn, the context meaning the lack of the massive content patch and campaign DLC, by having weekly events that offer tangible rewards.

Double Credits, Double XP, Double XP and Credits, Increased Drop amount, Increase Drop Rate and Amount, Discount Faction Packs with a different faction every weekend or entire week, do something to make people want to play PvP or PvE more because there is a direct reward that feels substantial. These are all the short term solutions that wouldn’t take too long or costly to implement week to week.

What Gearbox should NOT do is not even make an attempt to do anything, like the current Battleplan.

It doesn’t even look like there is a Hardcore Spotlight either.

Maybe it’s possible to create a minimum 3, maximum 5, man raid mission. It’s going to be a small map (like real small, minimal traveling) that contains 2 mini bosses with some trash in between, which should only take 10 to 12 minutes altogether. The final 10 to 12mins is to fight the main encounter, which is a somewhat challenging boss but drops a high number of loot. Basically, a competent group could spend 20 to 22 minutes to get a lot of credits and gear instead of slogging through poor paced missions like, wait for it, The Archive.

If anyone played Ruby Sanctum in Wrath of the Lich King, you would know what I’m talking about.

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Let's Brainstorm! Realistic Ideas For GBX To Increase BB Playerbase?
Battleplan 18: 9/8/16
#25

Can confirm.

Our regular team is going to sit in Meltdown next time we play and discover how long it takes to get a game. None of this “jumping to Incursion after twenty minutes” business. We may not end up getting a game, but it’s the principle of the thing!

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#26

The plague has officially infected the other platforms.

Maybe I’m merely late to the party.

#27

@EdenSophia

Can I add you on PS4 for Battlebornage?

#28

I only play with my regular gang these days, so you’re not likely to see me on solo, but you’re more than welcome to add me anyway.

Just remember: Mellka is always reserved for me. :wink:

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#29

@EdenSophia

Will do, understood, and cheers!

#30

There’s nothing that can be done to attract new players at the moment. It would be pointless. Problem areas need to be addressed and new content added otherwise it is pointless at this time. They can attract new players and they’ll all just leave again like after the Humble Bundle on PC. Gearbox is hard at work fixing all the problem areas but it’s going to take time. If you feel you need to take a break until the fixes and new content is out then feel free to. If you want to just give up and abandon the game then feel free to. Otherwise you’re going to have to be patient and wait for all the changes to take place. There’s not much else you can do. I just hope that you don’t go spreading doom and gloom everywhere because things aren’t going the way you’d like them to.

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#31

My patience for this game is currently near limitless!

I totally get what you are saying though!

@Kaleidodemon

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#32

In that last post I was addressing people in general (I would have used the other reply arrow to address you directly otherwise). At any rate I’m glad that even though you may have thought I was addressing you directly you were cool with what I wrote and gave a chill reply. :slight_smile:

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#33

I like what you are saying Kal…I just disagree…

There is LOTS they can still do…and easily as they have already coded those into the game. Rivaire speaks about them…EVENTS and specials and SHIFT codes, price cuts, etc…and those are just starter ideas.

And people keep assuming there is sooooooo much to fix.

Hell…the game is FUN!..RIGHT NOW!

Sure it has issues but name me ANY game as complex as this one is that has LESS issues than this one.

We all want things to go well. This isn’t “doom and gloom”…this is just stark reality hitting us all. 300 players a night does not equate to a successful game. And I frankly don’t understand why GB keeps pushing ahead on a seemingly “set” schedule of how they will do things while the ship is sinking.

So what I simply am advocating is hold back on anything but the MOST required “fix-it” stuff and shift resources and strategic thinking entirely…and put massive effort into “Let’s raise the number of players” stuff. My goodness, have we even thought about the word “advertise” lately. PAX should only be a START…not the end of advertisement. I think they should full court press to get the word out on BB…how much FUN the game is and how it is so unique…nothing like it!

Otherwise it will be a very short lived bump in numbers when the DLC is released. Which OBTW is 6 weeks from now.

Simply my opinion. And what I know about running a gaming company you could put in a very small shoebox. However…some times you just have to use common sense.

If it waddles like a duck, has feathers like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck…

IT’S A DUCK!

I love the game and I love GB (else I would never have bought a PvP type game to begin with)…I just think it’s time for them to do some radical thinking and re-prioritization.

Else around Thanksgiving, it’s gonna be awful quiet on the BB side of things…echos in the hallway quiet.

#34

Demon Souls how i miss that game :confused:. Something the demon souls community does is a “back to the nexus” event every year i believe its in October :slight_smile: (For those unfamiliar the nexus is your town hub in demon souls basically.) In the event everyone goes back to demon souls makes a new character or if your new just start.
perhaps we could try to do something similar for the other modes and such. capture has become nearly unplayable on ps4 meltdown is also slowing down quite a bit.
Once FaceOff comes i don’t even think meltdown or capture will be playable at all.
since we cant really fix the small numbers we should organize with one another.

#35

As far as returning/retaining playerbase, I think they would benefit from rotating events every day. Yes, EVERY DAY. (like every 24 hours) Not predictable either - so more people will at least log on to see what the daily spotlight is. Not just on weekends (when I can’t play anyway most of the time), but oh, look, today it’s double exp, i should work on x character! Oh it’s raised loot on the archive, i should farm it! Oh, double credits on meltdown? Don’t mind if I do!

:slight_smile:

edit: thought of more.
Bonus points for the events being very specific, so the small player base pools in one spot for better queueing on that thing.

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